Ketogenic diet? I am so confused

Interesting article, zogo. I notice it mentions a deficiency of magnesium as being pro-inflammatory and pro-cancer, as well. That is one thing I've been taking daily since my diagnosis (and magnesium will definitely keep you regular, too, Abigail!)

zogo said whole wheat bread has as much sugar as a candy bar.  perhaps but try to find whole wheat bread without refined sugar of some sort.  I've tried.  whole wheat also has protein, there is an organic loaf made without yeast so no sugar needed to feed the yeast, it's a sour-dough so I guess there was some sugar in the starter, gary has said sour dough makes a perfectly okay food toxic.  perhaps, but tasty for sure

they gotta ad a bit of sweet to activate the yeast.  wish I had access to that bread though

Momine, you're right.  (I have baked my own bread for years.)  Sugar and salt are both needed if you are using dry yeast; the chemical reaction between them helps the bread to rise.  Sourdough and fresh yeast don't need the sugar component, but it is often added anyway to soften the "sour" flavour.  I, personally, like the "sour" flavour in sourdough, so I don't add sugar to mine.

Light, yes, that is my understanding as well. However, I do not eat a no-carb diet. I mainly aim to keep the carbs low and stick to high-fibre carbs. I realize that is not ketogenic, but I am not sure that actual ketosis is easy to achieve, nor am I completely convinced that it is necessary. My aim is to keep my blood glucose reasonably low and steady. So far it has improved a fair amount by doing the above.

I am not sure how many carbs are in a serving of this kind of bread. I usually eat a small serving every other day or so. If I eat bread, I do not eat some other starch in that meal. Other times I eat very coarse barley rusks instead of bread, it sort of depends on mood (and on how fresh the bread is ).

I just wanted to add that I'm staying strictly ketogenic and have been for the last 3.5 weeks.  I checked for ketosis on the third day and the stick came back dark purple, so I got there quickly.  For the first 2 weeks my glucose still kept coming back 106--the same as my fasting BS before I started the diet.  Today it was 87--huge relief there, but I've heard that it needs to be even lower for the keto diet to be completely effective--like 60-70's.  No matter--it's headed in the right direction.  I've checked for ketosis about every other day and have never slipped out of it--I must say I'm pretty motivated and I've lost 13 lbs now--not bad for 3.5 wks.  No matter if the cancer goes away tomorrow, I will stay on this until all weight is lost, which is 40 more lbs, b/c fat is metabolically active and causes all kinds of mischief.  I plan to never touch that devil, sugar, again, lol.  

Yes Momine, have told them.  It makes my naturopath doc very happy and the others don't seem to care.  I've read studies that keto is very good for those undergoing radiation therapy but my MO is unaware of that.

Piper, ok, cool! Best of luck with it. Losing some weight is definitely a good way to go with this DX.

Where do you buy the keto sticks?  And is there another way to test besides using these?  I'm intrigued by this type of diet as well, although SpecialK convinced me to go the Virgin diet route first.  I know that as soon as I was dx, I immediately stopped eating out of fear, anxiety and shock (that's how I react to things like that) and I lost 8 lbs.  Of course that was before arimidex, tamoxifen, menopause, etc. so I don't know if I could drop weight that quickly again. But I wonder if I put myself into keto.  As soon as the dx was done, I started looking at diet and found out that sugar is the worst, so I eliminated it all, and went gluten free, and then off came the weight...? 

Claire

Ketostix ~ Walgreens, cvs, Target, Wal-Mart...

I cut them in half lengthwise to make them last twice as long.

For all who are decreasing sugar and weight, this comes from the Life Extension website:  

• Fat tissue is a major source of estrogen production in postmenopausal women. Therefore, there is an association between high body weight and decreased survival in breast cancer patients.
• Obesity and possibly insulin resistance can decrease the levels of sex hormone binding globulin (SHBG) in both men and women and increase breast cancer risk or cancer progression. This is an important factor in estrogen-dependent breast cancer cells because it is adequate levels of SHBG that act as an anti-proliferative and provides an anti-estrogenic effect.
• Obesity can alter liver metabolism of estrogen, allowing the retention of high estrogen byproducts with high estrogenic activity within the body."

Dear all,

I've avoided all grains and nearly all processed sugar for the past 5 weeks. My husband has lost 12 lbs and I think I've lost 3.  It wasn't hard at all to make those modifications. Now I just got the book The Virgin Diet (the author's last name is Virgin, but I joked with my husband that I probably would have to sacrifice a few virgins just to lose the 7 lbs I need to, and keep it off ha ha).  It suggests you eliminate 7 foods from your diet for 3 weeks and nearly guarantees you'll lose weight--a considerable amount.  

So far I've read a few pages and I do see that if I eliminate corn, dairy, peanuts, gluten, processed sugar/artificial sweeteners (however it doesn't say anything about stevia), soy and eggs, I'll lose weight.  You eliminate them for three weeks and then add them back one at a time and see what you weight does...it's based on food intolerance. It seems pretty strict, but I can do anything for three weeks...after all, I did chemo and rads for much longer. I'll let you know how it goes.  SpecialK on these boards mentioned it before and it seems to work for her.

Claire

I think I'll go out and get some test strips, too.

zogo, yep.  I can do this for 3 weeks,but I'm pretty much vegan by choice most of the time, and if I have to stop eating dairy and go for meat instead...yikes.  We'll see. I'm losing--very slowly--by eliminating grains and sugar.  Since that's easy for me, I may just realize I'll lose slowly but surely that way, and keep that as my new "normal" practice. I'm lean as it is which makes it harder to lose, I know.  I just need to get below 19.5% BMI for optimum health--it's where I feel best. 5-6 more pounds.

Abigail 48:

? I've never heard of bloodroot, but I am a believer in naturopathic medicine coupled with conventional medicine. It sounds interesting. And I'm a fan of God, too!

Claire