Carbs are the blue pill

As a fan of Roissy’s blog, I’ll follow his recent post with an account of my experience on the Paleo diet.

Actually, in my case, it’s more a cross between the Paleo and ketogenic diets. In the Paleo diet you eat plenty of meat and avoid carbs and sugar. In the ketogenic diet the focus is more on consuming as much fat as possible – the perfect ratio is something like 4 to 1 in favour of fat versus protein and carbs. So that means plenty of double cream and butter, lard and so on.

Like Roissy, I have been unable to stay away from beer. Fortunately, my ancestors were all Northern European and must have drunk a truckload of the stuff. I have tried to substitute for whisky as much as possible, as it is zero-carb. And wine, too, which is low-carb.

I’ve only been on this for about two months. And I haven’t been really strict. But pretty much on track.

Weight loss has been something like a stone (14 pounds). And much has been off the gut, as I’ve lost about a belt notch and a half. I seem to have kept my muscle, too – unlike a period about 5 years ago when I exercised a lot and half-starved. I got the hipster-look, then, more or less, but it didn’t particularly suit me. My face got a little too gaunt and sharp.

But I'm not going for that now. I want lean muscle. So anyway - I've been getting very thirsty, at times. And I've wanted to drink more alcohol. My energy levels are good, but what’s really happened is that I have a shit load of nervous energy that I didn’t have before. I guess my testosterone levels are up, as I’m more contrary than ever. My dreams at night are more vivid, and I wake up earlier – although I mostly feel compelled to go to sleep earlier, too.

But yeah, my mood – like I said, I think my testosterone levels are up. And this doesn’t make you feel “good” in the sense that eating a pie or a pile of spaghetti would. I feel like I’ve been removed from a comfort zone, somehow. It feels like a loss, of sorts.

It has been shown that carbs are addictive. And so the withdrawal may be much like a withdrawal from drugs. This is not a flippant comparison – the effect on my emotions has been interesting, to say the least. And it is probably the case that carbs are just another thing that keeps the populace docile and happy with their lot. Just like prescription drugs, TV sports and soaps, and so on. And like those, they are all brought to us by Too Big to Fails, Big Pharma, Big Agriculture, Big Corporate Media etc.

So I’m going to stick with the lifestyle. It seems the perfect nexus of improving health whilst Sticking it to the Man. Dietary fat is the red pill.