On Monday evening, my daughter came to the dojo to say goodbye to the other kids she had practiced kendo with.
So at the end of the adult session I packed her shinai (bamboo sword) into my shinai bag. To do that, I had to remove the tsuba (sword guard) and tsubadome (a fitting that holds the tsuba in place). I put them in my pocket in a rush and went home. When I got off the train and put my hand in my pocket, I could no longer find the tsubadome. It was decorated with a pretty sakura pattern and had been a small present for her from the tooth fairy. Oh damn. I had lost it somewhere.

On Wednesday morning I was back in the dojo to practice. I went to the shinai storage room where I had taken the tsubadome out, but I could not find it there. I asked the resident sensei if anyone had found it. He didn’t know. He checked in the lost-and-found box and it wasn’t there. I told him not to worry, that it was my fault, and that I had probably lost it somewhere else: maybe on the way to the station, or on the train.

On Wednesday evening, as I came back to the dojo for my evening practice, the sensei handed me the lost tsubadome, telling me that another parent had found the tsubadome at the station and brought it back, recognising from the pattern that it was my daughter's. It was not an expensive item, but it had sentimental value, and I would not have been able to find an exact replacement easily.

I was speechless that a nameless stranger would be so kind.

This kind of thing only happens in Japan.

What do you think would have happened where you live?

I have been struggling with fat loss for a long time.

Over the years, I have learned that most people who want to lose fat end up failing because they don't use a method that works.

And the reason is not because they're stupid or masochistic, but because most people just don't know what works. They believe the myth that fat loss is obtained by eating fewer calories than you burn, and never realise it's a metabolic imbalance that's actually keeping them fat.

No matter how hard you exercise or how little you eat, it's impossible to burn fat while hormones circulate in your body that tell fat cells that they are not allowed to release their stored fat. To be honest, it took me too many years to learn this lesson too.

And then there's the vicious circle of not seeing results (since the method won't work) and losing motivation and giving up.

But don't worry: we've all been there. And we can get out of it.

Tip 1: Get a physical feel for what you're missing

How much do you need to shed? 10 kg? 20? Load up a backpack to that exact weight. Then wear it at all times for a week anywhere you go, including at meetings, at meals, on the toilet. Notice how much it slows you down and fatigues you. Once you take it off at the end of the week, you'll know why you need to do this.

You can't afford to keep carrying that backpack every day for the rest of your life.

Tip 2: Whatever you choose to do, pick a sustainable approach

Trust me: if it makes you hungry all the time, you won't keep it up. Been there.

Tip 3: Whatever your approach is, give it a chance

Whatever you do, do it properly, as instructed, and stick with it for at least a month before deciding whether it works for you or not. No cheating. Give it a chance.

Tip 4: Measure whether it actually works for you

Don't take anyone's word for it. Measure, measure, measure. Even just your waistline, if not your body fat; but daily. Once you've got a month's worth of logs, check if there is a significant change. If yes, give it another month. And another.

Tip 5: Reward your wins

When your waistline finally shrinks by another 5 cm, celebrate by buying new clothes you like—nice clothes that flatter your new, leaner shape. You earned it.

Tip 6: Burn your boats

When you buy those new clothes, give your old ones to charity or throw them away. Make it clear to your subconscious that you won't go back to the old size. And don't be afraid to do it all over again when you shed another 5 cm. It's worth the expense.

Tip 7: Nutrition > Exercise

If you have a fat accumulation problem, you can exercise as much as you like, but it won't help you slim down unless you fix your metabolism. (Pro tip: this does not mean "eating low fat".) Of course, exercising will make you healthier, but it can never make you lean if your hormones forbid your cells from releasing stored fat.

Pick an approach that actually works. You know which one I'm talking about.

Secret 1: The Role of Hormones in Getting Fat or Lean

It's a hormonal imbalance, not fat intake, that causes fat accumulation.

The main hormone at play is insulin. Its role is to prevent elevated blood glucose (a dangerous thing). Insulin tells cells to take glucose from the bloodstream and also, as a side effect, not to release any of the fat they already store.

