Amadeus Schmidt wrote:
>
> Kathleen wrote:
>
> >... ketosis... after 3-4 days with deep cracks at the sides of mouth
> >and leg cramps (I'm a very rare variant of AB neg).
>
> If you have cracks at the mouth sides than your body has such a
> severe vitamin lack that it isn't even able to maintain the
> integrity of your skin, your outside boundary!
> Protein alone isn't enough for growth and maintenance.
> Heavy vitamin supplements are are option to come out of the first
> severe lack.
Vitamin supplements is one possibility, highly recommended to somebody
on a ketogenic diet because food choices tend to be limited (don't have
to be, just tend to be) and food tends to be cooked, destroying some
nutrients. The other may be increasing your intake of fats containing
essential fatty acids (fish oils, flax oil, some other oils and/or nuts).

> Ketosis: if your body doesn't get any carbs, it'll produce ketone
> bodies (can be smelled) and will start to convert protein to carbs.
Ketone bodies are ALWAYS produced in the body, they are usually burned
very quickly in the presence of carbs. It's very rare that their
concentration reaches so high that the body starts expelling them
through breath so they can detected by smell. One has to be in very
deep ketosis (and fairly highly dehydrated to boot). Conversion of
protein to carbs is not dependent on the presence of ketones.

> The ratio is about 2 lbs meat for the 180g of carbs *used* per day.
> (Probably in ketosis the brain nutrition is also at a reduced
> carb consumation which may reduce the minimum carbs some percents)
After adaptation (which takes about 3 weeks on ketosis) the bodys
requirement for glucose (without high intensity excercise) drops
to about 40gm per day. Since 58% of protein gets converted to glucose
whether you want it or not a person on a typical keto diet will
get enough protein to fill the need for glucose. During the first
3 weeks of a keto diet one may want to increase protein intake
to prevent lean tissue loss due to conversion to glucose. Then again,
if one is sufficiently overweight so he/she wants to lose some lean
tissue weight as well, this may not even be an issue. (Most
seriously overweight people also have quite a bit more lean tissue
than an average person).

Ilya