AIBU to feel constantly hungry on a low-carb diet?

[Touty]

Been doing low carb for a while now and seems to be the only way for me post middle age

But OMG I’m hungry all the time, like a wolf. I find myself snacking on peanut butter and cheese to keep me going.

Tonight I’ve eaten a whole tray of turkey meatballs, must be about 350g of meat, I’m still hungry.

Any tips?

This is fundamentally misunderstanding how LCHF works. You can't 'just eat some carbs' on keto or you will then not 'be' keto IE ketogenic any more as your liver and blood will be topped up with glucose again and it takes days to get back into fat burning and you feel hungry and headachy during those few days.

By all means don't do LC, choose another method but changing from high carb or low carb can make you feel very unwell. If you choose low carb you really have to go for it.

Op. It's possible that you are hovering at two high a daily carb number and that is increasing your blood sugar slightly above your tolerance which will increase your hunger.

Peanuts and cheese both contain some carbs, peanuts are relatively high in carbs actually so you need to be careful with totals as it gets easy to start slipping.

I would spend a couple of days calculating your intake to double check and rethinking your food if you are too high (50g per day is considered top top end but sometimes having all that in one go can have similar effect)

Otherwise. I have found fasting it intermittent fasting effective in addition/instead of keto and skipping breakfast delays hunger.

Low carb is the only thing that works for me if I’m loosing weight. I followed @BIWIlow carb boot camp and over all lost 5st that badly needed to go.

For me the trick was low carb veggies and lots of them, along with high fat. It’s the fat that helps you feel satiated. If you’re reaching for snacks it may be that your meals aren’t big enough remembering that you don’t need to count calories.

If you are hungry on low carb, you are not eating enough. Make your meals bigger, and eat until you are full. Then when you get hungry, eat another full meal, not a snack. Snacking is part of the problem.
If you want sensible advice that is backed by actual research and medical practice take a look at Dr Eric Westman on YouTube. He does have paid for programmes (I have done one) but ALL the relevant info is available for free as youtube lectures or downloads.
Best wishes.

Increase your fibre. Celery, carrots whatever. It helps trust me!

You need to eat fat. That’s what fills you

Terrible advice. You don’t need fibre. I haven’t had fibre in 5 years and I’m very healthy and regular. I have comprehensive blood tests and scans every year just to see how I’m doing. I have never been so healthy and I am never ever sick, not even a cold

You don't mention your fat intake. In order to change your body to use fats not carbs as fuel you need to eat fat.

@Touty

can you post what you eat in a typical day?

I’m edging back towards low carb. I lost lots of weight, then after we had kids found it hard to maintain - the overall tiredness made me crave a carby hit. Plus it got really expensive and it does require you to spend some time preparing meals compared to making a sandwich and opening a bag of crisps. But I suspect that it’s going to be the only way to tackle the middle aged spread I am developing in my 50s 🙄

Me too, it's very annoying. I could feel very physically full but still not feel like I've actually eaten unless I have some carbs... which then leads to me eating crackers with butter at 11pm because I'm still 'hungry' before bed.

I tried it on and off for years, it simply wasn’t sustainable for me, I liken it to slimming world, you always end up fatter than when you started. There are some who can maintain it, but very few.

Low carb never made me feel full. I was on the bootcamp threads back in the day and everyone else would click into this satiation state a few days in and feel zero hunger but it never happened for me. I lost weight and it was effective from that pov but I was so disheartened that they effectively became fasting threads as people were going until 3pm then having a single boiled egg and saying how full and energetic and clear-headed they were. I ate in abundance on low-carb, lost three stone but felt permanently hungry and tired and grumpy so I couldn't sustain it long term.

Two years on Mounjaro now and and there is no food or food group that's off-limits. I eat everything - carbs, fat, protein, fibre and for the first time in my life, in my 40s, my body feels like it functions normally. I spent my whole life doing either low cal or low fat or low carb and got fatter and fatter and felt miserable all the time. Nothing worked until this.

This is projection, the OP only says she is doing low carb not extreme low carb. Low carb can be sticking to <150g carbs a day, say. Or indeed not counting anything.

Your advice is terrible. Glad it works for you but don't go around saying you don't need fibre, unless you want to look like an idiot.

150 grams a day is low carbon, that amount has a huge impact on your body chemistry including blood sugar levels. If done right there is no hunger. But I also think there's not one way of eating that's right for all.

If you are constantly hungry it is not sustainable. Some people get on well with low carb and some don't.

I do not. All the advice to fill up on protein I follow, am still hungry and so then eat more on top. I could eat an enormous steak and still be wondering where the bread is. You have to adjust these things to suit your own body. I need carbs and lots of fibre (salad, veg, fruit) to feel full.

Bread/pasta bloats me/gives me indigestion so I eat more potatoes and rice so I'm full and have enough energy.

if you do a lot of exercise you need carbs for recovery.

@Touty Are you eating plenty of fat in your meals? That's what will satisfy the hunger.

You haven't actually said what you're eating in a typical day though. If you can give us an idea, we can help.

And also - how much water/fluid are you drinking? That helps too.

I do not associate advice to fill up with protein either low carbon way of eating. Most energy and calories must come from fats, need to drink loads and aim for 500 grams of veg per day, preferring leafy green ones. Reducing carbs and increasing protein is not low carbon LCHF, it's something else.

Are you drinking enough? Could it be thirst rather than hunger? I generally lo (ish) carb and am normally full on it, lots of fiber and fats though, but it feels easier when I drink lots of water too

Agreed. I think target protein for me on low carb is 90g per day, so I don’t eat lots of meat.

I read that too much protein can stall weight loss. There has to be a balance.

It depends how low your carb intake is.

If you're trying to follow keto and keeping your carbs to 20g max per day, you will need to increase your (healthy) fat intake.

If you're 'just' low carbing and aiming for below, say, 50g of cabrs per day, you can increase your carbs but weight loss will be slower. You still need higher fat though.

Personally, I found the fat intake too much doing strict keto but never found myself hungry. If anything, I struggled to eat enough because I wasn't really very hungry at all.

Don't fill up on protein because your body will conver excess protein to glucose to a degree too.

There's a really good fb group i can pm you the name of if you'd like.

Not of you're 'fat adapted' and your body uses fat as its main fuel source

Is it hunger or is it carb cravings? They feel very similar to me and the sugar cravings take a good few weeks to go and if I start eating even a small amount of carbs again they come flooding back.

I think you are missing having piles of low carb vegetables. For example have an omelette with a 3/4 plate full of spinach. You won’t feel hungry for hours.

If you follow keto properly, you dont need a lot of fibre.

A lot of the usual dietary advice is based around people eating a low fat/high carb diet. It changes if you eat low carb/high fat.