Introduction - Feel Great on Low Fat & Carb

[Svenergy]

TLDR:
18 y/o, lived on high fat diet throughout life, suffered with inconsistent energy levels and occasional random brain fog. Experimented with low carb, low fat diet last year with great results: better energy, no acne, greater cognition and social prowess. Also experimented with high fat diet: worse energy, terrible acne, brain fog. High MUFA (olive oil), low saturated fat, low carb also leaves me lethargic. Stayed same weight on each diet.

My question:
Is a low carb, low fat diet sustainable and healthy for my body / brain in the long run, even if I feel better in the short term? This has been the only diet I have felt truly great on.

Some genetic background:
APOE 4/4
FADS1 & FADS2 - Both vegetarian predisposed

Hey guys. I've been a lurker on these forums for a couple of weeks now, following my genetic results from 23andme. As it turns out, I've got homozygous APOE4, and now I find it difficult to focus on anything else.

I turned 18 this April and have always been on a relatively high-fat diet (in particular high in saturated fat). Cheese, whole raw milk, nuts, olive oil, butter, or coconut oil - you name it and I consumed it frequently, throughout my life. Likewise, as far back as I can remember, I've always had strangely inconsistent energy levels. Especially after certain, seemingly random meals, I would feel lethargic, tired, and anti-social.

Last year around this time, I experimented with a low-fat and relatively low-carb, moderate protein diet. Coupled with intermittent fasting, I grew to love this new lifestyle of mine. Until that point, and ever since the start of puberty, I had suffered acne inflammation. Upon beginning this new diet regiment, however, near all of my acne and inflammation disappeared, my energy levels hit an all-time high, I always woke up quickly and with greater energy, and I became much more social and outgoing in general. I was loving life.

At this time, I was consuming around 70-80% boiled vegetables with the remaining 15% and 5% consisting of lean chicken breast and olive oil to cook with, respectively. The majority of my veg was made up of a mix of onions, brussel sprouts, carrots, and broccoli. Occasionally I would have a green salad with a small dousing of oil-based dressing. Dairy, red meat, grains, beans, and legumes were excluded from my diet at this time. I would occasionally snack on sardines packed in olive oil and some stray nuts, here and there.

As the months went on, however, I began to reincorporate a number of these items back in. It is very tough maintaining such a diet nowadays and in a social environment. Eating out is nearly out of the question for me.

The following fall and winter I began to experiment with an extremely high fat, moderate protein & carb diet. I ate a LOT of dairy. On some days I would even drink an entire gallon jug of whole raw milk. Simply put, this new diet I had adopted was doing myself no favors. I had terrible energy throughout the day, my acne came back full force, and I suffered from minor social withdrawal. It was at this time I began to suffer from a mild case of high-functioning depression, although nothing was formally diagnosed.
Fast forward to now. I am educated on my predisposed sensitivity to saturated fats and am once again attempting to regain control over my body. I felt great on an extremely low fat and somewhat low carb diet in the relative short-term.
Is this sort of diet sustainable? I had some difficulties keeping my calories up where they needed to be and, as such I began to lose a good deal of weight. This proved somewhat concerning for myself and for my family.

Let me know what you think. Is significant olive oil consumption the only way to go? I don’t necessarily feel very good on a high fat diet of any type and am at wits end with trying to figure this out.

Thanks for sticking through with this post until the end, for all that have made it this far.

[CarrieS]

Welcome SVenergy and congrats on your first post. You've made some incredible observations on how your diet affects you. Being mindful on how food affects us and tweaking is a major step in personalizing what works best for our individual bodies. Your response to "a LOT of dairy" makes me wonder if you have a dairy intolerance so it sounds like it was a good plan to eliminate it after you realized what it was doing to you. As stated before, we are all individuals and we need to figure out what works best for our bio individual bodies.
Stavia's Primer has some diet tips for us e4/4s that can be found here: viewtopic.php?f=33&t=1418. Also, if you haven't tried it, you can search previous posts using a key word by clicking on the "spyglass" icon to the left of your name.
Again, welcome! I look forward to more posts on your progress.

[Julie G]

Welcome SVenergy! I agree with Carrie. You've made some incredible diet/health observations at a young age. Kudos to you. Dairy is well known in the scientific literature for it's role in causing acne. Here's a great paper on the topic.

It's extraordinarily unusual to have been on a high fat diet since birth. Your parents must have been mavericks for their time. My 25 year old son was raised on a LFHC diet, heavy with grains, fruit, and fruit juices.

As a 4/4, at age 18, you are beautifully poised to avoid the pathologies associated with our risky allele. The most important thing you can do is to avoid becoming insulin resistant. If you feel good on a low fat, low carb diet- enjoy! As early as age 20, E4 carriers (in a dose dependent fashion) begin exhibiting a mild (5-10%) cerebral glucose shortfall in the same regions of our brains as AD patients. Some of us use olive oil and other healthy fats (like sardines and nuts) to create ketones to offset that neuronal fuel deficit. You can do the same with a long daily fast and exercise. I used a very low fat diet when I was young and also felt good, except for a few hypoglycemic episodes. It wasn't until I begin to show symptoms of insulin resistance in my late 40s that I began to feel badly.

Very cool about your FADS 1 & 2; even cooler that you knew to check it out . If you decide to go vegan, pay attention to DHA, choline, B12, D- the usual suspects. You have genes, health, and age that will likely enable you to do quite well with that type of approach. Occasional fish or eggs might serve your brain well.

You're a role model for your generation, my friend. I wish my son was half as interested as you are in optimizing health. Keep up the great work.

[Karengo]

Hello Svenergy - a warm welcome to our community! Having the courage to step up and share your story with us after only 2 weeks of lurking is very admirable! I'm sure many people will make it to the end of your posting. I know I did easily and really appreciate you for sharing a ton of information with. I echo what others are saying about you being an inspiring role model by taking the time to learn about your health and empowering yourself by choosing to take action. Look at how well you're taking such great care of yourself.

Please be kind to yourself and trust you're well ahead of the game. It sounds like you've already been making great progress with your health discoveries. For instance, you noticed your reaction to dairy. Again I encourage you as others do - and will - to trust your body and what feels good and right for you. There are no hard and fast rules really as we are individuals and things can change and impact our health. Lifestyle factors such as sleep, social connections and learning new things can also play an important role in our overall health. I feel there's still a lot for us all to learn. We're often times - most of the time! - waiting for the science to catch up!

Feel free to reach out and ask more questions whenever you feel inspired and continue to share your experiences as we're all open to learning from each other. I trust you'll find our community is very supportive and we're really glad to have you be part of it!

Be well and enjoy life!