This is topic Ketogenic diet shows great results. in forum Medical Questions at LymeNet Flash.


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Posted by droid1226 (Member # 34930) on :
 
So I've gotten into this because Tim Ferriss (author of "The 4 hr Work Week") had some pretty bad lyme symptoms & he decided to try & manage it through diet alone.

He monitors his his level of keytones throughout the the but he has remained very productive & completely eliminated brain fog.

For me, it doesn't make me feel good but it does make me feel terrible when when I'm not on it.

Pubmed shows amazing results. Apparently the Ketogenic diet was/is the first line defense for different types of epilepsy but we choose pharmaceutical management instead.

http://www.charliefoundation.org/explore-ketogenic-diet/explore-1/introducing-the-diet

I know most of us are already on an anti inflammatory, low sugar, anti-everything diet. But keeping your body in a state of ketosis has shown big results in cancer & parkinson's as well mitochodrial/metabolism disorders.(<<autoimmune disorders like lyme)

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25666556

It's also anti inflammatory

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26011473


A side effect of it is extreme weight loss so probably not great for those that are underweight. Incredible results for overweight people.
 
Posted by WPinVA (Member # 33581) on :
 
The Ketogenic diet is generally used in epilepsy when meds don't work. And it is supposed to be very effective. However, there are downsides too. While it may sound more appealing than drugs, the diet is deficient in a variety of nutrients and requires a lot of monitoring. It is used under close supervision with the guidance of dietician, doctors, etc. So please ask your doctor first before trying it!

One recent development in epilepsy is to do a halfway approach by limiting carbs or going gluten free. Apparently some families didn't fully comply with the ketogenic diet and still had good results. That's for epilepsy tho not for Lyme.
 
Posted by droid1226 (Member # 34930) on :
 
Maybe nourishment could be supplemented through juicing. Side effects from benzos & other seizure meds can be irreversable.

We just read a story about neuroblastoma & the 27 yr old girl chose assisted suicide. I wonder if this diet was even mentioned when she went through chemo. Studies show incredible results.

I just think it's sad that it was a first line defense, until pharm's came along. If I would have known about this, I would have tried this instead of a benzo that I got put on for seizures.

I know it's near impossible to follow this diet & I know it can't heal lyme. But I also know that their are many lyme sick people who refuse to change their diet when they could have manageable symptoms. Instead they choose a less disciplined (which I understand) diet which leads to being very symptomatic.
 
Posted by Andromeda (Member # 45866) on :
 
I tried to do this diet, it was really hard

My body would go into ketones, I'd get almost a sweet, bad breath... And then I'd eat something like yogurt, with too much sugar and I'd get knocked out of ketosis. I gave up, it was too much to do while sick.
 
Posted by SacredHeart (Member # 44733) on :
 
droid I have had to work on my diet slowly. Just my nature. I gave up sugar before the lyme diagnosis. Finally totally gluten free. Now I'm working on dairy. I'm doing no milk.

Cheese will be next. I need to find a good substitute.
 
Posted by Brussels (Member # 13480) on :
 
I know a person who said his candida went dormant only with that ketone diet and it didn't come back.

I couldn't stand more than a couple of days on it. I felt my organs were dissolving, disappearing, an awful feeling of going to die.

I love proteins, specially when I have active infections. I somehow do a part ketone diet, but I do consume carbs too. I find that my body cannot convert all proteins to energy so fast as with carbs, specially when fighting so many infections.

I'd rather do a complete fasting than ketone diet. I had less problems with full fasting (only eating one fruit a day) than with cutting totally carbs. I guess, like everything, diets are very personal and change with the course of life, disease.

Wish you good luck on it! Let us know.
 
Posted by Jordana (Member # 45305) on :
 
This is weird. I was just looking into this because I just read that Tim Ferriss had Lyme and then heard he was doing a ketogenic diet.

He didn't really go into why he was doing the ketogenic diet for Lyme.

So I went over to pubmed,which is acting VERY WEIRD today for some reason, but yesterday I spent some time reading about the metabolism of Borrelia.

It appears the only way it makes ATP is through glycolysis. So it needs sugar --any kind of sugar, to survive. This is what they think. We humans have other tricks up our sleeves such as using fatty acids to make ATP, so we can survive without sugar/carbs.

