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16:02 · Jan 20, 2025

Watch This If You've GAINED WEIGHT On The Carnivore Diet...

Dr. Anthony Chaffee addresses why some people struggle to lose weight on a carnivore diet, emphasizing the critical difference between fat loss and weight loss. He explains how previous starvation diets and metabolic medications like Ozempic can damage metabolism by causing loss of lean muscle mass rather than fat, leading to metabolic slowdown that can persist for years. The episode reveals how the body's survival mechanisms, demonstrated in studies like the Minnesota Starvation Trial, cause metabolism to adapt during periods of caloric restriction.

The discussion focuses on leptin resistance as a key factor in stalled weight loss, showing how elevated leptin levels can indicate compromised metabolism that takes months to recover. Dr. Anthony Chaffee explains how insulin, fructose, alcohol, and plant lectins all block leptin function, preventing the body from recognizing satiety and accessing fat stores. He emphasizes that health improvements should be the primary focus, with body composition changes following naturally as metabolic health is restored through proper nutrition.

Key Takeaways

  • Measure waist circumference while lying down at belly button level rather than relying on scale weight, as muscle gain can offset fat loss and mask progress
  • Elevated leptin levels from past dieting damage can slow metabolism for months, requiring patience as the body heals on a ketogenic carnivore diet
  • Eliminate alcohol, fructose, and plant lectins that block leptin signaling at the hypothalamus level, preventing proper satiety and fat burning mechanisms
  • Focus primarily on health markers like fasting insulin, energy levels, and medication reduction rather than weight loss, as metabolic healing drives sustainable body composition changes
  • Weight Loss vs Fat Loss on Carnivore Diet
  • How Starvation Diets Destroy Your Metabolism
  • Leptin Resistance and Slow Metabolism Recovery
  • Alcohol and Lectins Block Weight Loss
  • Gender Differences in Carnivore Weight Loss

This is an auto-generated transcript from YouTube and may contain errors or inaccuracies.

