PCOS/Insulin Resistance SupportSupport for us with any of the following: Insulin Resistance, Syndrome X, Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome, or other endocrine disorders.
I don't focus on grams. At all. It's too consuming, it's boring, and I can track for a couple days before I fall off of the tracking bandwagon.
Instead, I gauge my carbs by types of foods. For examples ALL fruits and veggies are totally okay (except I replace potatoes with parsnips or sweet potatoes). Then I have serving for breakfast (like oatmeal or a breakfast-quinoa type of salad), something small with my lunch (like 1/2 of a whole wheat bagel loaded with veggies and hummus), and a small serving of carbs with dinner (1 cup of pasta, rice, etc.)
If that isn't helping your weight loss efforts, just reduce carbs. Try kelp noodles instead of normal pasta, or use a whole grain tortilla instead of a bagel for a veggie wrap.
Certain days need more carbs than other. Workout days, hiking with the family, etc. need more carbs, and it's all about being mindful of lifestyle variations.
I also don't believe in counting calories, fat, etc. I know a lot of people will disagree, but it certainly helps!
That being said, certain people NEED to count carbs. You should be shooting for about ~15-25% of your diet being from carbohydrates in order for normal brain function, metabolism, etc. A standard 1500 calorie weight loss program should be ~56-93 grams of carbohydrates a day. Good luck
I stay under 100g, the first week I did under 60g or so, figured I needed that jump start. I think as long as the carbs you are getting are "good" carbs you shouldn't be in too much trouble.
Like the carbs I've been getting are from whole grain bread, bananas, sweet potatoes.
I know a lot also do the IR diet and that allows you carbs as long as you match it with protein... I might start testing that out a bit this next week and see if it works too.. I would love to have a dang scoop of ice cream lol
I have only cheated like twice in two weeks and I've lost 8 lbs. BUT I am working out daily
I think the key to PCOS and fighting off the belly is you have to gain muscle my arms and legs in 2 weeks are looking fab lol hope that belly starts shrinking soon too
It all just takes time, I don't think it's a race it's just about changing and getting healthy
I stay under 100g, the first week I did under 60g or so, figured I needed that jump start. I think as long as the carbs you are getting are "good" carbs you shouldn't be in too much trouble.
Like the carbs I've been getting are from whole grain bread, bananas, sweet potatoes.
I know a lot also do the IR diet and that allows you carbs as long as you match it with protein... I might start testing that out a bit this next week and see if it works too.. I would love to have a dang scoop of ice cream lol
I have only cheated like twice in two weeks and I've lost 8 lbs. BUT I am working out daily
I think the key to PCOS and fighting off the belly is you have to gain muscle my arms and legs in 2 weeks are looking fab lol hope that belly starts shrinking soon too
It all just takes time, I don't think it's a race it's just about changing and getting healthy
Thanks so much for your insight it's greatly appreciated
Location: NW New Jersey But, My Heart's In Pittsburgh!! GO STEELERS & PENGUINS!!!
Posts: 3,060
S/C/G: 245/143/145
I think the number of carbs you consume per day depends on your plan....whether it be something like Atkins or your own plan.
For me, I've been on Atkins 9+ years now, and keep my carbs on the lower side. Typically, I eat between 25 - 50 carbs per day. I don't eat any bread, rice, white potatoes, pasta, white flour, sugar or caffeine. I do eat 1 sweet potato a week and plain greek yogurt everyday.
I've been maintaining 8 years now and am not really looking to lose any more weight.
I think the number of carbs you consume per day depends on your plan....whether it be something like Atkins or your own plan.
For me, I've been on Atkins 9+ years now, and keep my carbs on the lower side. Typically, I eat between 25 - 50 carbs per day. I don't eat any bread, rice, white potatoes, pasta, white flour, sugar or caffeine. I do eat 1 sweet potato a week and plain greek yogurt everyday.
I've been maintaining 8 years now and am not really looking to lose any more weight.
WOW!! You are a huge inspiration to all of us, I'm sure it was a lot of hard work. CONGRATS to you!!
On thing that doesn't work for me is if I regard fruit the same as veggies. I don't limit veggies or count those carbs but the ones in fruit add up pretty quick if I ate as much fruit as I wanted.
Most people seem to lose on betweem 50 to 100 gr of carbs a day I think from reading posts over a period of time.
I also agree that overeating fruit can be very easy for some of us. In fact, for me, fruit, potato (even sweet potato) and whole grains can easily derail my weight loss. I can far too easily convince myself that "healthy" or "paleo" carbs are ok.
