My experience with Carnivore diet has been life changing, for the better. I’m a 40 year old man with a height of 5’10” and had a starting weight of 270 lbs in July 2020. I went on a Carnivore or the beef only ‘Lion diet’ for about a year and my weight dropped to around 180 lbs. The lowest weight I achieved was 175 lbs by Oct 2021. For the first few months I was losing weight rapidly and I was testing various carnivore acceptable foods, such as eggs, chicken, and pork. I realized that I felt the best when I only ate beef. Any cut from prime ribeye to 80/20 ground and everything in-between, I ate a lot of chuck roasts! Grass-fed/finished didn’t seem to matter so, I saved money. I also consumed black coffee everyday.
During this weight loss time, I did not exercise longer than a few weeks at a time, because each time I started a regimen of running or lifting my weight loss would stall or go the wrong way entirely. From a health standpoint, I felt amazing, I no longer had heart burn or indigestion and my IBS symptoms were non-existent. I still had/have sleep apnea and need my sleep machine every night. According to my biometric body weight scale when I was 175 lbs I still had 22.4% body fat and had 72.1 lbs of skeletal muscle mass with 10.8 lbs of bone. I went from fat and weak to just mostly weak!
From a strength standpoint, I felt weak, I could only do a single chin-up and 10 push-ups were a struggle. At that point, I started running and lifting weights. My body didn’t respond the way I expected, I was tired and felt wore down all the time. So, I increased my fat-to-protein ratio to roughly 75/25 while getting at least 180g protein daily. I added heavy cream and butter to my coffee, added some high fat/protein yogurt and grain-free “granola” in addition to my beef intake. I also supplemented with carb-free protein shakes with creatine and as of June 2023 my weight is 193 lbs with 22.8% body fat, 77 lbs of SMM, and 11.8 lbs of bone mass. I can do 10 clean chin-ups and about 7 clean pull-ups, 50 (perfect) pushups, and can run 5 miles in 40 minutes 16 seconds. Always evolving, I will eliminate the yogurt and granola soon to see how it affects my satiety and feeling of strength.
I had hiccups along the way that would bring sugar and grains back into my diet. But, the way I felt after eating the SAD for even a couple of days really opened my eyes to how dangerous that diet is for me. I’d wake up with a stiff neck, IBS came back, along with the heartburn, I couldn’t run because of my sore knees, I had a total lack of motivation, was super irritable, and had a weird depression. All of this would hit me at the same time.
I want to thank Dr. Baker for his Youtube videos! I finally bought his book! Now lets see what I was doing wrong all this time!
Adam
