The Schwarzbein Principle Diet Pros, Cons, and How It Operates

Jeez I’m so confused so many people endorsing ketosis, and now she’s saying it’s really bad. I’m sticking with it for now..

She is totally right in everything she is saying. She really knows her stuff. Regarding ketosis: I am an RN and have seen a lot of people die. If they haven’t been eating for some time prior to death, they will have a sweet odor on their breath: ketosis. They are breaking down or cannibalizing themselves. Think about that next time you think about that low carb diet you are eating yourself.

The medical profession is a joke, like a bunch of economists, one doctor says one thing then another doctor says the opposite, high carb, low carb, high fat, low fat, though it is strange that on a higher fat diet a lot of people feel better, more energy, but this is destructive who knows.

I’ve been researching health/nutrition and experimenting with all kinds of diets for 10+ years, and I will tell you this: this presentation (even though it was too short to do full justice), is a literal health gem. I’ve seen vegans restrict fat and protein and run around boasting how great their diet is. Then years later they fall off the diet because they have disease states that are causing them great pain and discomfort (like low energy, muscle loss, digestion issues, always being hungry, etc) Same thing for people on ketogenic/low carb diets (insomnia, loss of libido, constipation, depression, difficulty building muscle, etc). Initially they make progress with some aspect of their weight or health but then, they too, reach a point where their bodies become unbalanced and reach a diseased state years later. She’s 100% right. You can’t push extreme states of physiology and expect to thrive in the long term. You can’t be high insulin all the time OR high cortisol/adrenaline. You can’t take macros or calories to the extreme. Your body will compensate for the shock in the short term but eventually you’ll become exhausted. And everyone then blames themselves for “falling off the wagon” when they can’t sustain these extreme forms of dieting. But that’s just their bodies saying “Enough is enough! Cut that shit out! This is throwing me way off balance!”. Diana is correct. We need more balanced macros with only very modest calorie reductions. That’s why diets like the Mediterranean diet or Zone diet are going to be more recommended by dieticians and trainers than extreme diets like 80/10/10 or keto. Then the weight will come down slowly over time and you’ll get to keep your health and your sanity. Fat tissue works like muscle tissue. When these tissues are stressed, initially they break down and get smaller. But they supercompensate/hypertrophy bigger than before you stressed them in order to DEAL with the stress again in the future. Now, everybody likes the idea of bigger muscles. So we’ll consistently stress them in order to make them grow bigger over time. But nobody realizes that dieting triggers stress to fat cells which (if done repeatedly) makes them grow bigger over time too. That’s why 95% of dieters fail. 1. It’s too exhausting on the physiology to restrict calories harshly in the long term and 2. As soon as you stop, your body goes into “over compensation” to protect you in the future from that level of stress. That’s why diets become less and less effective each time you do them. The body adapts to that level of stress. Eventually diets stop working even when you eat almost no calories because of that repeated bout effect to your fat stores. And you can push your body’s physiology even harder by doing things like fasting for weight loss. But again, you will eventually become exhausted and unable to get results from that too. You can get short term results, but it’s not sustainable. Stress works best when it’s brief. Just like Diana said “stress can help your rebuilding rebuild BETTER”. And it does. Intermittent stress on muscles help them grow bigger. But Intermittent dieting on fat tissue makes it grow bigger too. Even intermittent dry fasting is a stress that creates health when done in the proper amount. The problem is people create a “fad diet” out of it and think “more is better”. They forget that stress can kill you if it’s extreme enough or done chronically. I only wish there were more people like Diana out there to help explain this. But maybe in another hundred years, we’ll all finally get it lol. I mean, right now the keto diet community are scratching their heads as to why their diet is at the bottom of the list of diets that are recommended along with Atkins and the Dukan diet. It’s gonna take a long while before people figure out why that is because they’re too blinded by “keto success stories” and “I dropped 30lb in 3 months” videos. It’s just like Diana said. There isn’t anything wrong with keto in itself as a short term, emergency use, system to keep you from dying in a critical situation. But being in that physiological state long term pushes on the physiology too hard for too long. Insulin and carbs (as well as fat and protein) are important for replenishing and rebuilding so that your body can continue to work and be resilient as you age. I truly hope I get to see more of this science awaken in the future. It’s truly exciting to see the real truth coming to light.

She sure has a lot of knowledge, no doubt about, and she’s very articulate. But me too, wanted to see/hear a podium discussion between her and ketogenic diet proponents. Maybe she’s up to promote her own book/program, but it’s a thought provoking presentation.

Thank you. This explains so much about the problems with the keto craze. The diet gives me panic attacks, but many doctors are crazy about it now. When I try to explain the problem, I get ridiculed and yelled at with no substantive response.

It’s interesting how hard people want to hang onto their low-carb diet, as witnessed in the participants’ questions in this seminar. As a personal trainer and coach, I am always trying to educate clients about the dangers and repercussions of low carb and ketosis diets. I think I’ll just send them these videos! Thank you! The science makes sense!

This would have been a much better discussion had you had a few biochemists in the audience. There are a lot of fallacies in her talk. Her belief of low carbohydrates is less than 100 gm/day. What people talk about it less than 40 20 gms a day. I spent 4 hours last night trying to find research that supports what she is saying. I found all kinds of research supporting the exact opposite. There is a reason why observation is only the first step in the scientific method. You can’t take a biochemical process in a vacuum and extrapolate a whole physiology philosophy. The very first wrong assumption is that there is no insulin activation or is very low in a low carbohydrate diet. That is incorrect. If that were the case people would be dropping like flies. Here is one of the many studies I read last night. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5664869/ Here is another https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20151996

I would love to watch/listen to a discussion between Dr. Schwarzbein and Dr. Ron Rosedale? Dr. Schwarzbein mentioned some studies that indicated that blood sugar and insulin that were too low resulted in increased mortality. Dr. Schwarzbein suggested that lower nitric oxide was the problem because of a reduction in blood sugar and insulin levels. I would like to know to what extent were the medications used in the trial/trials the problem? If diet (lower carb/lower glycemic) and exercise were used (no meds) would increased mortality have resulted? Also, what level of carbohydrate consumption would Dr. Schwarzbein define as low carb? This was an excellent presentation that raises a lot of questions.

I didn’t know indocrinology could be so much fun. Diana talks about all the relevant hormones, not just insulin, not just cortisol, that are involved in health and weight loss.  Great counterbalance for anyone on any diet, fad or SAD.