But there are also drawbacks to pursuing a low-carb lifestyle – physical, psychological, and social.  Given that many of the drawbacks that I have experienced are the same ones that discourage others from starting or staying with low-carb, I thought in the interests of fairness, I should discuss the drawbacks.

Side effects during transition due to electrolyte deficiencies – I had dizzy spells when I first started eating low-carb, and I didn’t really get them “cured” until I went back and read “Protein Power” more closely, and found out that the body will dump a lot of potassium and sodium (which are electrolytes, along with magnesium and chloride) as it’s dumping the extra retained fluid.  I started supplementing with potassium and magnesium, and eating more salt, and this eventually worked itself out.

Heart palpitations – same thing – some sort of electrolyte deficiency or imbalance.  It worked itself out as I got used to the diet and was taking supplements, but it was weird.  Fortunately, I knew it was diet-related and that I wasn’t having a heart attack.  The main problem with electrolyte deficiencies is that the symptoms are pretty much the same as when you’re getting too much!  So you really have to know how much of them you’re getting so you can adjust your dosages properly.

I had other side effects as well, but I didn’t document them so I don’t remember them!  This is like a lot of other health stuff – your results may vary.  You can pretty much count on experiencing some odd or uncomfortable side effects, so it’s really important to educate yourself on them.

Different body – the body I have now is not the same one I started with on low-carb.  It has just as many quirks but some of them are different ones than before.

I can easily get muscle cramps due to (I assume) a lack of potassium.  I still take potassium supplements on occasion but I still haven’t figured out how much or how frequently is just the right amount.  This is a significant deterrent to exercise (not that I need any deterrents, though).

I seem to be more easily dehydrated, but (like a lot of people) I don’t seem to feel thirst until I really really need it (although I will drink quite a bit if water is sitting right in front of me, fortunately).  I’ve always had a problem drinking enough water, but it’s more of an issue now that I’m not carrying around an extra gallon or so in vivo.

Skipped meals – hunger signals are more subtle now that my blood sugar isn’t surging up and down to unhealthy levels.  So, if there’s nothing in the fridge that I want to eat, it’s a lot easier to snack on a glass of milk or a few crackers with butter or cheese than it is to cook a decent meal.  This is an advantage, of course, when no food is available, but it can be a disadvantage when I just don’t feel like cooking (which is most of the time) and there are no tasty leftovers in the fridge.

Reduced dental hygiene habits – I didn’t realize the extent to which I relied on mouth fuzz to prompt me to brush my teeth until I stopped getting it.  Since I still eat some carbs (including sugar) I still get some fuzz, but not nearly as much as I used to – so the fuzz rarely gets to the point where I feel I absolutely have to brush my teeth.  I don’t have bad breath and I have really strong teeth – so I just don’t have as much incentive to brush my teeth as I used to.  It’s embarrassing to admit this in our hygiene-crazed culture, which makes it all the more important to talk about.  And no, I will not tell you how often I actually do brush my teeth!  But obviously – less fuzz means less decay due to sugar, so I don’t believe I am compromising my dental health.  Here are a couple of great blog posts about preventing and reversing tooth decay in case you get more worried about my teeth than I am.  And good luck finding a dentist who is aware of this information (which should be known by all of them).

Carb cravings – well, this is a problem I also had before low-carb, of course, I just didn’t feel as guilty as I do now when I satisfy them.  I wonder how much of the carb cravings might be due to some sort of deficiency, versus the simple psychology of “it feels good to eat carbs”.  Dr. Michael Eades of “Protein Power” advises people to start or increase magnesium supplementation if they have carb cravings, but I still have the cravings even with supplementation.  I discuss my effort to puzzle out my feedback mechanism for cravings in a previous post, A buzz or a glow?

Lots of guilt and shame – am I craving carbs (especially sugar!) because I am a weak person, or is there something going on physiologically that I just don’t know the cure for yet?  It’s just so easy to assume my frequent desire for ice cream or sweets is “just me” and feel ashamed at my weakness.  It’s also a lot easier to feel guilty/ashamed than it is to devote considerable effort, time, and perhaps money to figure out what is actually behind the carb cravings (if it is other than psychological … or even if it is psychological!).  Of course, there was also constant guilt with the low-fat diet, because even if I followed the guidelines, I was still hungry and wanted more fat/protein – so then, too, the easy assumption was that there must be something wrong with me… which was true … I wasn’t getting enough fat and protein!

Toxic culture – well, this is a huge issue, and has been discussed in so many other media (like this recent excellent post by Dr. Michael Eades (Protein Power))  that I’ll just mention the basics.  Our culture – particularly the media – aggressively criticize a low-carb lifestyle.  Numerous studies showing its benefits are ignored, or worse, skewed into showing no benefit.  Health experts, most with virtually no training in nutrition other than the food pyramid, preach the non-existent benefits of grain-based diet.   Anyplace where food is sold has numerous high-carb, low-fat, no-nutrition products touted as health food.  It’s an upside down world in so many ways, and this toxic culture is one of the most basic, one of the most insidious, and is the single most difficult issue that low-carbers must contend with in pursuing their own good health.

Not a cure-all – I believe that anyone that has done a decent amount of reading about the benefits of eating a low-carb diet could be forgiven for forming an unconscious assumption that low-carb will cure anything.  Every aspect of human health is either directly or indirectly affected by unbalanced blood sugar and by insulin resistance.  While following a low-carb lifestyle will certainly improve many aspects of one’s health (as I have already attested) it can’t cure everything, especially if a health problem has been plaguing someone for years.