Right now I'm doing low-medium carbs and limiting myself to 100g max per day. If I'm trying to go full blown keto diet I'll stick to under 30g and feel better about my days the lower they are. I've done it a lot and it works, but I feel better when I'm having 50-100g of carbs from veggies, cheeses, etc. My main concern is keeping the calories in check daily.
The thing to remember is that glucose is the only fuel that your brain can metabolize, so if you start to severely limit your carbs, your brain function gets all wacky. Carbs are EXTREMELY important to a normal body, even during weight loss. It's so important to not limit them any more than 50 grams because a person can start to see ill side effects.
I'm huge for carb reduction, but it's important to look at the bigger picture too
ETA:
Glucose is not the only fuel- certain parts of your brain can ONLY burn glucose, but it can also run on ketones. However, research does suggest that the brain runs better on carbs, so just be careful and watch your body! Only you know what is truly good for you!
The thing to remember is that glucose is the only fuel that your brain can metabolize, so if you start to severely limit your carbs, your brain function gets all wacky. Carbs are EXTREMELY important to a normal body, even during weight loss. It's so important to not limit them any more than 50 grams because a person can start to see ill side effects.
I'm huge for carb reduction, but it's important to look at the bigger picture too
ETA:
Glucose is not the only fuel- certain parts of your brain can ONLY burn glucose, but it can also run on ketones. However, research does suggest that the brain runs better on carbs, so just be careful and watch your body! Only you know what is truly good for you!
The body can make glucose from proteins and fat (in the liver). The traditional Inuit diet during much of the year is virtually all fat and protein, and they do quite well on it, if they avoid nontraditional foods. They do eat a variety of low-carb and high phytonutrient plant foods such as blueberries and wild plants, but the calorie and carb content is considered negligible.
The research on very low carb diets, seem to support the conclusion that carb intake isn't all that important so long as diet and/or fat stores are sufficient to make the glucose required.
If you're very active fat stores and diet may not be able to make glucose fast enough individually (thus for some people, caloric intake AND a certain amount of fat stores must BOTH be available to make enough glucose to support body and brain). This is why very low calorie diets (regardless of carb intake) often advise against exercise - because the body may burn through glucose faster than it can be manufactured).
There are very good reasons to avoid a zero-carb diet, but very few low-carb, even VERY LOW, advocate eliminating all carbs. If you're eating a wide variety of low and lowish carb fruits and vegetables (or even just vegetables) you should be able to produce enough glucose for your brain and body unless you're also taking in far too few calories or are burning calories too quickly to keep up with your body's glucose building. This is a very recognizeable event. You'll feel sick and lightheaded and a small amount of carbohydrate will almost instantly make you feel better.
A longer term solution, if you feel lousy or sluggish mentally or physically on low-carb, is to increase your veggie, protein, and fat intake, which will work just as well as eating more carbs (at least if your goal is weight loss).
If your goal is weight gain, or if you have no body fat to spare, it would make more sense to add carbs. The body is more efficient at getting glucose from carbs than making it from protein and fat, but for weight loss, efficiency isn't so great. You want to make your body to use more energy, not less. Providing large amounts of carbs, just provides the body with a "short cut." Great if you want to maintain or gain, not so great when you want to lose.
It's easier for the body to make glucose from carbs than from proteins and fats, but when you want to lose weight, in most cases easier is not better. The more energy (calories) you can make your body use, the better, and it takes less energy to burn carbs for fuel than it does to burn proteins and fats.
This is why many people (including me - when I follow it) find that they consistently (not just in the early water loss/ gain phase) lose better on low-carb than on high-carb when calories remain the same.
For me, it's amounts to a 300 calorie difference. I lose about the same on 1800 calories of low-carb or 1500 calories of high carb. Since the more carbs I eat, the hungrier I get, it would seem a no-brainer, my biggest problem is convince myself that eliminating all grains is the way to go, so I end up eating more carbs than I could and should be eating.
If I could convince myself of what I logically know: that is that eliminating ALL grains, potatoes and high-sugar fruit is safe and reasonable, I'd be where JerseyGyrl is now, rather than having 175 lbs to lose and 30 lbs to re-lose.
Kaplods- I do know that the body has specific ways of synthesizing glucose from protein and fat, it just makes me nervous to rely on that, rather than a whole source in moderation.
Halo104, You shouldn't say you have to eat carbs to fuel the brain when that isn't true. My brain was foggy when I ate carbs. Since I've cut down to 50 grams of net carbs a day my brain functions better than ever, I have tons of energy, and I sleep great. I also have no cravings and am never hungry. Couldn't say that with carbs. Just because you are nervous about eating low carb and brain function doesn't make it scientific fact. In fact, last month the American Diabetic Association released a press release that they now see the benefits of low carb from new scientific information.
For those doing low carb
