Luked89
Member
I hear terms like social anxiety and generalized anxiety disorder. I'm not sure if that's what I have, but I'd say I've always felt like my mind tends towards negative thinking, self judgement, judging others. Generally when socializing I feel people don't like me, I judge myself, and always assume the worst.
There are a couple of fixes for this I've discovered
1. Sleep deprivation and/or a hangover.
2. Keto diet.
I little context on these
I've noticed when I get drunk and don't get a full night's sleep, I feel great the next day. Yes, I'll feel gross, nauseous and get that low level headache. But my outlook on life, and interactions with others are so great compared to my usual state that I'm happy regardless of the side effects.
I've experimented with sleep deprivation by literally just not sleeping, and it also does the job. Granted things start getting weird and maybe the cons start to outweigh the pros on this method but nonetheless, it works. I don't worry, or stress over things and talking to people just goes well. I feel good and people respond well to me. I looked into it at the time and supposedly there are studies showing sleep deprivation cures depression but with one drawback. It stops working when you sleep.
The next is keto.
Now this one a bit tricky. I'd done keto before. Bulletproof coffee, 1lb Ribeyes, eggs cheese etc etc. High calorie 3 meals a day with snacks. This helped me gain weight, but nothing for mental health.
My second time around I was a bit more educated on keto and started an intermittent fasting style keto diet. I ate from 5pm until about 8pm.
I consumed these foods
Salmon, buffalo mozzarella, mushrooms, olive oil, MCT oil, desiccated organs, some spices and herbs.
I was in somewhat of a bad place when I decided to start keto again. I stuck through the first 2 or 3 days as I was motivated to feel better. I was using keto urine strips at the time each morning. First few days no ketones. Or the third or fourth day I woke up with this INCREDIBLE feeling. It was like the sleep deprivation or hangover but without the side effects. I went to the bathroom and lo and behold the urine strips showed ketones. I had literally found peace. I wasn't afraid of death, nothing could bother me. No worries, no fear of the future, no social anxiety. It was such an amazing feeling. I was in a great mood and optimistic about the keto diet.
So I'm feeling great, but hit a road bump soon after the start. I decided to eat some eggs. They're keto right? So I ate some eggs and the whole thing collapsed. I was back in hell. Anxiety, stressed out, general feelings of dread. I thought "was it a fluke?" "Will it come back?" I knew if it was to come back It would be by eating what brought me there the first time. So I go back to eating the foods I mentioned, and it took a full week but thank God it worked. I was so happy. I ended up doing keto for 2 months. A couple of times I tried to eat eggs and every time, it had the same effect. So I realized eggs were one issue. At a much later date I did an everywell food sensitivity test and eggs were off the chart, as expected. I also felt chicken gave a similar effect but not as bad as eggs and lo and behold it was half the level of eggs on the test.
Ok so yes it all sounds great right. Keto cured my social anxiety and removed so much negativity from my mind. Well unfortunately there were some drawbacks.
1. Sex drive was kinda low. I could get it up, but wasn't really feeling the urge to go get some.
2. Pretty much from the start a hunger for carbs that was growing
3. Similar trajectory to the hunger was a cranky to irritable to outright angry state. Worsening as the days went on. This one was weird because I didn't think it was possible to feel so good and angry at the same time.
I remember one day I kind of ****88 around and ate a bunch of keto processed food, and smoked too much weed and went into a social situation and I felt like everyone didn't like me, and was having thoughts of so much negativity. It was interesting to see the contrast from that day to the days before, and the days after when I'd fixed the diet and cut down on the weed.
In the end, I had to stop keto. The hunger for carbs had gotten so severe. I was starving no matter how much fat I ate. There's been a couple of times I started again and felt the good stuff come back but I quit again right away. Hunger is powerful, and probably for a good reason.
Since then I've tried Paul saladino style animal based, gaps, and now peat style eating. Unfortunately non of these provide the effects from keto and IF.
Well if you've got this far I appreciate you taking the time to read my story. I wrote all this to give as much context as possible, and any thoughts on anything I've said would be appreciated. But my main question is
TL;DR
If keto with IF, sleep deprivation and/or hangover seem to cure me of negative thinking and social anxiety, would this indicate maybe high levels of cortisol? Why is it that stress hormones feel so good on keto, but going through something traumatic or not eating well makes you feel so bad. Wouldn't there be cortisol involved there too?