This leaves an enthusiastic but disappointed low-carber (like myself) to wonder – am I just not doing it right?  What else could be the problem?  This is especially true for weight loss. I’d bet good money that when people stop losing weight with low-carb, they lose faith in the diet, regardless of how good they feel otherwise.  I certainly did!  Some really good long-term studies on what is going on when weight loss stalls, but the low-carb diet is maintained, would provide a tremendous boost for people who are struggling to maintain a low-carb lifestyle while facing tremendous pressure from their culture, family, friends, and health experts to switch back to a high-carb, low-fat diet.

Conclusion - pursuing a low-carb lifestyle has most certainly been worth it for me and my husband – we are healthier because of it, and if we ever get around to reproducing, our kids will be healthier for it, and much more knowledgeable about optimal nutrition than we were.  I am grateful to all those health care professionals who wrote books and set up websites to get the message out about low-carb diets.  I feel confident now that I, my husband, and our (future) children will not have to suffer from diabetes or other lifestyle-related metabolic disorders, and that gives me some measure of peace in this upside down world.

Recommended reading:

Weston A. Price Foundation

Real Milk Campaign

Nourishing Traditions – great book on food raised and prepared naturally

Lardy, Lardy – great post on the health benefits of lard by Dr. Mary Dan Eades (Protein Power)

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In adapting to England over the last several weeks, I would say that the culture does not feel foreign, so much as different.  It’s like seeing something odd out of the corner of my  eye; I shift my perception to take it in more completely, and spend a little more time processing it, but what originally caught my attention does not seem so strange as it did at first glance.  What wears me down is the sheer number of times I have to stop and process the new and somewhat different information, and attempt to relate it to what I already know.

Traffic roundabout, in London (where fortunately I never had to drive!)

The signs are in English, although the English is often not quite the same usage as what I would anticipate.  The street signs are strange but generally understandable, after a few moments observation of the traffic and the area.  The food often has funny or incomprehensible names but usually tastes good, although not quite like anything I’ve ever had at home, either.  The coins look odd and sound funny when clinking together in my pocket (and the denominations are slightly different as well) but they work as coins ought to when I need to use them.  The accents of the people I pass by on the street often render their speech incomprehensible, but if I end up chatting with those same people, eventually something clicks in my brain and the words fall together (albeit usually not until after an embarrassing pause whilst my brain furiously processes the shift in pronunciation and the slightly different grammar and usage).  On top of this is my knowledge that most of these people have no problem understanding me, because they have been watching American films and TV shows their whole lives and have no problems at all understanding an American accent and American English usage.  Brits do like Americans, though, so any problems I have understanding them usually injects a bit of humor in an otherwise awkward situation (as long as I am polite about it, of course).  This is why I stated in my previous letter that I have not been unhappy here, simply overwhelmed.  I have met so many nice people and when I am willing to express my confusion, they are always willing to help me clear it up.  The only times I do not try to clear things up are when I am already at my limit and feel that I can no longer take in new information.

Road sign in Little Barrington, UK

Ah, the wisdom of maturity.  Only a few years ago, I would have been constantly berating myself for not understanding everything instantly.  Something that a constantly changing military lifestyle has taught me, though, is patience with myself and a better understanding of my learning curve and my limits.  I am confident, now, that I will learn what I need to learn eventually, and I am willing to grant myself the time to learn it (usually).

For those of you who received my Australia trip e-mails, you may recall that I mentioned that Australia felt less foreign than Hawaii.  Modern Hawaiian culture has such a strong Asian and Pacific cultural influence that Hawaii often appears to feel more like a foreign country than a U.S. state.  So I must admit that when I say that England does not feel really foreign, I am again comparing it to my experience in Hawaii.  Mainstream American culture often feels closer to English culture than it does to Hawaiian culture.  I would like to emphasize, though, that I don’t consider this to be either a good or bad situation; I truly enjoyed my experience in Hawaii, and the strong Asian influence simply made it more interesting.  I’m just commenting on the differences between the cultures.

Well, enough philosophizing!  Onward to the specific bits…

London street, near Big Ben (in the background)

Of course, no discussion of the differences between our two cultures would be complete without mentioning the traffic.  I have had a truly difficult time learning that the British drive on the left… and I am only referring to my experiences as a pedestrian!  This IS foreign, no doubt about it.  I have crossed more busy streets here in the last several weeks than I have in the last several years, and every time, it is a challenge for me to remember which lane contains traffic going in which direction.  It is as if I learned American traffic patterns in infancy, when I can’t even remember learning them, and now I cannot unlearn them, or at least adapt them to these new conditions.  My car will be arriving soon.  My American friends here tell me that it really isn’t too difficult learning to drive on the left side of the road, that you just follow the cars in front of you and you usually do okay.  I do suspect that once I have been driving for a while, that will help me learn the drive-on-the-left traffic patterns much better than just being a pedestrian.

Park Place (road leading to my flat, at The Park, in Cheltenham, UK)

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I had an awesome time in England.  I met many wonderful people, both at work and outside of it, especially in my A Course in Miracles study group.  I eventually adapted quite well and took the opportunity to travel both locally and further afield, to Scotland and the Shetland and Orkney Islands, and on continental Europe (which I mentioned in an earlier post about driving through the Alps).  On the one hand, I wish I’d been able to stay longer in England (I was originally supposed to be there for 3 years, but was there only 1 year).  On the other hand, a few months after I arrived back in Quincy, I met my future husband.  Well … I guess it was a good trade.