Too much protein - any tips?

[Stoozie]

I'm trying to listen to my body, eat to appetite and not sweat the small stuff.

But....

I'm still on roughly double a healthy amount of protein.

I'm guessing more fats must be the answer. Tomorrow i shall try avocado with mayonaisse for 1 of my 2 meals, and cream in my coffee, and take it from there.

Any other tips?

[MikePollard]

You are right - up the fats!

[Praveen55]

Stoozie

What amount of protein do you consider healthy?

[Stoozie in reply to Praveen55]

I was hoping to get it down to 50g/day but am always over. Often as much as double.

[Praveen55 in reply to Stoozie]

According to Institute of Medicine (IOM) , the organisation responsible for setting the dietary reference intake:

1. Recommended dietary allowance (RDA) for protein is 0.8 gm/kg/day for both men and women. RDA is defined as bare minimum value at which risk of inadequacy is very low, about 2 -3 percent. Please note that this should be considered as the lowest limit of dietary protein intake.

2. Because of insufficient evidence of any adverse effects, the safe Upper Limit (UL) has not been determined. However, there is consensus among experts that protein intake should not exceed 30 % of daily energy requirement. This can be considered as an UL.

3. Between RDA and UL the risk of inadequacy and of excess are both estimated to be zero.

4. I guess 50 gm should be the lower limit in your case and it can be safely exceeded up to 100 gm without causing any adverse effects. Perhaps, you will be consuming less than 20 % of energy requirement from protein. Set a goal for 80 - 90 gm protein or as per satiety.

I have been eating as per satiety and I too thought I was consuming too much protein. Hence I looked into IOM reference. In fact, I am in the similar range. On counting, I discovered that my protein intake varies between 70 and 100 gm per day but I feel quite good and my weight is stable. Once in a while I incorporate IF rather than limiting protein or fat.

[Cooper27 in reply to Praveen55]

When I was looking into keto macros, they seemed to suggest the protein allowance was based on lean body mass (e.g. what you'd weigh if you deducted the fat and bones from your body), and that's how they came to a figure of about 50g for me. It is very low though, I constantly went over just by eating a couple of chicken thighs at dinner and half a tin of tuna at lunch.

[TheAwfulToad Ambassador]

I'm quite surprised you're going as high as 100g/day, but if you feel that it's right, then it's right. As per Praveen55 's post, there's no real upper limit for protein. Do you eat plenty of veggies? Personally, I find that just getting plenty of veg on the plate ensures that I don't have enough stomach space for "too much" of anything else

I don't really buy the idea that "too much protein" is bad for you, except inasmuch as it may be displacing other more important things from your diet. Yes, protein may be (partially) converted to glucose, and it does elicit an insulin response, but I think you'd have to eat an awful lot of it for that to have any effect on bodyfat.