There are a couple of fixes for this I've discovered
1. Sleep deprivation and/or a hangover.
2. Keto diet.
I little context on these
I've noticed when I get drunk and don't get a full night's sleep, I feel great the next day. Yes, I'll feel gross, nauseous and get that low level headache. But my outlook on life, and interactions with others are so great compared to my usual state that I'm happy regardless of the side effects.
I've experimented with sleep deprivation by literally just not sleeping, and it also does the job. Granted things start getting weird and maybe the cons start to outweigh the pros on this method but nonetheless, it works. I don't worry, or stress over things and talking to people just goes well. I feel good and people respond well to me. I looked into it at the time and supposedly there are studies showing sleep deprivation cures depression but with one drawback. It stops working when you sleep.
The next is keto.
Now this one a bit tricky. I'd done keto before. Bulletproof coffee, 1lb Ribeyes, eggs cheese etc etc. High calorie 3 meals a day with snacks. This helped me gain weight, but nothing for mental health.
My second time around I was a bit more educated on keto and started an intermittent fasting style keto diet. I ate from 5pm until about 8pm.
I consumed these foods
Salmon, buffalo mozzarella, mushrooms, olive oil, MCT oil, desiccated organs, some spices and herbs.
I was in somewhat of a bad place when I decided to start keto again. I stuck through the first 2 or 3 days as I was motivated to feel better. I was using keto urine strips at the time each morning. First few days no ketones. Or the third or fourth day I woke up with this INCREDIBLE feeling. It was like the sleep deprivation or hangover but without the side effects. I went to the bathroom and lo and behold the urine strips showed ketones. I had literally found peace. I wasn't afraid of death, nothing could bother me. No worries, no fear of the future, no social anxiety. It was such an amazing feeling. I was in a great mood and optimistic about the keto diet.
So I'm feeling great, but hit a road bump soon after the start. I decided to eat some eggs. They're keto right? So I ate some eggs and the whole thing collapsed. I was back in hell. Anxiety, stressed out, general feelings of dread. I thought "was it a fluke?" "Will it come back?" I knew if it was to come back It would be by eating what brought me there the first time. So I go back to eating the foods I mentioned, and it took a full week but thank God it worked. I was so happy. I ended up doing keto for 2 months. A couple of times I tried to eat eggs and every time, it had the same effect. So I realized eggs were one issue. At a much later date I did an everywell food sensitivity test and eggs were off the chart, as expected. I also felt chicken gave a similar effect but not as bad as eggs and lo and behold it was half the level of eggs on the test.
Ok so yes it all sounds great right. Keto cured my social anxiety and removed so much negativity from my mind. Well unfortunately there were some drawbacks.
1. Sex drive was kinda low. I could get it up, but wasn't really feeling the urge to go get some.
2. Pretty much from the start a hunger for carbs that was growing
3. Similar trajectory to the hunger was a cranky to irritable to outright angry state. Worsening as the days went on. This one was weird because I didn't think it was possible to feel so good and angry at the same time.
I remember one day I kind of ****88 around and ate a bunch of keto processed food, and smoked too much weed and went into a social situation and I felt like everyone didn't like me, and was having thoughts of so much negativity. It was interesting to see the contrast from that day to the days before, and the days after when I'd fixed the diet and cut down on the weed.
In the end, I had to stop keto. The hunger for carbs had gotten so severe. I was starving no matter how much fat I ate. There's been a couple of times I started again and felt the good stuff come back but I quit again right away. Hunger is powerful, and probably for a good reason.
Since then I've tried Paul saladino style animal based, gaps, and now peat style eating. Unfortunately non of these provide the effects from keto and IF.
Well if you've got this far I appreciate you taking the time to read my story. I wrote all this to give as much context as possible, and any thoughts on anything I've said would be appreciated. But my main question is
TL;DR
If keto with IF, sleep deprivation and/or hangover seem to cure me of negative thinking and social anxiety, would this indicate maybe high levels of cortisol? Why is it that stress hormones feel so good on keto, but going through something traumatic or not eating well makes you feel so bad. Wouldn't there be cortisol involved there too?
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