“Cured” is a word you don’t often see. To learn more, I reached out to Charlie’s dad, Jim Abrahams (who directed the Hollywood movie Airplane! in 1980). Abrahams is the co-founder of The Charlie Foundation, established in 1994 to provide information about ketogenic diet therapies for people with epilepsy and other disorders.
“The word cure is controversial,” Abrahams said. “The Epilepsy Foundation raises money by saying there are no cures. But I know hundreds of people who have been cured. Charlie turned 30 in March 2022, and he has had no seizures in 25 years.”
This story starts in 1993, when 11-month-old Charlie developed severe epilepsy, sometimes suffering as many as 100 seizures a day, even while on several medications. His medication-resistant condition, known as refractory epilepsy, occurs in about 30 percent of people with epilepsy, according to Johns Hopkins Medicine. Even brain surgery provided no relief. And the drugs his son had to take had massive side effects, effectively turning him into a nonfunctioning zombie, Abrahams said.
Desperate to help Charlie, Abrahams began reading medical studies at the library. He came across a study published in late 1992 in Epilepsia, the leading authoritative source for clinical research for all aspects of epilepsy and seizures. The study showed that in 58 consecutive cases, putting kids as sick as Charlie on the ketogenic diet improved seizure control in 67 percent of them. When Abrahams came across that study, only about a handful of children around the world were still being treated with a keto diet, despite the fact that it was a well-established approach to controlling epilepsy.
As the 1992 study explained, “the ketogenic diet was developed in the 1920s as a treatment for intractable childhood seizures when few antiepileptic drugs (AEDs) were available.” However, as AEDs were developed by pharmaceutical companies, doctors began abandoning the keto diet in favor of using drugs.
“There are still children whose seizures are refractory even to modern therapy, but use of the ketogenic diet appears to be waning,” the 1992 study warned. “At Johns Hopkins, we continue to believe that the diet is very effective and well accepted by patients and families.”
“The study was hot off the presses,” said Abrahams. “Still, no doctors had mentioned it to me. I called Dr. John Freeman at Johns Hopkins,” who had worked on the study.
Dr. Freeman immediately began working with the family. In just one month on the original ketogenic diet designed in 1923 by Dr. Russell Wilder at the Mayo Clinic, Charlie became seizure- and drug-free. There are five variations of the keto diet, and “classic keto,” the original, is the strictest, with 90 percent of calories coming from fat, 6 percent from protein, and 4 percent from carbs.
“Most kids like Charlie can get off the keto diet after 18 months to two years. After two years, they are drug- and seizure-free,” said Abrahams. “We tried after two years to wean him off the diet, but the seizures returned. For his brain to heal itself took longer than some other kids.”
The family was able to get Charlie off the keto diet after a total of five years. The seizures never returned, and Charlie now eats whatever he wants.
Unnecessary Suffering
While Abrahams was very grateful his family got Charlie back, he began to realize that much of the suffering his son went through had been unnecessary. He would wake up in the middle of the night, thinking "90 percent of these seizures didn't have to occur. This was not a pie-in-the-sky diet,” he said. “There were 70 years of medical history about the diet and how well it worked for kids like Charlie. Different hospitals with the same patient populations published about the efficacy and had the same results. For roughly one-third of the children who experienced multiple daily seizures, the seizures went away with the ketogenic diet.”
Abrahams expressed his frustration in a 1994 Dateline special. "You pour the drugs down your child's throat despite the fact there's something inside you that says, 'Wait a minute, this can't be right.'"
Dr. Donald Shields, a child neurologist, was one of Charlie's doctors. He also appeared on the Dateline episode to talk about the drug protocols he had tried with Charlie. Most of the mainstream drugs had been exhausted, and Dr. Shields was considering using more experimental ones. Even though he had some knowledge of the work Johns Hopkins was doing with the keto diet, he admitted on the program that he had tried to dissuade the family from pursuing the dietary approach.
"There's no big drug company behind the ketogenic diet," Dr. Shields said. He said he "hated to admit it" but agreed with the reporter that one of the reasons the ketogenic diet was not more popular with doctors was because there was not a big drug company behind it, selling it to the doctors.
Abrahams soon channeled his anger into action, first co-founding The Charlie Foundation with his wife, Nancy, in 1994. In 1997, he directed and produced “First Do No Harm,” a made-for-television movie starring Meryl Streep that somewhat mirrors his family’s experience with the ketogenic diet, highlighting the side effects anticonvulsive drugs can have on children with epilepsy.
“When we started the foundation, I said, ‘I’ll be doing this maybe a year. It’s so obvious. Do you want to drug your kid, cut his brain, or change his diet?’ I was wrong,” Abrahams said.
Thirty years ago, when Abrahams questioned doctors about how much of their formal medical training was devoted to studying nutrition and diet therapies, he would usually get an answer of “zero” or worse, a lecture.
Back then, the doctors would argue that they didn’t have the science so they couldn’t recommend the diet, he said. But now the mechanisms of how the ketogenic diet works are understood and its effectiveness against certain diseases, like epilepsy, are known in the medical field.
Still, Abrahams gets emails every year from upset families saying their doctors never mentioned the ketogenic diet. “It’s a broken record. It’s more maddening today than it was 20 to 30 years ago. I still struggle with the whole notion of forgiveness.”
If a person is working with a trained dietitian and there are no contraindications, like if the body can’t digest fat, there’s no excuse not to recommend the keto diet, he said. He used to believe that if a neurologist ended up having a child with epilepsy, that would help advance the use of the diet. Over the years, he did meet two neurologists in that position, neither of whom put their children on the keto diet. While this may seem baffling, it makes a certain type of sense to Abrahams.
“Imagine being a 60-year-old neurologist. God knows how many patients you never recommended the diet to even with the abundance of efficacy. How do you look in the mirror and think, ‘How many people’s lives did I screw up?’ All of the other influences add up. Medical schools—who designs the curricula? Is that influenced by the drug companies? I don’t know. Let food be they medicine has been around 2,500 years. There are powerful forces that influence our medical system that don't have much to do with good health."
Lynn Tryba: How did you come to learn about the keto diet for cancer?
Miriam Kalamian: In December, 2004, my husband, Peter, and I found out our 4-year-old son, Raffi, had a brain tumor the size of an orange. They said it was inoperable, told us what we had to do, and warned us not to go online. I went online.
Tryba: What did you see?
Kalamian: It was a horrible shock—it was all bad, nothing positive, nothing to give us hope. We went along with the standard of care, which was chemotherapy every week for 14 months. Three months later at his post-treatment MRI, they said, “It’s lit up like a Christmas tree. We have to radiate.” He wasn’t even 6. They don’t usually do radiation to kids that young because it impairs cognition. We were on the edge of agreeing to this, but then they said they couldn't do it because the tumor was diffuse and infiltrated, the same reason they couldn't operate. We did the unthinkable and had surgeries done by the only doctor who would agree to it. He did it in a two-part surgery. The first part was fairly successful in that it stopped the tumor growth, but it impaired a lot of my son’s executive functioning. The second surgery was not successful. It grew back in they hypothalamus within a few weeks and started invading new areas as well.
Raffi, age 4, the summer before his brain cancer diagnosis.
Tryba: What did you do next?