I also watched a presentation by Eva Sapi where she talked about needing a Trojan Horse type of targeted drug that attaches a sugar molecule to the abx so the borrelia colony takes it in as food. That was pure speculation on her part, but it was a little more evidence that sugar is compelling to Borrelia.

The only problem I have with it is that over the long term ketogenics lower metabolism. It is much easier to make ATP out of sugar than it is to make it out of fats. If you are very sick and weak you might just end up making yourself weaker.

But I'm going to try it as soon as this mino herx is done.
 
Posted by bcb1200 (Member # 25745) on :
 
My LLMD (Dr. M) loves the Ketogenic diet.

He has had people go into big herxes from it. He believes you burn up biofilm, etc and get the bugs.

He also recommends the Wahl Protocol. Terry Wahl (MD) had MS and was in a wheel chair and healed herself to full health on a Ketogenic diet.
 
Posted by poppy (Member # 5355) on :
 
Concerned that this is just another lyme fad, of which there have been many.

And it is true that those of us who are too thin already could not do it.
 
Posted by Jordana (Member # 45305) on :
 
I don't think the ketogenic diet is a fad. It's been used for epilepsy since at least the 1950's. It has distinct physiological effects.

I don't think anyone should be ketogenic forever. There are too many things that can go wrong with longterm carb deficiency. It's a medical intervention.

BUT. Absolutely. If anything about your health indicates it would make things worse for you than better, don't do it.
 
Posted by gz (Member # 43818) on :
 
There are many pathogens and disease processes that are dependent on us to feed them glucose through our own dietary carbohydrate. I've had tbd's for many years, but switching to a gluten/grain free (very) low carb diet made a huge difference. I've been eating this way 6+ years.

Ketogenic diet isn't too easy to maintain without proper dedication. To get the physiological adaptations, serum ketones (beta-hydroxybutyrate or B-OHB) have to brought up to and maintained at 0.5 mM or higher (ketones in urine are not indicative of B-OHB levels).

This requires tightly controlled macronutrient ratios, different for everyone. If there are underlying insulin resistance issues then protein often has to be kept pretty low until a certain amount of healing takes place.

Most low carb diets can get the body adapted to burning fat and healing a lot of damage even though they aren't strict enough to induce a constant state of nutritional ketosis.
 
Posted by MichaelTampa (Member # 24868) on :
 
I remember reading some months ago, that one well known doc thought that the ketogenic diet for cancer was not all it was cracked up to be.

I believe this doc felt that it breeds an even tougher cancer than otherwise, due to the fact that it can live and grow without the normal levels of sugar. So there would be short term help, but long term harm.

I think his was Dr. Nicholas Gonzalez, but not sure it was him.

I don't think all believe this, but his opinion counts a lot for me. He had a great level of success in treatment, before he died as part of a series of deaths to quality alternative health care providers.

Not sure if or to what extent this would translate to lyme.
 
Posted by Jordana (Member # 45305) on :
 
yes, the Gonzalez and Gerson approach to cancer is NO FAT AT ALL. I cant quite remember why that is but it's got a pretty ironclad rationale -- partially being that without fats to digest there is more prevalent mitochondrial uncoupling, which frees up energy exponentially in the body to heal.

Cancer is not the same as Lyme, since cancer is the response of cells to mutate. A bacterial infection might require a different protocol.
 
Posted by TxCoord (Member # 9204) on :
 
I am on a supervised low carb eating lifestyle through the VA that has given me an over 70 pound weight loss, stopped the need for type 2 Dia. meds, and decreased my need for BP meds to the extent that I only take them to protect my kidneys.

Almost everyone in the program that is a diabetic has either reduced, drastically, their need for medication or are completely off meds as the diabetes is entirely controlled through the low carb program.

Fat is a necessary "food" as 1. nutritionists are discovering that the "no/low fat" push from the 70's is counter productive. The human brain is mainly a "fat" and when you take away fat from the diet . . .

I do not say this is a diet for everyone, however, every single Veteran in our program that sticks to less than 20 carbs a day has lost weight, improved their medical conditions and have been set free from bottle after bottle of meds.

