I'm starting to feel more rested. I had a fabulous 11 hour sleep last night. It was glor-eee-ous. Since I'm back and I have less than 10 days before my MRI I wanted to hit my restricted ketogenic diet hard, but my blood glucose numbers were wild. I don't know if being on the restricted ketogenic diet causes your body to become more sensitive to insulin or perhaps desensitizes you, but it has been insane. Before I headed out to Friday Harbor last week I had an episode where my blood glucose fell so low that I felt like I was having a seizure. We believe it was not a seizure though, just a severe hypoglycemic attack. It was very scary. Because of that episode, we decided that while on vacation I was not going to be fasting or restricting calories, or being nuts about food choices. As you know from the previous post, my body was all messed up from traveling and excessive excitement, so it's probably a good thing that I wasn't being crazy about my food too.
Yesterday, back on my regular plan, I was freezing and very dizzy. I wasn't even doing anything, I was sitting down. I quickly decided to check my blood glucose and it was 45. That is dangerously low. I was having problems thinking, it was confusing me to even work my blood glucose monitor - I couldn't figure out which end of pricker thing to draw blood. I immediately ate 2 ounces of nuts (that's quite a bit), and it caused a temporary rise of 13 points, then within moments I was back down to 51. I couldn't stabilize my numbers for the life of me. Worried I was going to endure a hypoglycemic seizure, I ate half of a banana (definitely not ketogenic). I don't know what's going on in my body, but this tumor killing blood glucose range of 55-65 for Seyfried is very, very tricky. And if you're not careful, it can be dangerous.
I know I can figure this out, and I know it will continue to get easier so I'm not worried, but I figured I'd share my experience in case anyone else out there trying to do Seyfried's plan had encountered similar problems. It's very tricky playing with low blood glucose when you already have a seizure problem. Almost like playing with fire. But if we didn't play with fire we wouldn't have much of our food. Know what I mean? And I know that it's important to keep my blood glucose very low in order to keep circulating glucose low so that I minimally feed the tumor. I say minimally because it's impossible to completely limit glucose. Our body creates glucose from excess glutamine (protein), and also I've read that our bodies can convert one of the triglycerides from fat (not much, but still important to know - that's why you can't eat unrestricted fat) into glucose. Anyway, I'm getting too detailed, which can get boring. It's all stuff that you'll read about if you choose to get into this lifestyle. In fact, here is the most comprehensive website that I've ever found about the KD. It is inspiring, encouraging, informative, and I enjoy rereading it often just to boost my excitement about the program. This diet is fabulous for anyone, it benefits cancer patients, those with Alzheimer's disease, diabetics, those with seizures, and so much more. The information is fascinating, whether or not you want to follow it. Enjoy! http://www.ketogenic-diet-resource.com/
It's too bad this restricted ketogenic diet is so clearly proven and undeniable. Carbs are delicious :) I can't help but notice the similarities between carbs and cancers, and the brain, with seizures, Alzheimer's, mental health, migraines, and of course diabetes, and so much more. We are killing ourselves with carbs and sugar. The carbs and sugar aren't just making us fat, it's literally causing diseases, and cancer, and brain metabolism issues. Looking at it now, it has become obvious to me. There's actually a new prescription "food" named Axona which helps people with Alzheimer's disease. It boosts the body's ability to create ketones so that the brain has more food. The Axona website says that the side effects from Alzheimer's are due to the brain's inability to metabolize glucose. So, if you're on a standard diet which is all about glucose and no ketones, the effects of Alzheimer's are going to worsen. However, if you switch to a ketogenic diet it will lessen (theoretically - I am not a doctor) the side effects, strengthen the brain, and possibly even heal the brain a little. There is a lot of research out there, and most doctors don't know anything about diet. (Blah, blah, blah, "heart healthy diet" - no bueno, that's actually the opposite of what you should be eating.) I'm not trying to be rude, it's just a slow process to integrate new research into hospitals. Practicing doctors are very busy and usually aren't researching up-and-coming stuff. Anyhoo, just wanted to throw that out there in case you hadn't heard that the ketogenic diet can help a lot of conditions (not just brain cancer). I hope this info helps at least one person. :) I can't say enough how I wish diet didn't matter, that we could eat whatever we wanted and there would be no repercussions, but it just isn't so. The good news is that we can help heal ourselves (to a certain extent), and that is empowering.
As a side note, people with Alzheimer's don't have to get the prescription Axona powder, they can just get on the ketogenic diet. There's no trick, it's just the pharmaceutical company found a way to make money off the 4.1 ratio of fat:carb+protein. Just wanted to throw that out there. It certainly does provide another tool in the belt though!
My glucose has rarely been at 45, and I don't feel bad at that level. Seyfriend mentions one of his (probably young) lab assistants who got down to that range frequently with no ill effects. Of course, your symptoms would suggest it was too low for you. I would think trying to keep your diet fairly consistent might help. I tend to rotate through the same 5 choices over 5 days (although this was to offset tendency to food allergies as opposed to targeting erratic glucose) - lunch is a repeat of the previous nights dinner, and I rotate through 5 protein choices - lamb, venison, goat, halibut, rabbit (I use D'Adamo's blood type diet to fine-tune my choices). This tends to keep me somewhat stable, although I have to keep the daily calories VERY low to keep glucose low, even at strict 4:1 ratio. It does get boring after a while, and I'm planning to look in to diet cycling. It's a tough regimen! We should give ourselves credit and be very gentle with ourselves.
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