Scott F.

Just like new, the first steps can be the hardest. A few things to keep in mind. Hydration is paramount. Carbs require a lot of water. If you have stopped the carbs your body is using them up as that has been the fuel source prior to carnivore. In turn, there may be the need for more water. One thing to offset that other than water intake is increasing your fat content. Fat burns better than carbs, requires less water and is an over-all better energy source. Next would be the individuality of most every thing health related. Going cold-turkey carnivore may not work for you. You may need to ease into the diet and wean yourself off the carbs and sugars. I never like using these words as they carry a lot of negativity, but they are adequate and accurate. You are having withdrawals and de-toxing. Coming off a dumpster diet can be hard. It comes with cravings, and perceived hunger that is your brain telling your body to get back to the status-quo. Good luck. This is a good place to drop by and share your experiences. Although we are all individuals odds are what ever you are experiencing more than likely there is someone here who has worked thru the same things. You can lean on that. Good luck. Higher fats, moderate protein, salt/electrolytes and hydration. Keep pushing. Scott

We had two in town and both have since closed. One was the Oak Grove Market. They butchered in one part of the building and another part those same meats were cooked and served. We shopped there a couple times per week and ate lunch there at least once per week. The second was called "Supply Line". Their meat selection was tremendous and if they didn't have what you were looking for they would track it down and it would be there the next time. Even for a local, family-owned business they kept their prices down and relied on service and quality to offset the big box stores. They were able to do that for years and years. I miss both those places. We now have one 20+ miles away that is 'from the field to your table' and their meats are incredible. Expensive over time, but incredible. Everything is high, and if they bought high and sold low, they would be out of business in short order. In some slight mental justification, I shop there because I have saved money just eating meats and secondly, they are local, and family owned. Maybe the third, the young man that opened it is maybe 26-27 years old and when he interacts with customers you would think he was the 75 year old farmer from down the road that watched everyone grow up. An old soul. Our pork is from out back to inside, only a few hundred feet from the door. Eggs the same. Scott

I go back in a couple weeks and I may be having that same conversation with the Rituxin. Since the onset in 2018 I can feel the difference between having the infusion, the next three months, and then the last two or so before the next one. The last month or so before the infusion I get a little run down, the fatigue sort of returns and I have been susceptible to most anything coming down the pipe. I was a frequent flyer during covid with and without positive tests. The last time I didn't really didn't get the run down feeling the last month or so, (five months on carnivore) and this time I'm as energetic as all get out. I'm stacking night shifts like cord wood and going to the gym consistently. I can say I have not felt better in a really long time, and especially since being diagnosed is 2018. Tomorrow is one year. My last blood work suggests I am on the cusps of having a normal immune system. If it tracks accordingly the next test should be "in the green". I get that there is a lot of negativity toward the state/approach of the current medical system and I understand the profit taking precedence over overall health. Nothing hard to understand there. But at the same time, I am both thankful and appreciative for the treatments I received. Good or bad, it got me to a point where I was still kicking to make a better decision. The alternative would not have ended well. Scott

I'm not sure it is an amount to be concerned with the way it reads. I had not thought about it years but it was a staple as a kid. Fried spam with eggs was almost a go-to. I have not had it in years. The next trip into the grocery store I am going to venture up the 'can' aisle for the first time in a long time. LOL Scott

The same. If I were single or if we cooked separate meals I would go straight red meats. I can actually feel a difference the few times I did red meats for a week to ten days. My wife does a ton to support my carnivore eating so mixing in chicken and fish here and there is a pretty good trade-off. Scott

As I learn more and more, this statement is incredibly accurate. I feel like the medicines saved me and I also feel like they kept me going. I am not sure if they did any harm, maybe, maybe not. I do believe 'keeping me going' and 'on the hook' are really similar. With all that, I am really appreciative of where I am today. Scott