Caveat: I only know of one person that this lifestyle change was counter productive, but he is not diabetic. (The doctor is trying something different for him).

Here is my typical breakfast - upon which I am losing weight - 2 eggs fried in butter or the fats from sausage/bacon (3-4 pieces/links), cucumber/tomato/olives, cheese.

Lunch is main protein (trying to keep protein around 6-8 oz)chicken SKIN ON, pork (with FAT), red meat (hamburger of the 73-27 is best for this diet - I'll explain why shortly), fish, and other fowl. Veggies - green beans, spinach, avocado, asparagus, spaghetti squash.

Dinner - lighter version of lunch (I often make soup from the drippings from lunch).

No peas, carrots, corn, fruit, starches of any kind (yup, no taters, rice or noodles) as they all contain sugar.

It is impossible to totally eliminate sugar from eating (natural sugar is in a lot of veggies to a certain level), however I do not eat added sugars and especially artificial sweeteners not just because of the chemical problems, but because my body can't READ!

Your body will interpret any kind of sugar or sugar substitute as SUGAR.

When you eat fat and your body goes into ketosis, you will burn fat! Proof? My last two BMI's went like this, in Dec 2014 I had lost 20 pounds total, but TWENTY-TWO pounds of fat!

Friday week (Jan 29th) I had lost (since Dec 2014) an additional 10 pounds total but lost TWELVE pounds of fat!

Measurements from start of program in 2013:
Weight 360
Waist 63" (yes, that means I was 5'3" around!)
Neck 21"
Body fat 51.4%

2016:
Weight 289.7 a little over 70 pounds!
Waist 54.25 - almost one foot loss in size!
Neck 18.75 - over 2 inches lost!
Body fat 41.6% a huge difference!

So yes, ketogenic works for the vast majority of people - especially those with diabetes.

Now how does it affect other medical issues such as Lyme? No one is doing research. No one, because they (CDC et. al.) don't want to know and don't care.

Always, always, always, be monitored by a staff of professionals - not just a doctor. I have a dietary doc, 2 RN's, and 3 nutritionists watching over me. And it has worked
2016:
 
Posted by droid1226 (Member # 34930) on :
 
There's clear evidence that it works for a subset of lyme patients. If you have tried a few protocols & had no success, it's just another tool in the box to battle this illness. There's no black or white answer.

A side effect is losing a lot of fat.

I notice a lot of people who are sick with lyme & they'll instagram or tweet their photos of dinner & it's bowls of rice or potatoes. Those things make me feel so much worse. Idk how they do it.

Also, low carb is mandated my Burrascano in his protocol.
 
Posted by faithful777 (Member # 22872) on :
 
I am actually trying the keto diet. I prefer to call it a way of living, diet sounds terrible!!

I had given up most of the foods not allowed on the keto program when I was active with Lyme and continuef after remission to drop weight.

It is rough in the beginning when you know a bite of something can knock you out of ketosis, but I do generally feel better on it and I love eating fat!!

Easier for me to cut out the bad carbs and stick to leafy greens and veggies. I eat about 80 grams of protein daily and drink plenty of water.

Lost a bunch of weight and am hoping to get the last of it off. I am planning to stick with it indefinitely.
 
Posted by TxCoord (Member # 9204) on :
 
Faithful, that's why Silver and I call it an eating lifestyle. I will let her share (later) what her results have been.

Unfortunately she didn't get a BMI when she started but she can testify to other improvements.
 
Posted by Jordana (Member # 45305) on :
 
The problem is that eventually it messes with your thyroid.

Not that it really matters in this case since your thyroid is probably already very badly messed with.

Shoemaker in his protocol says something similar -- he puts people on a "no amylose" diet because this is the enzyme that's most likely to cause inflammation. Starches can be persorbed out of the intestine and cause, among other things, autoimmune neurological problems.

I suspect that along with the brain healing effects it also has to do with spirochetes finding your pancreas. You can kill the bugs out of there but once that's done the pancreas needs some time off.
 
Posted by faithful777 (Member # 22872) on :
 
I find that my thyroid performs better eating this way. I am hypothyroid and have actually been able to reduce my medication.
 


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