When Diet Isn't in Your Top Three: Keto, Priorities and Hunger Control (Summer 2020)

2020-07-12

This is a 26-minute Live I did in my Facebook group in July 2020, my first in a while. I was in the middle of the pandemic, with "COVID hair" and birds yelling in the background. It isn't on YouTube. There's little nutrition how-to in it. It's about priorities, guilt, and why I keep using ketosis even when I gain weight.

In this recording

[0:01] Kicking the video stand, morning hair, and why I took a break from social media.
[0:38] Goals and motivation: people who struggle often fall into a blame-and-guilt cycle.
[1:22] When I hear why the diet slipped, it's usually something huge: a dying parent, a divorce, a move, a new job.
[2:00] My first coaching question: what are your top three priorities, and is weight loss in them?
[2:43] If your top three are going well and the diet isn't, you may simply be prioritising, and that can be appropriate.
[3:22] Organise, delegate or collaborate on the top three to make room for diet, or forgive yourself.
[4:01] Some people find a daily weigh-in motivating; for others it's self-defeating.
[4:38] The pandemic reshuffled everyone's top three: kids home, work changes, favourite places closed.
[5:11] For me, diet and body condition dropped out of my top three. I gained some weight and lost some fitness, and I'm okay with it.
[5:53] A multi-year depression lifted this year, and I put my energy into new things.
[7:08] I'm proud the group stayed on weight loss and off politics through a strange online period.
[11:54] Why I don't advertise total pounds lost: losing 100 and regaining 50 is not the same as losing 50.
[13:24] Why my own weight is a bad benchmark: kickboxing several times a week, no family to cook for, alcohol as my usual cause of gain.
[14:47] What keto gave me more than weight loss: I don't feel helpless about my weight anymore.
[15:59] I use ketosis, not meditation, to control hunger.
[17:10] I'll go 10 or 12 hours and have to remind myself to eat protein.
[17:53] Protein is what protects muscle while you lose.
[18:34] The seatbelt problem: being good at losing weight made me too comfortable gaining it.
[19:24] I'm a food-first traveller, so eating less is a real change for me.
[24:38] "Keep what is useful and discard the rest": you're allowed to be here even if weight loss isn't your goal right now.
[25:22] An open Q&A call, and a separate COVID video kept out of this one.

Watching this in 2026

The top-three question is the most useful thing in this Live, and it isn't about food. If the diet is slipping because you're caring for a sick parent or changing jobs, then you haven't failed. You made a call about what mattered more. You can either free up room by delegating or organising, or give yourself permission to wait (live QTSN8647). Near the end I told anyone who'd gained weight that they still belonged in the group, because self-acceptance and knowledge are what we're here for (live QTSN8647).

I'd keep the honesty about my own weight too. I said plainly that I had gained, that alcohol was usually the reason, and that I wasn't a good benchmark for anyone because my activity and home life were so different (live QTSN8647). Comparing yourself to someone else's numbers usually goes badly, which I'd been saying since 2017 (social media video).

The claim worth unpacking: "I use ketosis to get to hunger control"

My claim here is about appetite, not metabolism. Once I'm keto-adapted, I said, I don't think about food, and the deficit takes care of itself (live QTSN8647). The trials on the ketosis evidence page measure weight, not my experience of hunger, and they're more modest:

In DIETFITS, 609 adults over 12 months lost 5.3 kg on a healthy low-fat diet and 6.0 kg on a healthy low-carb diet, not a significant difference (Gardner 2018). The low-carb arm was moderate, not ketogenic.
Across 13 trials of at least 12 months, very-low-carb ketogenic diets came out 0.91 kg ahead of low-fat diets (Bueno 2013).

Both things can be true. On average, keto doesn't beat other diets by much. Some people, me among them, find it the diet whose hunger they can live with. So watch your own hunger and your own adherence, not the averages.

The muscle point holds up better. In older adults, those in the top protein fifth lost about 40% less lean mass over three years than those in the bottom fifth (Houston 2008). Energy-restricted high-protein diets also preserved more fat-free mass across 24 trials (Wycherley 2012).

The line that holds up: don't count what you can't keep

I refused to market the group on total pounds lost. If someone loses 100 and regains 50, counting 100 is half a lie. But that person isn't a failure either, and the regain doesn't mean keto stopped working (live QTSN8647). That's the most kd-01 thing I said in 2020.

If skipping meals or "forgetting to eat" sounds appealing for the wrong reasons, or you have a history of disordered eating, bring a doctor or therapist in before you lean on hunger suppression.

Key points

Ask whether diet is in your top three. If it isn't, and the top three are going well, that's a choice, not a failure.
Daily weigh-ins help some people and hurt others; know which you are.
Ketosis gives me hunger control. The trials show modest average differences between diets.
Remind yourself to eat protein when you're not hungry; it protects muscle.
You don't need to be losing weight to belong in the group.