117: Navigating Low-Carb Diets: The Hidden Dangers and Sustainable Solutions for Entrepreneurs

This quick and informative episode challenges common perceptions about low-carb diets, exposing their temporary benefits while highlighting long-term health risks. Learn how to create a balanced approach toward sustainable health, focusing on whole foods and mindful eating practices without neglecting the importance of carbohydrates. 
• Discusses the allure of low-carb diets during New Year's resolutions 
• Differentiates between simple and complex carbohydrates 
• Explores hormonal shifts and energy crashes related to low-carb dieting 
• Examines the impact on thyroid function and mental health 
• Advocates for a balanced and sustainable approach to nutrition 
• Emphasizes the need to listen to your body and adapt your diet accordingly 
• Offers strategies for incorporating variety and healthy fats in meals 
• Encourages intermittent fasting as a complementary practice 
• Warns against the risks of muscle loss on low-carb diets 
• Calls for a re-evaluation of health priorities as the New Year begins

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Chapters

• 0:00 The Impact of Low Carb Diets
• 14:51 Sustainable Nutrition for Optimal Health

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

It's that time of year again, new Year's resolutions are in full swing and for many, the go-to solution for better health is cutting carbs. Low-carb diets like keto and Atkins are tempting because they promise quick results, better focus and reduced cravings. But before you commit to a low-carb lifestyle as your New year health strategy, let's dive into the long-term implications. Are you unknowingly affect your energy and hormonal balance, and what you can do to build a sustainable plan that supports your health for years to come. Stay tuned.

Speaker 1: 0:55

Hello, I'm Jeffrey Mort. If you're like most entrepreneurs, you're busy taking care of business. Yet who's taking care of you? If you're ready to take your energy and performance, take care are limitless. I'm grateful you're here. Yes, always grateful for you joining me here today as we wrap up another year and dive into a new year. I'm grateful for you joining and being part of this podcast and being a faithful listener. All we ask is that you can go over to your favorite podcast platform and leave us a review at the end of the year and a good one at that and let us know what you like about the podcast. And if you want to reach out to me directly, there is a send us a message feature in the show notes that you can use there.

Speaker 1: 1:56

So let's talk today about the short-term appeal of low carb diets. That's right, low carb diets. They're popular for a reason, and that's because they work fast. By drastically cutting carbohydrates, your body shifts into what's called ketosis, using fat for fuel instead of glucose. But that's not entirely true. We're going to talk about that in just a little bit. But this metabolic change often leads to things like rapid weight losses, which most people are looking for, reduced hunger and cravings, which they want as well, and improved focus and mental clarity. But for entrepreneurs those quick wins they can be appealing Like who doesn't want more energy and sharper focus to tackle their goals in their business. But here's the kicker Many of these benefits are temporary and you know I'm not opposed to the low-carb diets for short-term. But we'll talk about that.

Speaker 1: 2:56

Let's clarify first of all, simple versus complex carbohydrates. Not all carbs are created equal, and understanding the difference is absolutely crucial when you know. When people say carbohydrates, I often wonder are they talking about simple carbohydrates or complex carbohydrates? And here's the difference simple carbs are found in sugar, pastries and processed foods, and these are quickly digested, leading to rapid spikes and crashes in blood sugar. Now those are the carbohydrates that I do not recommend to anybody myself, my clients, my children, family, anybody. Now complex carbohydrates, on the other hand, they're found in whole foods like brightly colored fruits and vegetables, whole grains and legumes, and these digest more slowly, providing steady energy and essential nutrients. These are the good guys, these are the good carbohydrates. So the problem isn't carbohydrates themselves, it's the type of carbs that you consume.

Speaker 1: 3:58

A low carb diet often restricts both simple and complex carbs, which can deprive your body of key nutrients needed for energy and longevity, and we're going to talk about that as well. Now that we've cleared that up, let's dive into how low carb diets impact your shirt, your short and long-term health. So the hidden costs of going low carb are number one hormonal shifts. So while low carb diets can initially stabilize insulin and boost fat burning, long-term use can disrupt hormonal balance. That's right. Prolonged low carb intake can increase cortisol levels, which is your body's primary stress hormone. So elevated cortisol can worsen fatigue, it can impact mood and stability, it can affect your sleep and it can interfere with overall hormonal Harmony.