why do you think people might be gaining weight or not being able to lose weight on Carnival oh well I mean that that comes up um it's it's actually the exception not the rule a lot of people do lose weight fairly readily we do need to remember that weight is different than fat loss what people want is they want to lose fat they don't want to lose weight so a lot of people mistake the two and so they do things like taking OIC or goie those sorts of things and they they take those drugs and it paralyzes their stomach so they physically can't eat anymore just like if they got bariatric surgery um but then there they're haven't changed their eating habits so they're eating really you know poorly and they lose weight but actually 40% of that weight is actually lean body mass so it's muscle bone healthy tissue that you you really can't afford to lose and then people typically regain that weight but they regain it in fat and so they don't regain their lean body mass and that that's um that's really bad so it's not important to lose weight it's important to lose fat and so when people are exercising they're lifting weights they're have making healthier decisions with their their diet and they might make healthier decisions with their lifestyle as well they could very easily be putting on muscle especially if they're working out um you know actively and so if they're putting on muscle and they're losing fat it might actually offset they may not lose all that much weight at all so may not be an actual St could just be that their their body habitus is is reforming so sometimes people testing their waist circumference which you actually have to do laning down by the way you have to be on your back and then take a tape measure and put that around the level of your um of your belly button and measure it that way that's what's more accurate and so it may be that you're staying the same weight or even gaining weight but your weight circumference is going down down down down down right okay well then don't worry about it you're losing fat and you're gaining muscle okay so that's fine if you are really not changing your body habit it's like you got a dexa scan and you're just like no I'm not I'm not losing any fat that can be um for a few reasons but one of the main ones is that when people are doing all these starvation diets in different sorts of ways of of limiting that what they're eating they're getting surgery they're taking medications they're just starving themselves you're going to trash your metabolism your body doesn't know that you're just trying to slim down and and fit into a smaller dress size your body all your body knows are inputs and outputs and so your your body's telling you it's hungry it needs nutrition and you're not bringing it in there's no animal on Earth that when hungry will not eat their optimal food when it's sitting there in front of them and so it's sending the signal saying hey you're hungry you need to eat and there's no food coming in and so your body just goes right we're in a famine we're struggling it's winter there's something going on here and we need to slow down the metabolism and and we see this there was something called the Minnesota uh starvation trial which a good for an Anil Keys went around starving people like they were in concentration camps probably got a sick joy out of it I don't know I I really don't like the guy obviously some people are much more generous to him um obviously he had to do some good work or else he wouldn't have had a reputation to sell to the highest bidder but I I just I really think that he's done so much harm to the world that he he's really irredeemable but uh the Minnesota starvation trial happened during World War II they want to see okay if you're if people are just really not um if we had to like severely ration if this was a protracted war and um that uh you know how how on how little can people live and what happens after the wordss with refeeding and things like that so they they starved the hell out of people and and sure they they lost a lot of weight but then it plateaued and they stopped losing weight and they were able to maintain you know you know what what you would a figure that you would see in a concentration camp but they were able to maintain that and survive on you food that that should have killed them really and um and uh you know that's because the the the metabolism slowed down and in fact they found in that study that um eating the way they did they were eating so little that if it was just about calories in calories out they would have lost more weight than they started with and just ceased to exist or you know AKA died and they didn't the body was able to adapt and adjust there there's all life on Earth can deal with a famine because there are famines and so all species have been had have had to weather famines at some point even even bacteria have to do this at some at some stage and so if you're not able to do that you die hey guys just want to take a second to thank our sponsor carnivore bar I don't promote many products because honestly all you need to be healthy is to just eat meat for those times that you're out hiking road tripping or stuck at work and you want nutritious snack that is just meat fat and salt if you want it the carnivore bar is a great option so I like this product not because it's just pure meat but also because I want the carnivore Market to thrive as well and the more we support meat only products the more meat only products there will be available in the mainstream so if this sounds like something you'd like to get behind check it out using my discount code Anthony to get 10% off which also applies to subscriptions giving you 25% % off total all right thanks guys right so we do this on purpose and our metabolism slows down if you look at um The Biggest Loser that show they lost a whole bunch of weight the classic sort of thing you know eat two celery sprouts and you know Crush yourself on the elliptical or something like that um in fact I had a lady who was on um that show and she said it was actually really it was a lot worse than that that the producers were really encourag encouraging like disordered eating and and eating disorders and things like that because they just wanted results they just wanted people losing a ton of weight and um but they checked the the metabolic rate of these people and it absolutely was trashed so yeah a lot of people lost weight just like they did in the starvation trials but they absolutely trash a metabolism and then they checked them six years later they'd all regained the weight and their metabolisms had not recovered they were still bottomed out and this is why you get um yo-yo dieting right so you starve yourself for a while you lose some weight but then it plateaus and you're like okay I'm starving myself I'm miserable I hate this and I'm not even losing weight anymore well this is stupid you get very discouraged and you you start eating other ways and then Wham your weight goes up you actually regain more weight than you lost because your metabolism is just depressing your body's like we just went through a famine we need to store up for the winter because that that's just what we're doing you like a bear getting obese for the winter and then sleeping it off you know your body's just like okay well we need to survive we're going into the next famine is right around the corner we need to store everything that we can that's how you survive and so then you're going into into a proper diet that's actually fit for humans and your metabolism is still crushed it can take time to recover uh I check people you know different sort of signs of of of metabolic Health like they're fasting insulin you can check glucose as well um also things like leptin P tiin that's a that's a very important hormone that's a that's a satiety hormone and people that have elevated leptin so they have leptin resistance is what it's called that they all actually find that that's that's that's associated with with a slower metabolism so is higher um you know insulin resistance so higher the insulin the slower the metabolism and the higher the leptin the slower the