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My St Croix Vacation and Diet
This February 2019 I took a vacation to St Croix. Typically I eat a low carb or ketogenic diet. When you go on vacation though you should enjoy yourself and not worry too much about what you eat. I practice what I preach in that respect. Besides, it is pretty hard to eat the way you eat in the US on an island that is basically a third world county. I must admit that St Croix does have some 5-star eating establishments. The grocery stores are what your limiting factor is going to be.
On a 7-Day vacation to St Croix from Colorado you basically spend the first day traveling and the last day traveling about 12 hours each day. During my vacation, I ate a cheeseburger with the buns, dessert practically every night, and had lots of rum with ginger beer or tonic. One of my favorite meals is conch fritters. This is basically breaded conch that is fried. I am sure I got a healthy dose of trans-fats in that. I also did not really restrict my feeding window like I usually do. I ate some breakfast on some days and I ate some lunches as well as eating dinner every night.
I have been keto-adapted for a couple of years now. I was curious to see how long it would take me to get back into ketosis following my extravagant week of eating anything I wanted. We arrived back home Tuesday night at midnight with my last meal being Sushi at the Miami Airport and I did eat all the rice.
Day 1 Wednesday morning keto numbers
I got Wednesday morning at 6 a.m. I was still on St Croix time and felt a bit groggy. My ketones measured 0.3, my glucose was 6.1, and my glucose Ketone index what’s 20.3. that is the highest glucose Ketone index I have seen on myself ever. My glucose converts to about 111. I was surprised to see that while I wasn’t in nutritional ketosis my body was still producing ketones. I was not surprised to see that my fasting glucose was elevated in the morning because I do have a pretty strong dawn phenomenon.
I had a glass of water with a tablespoon of apple cider vinegar. I do this pretty regularly and I find that it blunts my apetite. I did my normal stretching routine and then a short 10-minute meditation. I then proceeded to make my normal bullet coffee.
My bullet coffee has 2 cups of organic coffee, two teaspoons of ghee, a tablespoon of MCT oil, two teaspoons of raw organic cacao, a pinch of cinnamon, and a few drops of stevia. I proceeded to get some work done after that. I did do a cup of chicken stock with turmeric and Himalayan salt added to it. I also had several cups of tea with stevia. I managed to get a short walk in before going back to work.
In the afternoon I had another bullet coffee and chicken stock with turmeric and salt. Just before 5 p.m., I checked my numbers again. Glucose dropped to 5.1, ketones went up to 1.1, and my glucose Ketone index was 4.63. that is a pretty hefty drop from 20.3 to 4.63. At this point, I really could break my fasting mimicking diet but I’m going to keep it for another day just to see where my numbers go. I was really tired by 8 pm so I made it an early night. I’ll let you know how I do tomorrow.
Quick review on glucose Ketone index
You would want an index less than one if you were treating epilepsy or cancer. This is a fairly difficult level to get to and maintain. If you are between 1 and 3
you would be in high ketosis and this would be ideal if you were trying to reverse diabetes or were an obese person trying to lose weight. A level between 3 and 6 would be moderate ketosis and would be ideal for treating insulin resistance. Between 6 and 9 you would be in low ketosis and that would be ideal for optimal health maintenance. Over 9 you are not in ketosis. By the way, the Standard American diet will give you a GKI of over 60.
Day 2 Thursday keto numbers
Thursday morning I got up around 6 a.m. I did my normal glass of water with a tablespoon of apple cider vinegar. I did my normal stretching routine and it went for a short walk. I decided not to check my ketones in the morning and would wait until right before I broke my fast. It does get tiring
poking your finger constantly. During the course of the day, I had two bullet coffees, a couple of turmeric ginger teas, and two cups of chicken broth with Himalayan salt, pepper, and turmeric.
At 4 pm I checked my glucose and ketones.
Ketones 2.1
Glucose 5.2
GKI 2.48
You can see that my ketones came up nicely. I find it kind of interesting that my blood sugar isn’t lower. 5.2 is equivalent to 95 in the American system. I broke my fast with a very large salad. I make my salad with spinach and baby butter lettuce, Napa kimchi, radish kimchi, fermented beets, sauerkraut, broccoli sprouts, pine nuts, guacamole, a sliced hard boiled egg, 2 tablespoons of olive oil and 1 tablespoon of balsamic vinegar. One nice thing about fasting the way I do is that you can immediately resume eating. If I were to water fast then I would have to ease into eating.
My Dinner after my Fast
Two hours later I ate a full dinner of seafood paella.
You can follow the link to see my paella recipe. I do use cauliflower rice instead of real rice. I did enjoy a couple glasses of wine with my meal and a cocktail after my salad. I made a coconut ice cream with blueberries, dark chocolate chunks, and walnut bits. I used organic local honey to sweeten my ice cream. Here is the recipe for that.
Day 3 fasting aftermath
My daily morning routine is pretty similar day to day. I was curious after breaking the fast last night what my numbers would look like today. So before I started with my evening salad at 4pm I checked my numbers.
Ketones 2.5
Glucose 4.3
GKI 1.72
OK, I must admit I was surprised at these numbers. My glucose continued to decline to 75 and my ketones actually went up slightly. I did eat around 2200 calories last night. It was more of a low carb meal than a keto meal so the results are even more puzzling to me. On this night I ate a large salad at 4pm and then around 630 pm I had a fairly intensive carb dinner of roasted beets, squash, carrots, broccolini, and shrimp. Once again I had my ice cream and several glasses of wine. Since I did just return from St Croix I put a bit of rum in my ice cream. Just for fun tomorrow I will check my numbers again. As you can see I pretty much live my life by eating in a restricted time window. When I was in St Croix and did eat my meals at all hours of the day which is not typical for me.
Day 4 Fasting aftermath
Normal daily routine and checked my numbers at 330 pm.
Ketones 2.1
Glucose 4.5
GKI 2.14
With my glucose at 82 I am really pleased. I do try to incorporate a 2 day fast every couple of weeks, but I had no idea that it could fix me so quickly after a week of ad lib eating.I am off to make a martini and eat a salad. Stuffed bell peppers for dinner. Thanks for reading.
Conclusion of fasting diet fix
As you can see once you are metabolically flexible you can really get back into ketosis fast. It’s time to stop sugar-coating your excuses not to take your health seriously. If you are prepared to make the necessary lifestyle changes,call us and we can help change you life and health!
You can always join one of our nutrition programs.
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