Kalamian: We enrolled Raffi in a clinical trial, but it didn't take long to learn that it wasn't working. At this point, they were out of treatment options and were going to move Raffi to palliative care. I was looking online at one of the drugs in the palliative protocol. The drug had a lot of awful side effects so I wanted to print this out to review it with his doctor. I was staying with my mom at the time because my son’s trial was in New York. Her printer wouldn’t work, so I bookmarked the page. A few days later, when I was at a spot with a working printer, I went back to the bookmark. Except it wasn’t the article about the chemo drug anymore. It was an article by Dr. Tom Seyfried involving a diet he had used in a mouse model of glioma, a type of brain tumor. I had brought up mouse model studies to my son’s medical team in the past and they would say it was going to be years before the research can be done in people, if they were tried at all, and years more before a treatment was approved. But Dr. Seyfried’s paper also included a reference to a case study with two children with advanced brain tumors who had been put on a ketogenic diet for eight weeks. The tumors had responded in both cases. I emailed Dr. Seyfried’s lab. A couple of hours later, he emailed me back, sending me a paper by Linda Nebeling PhD, MPH, RD, FAND. He also told me about The Charlie Foundation for Ketogenic Therapies. Although he's not a medical doctor, he was passionate and excited to help. I’m looking at this information and thinking, “Well, why wouldn’t we want to try it?” One of the kids was still alive more than a decade after the treatment. And we could still do the chemo alongside of the diet if that’s what we decided to do.
Tryba: You stumbled across the ketogenic diet by serendipity.
Kalamian: The other serendipitous thing was that the team of epileptologists at Johns Hopkins hospital, led by John Freeman, MD, had just put out their fourth edition of The Ketogenic Diet: A Treatment for Children and Others with Epilepsy. This was the first time they offered any speculation on the use of it in brain tumors. It was just one paragraph buried in a short section on speculation near the end of the book, but it was the first glimmer of hope we'd had in ages. Keto diets had been used as a treatment for epilepsy since the 1920s. And here it was, a protocol for kids that we could use with Raffi.
Tryba: Did you put Raffi on a ketogenic diet after that?
Kalamian: Yes, and I was terrified to take this on without medical support from his brain tumor team, but we had no choice. When you’re dealing with kids, doctors are even more reluctant to stray from the norms than they are with adults. We had local support from his pediatrician, general oversight from his local oncologist, and two moms in a support group for kids with epilepsy who were following the modified Atkins diet. That was enough of a start. I fasted Raffi like they were doing at the time for kids with epilepsy, but this was trickier to do outside of a hospital setting. Kids shift quickly into ketosis and by by night time, that poor kid was ketotic. That’s how quick kids can make that switch to ketosis. The book had warned this could happen and we followed the protocol to reverse it, and just kept going. We had started it right after an MRI showing progression had formally kicked him out of the trial. Three months later, his next MRI showed the tumor had shrunk. The only other treatment he'd received was a reduced dose of a chemo drug that Raffi had already failed. We had to go along with that because the local oncologist had to stay within the good graces of his profession, but he was clear that this is not what had caused the shrinkage. After Raffi’s next good MRI, the oncologist started skipping treatments. He gave us a three-week holiday and finally said, “We’re just damaging him with this stuff. Let’s not do this anymore to him.”
Tryba: How were you feeling at that point?
Kalamian: It’s what put me on the path to get my degree in nutrition. I was hoping for anything, just a few more months with Raffi, anything. When we were told the tumor had shrunk, we sent the MRI scan to two other centers, the one that had conducted the clinical trial and another center where he had been treated. Both concurred there had been tumor shrinkage, between 10 to 15 percent. But nobody was going to say it had anything to do with the diet. I literally begged the consultant nutritionist for The Charlie Foundation to have a call with me. She was resistant due to the liability. I said, “Listen, I’ll sign any waiver you want. I know I’m doing this wrong, and I’m afraid I'm going to harm him.” That’s what got her to work with me. She has a heart, and the thought of damaging a kid . . . She spent an hour and a half on the phone with me, and cleared up the things I was doing wrong. The good MRI was June. My talk with the nutritionist was July. By August, I was enrolled in a program leading to a Master’s degree in human nutrition.
Tryba: How was Raffi by then?
Kalamian: My son was doing great! He was getting stronger and healthier and back to school and enjoying life. Peter and I were enjoying this extra time with him. I got my degree from Eastern Michigan University in 2010. To become a Certified Nutrition Specialist took another couple of years. My son died in 2013, a year after I got my certification. If we could have gotten the tumor to shrink before his surgery, if we had known then what we do now, we could have avoided a lot of the damage. One of the main benefits in initiating a ketogenic diet early on is you can get a better tumor resection. But most people are not finding out about this until after surgery because they’re rushed into surgery being told it’s an emergency. In many cases, it’s not.
Raffi, 12, enjoying a whale watch. He wouldn’t have survived to experience this if his family had not found the keto diet.
Tryba: Does the keto diet help with all cancers?
Kalamian:. There’s a standard of care therapy for brain cancer, and it has a standard outcome, which is piss-poor. When you combine the diet with it, you can get another year. I have clients who are four, six, eight years out from diagnosis. I work with one that’s 10 years out. The ketogenic diet’s positive effects are clear on brain cancer, not so clear on other cancers. I still think reducing inflammation and lowering glucose and insulin impacts the tumor or just the cancer, in general, and makes the other therapies you’re doing more impactful. If you can compromise the metabolic needs of the cancer cells while nourishing the rest of the body with the right kinds of nutrition, with ketones to replace the sugar you’ve pulled out, then you’re going to get a better outcome, even if it's just an improved quality of life. That alone is huge!
Tryba: Why don’t doctors start using food in conjunction with standard of care medicine?
Kalamian: Because they don’t understand the power of food and nutrition. They just see food as something that provides enough calories so you don’t lose weight. But the type of fuel you put in the body makes a difference in what the cancer can utilize and what compromises it. When it’s compromised and you hit it with therapy, it’s going to be more impactful.
Tryba: How do we change the perception that nutrition doesn’t matter?
Kalamian: Change is happening, but most oncologists are so stuck in the nutrition paradigm. You could hand them all the evidence on diet, but their bias prevents them from believing it. Then you have the ones who say, “It looks like maybe nutrition does have an influence,” but they often end up suggesting a plant-based diet as though there was evidence for it, which there's not. There's this fear that their patients will lose weight, which is often the case with keto. Thankfully, recent research has shown that the weight loss with keto is more likely be from fat, not muscle. There also seems to be some benefit from fasting around chemotherapy. I have a modified fasting protocol that includes broth that people drink for a little bit of protein and gut protection. It provides calories but keeps you in a fasting mimicking state during chemo treatments, which lessens GI side effects and makes infusions more impactful. The fasting state sensitizes cancer cells, making them easier to kill.
Tryba: What clinical evidence shows following a ketogenic diet offers therapeutic potential for people with cancer?
Kalamian: There’s been some beautiful work with women with breast cancer showing that the body composition is better in women who are able to follow even a modified low-carb ketogenic diet and that their biomarkers are better than women on a control diet. You may have seen an explosion of information about a new preclinical pancreatic cancer study that came out showing people on the ketogenic diet were doing better than those who were not. They’re organizing an official clinical trial. A few years ago, Memorial Sloan Kettering, a very reputable center, started a trial for ketogenic diet for newly diagnosed endometrial cancer. Almost 100 percent of women who develop endometrial cancer are obese and insulin resistant. There are some high-level people involved in this research, like Lewis Cantley, he’s the one who discovered a pathway that promotes cancer called P13K. That pathway is very active in a lot of cancers, like ovarian, breast, and prostate cancers. Cantley spent the majority of his career working with pharmaceutical companies to develop P13K inhibitors for that pathway. Sorry to get technical. These inhibitors block phosphorylation of the insulin receptor on cancer cells.When you do that, then glucose and the insulin stay in circulation instead of going to feed the cancer cell. But this can turn people into diabetics, which results in poor cancer outcomes.
Tryba: Wow.
Kalamian: The next level of that was, “Now they're diabetics, and this drug is failing, so what should we do?” They knew from earlier research that women on Metformin because of high blood glucose had a better outcome in cancer. Then, it became, “Well, what if we combined it with a ketogenic diet?” since that also lowers blood glucose. They spent all this time and research money on a drug with horrible side effects of hyperglycemia and other issues. And here’s this diet that also inhibits that pathway because the body is perceived to be in a starvation state so Cantley began to suggest putting these women on keto diets alongside the drug. In a starvation state, activity in these pathways associated with growth slows down.
Tryba: Could you explain that a little more?