True. I truly believe there is no financial future with cures. I'm sure there have been a few that cured the common cold but not that I am total conspiracy theorist, but I'm guessing they died a mysterious death or wound up in an unmarked grave. I still believe in the benefits of modern medicine I just have a bigger belief that the medicine is the stopping point for most doctors and most people. For me, it took me years to punish my body with a dumpster diet to develop all the issues I had coming into carnivore. I was diagnosed in 2018 and the pain management medicines and the infusions kept me going. If someone is rushed into the emergency room with life threatening issues, like blood pressure or glucose or cardiac type issue, the advances of modern medicine can save their life with basically an immediate response. My issue is that is where the treatment stops for most. You are now on this medicine forever and we are not going to figure out the root cause and get you off the medicine. I didn't know about carnivore in 2018 so I was thankful that the medicines kept me around for what turned out to be the next six years. I started carnivore as a weight loss hack and had no idea it would provide any other benefit. The weight peeled off just as advertised. As I read and learned I thought most of the stories on boards like, and youtube, and etc, were pretty much full of it. Click the button below, or buy this product, etc, etc. I'm a nay-sayer at heart. As I started to need my medicine less and less, and (I'm sort of slow) putting two and two together, I figured out that the things I had eliminated from my diet could have been my problem all along. Although I am super appreciative of the medicines that saved me, I do wish I had dug deeper way back when and figured this out 6+ years ago. Being off "supposed life long medicines' is an incredible feeling. I appreciate the advances in the short term but most would appreciate them/the process even more if the health system pushed things to the next step. As you stated, all the money is in continued treatment. Scott

....if you read it on the internet it has to be true..... Scott

Great story. Congrats on the victory. Big picture for me, it is just crazy to me at times how with all the advances in modern medicine we find the answer in a ribeye. Scott

I don't eat out all that often so I don't run into the seed oils being an issue. One of the first things I read and learned with going carnivore is that there is an awful lot of individuality involved. Even when we all go forward with the same basic principles our results can vary, and sometimes they can really vary. I have had well over fifty years with frying in seed oils as a 'staple' to my diet. Mostly the vegetable and corn oils but when doing wings we always 'stepped up' to peanut oil. I never had an issue and frying was my preferred way to cook, slightly second behind the grill. After not having them for several months while using butter and tallow I am not sure exactly what happened. I ate Mexican one night and asked the grill be scraped and butter used for my meat "as us carnivores sometimes do". I feel like they did that time and I had no issues. The next time I asked the same thing at the same restaurant and the waitress acted as if it were a big deal. I didn't taste any difference but the trip home required a beside the road pit stop. I blamed "Mexican" not seed oils. A few weeks later my wife was cooking and she used Canola oil and then told me she had forgot I was eating form the same pan. (been really good about supporting me on carnivore). I told her no more oil than was involved it would not really matter. Half way out to the dog pen I had to make a hasty retreat. I find it odd that I am now that intolerant to something I spent years almost eating by the bucket. Strange. Scott

Men too. I would like to avoid that as well. Scott

I think most of us have had that experience. I am guessing the vegan crowd gets the same reaction as anything outside the "norm" can be frowned upon. Eggs can be a focal point for many as we were taught for many years the dangers of cholesterol and how they link directly to negative heart health, like red meat and saturated fats. Again, eating eggs is taboo but stopping by a fast-food joint three-four times per week is not frowned upon by many. I'm cheap by nature and have found many benefits from going carnivore. Early on I was bored on night shift and did the math on fast-food, soft drinks and snack cakes I was eating daily before carnivore. I work rotating swing shifts and hit this country store on my way to work on most every day I worked. I started every day with two big bacon, egg and cheese sandwiches on buns, a Mountain Dew and two snack cakes from there or Bojangles for two chicken biscuits, a large fry and two cinnamon twists with a large Pepsi, every day I worked. On my days off I started everyday with a Mountain Dew and two Little Debbie snack cakes. Back then I could eat like a horse, maybe even two horses. I was dropping well over $400 a month on the very dumpster diet that was killing me slowly. I'm so cheap the $400 realization is as much motivation as all the health benefits from eating the way I do now. LOL Babbling, but I have friends who tell me I am too small, or lost weight too fast, and need vegetables in my diet, and when I come back with, I have not taken pain nor inflammation medicine in 9-10 months now. I was eating my way to pain and inflammation every day then taking medicine to get through the next day. Carnivore changed that for me, yet, the doctor in them comes out as they want to correct my way of thinking. It is funny how that works. Scott

Yep, very true. One of my favorite and least favorite things to hear is when I say I only eat meats, salt and water on the carnivore diet, one, everyone becomes a physician, dietician on nutritionist on the spot and two, they are usually eating a Big Mac with a Super-sized fries and soft drink. (or something similar). It can be a tough ticket to sell and most of the time I will discuss if they seem interested but if they are preaching to me or teaching me, I find a way to move on. I do believe it is individual in results but most carnivores fall under the same blanket. X amount of fat may work for you but I may do better with XX amount of fat. And my body may respond to carnivore differently than yours or someone else's, but still we have the same basic approach. My wife does not eat the carnivore way so I still have some variety in my meats but at the same time I have found I feel better and do better on red meat, especially red fatty meat. I like chicken and pork and fish as much as the next guy but if we were not shopping for two/cooking for two I would go straight lion's diet and eat only red meat. This is a good place to bounce your ideas around and share your experiences. I enjoy the experiences of others as I have learned a ton from the others on this board. Scott