While insulin is elevated, it is not possible for cells to burn their stored fat.

Secret 2: The Low Carb High Fat (LCHF) Diet Principle

The pancreas secretes insulin when we eat foods that elevate blood glucose: sugar, sugary drinks, bread, rice, pasta, cakes, sweets, potatoes... (carbs and starches).

Reducing carb intake (the "Low Carb" part of LCHF) results in lower insulin levels. This allows cells to release stored fat for use as fuel. The "High Fat" part says what else in your diet will provide the calories you are no longer eating as carbs. LCHF makes you leaner because it lets your cells release your stored fat, and burn it.

It's not eating fat that makes you fat: it's storing fat that does.

Secret 3: The Deceptive Nature of 0% Fat Foods

You may have been brainwashed to the contrary but fat is actually full of flavour.

It's an easy sell to offer a "0% fat" version (of a yoghurt, say, or a cookie) to lure customers who want to lose fat. But if the manufacturer removes fat, the product becomes flavourless. So they replace it with... sugar, in some form or other.

That sugar (a carbohydrate) will elevate your blood glucose, hence your insulin, and will prevent your stored fat from being burned.

The "0% fat" version of the food is actually more fattening than the "full fat" one.

Insight 0: What Diabetes Is (with apologies for oversimplification)

A degenerative disease resulting in insulin malfunction. Elevated blood glucose is dangerous (see Insight 1), and insulin is a hormone that helpfully keeps blood glucose down. In Type 1 diabetes, the body no longer produces insulin. In Type 2, cells no longer respond well to insulin. Either way, elevated blood glucose ensues.

Insight 1: What Diabetes Does To The Body (idem)

Elevated blood sugar eventually clogs the capillaries. Restricted blood flow damages the affected organs, possibly leading to blindness, leg amputation, nerve damage, heart disease and the loss of 6-14 years of life expectancy.

My perspective: No food tastes so good that I'd give up my eyesight to eat it.

Insight 2: Difference Between Prediabetes And Diabetes

Diabetes is diagnosed from elevated blood glucose. Above a first (elevated) threshold, I'm called pre-diabetic. Above another, diabetic. But these thresholds are a simplification: in truth, it's a continuum. Even as pre-diabetic, the irreversible cell degeneration has already started. It just hasn't gone as far.

Insight 3: If It's Incurable, How Can Diabetes Be Reversed?

Unfortunately, it can't. In 2024, medical science has no known cure. Better not to get it in the first place! I should have acted promptly. But it may be put into remission.

Insight 4. What Does "Remission" Actually Mean?

It means that, for at least 3 months, my blood glucose has been at normal levels. So long as I stay in remission, I can enjoy life without suffering any of those nasty consequences. But I am not "cured". If what keeps me in remission is LCHF/keto, the moment I eat like a non-diabetic then my blood glucose will shoot back up.

I have beaten my stubborn visceral fat—and an associated incurable disease.

It has not been an easy ride, and it's not over. I seem to be winning the battle: I am lean, physically fit, and people guess I'm 15-20 years younger than my passport age.

Discovering what works has been hard. I've had times when I thought it was all over. I've been documenting my false starts, my failures and my successes. I am writing down everything I wish I had been told when I first faced these challenges.

But I'll always write "I did X" rather than "you should do X"; and here is why.

I am not a medical doctor (much less your doctor)

I am in no way qualified to offer medical advice to anyone—not even myself.

I am just a patient, not a doctor. What little I know, I didn't learn in medical school. I found out because bad stuff happened to me and I had to find ways to deal with it.

The only reason why you might want to listen to me is because I've been there, I share your pain, and everything I talk about is stuff I've tried on myself.

But I have been taking risks with myself. I've gambled with my health, going against what my doctor told me. I've chosen to try stuff that had no medical safety net, and which might one day have detrimental side effects I don't even know about. Your doctor would be much more risk-averse with your health. Talk to her first.

As a scientist, I document what worked for me. But it's a sample size of one. No guarantee that any of that will also work for you in the same way.