Kalamian: I call it abundance and austerity. When there’s abundance, the body goes, “Oh yeah, let’s grow, grow, grow. Hey, you cells over there, we don’t know what you’re about, but here, take some of this, we got plenty.” But when you’re fasting or when you’re calorie restricting or you’re carb restricting, when you’re limiting those nutrients the body is used to getting, then the body goes, “Wait a minute, we’ve got to keep the essentials up and running. But you cells over there, you're not helping us at all so you’re not getting any of this supply.” It has a major impact on those pathways. Everybody that’s even studied a little bit of cancer biology understands this but they don’t make the mental leap needed to of put it into practice. I mean, think about it. Oncologists have spent a fortune on medical school. Protocols replace curiosity. They have an algorithm they’re going to work with. They're in a clinical practice where they are respected by their colleagues.
Tryba: It’s perverse though.
Kalamian: It is perverse. It’s not in the best interest of the patient. But they don’t have the time, number one. They don't make a move without evidence from clinical trials, which are so much more challenging in diet research. They’re also worried about losing their standing in their profession. There’s a few of them out there. There’s Dr. Jethro Hu at Cedars-Sinai. He’s running a clinical trial on the effects of a ketogenic diet on newly diagnosed glioblastoma. After he was about year into that study, he said to me, “I was blown away. I expected there to be some impact on the tumor. But I didn't expect to see this much improvement in quality of life.”
Tryba: What was he seeing in the trial?
Kalamian: His clients were generally sailing through the radiation and chemo intensive protocol, whereas the people who continued eating standard diets were experiencing more profound side effects. For the most part, if you’re not reducing the inflammation caused by the treatment, you’re having to take a steroid drug called dexamethasone. It reduces inflammation yes, but one of its many side effects is that it raises glucose. In most cancers, but especially in brain cancer, this is associated with a much poorer prognosis.
Tryba: Some oncologists are kept in place by their financial dependency or fear of losing their status where they are working?
Kalamian: Yes. One example is Colin Champ, a radiation oncologist. He’s a Paleo guy, goes by Caveman Doctor. You look at what he was putting out there 10 years ago, and you’re thinking, “Oh great, a whole new wave of people who are going to make a difference.” And then he gets dismissed because of his blog posts. He's now started his own clinic in Florida.
Tryba: I feel bad for the people who might not find a person like you to work with.
Kalamian: Or the people being fed this misinformation about how unpalatable, dangerous, or impractical keto is. In my practice, we meet with people, collect information about their food preferences, and make beautiful meal plans or recipe books for them based on what they want to eat, not on what we think they should eat. We take people’s desires into account, but if they desire Entenmann’s pastry, well that’s definitely not going to work. Keto is about 5 to 10 percent carb. When you have fat and carb in combination, like an Entenmann’s pastry, that’s where you’re doing the most damage. But there are replacements for those things. If you’re a packaged food addict and you want to do keto, there are packaged foods you can buy. Of course, that's not ideal, so we steer people toward the better quality ones if that’s what they need to do to get up to speed with the diet. But we’re always working on moving them to the next step of using whole foods and tracking their nutrient intake for themselves. My son’s endocrinologist told me that the diet was not possible for most people. He said it was too difficult. I explained to him that difficult was sitting in the waiting room when my kid’s having his third surgery. That’s difficult. The diet’s a walk in the park.
Tryba: I don’t understand the disconnect. When you have someone you love who’s going through treatments, especially radiation, or if you read about the possible side effects from drugs, it’s endless. You have to get your blood and organ function monitored to make sure that the treatments are not pushing them into organ failure. It’s strange to me that doctors will say, “Oh, but asking someone to change their diet will be too hard for them.” Not only that, if you get away from packaged simple carbs, you feel better, even if you don’t have a cancer diagnosis. I have a friend who has multiple sclerosis. She found the Wahls Protocol. And just recently there has been some exciting new published research showing that keto is slowing progression of MS.
Kalamian: Absolutely. Good choice.
Tryba: Her doctor said the same thing, “Diet doesn’t do anything.” Really? Because it dropped her inflammation significantly. She lost the extra weight she was carrying. She has had no disease progression for years and has not had to use any of the MS drugs.
Kalamian: Isn’t that amazing? It’s food and supplements and exercise and improving sleep. I saw somebody took a photo of something on a doctor’s wall, and it said, “Don’t confuse your Google search with my medical degree.” It was up next to his medical degree on the wall. It’s this hubris. It’s this arrogance about their position in life because there’s that reverence for doctors. You go to other countries where doctors don’t have that status, where it may be easier to get your degree because you don’t have to have all that money for med school, you don’t have the status either. You’re there to help the family figure out what to do because they don’t have the resources to do a $100,000 treatment.
Tryba: The hubris is weird because there are advances in some cancer statistics but so many of them remain horrendous.
Kalamian: Peter Attia has a podcast called The Drive. He’s a medical doctor interested in healthy aging. He has interviewed doctors about this exact thing. I saw it early on when people said a miracle drug had come out for brain cancer called Temodar. It moved the needle on the median survival by just 10 weeks. That makes it a breakthrough drug, 10 weeks. The ketogenic diet alongside the standard of care often gives people at least an additional year, maybe a year and a half. They’re not going to get a dime for the diet. That’s the other part of it, the funding for the research. Pharmaceutical is not going to fund a diet study. Siddhartha Mukherjee wrote a book called The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer, which won the Pulitzer Prize. He posted at one point, “We’ve got the funding for the drug. But now we need $300,000 for the ketogenic part. Does anybody have any idea of how we can find the funding?” That’s Siddhartha Mukherjee. Nobody’s handing him $300,000. Dr. Jethro Hu at Cedars-Sinai also needed to get companies to donate equipment and food for his clinical trial on the effects of a ketogenic diet on glioblastoma.
Tryba: Why doesn’t the government provide more funding for studies?
Kalamian: It’s the government’s ties with the pharmaceutical industry. They want to support the institutions. Institutions get some of their money from the government. But they get the major part from pharmaceutical companies. The more clinical trials they’re running, the higher their prestige. Mass General and Dana-Farber are constantly pumping out all these clinical trials where all they’re doing is using people to gather data so they can move to another part of the clinical trial. They’re getting these tiny little incremental benefits. A couple of doctors are understanding of that and are more supportive of the diet option now. If somebody brings up that they want to do a ketogenic diet, the doctors will say, “Yes, that’s a really good plan.” But they never bring it up because it’s not a part of the standard care. It’s not an approved therapy. They don’t feel it’s within their wheelhouse to discuss diet unless they're asked to.
Tryba: How do you do this work of educating people about the power of keto for cancer without feeling crushed?
Kalamian: Because of my son. Any time somebody wants to put their foot on my head, I say, “No, I’m fighting for my kid right here. I’m fighting for the families, not just kids anymore. I’m fighting for the families that have a dog in this fight.” That’s what keeps me going. I have always looked at what I do as leaving a legacy for my son. I attribute that legacy to Dr. Tom Seyfried's efforts. A change in diet won't appeal to everyone with cancer, but it should be an option for those who want to make the effort. I want other people to be successful without having to cobble bits of info together like I had to do.
People seem to understand little about the workings and overall purpose of the human body’s metabolism. I was one of them.
For instance, my metabolism was the first thing I blamed for weight gain.
As my once-athletic physique sunk into a misshapen form of fat over the past few years, I’d been quick to fault aging and a slowing metabolism, even as I had a second helping of pasta and later hit the snooze bar on my alarm and skipped morning exercise.
Well, I’ve learned my lesson.
Is Metabolism the Cause of Weight Gain?
Research reveals that you can’t entirely blame a slowing metabolism for weight gain.
Indeed, while a slow metabolism burns fewer calories than a fast-paced one, it is physical inactivity and poor diet that contribute the most to weight gain.
The Role of Your Metabolism
Still, metabolism plays a big role in overall health and is something you want running like a finely tuned sports car, and not a sluggish truck. It is, in many ways, an engine.