I just eat meat and eggs. Every so often I will drink a glass of milk, but other than that, meat, salt and water. I have an auto-immune disease and I took medicine for pain and inflammation for 6+ years. I started carnivore as nothing more than a weight loss hack. My son tried it and lost 12-14lbs in a couple weeks. He described the diet to me and i thought I would give it a whirl. Six weeks later the weight was peeling off extremely fast. Then I started to realize I was skipping my medicine (didn't take it daily/ritually but more so when I need it-three four times per week). At first I thought it was just coincidence but soon realized it was the change in diet. I'm not sure which plant, or combinations of plants/carbs/sugars, etc. triggered my inflammation but I know now one or more of them did. I'm 11 months in and it is still meat salt and water. I'm not the luckiest guy in the world and I feel like if I were to go back to that way of eating I would pick the most inflammatory first. That would be my luck. So, yep, you are amongst meat and egg eaters. Scott

I never owned a motorcycle and never really had the urge to ride. I do enjoy looking at them, especially the older Harley Davidsons. Good luck, enjoy and be safe out there. Scott

I didn't track mine the first 6-7 months, maybe 8. The last few I tried to hit a protein target for the 1 gram of protein per pound of ideal body weight for muscle growth. It was one of those things like "I knew" but didn't "do right". I went to some lean cuts of meats like chicken breasts, etc. to boost the daily protein content. I was counting protein but forgot to factor in those cuts of meat lowered my fat intake. I actually gained some weight and although it didn't totally deplete my energy levels, there were some differences. In the pursuit of the protein, I put 2 and 2 together and got 3. Once the shortcoming dawned on me it was a quick and easy fix. If I hit the protein target, so be it, if I don't as long as the fat content is up, I'm good. Mostly it feels like, the more the better. Scott

I was watching a video the other day and this guy spoke about Pfi zer as big Pharma. They had just celebrated 100 years of research and medical breakthroughs. But in those 100 years they have yet to cure any disease or sickness. There is no money in cures as it all lies in the treatments. Scott

True. But we have evolved to a point/conditioned ourselves over time to not mimic our ancestors. Somewhere along the lines we used technology and indulgence and maybe even some gluttony to get away from where we started. There is a short clip from Dr. Attia in the video that speaks to that as 'we may have outsmarted ourselves when it comes to our way of eating'. I agree the carnivore approach mimics our ancestors, especially when carnivore leads you to one meal a day and sometimes less. For me, and just speaking for me, OMAD works really well but I am sure our ancestors didn't have the luxury nor the 'hunting luck' to eat every day. I am guessing OMAD is "sorta-kinda" mimicking our ancestor, but I would guess there was a day or two in between most of the time. Your thoughts on eating when you were successful would be quite the social experiment. It would be a link to why when you are 'fasted' and the ketones are high; you get that mental clarity and focus. If we had spears and rocks, I doubt we kill much being stuffed, or "fat, dumb and happy". Talking about a real life-real time experiment, this would be the one. Scott