Speaker 1: 4:59

Number two energy crashes. Over relying on fat as your primary fuel source can lead to dips in energy. Many individuals on a low-carb diet report feeling sluggish, especially during high-demand periods, and nobody wants that. For entrepreneurs, this can mean fewer productive hours and less focus on what truly matters, and we're going to get more into the energy cycle in just a couple of moments here.

Speaker 1: 5:27

Number three thyroid function. Thyroid hormones regulate your metabolism and long-term low-carb dieting can suppress their production, which can result in things like fatigue, even weight plateaus. So totally counterintuitive of what we're going for here on, you know, on diet, on a restrictive diet also a drop in vitality. Again, your thyroid is the governor of your metabolism, the governor of your energy, so that can be detrimental to your vitality as well. And then number four mental health effects. Yeah, that's right. Carbs aren't just fuel. They are vital for production of serotonin, which stabilizes mood and promotes happiness. Serotonin is your happy hormone, so chronic carb restriction can lead to increased anxiety or feelings of even depression. I've seen the data that proves this in clinical practice, using at home functional lab testing like the Big Five Bundle or the Vitamin Tox Test Starter Kit that shows how detrimental low carb diets can be to overall balance and well being. So what about longevity? We mentioned longevity earlier.

Speaker 1: 6:45

If your goal is to build sustainable health and wellness, then balance is the key. Long-term adherence to restrictive diets can decrease your body's resilience, can limit essential nutrients like fiber, antioxidants, vitamins found in fruits and whole grains, and can also cause unintended consequences like nutrient deficiencies, im imbalances in minerals, vitamin deficiencies, things like that, and this can impact not just your energy but your ability to thrive as a high-performing entrepreneur over time. Now I want to give you a plan here, but of course I'm not giving you any medical advice or medical treatment plans or anything like that. But what I do want to give you is a balanced approach to nutrition, just a really broad brush balance approach here. Uh, you know, in my practice over at love and eg wellness, we use the lab testing to be able to pinpoint the imbalances and then we can give a bio individualized, a personalized wellness plan to each client over there. This is just a broad-branch balanced approach to nutrition.

Speaker 1: 7:54

So, instead of restricting carbs entirely, you may want to consider a more sustainable approach, such as, number one, prioritizing whole foods, so swapping processed carbohydrates for whole complex carbohydrates that release energy gradually, as we talked about at the top of the program. Think sweet potatoes, think quinoa, think oats, especially organic oats, and you can know if these things are beneficial for you or not by running what's called a, an IgG food sensitivity test that tests over 190 foods to look at a delayed when I say delayed that's like 24 to 72 hours delayed immune response that could cause inflammation in the body. So you know you could be eating sweet potatoes but have a food sensitivity to them and not even know that. And that can go for things like spinach and strawberries and grains and all kinds of things. And then of course you know gluten, eggs, dairy chicken, almonds. Those are all the top five food sensitivities that are the most common. But that food sensitivity test can be done right at home and can really help dial in the diet and prioritize the right whole foods for your body.

Speaker 1: 9:11

And then that leads us to number two listening to your body, tuning into how you actually feel. If your energy dips or your mood declines, you know a day, two days, three days after being on a low carb diet or eating something different, it's a signal to adjust not just your diet but all of the important categories of the de-stress protocol that are taught at the Integrative Health Practitioner Institute. So de-stress, diet, exercise, stress reduction, toxin removal, rest, emotional balance, science-backed supplementation success mindset. It all plays into balancing out the body and listening to your body. So if you're leaving a workout with less energy than you went into it with, then you probably did too much in that workout. So I'm not going to go too deep into the de-stress protocol. You can go back to episodes, the even episodes starting with episode 12. So we're going way back here in the Breaking Boundaries podcast, but 12, 14, 16, 18, and so on, those ones brought you through the de-stress protocol and I did that on purpose with creating a catalog, a library of podcast episodes that you can use as a resource to be able to help you dial in and listen to your body.