What Does Your Metabolism Do?
Metabolism is essentially the summary of all the chemical processes that take the calories from foods and beverages and combine them with oxygen, creating energy.
Energy powers breathing, blood circulation, cell growth and repair, and many other necessary functions.
What Can Effect Metabolism?
Several factors shape the pace of a metabolism.
Body Mass
First, larger people and those with more muscle have fast metabolisms and burn more calories. Genetics decidedly plays a role here.
And—sorry, women—men tend to have faster metabolisms because they usually have more muscle and less body fat. (Of course, this doesn’t apply to all women.)
Medication
Medication can slow, as well as quicken, metabolisms. Lastly, as people age, muscle typically decreases and fat starts appearing in unlikely places, like weeds in a garden.
Kick Start Your Metabolism!
Again, as metabolism slows, fewer calories burn. But as health experts point out, a slowing metabolism has only a small effect on weight gain. Overweight people have been shown to have faster metabolisms because they need more energy.
Still, it doesn’t hurt to increase your metabolism. It will increase energy output and make you feel better. It will also contribute somewhat—although not entirely—to weight loss. Who doesn’t want that?
There are several easy ways to kick-start metabolism.
Motivate Your Metabolism with Movement
The more you move, the more your metabolism keeps going. Go for walks, long hikes, runs, swims—anything active. If your body can handle it, high-intensity training can keep a metabolism moving fast for as much as a day. If you’re walking or jogging, simply quicken the pace for a minute and then resume the regular pace, repeating the cycle for at least 12 minutes.
Strength Training to Burn More Calories
Strength training increases muscle mass, which, in turn, burns more calories than fat tissue does. As people age, it’s vital to slow the pace of muscle loss; weight lifting at least twice a week keeps muscles firm. You’ll also get your metabolism moving from the cardio involved in weight workouts.
Burn Fat & Calories by Drinking Green Tea
A compound known as epigallocatechin gallate might increase calorie and fat burning. In fact, consuming about 250 milligrams of it might quicken the metabolism enough to burn 100 calories a day, studies have shown. Fortunately, epigallocatechin gallate is easy to find: It’s in green tea. Drink up!
Sleep Better to Keep Your Metabolism Moving!
Sleep deprivation hurts in many ways, not the least in that it slows metabolism. For many, it’s easier said than done, but a consistent schedule of sleeping seven to eight hours a night will keep the body fresh and the metabolism moving.
Sources
“Can you boost metabolism?” by Mayo Clinic Staff, www.MayoClinic.org
“Effect of a thermogenic beverage on 24-hour energy metabolism in humans” by S. Rudelle et al., Obesity (Silver Spring), 2/07
“How can I speed up my metabolism?” National Health Service, www.NHS.uk
“Sleep, women, and heart disease,” American Heart Association, www.heart.org
“What exactly is metabolism?” http://diet.MayoClinic.org
From “keto flu” to kidney stones and even pancreatitis, some people are finding the keto diet is not the “one size fits all” weight loss plan they thought it was.
As the First Lady of Nutrition, I have more than four decades of experience with diets and weight loss, and the associated trends that come and go. One thing I’ve observed is that when we go to drastic extremes with diets, whether it’s extremely low fat or, in the case of keto, extremely low carb, it puts too much stress on the body and serious problems arise.
I get it—it truly is inspiring to see the celebrities and doctors we admire have such dramatic weight-loss results with the keto diet. Even though it’s such a huge departure from the way we’re used to eating, we rationalize that “desperate times call for desperate measures” because we see the health impact that carrying all this extra weight is having—not to mention the painful blow to our self-esteem. But...
When a diet like keto sounds too good to be true, it probably is.
The Origins of the Ketogenic Diet and How it Works
Originally developed in the 1920s as a medical treatment for children with a seizure disorder, the ketogenic diet has taken the weight loss world by storm for the past few years. With its goal of 75 percent fat, 20 percent protein and a mere 5 percent carbs, it’s a huge change from the standard American diet of more than 50 percent carbs.
This way of eating switches your body from burning sugar and carbs as fuel to using fats as its primary energy source, and this can be a total game changer in your health—when it’s done properly. But, with huge changes comes huge challenges for those whose genetics and fat metabolism just aren’t geared for it.
Who Shouldn’t Go Keto
First of all, I need you to know: if keto failed you-you didn’t lose weight and you felt awful—it’s NOT your fault! One diet truly does not fit all, and keto may not be the right fit for you. The high amount of fats required for your body to go into ketosis and extreme fat-burning are not right for everyone.
Here’s a List of Everyone Who Should Avoid the Keto Diet:
You have a history of pancreatitis or high triglycerides. High triglycerides circulating in the blood for a prolonged period of time can lead to acute pancreatitis. The high fat keto diet is a known cause of acute pancreatitis, because it causes an increase in circulating fats.
You have gallbladder disease or no longer have a gallbladder. The gallbladder stores and concentrates the bile, which is made by the liver. Bile is essential for fat metabolism. A high fat keto diet can aggravate existing gallbladder disease. Also, if your gallbladder has been surgically removed, you may have trouble digesting all the fat you eat on the keto diet. Weight gain, bloating, and other digestive discomforts would be the first signs you would notice with this.
You have low blood pressure (hypotension). The ketogenic diet makes your body more acidic as it starts producing ketones. Prolonged low blood pressure combined with acidosis can lead to cardiac arrest.
You have kidney disease or a history of kidney failure. The way you test to see if you are in ketosis and burning fat as your primary tool, is to see if ketones are present in your urine. If you already have kidney issues, the added stress of the diet on the kidneys may worsen existing disease.
You have multiple nutrient deficiencies or have had weight-loss surgery. If you already have poor nutritional status from either prolonged sickness or severe calorie restriction, a full nutrition workup is recommended before starting any diet. You need to nourish your cells and rebuild them, not stress them further.
If you’ve had gastric bypass or other weight loss surgery, it is likely a diet was prescribed for you at the time of your surgery. These surgeries often change how you break down your food and limit the amount of each nutrient you are able to metabolize.
You have tumors in your abdomen or liver. While keto can be helpful when you have cancer, it must be supervised by a knowledgeable professional so you don’t further compromise your digestive and liver functioning or develop deficiencies.
You have low gastric motility. The ketogenic diet is known to cause constipation from the start, you need to be cautious if you already have impaired motility, because bowel obstruction can result.
You have known genetic conditions—from birth—that can’t tolerate ketosis. Several genetic disorders that are identified at birth are known contraindications for the keto diet. With the exception of Porphyria, which can develop later in life, you would be aware if you have one of these conditions.
Fix Your Fat Metabolism and Make It Work for You
Underlying most problems with the keto diet is trouble with fat metabolism. Your body wants to burn fat as its primary fuel, but if your bile is congested, you have too little bile, you’re missing your gallbladder, you have fatty liver disease, or you have other digestive issues, then you can’t digest all the fats the keto diet requires you to eat, and you’ll feel worse instead of better.
The first step to fixing your fat metabolism is building better bile. Free-flowing bile is essential for eliminating toxins and digesting fats properly.
The next step is to rev-up your fat-burning metabolism by eating the right fats—essential omega 3 and omega 6 fats from good quality sources. When it comes to weight loss, good quality fat is your friend—essential fats nourish and create healthy cells, reduce inflammation, and help shift your body into burning fats for fuel, all while feeding your brain and balancing your hormones. Choose grassfed meats, free range poultry and eggs, and cold-pressed organic oils like hemp, flax, and walnut to maximize your omega 3 and omega 6 fat intake.
Once your fat metabolism is working optimally, you may still find keto just isn’t right for you. Your ancestors may have had less of a fat-focused diet, and this is still in your genetic make-up. It’s important to listen to your body and do your homework to find the diet that’s right for you.