Bing Videos Sort of pick up around 16 minutes. It gets into breaking a fast with high fats/moderate proteins and how that can mimic the fast and extend the benefits of ketones days after breaking the fast. I think this sort of explains the two to three days of being super energetic after the end of the extended fasts. I am thinking it is an individual response as well but in theory, this video sort of backs up how I was feeling. Tonight, I hit 72 hours of the water fast. It has been pretty similar as the other fasts and is actually much easier than it sounds. There was a time I barely went 96 minutes without eating something or drinking a soft drink and back then going 96 hours without eating would be straight craziness. I'm probably going to break this fast around 84 hours tomorrow morning when I get home. This possibly can go to the video posted about "fasting too much". Since I have body fat to "spare" the longer fasts can help with fat loss but more importantly it is the metabolic return. Since I am 90+ pounds lighter than I was 11 months ago I may get to a point where there is diminishing returns on the length of the fasts as well as how often I do them. The fasting should be providing some stressors to the body and at some point, the body will start to adapt making the fast a normal part of life. From there, with that normalcy, it could start losing some of its effect. I read the 'body is smarter than the brain' and at some point, we need to listen to our body more than we do with the brain'. This video and Dana White had a couple good excerpts (and the ones I am experiencing but could not figure out how to explain). We are constantly exposed to food thru brilliant marketing. There is pretty much no part of our daily life where this 'brilliant marketing' keeps food at our disposal. During the fast, for me between 48 and 72 hours, I am not physically hungry, and my body is not calling for any type of sustenance. I have a ton of energy. I feel really good. I'm pulling 12–13-hour night shifts. I am going to the gym the morning after the shift. My body is telling me it is in a good place. However, my brain is constantly thinking about food. I'm watching a video on carnivore and fasting, and every frame is a person cutting an amazing piece of meat. I immediately start thinking about eating and how I am going to break the fast. This would taste really good right now and my brain starts the negotiation about 48 or 72 hours is long enough and the benefits are there already so let's eat now. We have an over-abundance of food access, and the marketers have made it OK to walk around the house and eat out of habit and boredom, which is a vicious cycle in itself. Babbling again. But the last part of the video sort of proofed how I felt coming off my last couple of fasts. Being fat adaptive already, fasting followed by a high fat/moderate protein breaking of the fast keeps the ketones going for longer after the break. The opposite would be if I did the same fast and broke it with a heavier carb meal which would kick me right out of ketosis and the ketones would be drastically reduced, if not stopped altogether. The more I look into it, there may be something to this carnivore thing after all. LOL Scott

My fat content has varied. When I was eating a ton of protein for muscle gains I allowed the fat content to drop. I gained some weight and my energy was not depleted but there was a difference. I have not nailed it down completely as I have tried differing approaches over the last 11 months but for me, and the most part, I do better with a higher fat content. I am not sure it is the higher the better but definitely higher than the 70/30 advertised ratio. Scott

I'm strict carnivore with a glass of milk here and there is about the only time I go outside the boundaries of 'strict carnivore'. I have started to incorporate longer fasting and I feel like ketosis and autophagy and HGH and stem cells are playing pretty big roles in my body composition. I have lost a little over 90 pound in 11 months. I am lifting consistently and although it was not my original plan, the amount of weight I am lifting is going up and the intensity as well. My walks are still 3.5 miles, but they are now more brisk, and a couple days a week I wear a 40lb weight vest. On the days without the vest I try to get 100 pushups along the way. I'm not vain in the least, and like Geezy no one is really seeing me naked so it does not really matter but I am not having any excess skin issues. I feel like 90+ pounds in 11 months is a lot and it is a relatively short time span. I know several people at my work who have had the by-pass surgeries and a few on GLP-1 type medications. They all have excess skin issues. When we change and shower at work I can see where it would be an issue for anyone who has that to deal with in their search/attempts to lose weight/be healthier. And this is just a small sample size but what they all have in common is a not so sensible diet and the lack of exercise. One guy has lost about 60 pounds on Ozempic and was prescribed it due to weight and diabetes. His meals are now smaller, but the same, and his exercise is pretty much non-existent. This past week he missed work when his glucose was well over 400, close to 500. This is just one person but I think is a good example of using prescription medication to treat the symptoms not the cause. I'm not saying the carnivore diet is a cure all for everything, but looking back at Terry's post/spiff about his new pharmacy......it gives it a tone more weight. Scott

Got me too. Scott

🔴Breaking: Huge CARNIVORE Breakthrough [HARVARD] Life-Changing Results This video can be really helpful to those just starting out, and even to those who have been carnivore for a stretch. Scott

I'm 55 and come from parents/grandparents that didn't throw anything away. It could always be used for something. When my mother-in-law passed she had amassed quite the collection of cool-whip bowls and butter bowls (which make excellent cereal bowls), even washed plastic forks and spoons to re-use. They come from a different time and I guess I picked up a lot of those habits. My Pops and brothers framed houses for a long time. He called it babysitting but I called it work. They had taken down an old two story house from the 1800's and was using the salvageable material to re-model/re-built another old plantation house on that farm. As an 8-10 year old my job was to straighten the old cut nails they used way back when. I had a big block of wood and a hammer. I spent many days straightening nails during that re-build. And at the same time I have no problem dumping money in my 1972 K5 Blazer nor the 1950 Chevrolet truck I am doing now. Go figure. Scott

These are the best kind. Most don't even require a prescription. LOL I miss ours here in town. Small, family owned for years and years. Old school where you could watch the guy cut the meat om the other side of the counter. Enjoy your new medical facility. Scott