Speaker 1: 10:27

So, number three, focus on variety Incorporate brightly colored, organic fruits and vegetables. So use the Clean 15 and Dirty Dozen shopping list to be able to know which fruits and vegetables that you can buy non-organic, that tested lowest or the cleanest for lack of pesticides. That's done by the Environmental Working Group every spring, so we'll be coming up on the 2025 testing and they'll be publishing that somewhere around March or April, I believe. So, brightly colored fruits and vegetables, healthy fats like avocado and extra virgin olive oil. You know, when it comes to healthy fats, those are really the top two right there Avocados and extra virgin olive oil. Extra virgin olive oil would be organic, of course, first pressed, cold pressed in a glass bottle, a dark bottle, so it's not, you know, getting any sunlight, and high in polyphenols if it could be labeled as that. And what else? For, focus on variety Lean proteins. Lean proteins like wild-caught salmon, pasture-raised poultry can definitely be beneficial for you there as well, and incorporating these all into your meals.

Speaker 1: 11:48

A diverse plate supports hormonal balance and energy production. You can also consider the stress mood metabolism test to see where those hormones are at. That's very, very important. And this is done not with blood work but with a saliva test. Because when hormones are tested through blood work, but with a saliva test, because when hormones are tested through blood work, they are bound to proteins and actually very inaccurate um for the availability, the bioavailability, of those hormones. So saliva is actually a better medium to be able to test those hormones with, and that's what we use in our private wellness practice. This can be done right at home, the privacy of your own home, to be able to look at hormones such as cortisol, estrogen, progesterone, testosterone, dhea all the important ones for how you're feeling in your mood. That's why it's called the stress mood metabolism test.

Speaker 1: 12:38

And number four embrace intermittent fasting. So pairing fasting with a balanced diet can activate something that's called autophagy and you've heard me talk about this before if you've listened to the podcast for a while. Autophagy is your body's self-cleaning process without the need for extreme carb restriction. So for most people, 12 to 14 hours of an overnight fast is ideal. You may want to consider using a continuous glucose monitor to understand how your lifestyle choices meaning diet and exercise, stress levels all affect your blood sugar.

Speaker 1: 13:16

Now, your blood sugar. Why is this important? Because blood sugar, glucose, is needed to produce energy as adenosine triphosphate. So now we're getting into a little bit of biology here or pathophysiology, but the ATP, adenosine triphosphate as you may or may not know, is the currency of energy that your body utilizes and that is derived from glucose. So you you may or may not know that glucose is converted from complex carbohydrates. That's right.

Speaker 1: 13:52

So low-carb often results in low energy, and something else that you you'll be surprised at is low carb can also cause muscle loss. So a lot of times on a low carb diet, the weight that is lost is not visceral fat in the body, but it's a lot of times comes from muscle loss. And the reason is this because the body prefers glucose for energy rather than ketones for energy. So the body is going to tap into those glucose reserves. And where is it reserved? Well, a little bit of it is reserved in the liver. So it's going to use that up first, and then it's going to go after the glucose that is stored in muscle tissue, and so that creates muscle loss. So a lot of times the weight that's lost is actually muscle that's being lost, and that's the reason why because the body is smart and it wants that glucose before it taps into ketones.

Speaker 1: 14:51

So before you resolve to cut out carbs for the new year, ask yourself is this sustainable? And I just gave you all the reasons to answer that question. Will it give me the energy and balance I need to thrive in the long term? At love energy wellness, we believe in a holistic approach to nutrition that honors both your short-term and long-term goals and vitality. So, ready to take control of your health and wellness, join our love energy wellness community for our seasonal detox group to reset your body and your mind and learn sustainable strategies for optimal health, or visit our transform page to get started on your own anytime. Remember your health is your greatest asset and balance is the key to unlocking your full potential. So until next time, stay healthy, stay balanced and keep breaking boundaries.