How to Know When You’re Eating Right for YOU
There isn’t a single diet out there that will work for everyone, unless it has the flexibility for you to customize it to suit your individual needs. But how do you know when you’ve struck gold and found the plan that fits you, your lifestyle, your genetics, and your metabolism to a tee? Here are the signs I recommend looking for:
You wake up with energy and in a good mood.
You feel more energetic after you eat—not less.
You lose weight easily.
Cravings are a thing of the past.
Your blood tests show you are healthy.
Your digestion works the way it should.
Exercise doesn’t leave you feeling drained.
You handle stress well.
You fall asleep easily and wake feeling well-rested.
Your body feels good and you have a strong sense of wellbeing.
Sounds too good to be true? Then you haven’t found the right diet for you! You might be thinking, “But I’ve tried so many diets, Ann Louise, and I’m still sitting here feeling fat and fatigued, and I just can’t seem to lose the weight!” Trust me, I’ve turned around thousands of “hopeless causes” and I can help you, too!
The underlying premise of the keto diet is right—your body wants to burn fat as its primary source of fuel. The problem is, you still need carbs to make hormones—thyroid, sex, and stress hormones, to be precise. Without enough carbs, you can feel tired, sluggish, unable to handle stress, have night sweats, and gain weight far too easily, among other signs of hormone imbalance. Too many carbs and the bloating, blood sugar increases, and fatigue set in.
Carbs, fats, and proteins all have one thing in common—they each have a “sweet spot” that creates optimal health in your body—too much or too little of any one of them is not a good thing.
I created my Radical Metabolism plan for even the slowest of losers, the most sluggish of metabolisms, and even those with autoimmune and other chronic illnesses that make a healthy weight seem so far out of reach. Thousands of people like you have already seen success with my plan, and found their ideal amounts of carbs, proteins, and fats, and they’re loving their new lifestyle! They’ve seen their energy levels soar, the inches and pounds fall off, and their blood tests improve—even thyroid! I invite you to get RADICAL, and find your way back to feeling good again.
If you have tried the Keto Diet and it did not work for you, there may be a good reason for it. Learn why this may happen and who should avoid following a Keto Diet here.
If you aren’t losing the weight you want to, then it’s time for a radical change. Bitter foods like coffee, cacao, cabbage, ginger, and dozens more, stimulate the liver, promote better bile flow, and boost your fat-burning metabolism, all of which are key components of losing weight and getting healthy.
Bitter foods are a big deal! So why aren’t we eating them, and what has taken us so long to discover their vital role in weight loss?
The answers to these questions came during the “aha!” moments that lead to my new book, Radical Metabolism. This radical new approach to weight loss and getting healthy helped me overcome the final hurdle to having the body I wanted to see when I look in the mirror – I finally lost that tummy pooch that I’d had since menopause!
If your metabolism is stalled and you crave sweets, your energy is flagging, and those extra pounds just won’t budge despite your best dieting efforts, then it’s time for a radical change to Radical Metabolism– and it starts with bitters.
Bitter for Better Weight – Why Didn’t I Think of That?
You’re born with roughly 9,000 taste buds that distinguish between five main flavors – sweet, sour, salty, bitter, and umami – or savory. Have you ever wondered why you are more drawn to sweet, salty, and umami foods and shy away from bitter or sour foods? That’s easy – survival.
Sweet, salty, and savory (umami) are tastes associated with foods that are fresh, rich in nutrients and protein. On the other hand, sour and bitter foods are associated with foods that have spoiled or plants that are poisonous.
We have a natural aversion to bitter foods for survival’s sake – but there’s more to bitters than what meets the eye. While most flavors can be discerned all over the tongue, the back of the tongue is reserved for bitter only, so we can detect poisons and spit them out before it’s too late.
However, bitter taste isn’t reserved just for poisons – it’s the most complex of the flavors. We have 35 different proteins in our sensory cells that respond to bitter foods and help us discern between friend and foe within this taste category. Why? Because bitter foods are some of the most powerful healers and important for our bodies when we need to detox and absorb nutrients.
The Benefits of Bitter Foods for Weight Loss
Bitter foods like coffee, cacao, watercress, arugula, cabbage, orange peel, ginger, apple cider vinegar, and more, boost bile flow, which is critical for detox, thyroid function, digestion, and even suppressing sugar cravings. Bile is a big deal, it’s been called “liquid gold” because of how valuable it is to your body. But there’s more to bitters than just bile building.
Bitters Improve Bile and Boost Your Metabolism
Bitters build better bile and boost your fat-burning metabolism. Bile is an emulsifying, soap-like substance that plays a key role in fat metabolism. The quantity and quality of bile you produce is essential to your health and your ability to lose weight.
Bile should be thin, golden, and flow freely, and your liver should make a quart a day of this substance. Problems come when bile becomes toxic sludge and stops flowing freely, from toxin overload, clogged bile ducts, elevated blood sugar, excess cholesterol, and not enough to nutrients to create it.
Did the Paleo or Keto diets leave you feeling tired and bloated? It’s likely bile quality is to blame. When bile is toxic, congested, and not flowing freely, you can’t metabolize fats properly, and it isn’t long before you’re bloated, tired, and craving sugars because you can’t digest those healthy fats.
The good news is bitters make it better! Bitters boost bile production, and more bile means better fat digestion and absorption. Bitters rev up your fat-burning metabolism and your body processes more fat – which means storing less of it. Studies show healthy bile also reduces insulin resistance, which is essential for weight loss and healthy blood sugar levels.
One additional note: Normally, the gallbladder regulates the flow of bile, but if yours is causing you pain and nausea, or has been removed, you may need help to boost your bile flow. This is what I created my Bile Builder for, and it works well in combination with bitter foods to get your fat burning metabolism back on track and digestion working optimally.
Bitters Support Liver Health
As the body’s prime detoxification organ, the liver takes an enormous beating from today’s toxic world. Many foods and lifestyle factors, such as refined sugars and grains, unhealthy fats like processed vegetable oils, too little fiber, too much alcohol and caffeine, medications, emotional stress, heavy metals and toxic chemicals in the air, water, and food, are all hard on the liver.
The most prevalent liver disease today is non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), which is characterized by the accumulation of fat in the liver. This is a sign the liver has stopped processing fat and storing it. If your liver is sluggish, every organ in your body is affected and your weight loss efforts will be stalled from multiple angles. A fatty liver is a toxic liver.
Because bitter foods increase bile production, your liver health will improve. Bile plays a major role in detoxifying your liver – it flushes out all the toxins your liver collects and can’t process. Without enough bile, these toxins get stored in fat cells and promote cellulite by increasing body fat and reducing collagen formation.
Like a magnet, bile grabs onto whatever the liver needs to get rid of – heavy metals, drugs, toxic chemicals, food preservatives, pesticides, flame retardants, and more – and carries it through the colon to be eliminated.
Bitter Foods Boost Thyroid Function
Essential fats from your diet supply your body with the raw materials needed to make thyroid hormones. If you’re not absorbing fats, you can’t make thyroid hormones. Once you have a thyroid problem, like hypothyroidism, it slows the emptying of the biliary tract, which increases your risk for gallstone formation. It also slows metabolism and causes weight gain.
The good news is bile acids boost thyroid activity. So when those bitter foods produce better bile flow, they’re also improving your thyroid function! According to thyroid specialist Dr. Antonio Blanco, bile release triggers your body to convert T4 (your body’s less active thyroid hormone) to T3 (the more active form), which fuels metabolism. He found individuals who improved their bile experienced a whopping 53 percent increase in metabolism, which breaks through the weight loss barrier!
Bitters Improve Digestion and Absorption
Bitter foods get your digestive juices flowing by stimulating the release of saliva, stomach acid (HCl), pepsin, gastrin, pancreatic enzymes, and of course, bile. It’s basically a downstream cascade that happens once bitter flavors are introduced to the tongue.
