Aha Moments.....

I am still hanging on the fact that I had such a hard time eating 700 grams of carbs in Friday. I was so unprepared. You know the saying...I use it all the time..."fail to plan, plan to fail". I hate failing, like we all do, but I try to use my failures as stepping stones and growth opportunities.

One thing that I learned is this...it is not easy eating over 700 grams of carbs without fat in just a few meals. But the biggest thing I learned was how crazy high my fat intake was when I was not watching what I eat. When I used to carb load....I never accurately documented what I ate...I just ate what I wanted for a few days. One of my typical meals on my cheat day would be this:

Lunch at McDonalds

Quarter pounder with cheese
Large fries
Medium coke
3 McDonald chocolate chip cookies

Let's look at the damage of that meal....

Calories 1750
Fat 75g
Carbs 250g
Protein 41g

I would eat this meal in one sitting and then be hungry for dinner and snacks in between. For breakfast I would have pancakes with syrup, bacon, eggs, yada, yada, yada and then for dinner I would go out to eat again. Major damage indeed....and the worst part is that I was really setting my body up for fat storage. I can't believe that I did as well as I did on the UD2 diet when I gorged for 3 days.

One of the biggest issues with pigging out like this is all the fat consumption. I can be pretty certain that my body is going to store all my fat grams as fat when I overfeed. The carbs and the protein are not the big issue really on the cyclic diet. You might ask, isn't a calorie a calorie? The answer is no. In the cyclic program, Monday through Thursday I eat low carbs...less than 50 grams a day. I also eat really high protein and keep my fat grams below 50 grams. Doing this along with a special training routine depletes my muscles of glycogen stores. I keep my protein high to maintain my muscle so that my body doesn't pull from my muscle for energy. Also, it takes more energy for my body to utilize protein in digestion so I burn more calories trying to digest protein. Since I am not giving my body many carbs to use as energy my body will pull from my fat stores for energy....yes!! Just what I want. So during those 4 days I am in fat burning mode by keeping my calories low, keeping my carbs low, keeping my fat low, and keeping my protein high.

Well my body...and yours...is smart. My body thinks I am starving it, so it starts doing all kinds of hormonal crap to prevent me from using too many of my precious fat cells. One thing it does is lowers my metabolism so that I don't burn as many calories a day. Dang it!! That is where the cycling of carbs comes in. By time my body has figured out what I am doing to it....burning that precious fat, I feed it tons of carbs....which makes my body happy. It makes my hormones happy, and my body doesn't think it is starving. So it takes all the carbs and use them. First it fills my glycogen stores back into my muscles.Yeah!! That is where about 300g of carbs go first. Then the rest of the carbs are used as energy to fuel my body. Now this works great if I keep my fat low!!!

Now dietary fat is the devil. It takes ALMOST no energy to digest fat and store it. My body..and yours LOVE fat...because it wants to store it just in case a famine arrives. Unlike protein and carbohydrates...my body will store the body fat readily for future use. It won't selectively pick fat to burn as fuel for my metabolism especially when carbs are available with the fat. So let's look at my McDonald lunch. That meal had a combination of fat, protein and carbs. My body will first burn the carbs for energy. It will also work on breaking down the protein for amino acids and other good stuff. Now...that 75 grams of fat...where do you think that is going??? Yep, it is going to my hips, butt, abs, as storage. Fat will not be used for energy because I have given my body tons of carbs to use as energy. Now do you see why I have to keep my fat low?

So with this cyclic diet I am in fat burning mode for 4 days and muscle building mode for 3 days. All in all, if I do this plan right I will lose bodyfat. When I carb load, the weight will definitely go up....but the cool thing is this.... It is NOT bodyfat weight, it is all water. Because for every gram of carbs I eat, 3-4 grams of water follows the carbs. So on Friday I weighed 133 pounds. Today I weigh 136.2. I am up 3 pounds...but who cares?? It is just water. And when I look in the mirror, my muscles actually look fuller and I look leaner than I did on Friday if I did my carb load correctly. I have abs on Sunday if I did my carb load right. If I overate carbs and fat, my abs disappear and I know that I spilled over in my carbs which will set me up for some fat storage. Sometimes, I do extra cardio if I see a spill over so that I can burn some of the fat that I had maybe stored.

So now I get it. I am going to keep my fat low on refeeds so that I keep losing bodyfat. I dig learning about all the hormone changes that are happening while I diet.

I just learned that low carbohydrate diets affect seratonin levels...lowers the levels...which is probably why I am cranky during my low carb days when I am not taking ephedrine. My ephedrine and caffiene stack help increase my seratonin levels...that is why I feel so good on that stuff. not only does it help burn fat, it helps mood for some people. A win/win!

Picture of my 21 year old son..he will be 21 next month actually

Always has his nose in a book like his mom...lol.