metabolism as well there's other markers as well there's actually quite a few but those are those are some interesting ones um that you can keep track of fasting insulin if you go ketogenic you go on a ketogenic carnivore diet that will come down fairly quickly and i' I've seen extremely elevated fasting insulin levels that start to correct straight away and even you know massively correct W within a few months and uh but it can take time depending on how high it is but it does come down once you stop eating carbohydrates and all this other garbage so that starts coming down in leptin takes a lot longer than that and so if you have elevated leptin it just understand that you have a slowed Metabolism from whatever Life Choices you've made before and you could be one of these slow burners that you have to wait for that leptin to come down before you your and your in the rest of your metabolism to perk up before you start your body starts letting go of your fat stores so things that can cause leptin resistance insulin blocks leptin it blocks the at the level of the hypothalamus so the hypothalamus and feeds into the pituitary and the hypothalamus and pituitary uh release a lot of major major hormones that then go to testes in men ovaries and women adrenals and both and they stimulate all these hormones coming out very important part of the brain leptin influences that and can actually influence the hypothalamus and the hormones then coming out of it insulin blocks leptin at the level of the H hypothalamus so not only are you feeling like you're starving all the time because letin is the satiety hormone um so you don't know that you're satiated you just keep eating keep eating keep eating because the signals that you're getting from your body is that you're starving and you need to keep eating and insulin is the fat storage hormone so as your insulin goes up you're actually incapable of burning fat people with an insulinoma that secretes a lot of insulin uh they cannot burn fat they just get enormously obese it doesn't matter what they eat because everything that goes into their body just gets stored into fat and people with with um type one diabetes don't make any insulin they could eat 50,000 calories a day they won't put on any fat at all they will waste away until they die right so insulin is the fat storage hormone you start eating carbohydrates that raises insulin you're going to store fat you won't be able to burn fat simple as but okay why is it then when your insulin starts coming down well your insulin could be elevated right so that needs to start coming down before your body's going to be able to access your fat stores once that comes down you can have this derangement with the with your leptin as well and that can be a sign of your other metabolic issues but insulin blocks leptin fructose blocks leptin alcohol blocks leptin and um lectins plant toxins called lectins block leptin and so you need to get rid of all these things and when you do that leptin starts com down that's another thing when people are stalling like oh my blood sugar is this or that's not really working is are you drinking alcohol because it's always assumed I mean it's not meat so you know obviously you're you know you should assume like like well no I'm doing a carnivore diet I'm not having anything else I'm not eating anything else are you drinking alcohol oh I do drink alcohol yes okay how often you drink alcohol oh well I have you know sort of you know three or four beers okay on the weekends or yeah every day yeah know like okay so you know um that's obviously going to have an impact isn't it hey everyone really happy to announce a new sponsor for the show and for everybody down in Australia Stockman steaks who are delivering highquality grass-fed and finished pasture raised beef and other meats flash frozen and vacuum sealed to your door something I've been enjoying a lot of myself recently as well they also have a great range of specialty items such as high fat keto mints and carnivore beef and organs mints with liver kidneys and beef heart as well so so use code chaffy today for free order of beef mints or another specialty gift along with your order at Stockman steaks.com and I'll see you over there thanks guys and so but people don't necessarily think about those sorts of things um so that that's that's one of the things that that we see when you go into a ketogenic carnivore diet leptin even if it's extremely elevated to the point that bariatric surgeons will just say there's no way you can possibly lose weight with diet and exercise it's not going to happen you'll have to get surgery if you want to lose weight that's not true though you can lose weight it just has to be the right diet and exercise it has to be ketogenic and it's better if it's a plant-free ketogenic diet because you're going to cut out the plants with the lectins in it as well and you will see that leptin come down but it takes months if it's especially if it's very elevated and it's and so sometimes people won't lose weight while that leptins up now there's going to be other things going on too with their metabolism and so but that's a a pretty good surrogate marker for your metabolism so as that leptin comes down down down down down once it gets down to uh you th you know low enough point and your metabolism has recovered to a certain extent that's when you see weight just stop start dropping off so I always counsel people and say listen most people lose weight pretty quickly but not everybody does and if you and you know you have high leptin so you could be in that category where it's it's a much more Slow Burn for some reason women uh with elevated leptin are more commonly slower to lose weight I don't I don't know but you know men got the long end of the stick on that one it seems like a lot of men even with high leptin um seem to do okay with with losing uh fat more quickly but a lot of women do too I have I've had women that were in that range that bariatric surgeons would say you know over 100 say there's no way in hell you can possibly lose weight and you know they they' lose you know significant amount of weight you know straight away in the first few months and so and then it just keeps keeps losing weight after that um but if you're if you're in that category where you're not really losing weight straight away you know just understand that that your metabolism takes time to heal and repair and to focus on your health because that's the most important thing I know a lot of people come to these sorts of um ways of eating because they want to lose weight but really this is about your health and as you improve your health you're weight will follow your body habitus will follow and so the most important thing is your health that's what you need to focus on how are you feeling how is your energy your mental your mental health your mental Clarity all these sorts things how's your diabetes doing how's your autoimmunity doing are you coming off medications your blood pressure coming down those those are the most important things very distant second is body composition you could be losing fat and putting on muscle at not losing any weight or even putting on weight most important thing is the health though very distant second is a body composition nowhere on that list is weight because weight doesn't tell you anything about health or body composition and that's that's really important things to remember and they're finding that they're they're massively improving the health of their microbiome um in fact there was um we're seeing this just just all over the place and let many people are publishing this you know Ken Dr kenberry has published this you know benaza has published this um Dr sha omara has published this and in fact Dr sha omara his microbiome was so good that the you know the president or whomever of the company that he used to test this microbiome personally called him and said you have the best microbiome our company has ever tested what the hell are you doing he's like all right I'll tell you and um benaza who's been doing a a clean omnivorous carnal ketogenic diet so
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