What happens when this cascade is triggered is a balanced release over time of these essential fluids, and proper breakdown of carbohydrates, fats, and proteins for optimal nutrient absorption. For this purpose, bitters need only be introduced in small amounts, and may not even need to be swallowed to be effective.
Bitters Reduce Acid Reflux and Constipation
Bitters reduce acid reflux, GERD, and constipation. Bitters relieve reflux by increasing the tone of your lower esophageal sphincter (LES) and “priming the pump” for optimal stomach acid levels, by inducing the digestive juices cascade that begins with the taste being detected on the tongue. Once this cascade results in better bile production, this intestinal lubricant relieves constipation and promotes healthy elimination.
Bitters Are Good For Intestinal Flora
Bitters feed “skinny bugs” and reduce the populations of “bad bugs.” Bitter foods, especially naturally fermented, unpasteurized vegetables like sauerkraut from cabbage, are acidic and loaded with gut-friendly microbes, increasing the numbers of bacteria that help with weight loss and maintenance of a healthy weight, and decreasing the numbers of “fat bacteria.”
The presence of even one strain of bacteria known to cause weight gain is enough to shift your entire microbiome and cause you to pack on the pounds. Bitters help rebalance the microbiome with intestinal flora in your favor.
Another function of bile is to reduce the populations of unhealthy bacteria, fungi and parasites. When bile is thin and free-flowing, it’s also acidic, and balances the pH of the intestines in a way that is unfavorable to “bad bugs.”
Just the presence of enough healthy bile is all it takes to kill off many foreign invaders that would set up shop in your liver and intestines and cause harm to your health.
Bitter Foods Suppress Sugar Cravings
This is a well-known principle in Ayurvedic medicine. Different flavors of foods hold different healing attributes, and one way bitters are used is to balance a meal and suppress sugar cravings.
You Can Have Your Coffee and Chocolate and Lose Weight, Too!
Coffee and cacao are loaded with bitter and antioxidants, and when consumed in moderation, they can enhance your weight loss efforts and support your overall health—and this is why they’re part of my Radical Metabolism plan!
Coffee is a powerhouse superfood packed with antioxidants. Did you know women who drink coffee have lower death rates from cardiovascular disease? It’s true! The latest scientific research also shows that coffee drinkers have fewer digestive issues and lower rates of type 2 diabetes, Parkinson’s, multiple sclerosis, and liver cancer. Coffee drinkers also have healthier brains and tend to live longer!
Cacao, the purest form of chocolate, has 20 times more antioxidant power than blueberries, making it a true superfood. Cacao helps cleanse and restore health at the cellular level. It also boosts your body’s serotonin levels, making you feel content, and when it comes to eating, you feel full faster. Notice here, the form of chocolate that has the health and weight loss benefits you’re looking for is pure cacao, not milk chocolate or other sugar-laden choices. When it comes to your health, don’t compromise!
For the last three decades, I have found myself rewriting the rules of nutrition—and now, with my new book, Radical Metabolism ($36.50, Lifelong Books, 2018), I’m at it again.
Why Rewrite the Rules of Nutrition?
I am well past 50 and, in moving through that transition, I was challenged by a metabolic slowdown. The plan in this book evolved from my discovery of what worked for myself and others. I happily report that my tummy pooch has finally disappeared!
Our Modern Toxic Nightmare
We are living a modern toxic nightmare, and the old remedies don’t work. Every day, we face an invisible war deep within our body as hormone-disrupting environmental pollutants contaminate, and progressively erode, our cellular defenses.
Petrochemicals, plastics, heavy metals, fake hormones, radiation, microbes, and other toxic agents all wreak hormone havoc on our biology. Most of these toxins are hidden, lurking in our food, air, and water, as well as body care, household, and cleaning products, and even technology. This is not your parents’ or grandparents’ world anymore.
Once enough of your cells become compromised, then tissue and organ function will follow. Healthy cells begin with healthy cell membranes. Without them, your body stands defenseless against toxic assaults, which results in hormone disruption and inflammation. Inflammation is the number one factor driving nearly every chronic disease today.
Healing at the Cellular Level
In 1858, physician Rudolf Virchow, the father of modern pathology, said, “All diseases are disturbances at the cellular level.” He argued that to treat a disease, we must first understand the cause—and the cause is always found at the level of the cell. There are many examples. Cancer occurs when cells develop aberrant growth patterns, and autoimmune diseases arise when cellular communication runs amok. And so it is with metabolism.
After I worked with thousands of “fat, 40, and fatigued” females, the pieces of the puzzle began to fall into place. One reason many diets fail is they don’t correct the shutdown of key fat-burning tissues in the body. You have three important metabolically active tissues: brown fat, muscle, and your microbiome—that vast community of microorganisms inhabiting your gut. Each of these prefers a specific type of food for its optimal function. If you don’t properly fuel these fat-burning tissues, they aren’t going to give you a radical metabolism and a healthy weight.
The Missing Link: Essential Fats
Another critical missing link concerns the role of the much-maligned omega-6 fats—the pariah of both conventional and alternative health experts. We hear so much these days about ditching omega 6s for omega-3 fats, but high-quality omega-6 fats are the most critical fuel for reigniting sluggish mitochondria—the energy engines in your cells.
Essential fats and certain essential amino acids fast-track your metabolism for lasting weight loss, as well as being vital to the nourishment of your cell membranes that surround and protect the mitochondria. The mitochondria are linked to the metabolically active “brown fat” that eats up heavy-duty amounts of glucose and fat for dramatic weight loss and fat loss, and decreased risk of insulin resistance.
In addition, no disease can be healed if your cell membranes—which direct nutrients in and poisons out—are weak and unstable. Radical Metabolism is about what to eat to rebuild and fortify those lipid (fat)-based cell membranes. This is also where omega-6 fats shine. Finally, breakthrough research reveals how putting back the missing omega 6s can boost cellular energy to gain vitality and accelerate fat burn.
Improving Bile Health
Reinstating omega 6s is just one aspect of Radical Metabolism. Eating “good fats” does you no good if you can’t properly digest them.
This program introduces the powerful role bile plays in the body’s slimming systems. Bile is stored in the gallbladder to break down dietary fat and remove toxins from the body. Harvard Medical School research has revealed that subjects with improved bile health showed a 53 percent spike in metabolism. Even more fascinating is a study out of Finland finding that people with decreased bile production are nearly 10 times more apt to experience hypothyroidism. With low thyroid on the rise, this provides hope to the millions of hypothyroid sufferers who experience metabolic slowdown as well as fatigue, dry skin, and constipation. Besides hypothyroidism, studies have also connected poor quality bile with chronic fatigue, migraines, depression, and autoimmune disorders.
What if You Have No Gallbladder?
If you no longer have your gallbladder, no problem! Unlike other diets, this plan helps you compensate to ensure you can fully utilize and digest good and essential fats. This is a key difference between Radical Metabolism and paleo, paleo plus, and/or ketogenic diets. I don’t want you overloading on fats if you don’t have a gallbladder or suffer from poor bile quality (as most weight-loss resistant individuals do) without nutritional backup, as this can result in weight gain—as well as decreased energy, gastrointestinal problems, stress on the kidneys, and other issues.
Radical Metabolism Strategies
Radical Metabolism will probably shake up your long-held beliefs and assumptions about what is healthy, especially when it comes to diet. I hope so!
I’m not just talking about weight loss—I’m talking about staying energized for life.
Let’s put the brakes on aging—I’m talking about gaining the tools necessary for dodging age-related illnesses so you won’t spend years stuck in the hospital revolving door.
If you find the word radical a bit intimidating, rest assured that its strategies are simple and straightforward, designed for easy integration into today’s busy lifestyle. However, these simple strategies produce radical results!
What You Will Learn From Radical Metabolism
How to harness the power of high-quality omega 6 oils to fuel brown fat to stoke your fat-burning fires, fortify your cell membranes, and rid your body of toxins.
Why bitter foods are key to metabolic healing and digestion. These support your gallbladder health, bile flow, fat breakdown, and better absorption of fat-soluble vitamins for immunity and skin health.
