Your habits when you are in your 40's and 50's are the foundation for your good health and fitness at 85. Improved diet is the low cost alternative to extensive medical intervention later in life. The body has the ability to heal itself, if we treat it with respect. ANYBODY who adopts a healthy diet, at ANY AGE, will benefit, and as the months go by, those benefits will multiply.

Hot Cross Buns

Two years ago (2014) our household would have eaten perhaps four dozen hot cross buns in the month of April, and there are only two of us.

Last year we might have eaten two dozen or a little more. We were certainly thinking about reducing the carbohydrate in our diet.

A Hot Cross Bun - Forbidden

Last week Carolyn came home with 6 buns in a pack. They didn't look appetizing to me. However, I decided to try one. I sliced it open, buttered both halves, added a few sultanas, and indulged myself. Not quite; it was nice, but not as enjoyable as I anticipated. About 20 minutes later, I felt like I needed another one. That's the trap when you eat carbohydrates. You get a glucose hit, and as the glucose level in the blood falls you crave for more. It was easy to ignore that temptation.

Living in Ketosis

I've been living in ketosis for about five or six months now. The immediate thing you notice is that you are never hungry. I eat more out of habit than necessity. But we often have meals late, and many people in ketosis cut back to two meals a day.

For myself I notice that I don't crave carbohydrates or sweet things at all. But, I do crave things like a quarter apple, or half a nectarine. Very ordinary meals, vegetables and meat, look delicious on the plate. Much more so than my meals used to look. My body knows what it needs, and looks forward to that.

I'm not able to measure my output of ketones. It's too expensive at this time. However, with my daily intake of carbohydrates less than 50gm most days, I'm sure that I'm almost always in ketosis.

My homeostatic setting has changed. I'm not sure, but perhaps it's taken 3-4 months. I know that because now it's very easy to eat this low-carb diet, and not feel that I'm missing out on anything I really want to eat. Yet, if I do on occasion break the diet, I seem to get away with it. For instance at a birthday party. Everyone has to eat the cake. I've found that I can, and my system, which is not insulin resistant, is able to cope with the glucose spike, and tuck that glucose away, without reverting back to a glucose metabolism.

The longer I've been in ketosis the easier it gets.

John Stephen Veitch