T or F: Carbs least important at breakfast and dinner? page 3

[ChocoTaco369]

Chaco-

I thought you just said in an earlier thread that you ate "too low" of calories and wrecked your metabolism and that you put on all the weight you lost when you went back to eating "normal". Isnt' the acknowledgement of a wrecked metabolism an acknowledgement of the flaw in an overly simple CICO approach?

-Go Pre

No. My metabolism is fine. I did eat too low calories for awhile so my weight loss was in my muscles, not my fat. My lifts were suffering. My deadlift dropped about 15 lbs, my benchpress dropped 10 lbs and my recovery was poor. Simply upping my calories for 2 weeks fixed all this. My deadlift and benchpress have already fully recovered. CICO is pretty absolute because CICO only takes into account weight - it doesn't differentiate between fat and muscle, so too great of a deficit tends to preserve fat and remove muscle while smaller deficits tend to promote fat loss and preserve muscle. At least that's my experience. None of these things hinge on a "wrecked metabolism." It's incredibly difficult to "wreck your metabolism" and a -25% caloric deficit for a few weeks or months isn't going to do that.

[jakey]

CICO is pretty absolute because CICO only takes into account weight - it doesn't differentiate between fat and muscle, so too great of a deficit tends to preserve fat and remove muscle while smaller deficits tend to promote fat loss and preserve muscle. At least that's my experience. None of these things hinge on a "wrecked metabolism." It's incredibly difficult to "wreck your metabolism" and a -25% caloric deficit for a few weeks or months isn't going to do that.

spot on, as usual. i think people on paleo message forums round the net seem to use this 'wrecked metabolism'/'metabolically deranged' concept way, way too much, until it becomes a crutch to support whatever bizarre theory makes them think calories don't matter. if you're alive, and you're not pathologically ill with major endocrine dysfunction, your metabolism works just fine.

[primalswan]

I think that many women find it works best to put the carbs at dinner or at least the 2nd half of the day. A high protein breakfast helps with leptin sensitivity and seems to make it easier not to snack and graze all day. Carbs later in the day help you sleep and help with insulin sensitivity. At least some women report these things.

This article I read today was pretty interesting.
Paleo For Women | Carbohydrates for Fertility and Health

this is what works for me too. Carbs early in the day mean I am more prone to snack the afternoon. I eat in an 8-9 hour window. My 1st meal is usually around 11AM-12PM and I make it high protein & high fat. I eat a load of veggies late afternoon and then have a high protein dinner with veggies and 1/2 a sweet potato or yam in some form. If I feel like a treat I have a banana or a few squares of dark chocolate around 8 PM. Go to bed at 9:30/ 10PM and am dead to the world until the sun comes up. Works well for me.

[paleo-bunny]

Nice to see so much common sense on this thread.

Thanks for posting that article sbhikes - it certainly rings true for me. The Paleo for Women site looks a great resource.

[gopintos]

The Paleo for Women site looks a great resource.

Just exploring it but it does look interesting. I just started reading her bit on women & IF.

[Danielle5690]

Just chiming in to say the low-carb breakfast/high-carb dinner approach works really well for me too. I have energy all day and sleep more deeply than I have in years.

I also discovered quite by accident that too much carb in my lunch (a small serving of white rice, for example) makes me dangerously sleepy on my commute home from work. So my lunches are low-carb too. I save most or all of my carbs for dinner.

[ChocoTaco369]

spot on, as usual. i think people on paleo message forums round the net seem to use this 'wrecked metabolism'/'metabolically deranged' concept way, way too much, until it becomes a crutch to support whatever bizarre theory makes them think calories don't matter. if you're alive, and you're not pathologically ill with major endocrine dysfunction, your metabolism works just fine.

People develop orthorexia eating this way. They get so food obsessed that they become terrified and anxious over certain foods. "Wrecked metabolism" is just a defense mechanism to justify their eating disorder in their heads. Very few people have a wrecked metabolism - my personal favorite are the people that claim to have gotten fat eating 1,200 calories on a SAD diet but lost weight eating 5,000 calories on the PB. It makes my head hurt. There are crazy people in every group, and the Church of Paleo has some of the whackiest members.

I just saw a woman on Facebook talking about how she only eats meat and eggs because eating green vegetables shoots her blood sugar through the roof and makes her binge on carbs, and her "wrecked metabolism" can't handle vegetables. I almost threw up in my mouth. Now we're demonizing lettuce because it has too many carbs.

[StackingPlates]

People develop orthorexia eating this way. There are crazy people in every group, and the Church of Paleo has some of the whackiest members.

Quoting for truth.

[sbhikes]

It's easy to wreck your metabolism, especially as a woman. Women are taught very young how to do it and they excel at it in ways that men simply will never understand.

[ChocoTaco369]

It's easy to wreck your metabolism, especially as a woman. Women are taught very young how to do it and they excel at it in ways that men simply will never understand.

It's "easy" to wreck your metabolism in the sense that the SAD is the specific diet that wrecks your metabolism. Take into consideration that it takes decades eating the absolute foods possible to wreck your metabolism. Taking that perspective, it's incredibly difficult. The human body is very resilient, and this is evident that decades of horrible food choices can be reversed in a couple months - just look at the success stories on this site. In fact, I'd go as far to say that it's nearly impossible to "wreck your metabolism" eating primally.