The foods (herbs, veggies, bitters, berries, and supplements) that will kick your metabolism into overdrive, reboot your gallbladder (or replace what’s needed in the form of bile salts if you no longer have your gallbladder), and heal your gut.
A Sample of Radical Metabolism
Here is a sample of what you’ll learn in the book:
How to optimize protein and amino acid intake to prevent muscle loss, boost mitochondria, and reset “metabolic thermostat”.
How to reduce exposure to toxins that may contaminate some of the foods you love, such as bone broth, chocolate, and green tea.
How to modify your kitchen to steer clear of common food contaminants, such as aluminum and Teflon.
How soups and juices can be combined into a powerful cleanse that rejuvenates and resets your system.
How cleansing beverages, such as hibiscus and dandelion teas, help clear toxins.
How prebiotic and probiotic foods (jicama, miso, sauerkraut, yogurt) can optimize immunity.
What if you could spring your metabolism forward as easily as the clock? Well, you can with my brand new Spring Kickoff. It’s called QuickStart: Your Guide to a Radical Metabolism. It is featured in this month’s Woman’s World magazine.
QuickStart is the bridge between my New York Times bestselling Fat Flush Plan–which launched the detox and diet revolution–and my highly-anticipated upcoming book Radical Metabolism, which will be in book stores this summer.
But, I don't want you to have to wait to start getting results! Now, you can rapidly and effortlessly start the metabolic revving process in just two weeks with QuickStart. Then, you can keep sending your metabolism into overdrive for long-term and keep the weight off for good with Radical Metabolism.
Whether you are over 40 or you just have an “over-40 metabolism,” this innovative new approach turns conventional weight loss programs on their head. It is especially effective if you’ve been struggling with a sluggish thyroid or autoimmune issues such as Hashimoto’s thyroiditis—this promises to kick your metabolism into overdrive and reset your metabolic “clock.”
As a health pioneer, I have been on the frontlines of nutrition for more than 30 years. Now I’m focusing in on metabolism at the level of the cell, because everything starts there!
If you describe yourself as a “slow loser,” you likely have some degree of metabolic damage. My new program is aimed at turning this around, especially for those with thyroid issues.
Here’s the thing: Thyroid problems are epidemic today.
Did you know, for example, that your thyroid depends on getting enough of the right fats to function optimally? In fact, fats are critical to ALL of your body’s vital operations. And it’s more than just the omega-3s that you hear so much about—the 3s, the 6s and the 9s all have their metabolic roles to play.
With my Spring QuickStart, you will flood your body with metabolically active fats and other superfoods—such as the long-forgotten bitters—that will heal and seal your gut, provide boundless energy and result in effortless weight loss. We will prime the pump with a tasty two-week program that includes your favorite Fat Flush meals, metabolism-maxing supplements, and beverages that help flush fat-binding toxins from your body.
It’s so simple!
Here’s the plan in a nutshell:
Breakfast: A supercharged Energy Blaster made with cacao, coffee and coconut milk.
Lunch: A filling Creamy Frappe made with Fat Flush Body Protein or Whey Protein.
Dinner: A wholesome Fat Flush meal with high-quality protein, skinny fats and unlimited vegetables.
To further fire up your fat burners, you will select four days for doing mini-fasts. Don’t let the word “fast” scare you because hunger isn’t part of the plan—even on those fasting days! You will be amazed at how satisfied you become when your body is getting everything it needs. In no time at all, you’ll be reaching for those skinny jeans or that little black dress you’ve missed so much.
One of the program’s biggest assets is its support system. Studies show that support is critical to success in almost any endeavor. The Spring Kickoff to a Radical Metabolism is built around community.
The program’s success rate is proof that support really does make a difference. Here’s what a few excited folks had to say:
I am (almost) sleeping like a baby and there is a spring in my step that I haven’t had in years. I love the energy I am having to tackle the things I’ve been putting off for ages. Even my thinking is clearer. Sandy F.
I aimed for losing 15 pounds and blew past that! I had to purchase skinnier jeans! Skinny wasn’t my goal, just cleaning up my diet and optimizing my health. This is the best because it changes the way you think about food. Stick with it and you will be rewarded in more ways that you can imagine. Juli J.
I did it–I lost 15 pounds! Laura M. (diagnosed with hypothyroidism)
Dear Fat Flush friends and supporters, I recently posted that I had lost 10 pounds on QuickStart. I am delighted with my progress this far! Thank you all for your good wishes! Layne K.
Make the next two weeks the best two weeks of your life! Remake your body and your self-image. Get a jumpstart on launching your new radical metabolism and say bye-bye to a sluggish thyroid—forever!
How fast is a fast fast? No, that’s not a tongue twister (though feel free to say it three times—fast). Short-term or intermittent fasting is gaining popularity as a route to not just weight control but to potentially living a longer, healthier life.
What Is Intermittent Fasting?
Intermittent fasting is an eating plan that includes cycling between fasting and non-fasting, as well as rotating in regular periods of very low-calorie eating.
Does Fasting Work?
There’s evidence that, in animals including rodents and fruit flies, a lifelong restricted diet that cuts calories by more than a third leads to a lifespan that’s a third longer.
Does it work for humans too?
Scientists haven’t figured that out yet, though evidence backs the idea that, in people, eating a calorie-limited diet leads to longer periods of good health with fewer of the diseases that typically strike in old age.
Still, who would want to deny themselves the pleasures of foods for an entire lifetime? Luckily, we don’t have to. We can get the benefits of long-term fasting with daily, weekly, or monthly short-term fasts or calorie restrictions, according to recent research.
The Science Behind Restricted-Calorie Diets
Mark Mattson, PhD, who heads the neurosciences lab at the National Institute on Aging, is an expert on the science behind intermittent fasting. He has contributed to a number of studies on intermittent fasting and calorie-restricted diets involving both animals and humans.
Results indicate that cycles of fasting may support cardiovascular health, lead to improved learning and memory and decreased symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease, and alleviate symptoms of asthma.
How Does Intermittent Fasting Work?
Promotes Cellular Strength
One theory is that fasting puts cells under mild stress. “They respond to the stress adaptively by enhancing their ability to cope with stress and, maybe, to resist disease,” Dr. Mattson told the Canadian Medical Association Journal.
Resets the Immune System
Valter Longo, PhD, of the University of Southern California, argued in a 2014 study that three days of fasting can “reset” the immune system and trigger the production of new white blood cells, helping to ward off disease.
Humans Naturally Adapted to Fasting
While researchers have done many recent studies on fasting, it is not new. According to Francoise Wilhelmi de Toledo, MD, medical director of the Buchinger Wilhelmi Clinic in Germany, the propensity to deprive oneself of food is evolutionary and natural.
Dr. de Toledo contends that because food was often in short supply as humans evolved, our bodies have adapted. Throughout history, droughts and other harsh conditions produced food shortages that caused our ancestors to fast—often involuntarily—and our bodies eventually got the message.
The Benefits of Fasting
Reproductive Health
Studies indicate that benefits of fasting include improved reproductive features (in menstrual cyclicity, ovulation, and fertility) and metabolism.
Joint Health
Pain and stiffness from rheumatoid arthritis improved when study participants employed fasting techniques for one to two weeks.
Cardiovascular Health
Fasting showed promise in improving cardiovascular health by lowering high blood pressure and reducing the cholesterol that can clog arteries and cause heart attacks.
Not only do fasting people lose weight, but their arteries are less inflamed if they fast every other day or employ the 5:2 Fast Diet (which features five days of regular eating and two fasting days each week). With both techniques, fasting days provide about one fourth of a person’s normal caloric intake.
An abstract from a 2024 conference presentation suggested that intermittent fasting may not reduce risk of cardiovascular death. The data has not yet been reviewed nor has it gone through the process of validation. Researchers have yet to compare and analyze a time-restricted eating group with a non-time-restricted feeding group.
