Back in March of 2023, I changed my diet (again) to be mostly carnivore. I was pretty strict for the first month—nothing but animal products, straight black coffee or tea when I had it (because I can’t do dairy so it would have to be coconut milk), no chocolate or nuts, etc.
The results for me were amazing. (YMMV.) But what was truly astonishing was that I got my brain back.
After that first month of strict carnivore, I added back in some things because they brought me joy, such as coconut milk for my coffee or tea, a bit of chocolate now and again, etc.
Recently, I’ve been thinking about adding more carbs into my diet. It’s the result of a few things. While carnivore has been pretty amazing for me, I miss some of those other foods, like grilled cauliflower, or carrots with humus. Plus, I’ve gained so much weight on carnivore, though that’s been a combination of a lot of things, not just the diet. It’s just so easy for me to overeat when it comes to meat.
I’ve recently been reading a book by Dr. Stacy Sims. She’s a scientist with 25 years of experience, studying the intersection of nutrition, exercise, hormones, and women. (And she has a marvelous book on fitness in menopause, that I’d highly recommend. Plus another one if you’re still having periods, that discusses how to train with your cycle, what to eat in regards to your cycle, etc.)
Most of the original exercise and fitness studies were done on white men. Of course. However, after listening to her and doing some more digging into the science, I’ve come to agree with her that women are not small men. While we have a lot of similar processes, women need to eat and train differently than men.
For example: after an athlete exercises hard, they need to eat something eventually, or their body will cannibalize itself. Instead of healing, it will start to tear down the lean muscles that have been built up.
How long do you have after you work out before this happens?
Men have a three-hour window. So the timing has never been a strong focus.
Women, on the other hand, have a THIRTY MINUTE window. (Imagine what the articles about health and fitness would be like today if the studies done on men had come back with such a short window.) So if you’re female and exercising hard, eat some protein afterward. And soon.
For men, the fat-burning process gets kicked off easily. For women, the fat-burning process does not start with just exercise, but only in the presence of carbs.
Recently (for one week now!) I’ve been going to the gym regularly. Four times this last week. Two times were weight training (arm day and leg day) and two times were sprint interval training (SIT). I not only want to lose weight but to change my body composition. I believe that weights and sprints are the only way to do that, particularly since I’m female, over 60, have thyroid issues, am post-menopausal, don’t sleep well, and have a lot of stress.
I’m doing the sprints on an exercise bike: fifteen seconds of peddling as fast and as hard as I can, followed by fifteen seconds of recovery, going slowly. Do that six times, which is just three minutes. Rest for three minutes. Then repeat. I can only do two sets at this point, but my goal is to work my way up to three. Also to change over to twenty seconds on, ten seconds off.
After doing these for just four days (two last week, two the previous week) they’re already getting easier. This is encouraging.
My goal with the weights is to first get stronger, then to add more weight. I don’t want to be doing a lot of reps with lighter weights. I want to do fewer reps with a lot more weight. Instead of ten reps, only be able to do six. I’m not there yet.
Because in addition to getting stronger and feeling better and all the other side-effects of all of this, I’m also determined to do this slowly, smartly, and without injuring myself.
So my week contains two weight days, two SIT days, two days where I’m doing yoga and a lot of stretching, and one day when I’m not doing a damned thing.
Will I be able to maintain this pace? I have no clue. This last week wasn’t easy, but it wasn’t impossible either.
I do know that if I’m exercising hard I can add a lot more carbs and stay in ketosis. That’s kind of the goal. To add some carbs, but not too many, because I do not want to lose the brain functionality that going carnivore gave me in the first place.
I’m not convinced that it was just the meat that did all the work healing me. I believe that it was also a) removing foods that I was slightly allergic to, that were causing me inflammation, and b) lowering my carbs significantly.
I’ll be honest—when I first started thinking about changing my diet to include more carbs, I forgot about how going carnivore had healed my brain. It was so traumatic of an experience, to realize just how much of my brain that I’d lost, that I kind of forgot about it.
Eventually, I remembered it. And I’m so determined not to go back there. I play Sudoku regularly, as well as other word games, just to make sure that I still have it. (I will admit that while I was in Portland taking care of my niece I’d kind of lost my brain again. Not too badly, but I was so stressed I just couldn’t think as well as I normally can.)
So yeah. More carbs. Keep that fat-burning process going. But being very careful about staying in ketosis as well.
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