Carnivore/Keto Dreams — Loose Skin

Ok, I’m not complaining, trust me.  At my age, I’m really happy with these photos of my body as I sunbathe here in sunny Florida.

But I’m lying down.

It’s a bit worse if I stand. But you really don’t want to see what my arms and thighs look like while I’m doing pushups and look back at them as they hang down.  It’s not a pretty sight.

I’m 64 and I’ve been doing Carnivore mostly, limited Keto, for at least eight months.  Since I’m older, I had been worrying, just in general, about maintaining muscle tone.  I exercise a lot and of course eat well.  What I’ve found is that my muscle tone is actually better than it’s ever been or close (if I’d eaten and exercised properly in my youth, I would have been really fit, of course).  But at any rate, I’ve been pretty happy with how things are going in that regard, though I do eat more protein than some people recommend (Mark Sisson seems to be the one I follow the closest).  I eat at least 80 grams of protein per day and I’m a woman (older) weighing about 119 pounds, maybe a bit less now.  There are days I eat well over 100 grams of protein according to me Keto calculator (Stupid Simple Keto).

So as I say, not bad.  A bit harder to deal with is that loose skin.  You can see the problems obese older women have when they lose 100 pounds or more.  They have to fold it around them like it’s an enormous quilt. Many of them have it removed.  I of course do not have a huge problem like that, but I have lost twenty pounds and I’m no spring chicken.  Complicating that is that most of my life my weight has fluctuated ten to fifteen pounds quite a bit without giving my skin time to adjust to proper nutrition and without maintaining a consistent weight for any length of time.  This diet and eating pattern seems to have solved that problem.

But what about the skin?

Well, it’s a bit of a problem for any of us who have lost any amount of weight at all.  But the health benefits far outweigh the down side.  I have noticed (on myself and those online) that luckily the face seems to do better with this than the rest of the body.  I’m not sure why.  Though it’s still an issue there to some degree, it’s not nearly the problem on the faces of these women who have lost enormous amounts of weight as the rest of their body.

I am certain it will take time.  My plan of action is to eat well, maintain my weight, and above all:  stay hydrated.  Be careful with the sun.  You need it, but don’t overdo it and apply a good natural sun screen like Lure Lux after about an hour of hanging outside, sooner on your face.  Exfoliate a lot.  Dry buffing helps some with cellulite and skin elasticity.  Hydration is huge.  I drink two eight ounce glasses of water on an empty stomach every morning even before having my coffee.

I have a cream my dermatologist gave me (place is called Allure) called Body Smoothing Lotion with Retinol.  Has Hyaluronic acid in it and other antioxidants.  It seems to help but I remain concerned about the other ingredients in it and my increase in headaches.  The tube does not say organic or natural and I don’t recognize a lot of the ingredients, but Dr. Oz has one that’s 98.6% natural, called Super Youth which has vitamin C, B5, Shea butter, and Hyaluronic acid.   I use them right now daily.  Retinols can cause some dryness, so I also use some olive oil when I’m outside.

But I think the key is good nutrition, maintaining a healthy weight once you arrive at it, and time.  Skin will adjust some over time but it can be a while, up to a year, they say.  So hang in there.  (Ha, so to speak).  I am.

In the meantime, I’m much healthier and feel great.

Stay tuned for my rant on organic food and environment coming tomorrow.  A dingbat friend of mine just talked about how many people can’t “afford” to eat well, and of course we can’t afford not to.  And there are plenty of ways to do it–anyone can–at least in this country.  So stay tuned.

Dreams:  I rarely have a bad one, but I dreamed that this crazy guy was shooting up Mucinex in his veins which left this sticky, stringy residue on tables for some reason (I have never done drugs other than alcohol, even marijuana, so the drug culture is a mystery to me–must be some idea from lines of cocaine I see in movies) and the guy was a serial killer and was trying to get me.  Combination of my husband telling me he had to get the guafenesin (Mucinex type with that single ingredient) I sometimes take for sinus headaches from behind the counter? and watching the ID channel late at night!