Long-Term Health
Scientists think fasting mildly stresses cells. They surmise that on low-calorie days, the body is forced to deal with this mild stress, which strengthens the long-term ability to ward off disease.
Intermittent Fasting Plans
Unlike traditional diets, intermittent fasting is more about when you eat than what you eat. The idea is to skip or limit food for a certain number of hours in a day or a certain number of days in a week or month. Here are some common approaches.
Every-Other-Day Fasting
Every-other-day fasting suggests you eat normally on the first day, then limit yourself to 500 calories (for women) or 600 (for men) the next. Continue to alternate.
With only 500 calories on your fasting day, it’s critical you make those 500 calories count, so choose food wisely. Opt for nutrient-rich foods, such as lean proteins and fresh produce.
Half-Day Fasting
Half-day fasting is essentially 12 hours on—when eating is permitted—and 12 hours off, when you fast. Beginning the fast in the evening makes the limited food intake much easier to tolerate since you’ll be dozing for about two-thirds of the period.
Over time, you might find you can increase your fasting hours to 16 hours a day. Some research shows increased health benefits if you limit eating to eight hours per day.
The 5:2 Plan
Eat what you normally do for five days a week, and eat just 500 calories on the other two (nonconsecutive) days.
The 16:8 Plan
Fast for 16 consecutive hours during every 24-hour period, limiting your eating to the other eight hours. For instance, have your first meal at 10 a.m. and finish your last meal by 6 p.m.
Eat-Stop-Eat
Fast for 24 hours once or twice a week.
Five Days a Month
Cut your food intake by 30 to 40 percent for five consecutive days a month, and eat as you normally do on the other days.
In a recent study, human volunteers who were put on a regimen of 725 to 1,090 calories a day for five days a month lost abdominal fat, became more fit, and had lower blood glucose levels than a control group after only three months.
Convenience Plan
If you can’t adopt a regular mode of intermittent fasting, try fasting when it works for your schedule. Skip a meal if you’re not hungry, or take a day off from eating when the time is right. You’ll still get some of the benefits of a more structured plan.
Fasting Precautions
Stay Hydrated
Be sure to drink plenty of noncaloric liquids while you are fasting. Water, unsweetened coffee and tea (a splash of milk or cream is OK), and other sugar-free drinks will help keep you hydrated.
Check with Your Doctor
Check with your healthcare provider before you make any radical changes in your eating habits, especially if you have medical conditions. People who should not fast include children, those who are underweight or have a history of eating disorders, and women who are pregnant, breastfeeding, or trying to conceive.
Sources
"Association between time-restricted eating and all-cause and cause-specific mortality" by M. Chen et al., American Heart Association, 3/18/24
“Fasting therapy for treating and preventing disease—current state of evidence” by A. Michalsen and C. Li, Forsch Komplementmed
“Fasting triggers stem cell regeneration of damaged, old immune system” by Suzanne Wu, University of Southern California
“How Intermittent Fasting Might Help You Live a Longer and Healthier Life” by David Stipp, www.ScientificAmerican.com
“Intermittent fasting: The science of going without” by Roger Collier, CMAJ
“Role of therapeutic fasting in women’s health: An overview” by M. Pradeep et al., Journal of Mid-life Health, 4-6/16
“Short-term fasting may improve health” by Mitch Leslie, www.ScienceMag.org
If you find that maintaining the weight you want isn’t as easy as it used to be, you’re not alone. Metabolism can be slowed down by a couple of factors that affect pretty much everybody: aging and stress.
But don’t worry—you don’t need to resign yourself to a slowly expanding waistline. There are a number of steps to take to boost a lagging metabolism.
Put simply, metabolism is the term for the body’s converting food into energy. It’s what keeps you breathing, thinking, digesting, pumping blood, and staying at the right temperature. And it can change over time.
The Big Slowdown
Aging
When you hit your mid-20s, your muscle mass starts to drop and your body fat increases. Pair that with a reduction in activity due to work and family demands, and most of us need fewer calories to maintain our weight as we grow older. Men over 60, for instance, need about 350 fewer calories than their teenage counterparts. And women frequently lose muscle mass and put on pounds as a side effect of hormone changes brought on by menopause.
Stress
That pumped-up feeling you get when you’re stressed out? Ironically, it does just the opposite of pumping up metabolism. Cortisol, an adrenal hormone that’s released during times of stress, comes in handy when you need to respond fast. It supplies a burst of energy, kick-starts memory, and raises the pain threshold.
But low-level chronic stress, the kind not brought on by a need to, say, swerve the car to avoid a dog or retrieve a statistic for a pop quiz, can leave you with cortisol that isn’t released. Instead, it can increase blood sugar, up carbohydrate cravings, and result in weight gain—and raise chances of a host of health problems including high cholesterol and blood pressure, heart disease, and cognitive impairment.
Speed It Up
You can’t get any younger, but you can set goals to be active and healthy at every stage of life. While you may not be able to remove all of the stressors in your life, you can work to alleviate the damage they do to your body and your psyche. Try some of these tactics to boost your metabolism and shrink your waistline:
Sleep
If you cut corners on your nighttime zzz, you’re likely to make up for your tiredness by overeating the next day. Sleep deprivation can also make it harder for the body to regulate appetite and eating, according to studies that have found it lowers levels of leptin, the hormone that lets you know when you are full.
The solution: Organize your schedule to get a full night’s rest—every night. If your lack of sleep is caused by insomnia, check your “sleep hygiene”—make your bedroom comfortable and focused on shut-eye and wind down your activities before bedtime.
Short-Term Fasting
There’s evidence that, in some organisms, a lifelong restricted diet that cuts calories by more than a third leads to a longer, healthier life with fewer diseases like cancer and heart conditions. Does it work for humans too? Scientists haven’t figured that out yet—and really, would you want to deny yourself the pleasures of food for an entire lifetime?
Luckily, you don’t have to. You can get the benefits of long-term fasting with monthly short-term periods of calorie restrictions, according to the results of a recent study.
Researchers put middle-aged mice on a low-protein, low-calorie diet for two four-day periods a month; the rest of the month they could eat as much as they pleased. Good news for the mice: They lived longer than their peers, they lost weight, they retained their mental capacities as they aged, and they were 45 percent less likely to get cancer. During their fasts, their blood sugar and insulin levels dropped dramatically.
There’s good news for humans too. The scientists tried out the short-term fasts on people, putting volunteers on a regimen of 725 to 1090 calories five consecutive days every month; on the other days, the participants ate as they usually did. After only three months, they lost abdominal fat, became more fit, and had lower blood glucose levels.
Exercise
Since losing muscle mass correlates with the metabolism’s slowing down, a simple way to up your metabolism is to work out regularly, with an eye toward challenging your muscles.
Start a routine of aerobic exercise; if you already have an aerobic routine, amp it up. The more intense it is, the more calories you burn. Try switching from high to lower intensity during an exercise session. For instance, run as fast as you can for a minute, walk for two minutes, then repeat several times.
Consider weightlifting: Strengthening your muscles will help streamline the work of burning calories.
Fill Up on Fiber
If you eat high-fiber foods, you’ll fill up with fewer calories, and the fiber will help your body process foods more efficiently. You’ll chew longer and feel full longer. Fiber provides a host of other health benefits as well. So when you’re hungry, reach for fruits, vegetables, beans, and grains that are good sources of fiber. Be sure to drink plenty of water too.
The Upshot
A slowing metabolism often means a growing waistline, but if you’re uncomfortable with the extra pounds, there are plenty of options for boosting your metabolism. Even better, putting them into practice may well improve your overall health.
Sources
“Can You Boost Your Metabolism?” MedlinePlus, US National Library of Medicine, https://MedlinePlus.gov, 11/6/17
“The Effects of Fiber on Metabolic Rate” by Mala Srivastava, www.SFGate.com
“How to Boost Your Metabolism with Exercise,” www.WebMD.com, 1/23/17
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