Nonetheless, I truly wish I had been told all this bleeding edge stuff back then.

Ultimately, what you do with your health is your responsibility. But information is power. If you recognise yourself in who I was, I hope my story gives you hope (we can win!) and empowers you to explore solutions outside the safe medical dogma.

Hi Frank, how do you create consistent elimination in a keto regimen? Seems like the lack of carbs reduces fiber which in turn can affect digestion. Look forward to hearing more of your experience in this regard. Thanks

Indeed. Constipation had been one of my biggest problems with LCHF/keto.

Before LCHF/keto, I had been eating muesli for breakfast since basically forever (the "no added sugar" variety, plus bran) and my #2 was as regular as clockwork. Banning carbs and therefore cereals meant abandoning that daily source of dietary fibre. Constipation was the predictable consequence.

I won't go into detailed descriptions but, to put it mildly, it is really unpleasant.

It makes you feel uneasy all day. Plus, the hard stools may have even worse "mechanical" side effects. Besides suggesting to eat more vegetables, all the doctor could offer me were glycerol suppositories. They cured the symptom rather than the cause. What I needed was something to soften the #2 without eating carbs.

Someone recommended inulin (never heard of before), a natural sweetener and soluble fibre extracted from chicory that did not raise blood sugar. It did the job but the unannounced side effect was ...gas. Way too much. I had to give it up.

I kept trying various other things, living with this problem for a year or two, till I came across ground flaxseed (also never heard of before, in my ignorance). Fibre, without carbs. It took less than a week to find that it worked well for me, with no side effects.

Flaxseed has completely fixed the problem for me and I now consume it daily.

The other thing that helped me is drinking a lot of water. I now drink about 3 litres per day. Water won't by itself fix constipation, and most of it ends up as #1 anyway, but clearly the #2 cannot be soft if there isn't enough water to go around.

When I am at work, I find that keeping on my desk a sports water bottle with straw makes it much easier for me to drink water frequently than if I had to refill a glass.

A lean and healthy body is my destination.

Nutrition and exercise (sometimes medicines) are the engine that takes me there.

But if I am blindfolded, I'll never get there. Measuring is seeing where I'm going.

Tip 1: Do Not Fear The Scale

Whether it's body fat, blood glucose or my company's performance: if I don't measure it, I can't improve it. I don't fear the scale as a hostile tribunal that might condemn me for my sins of gluttony: reading the scale is simply seeing the road.

Tip 2: Frequency of Measurement

I measure daily. I keep logs. I measure in consistent conditions, first thing in the morning, before breakfast. Else, I can't compare.

Tip 3: Smooth the Measurements Before Trusting Them

Having measured daily for decades, I know the data is pretty noisy. Partly because my consumer scale is imperfect. Partly because my body parameters do oscillate. What really matters is the smoothed value, averaged over the past week or month. That really tells me what's happening, and whether I'm trending up or down.

Tip 4: Early Warnings Allow Micro-Corrections

Daily measurements let me spot unhealthy trends before I notice them in my vitality or in my mirror. Without measuring, I cannot tell a 2% difference in visceral fat, body mass or blood parameters. But, once I know that today I'm 2% worse than yesterday (for whatever reason), it's easy for me to skip a meal or to take a brisk walk instead of the bus to compensate. I can make small but significant corrections before the situation worsens, preventing bigger problems in the future.

This is simply advice to my younger self.

I once got a pre-diagnosis of diabetes. Along with it, recommendations to shed that belly fat by exercising more and eating less. I listened but didn't really act on it. First, because I had already tried to lose that fat anyway, and never managed to. Second, because I thought I had no time to exercise any more than I already did.

A few years later I got full-blown diabetes—irreversible and incurable.

I greatly regretted not taking action sooner.

Dear younger self, here are 7 simple tips from someone who cares deeply about you. You are stubborn, depressed and fed up already, I know. But please pay attention. <A stitch in time... / An ounce of prevention... / insert favourite proverb>

1. Make it your #1 priority to avoid getting the real diabetes. It's irreversible.

2. Ignore "eat less and exercise more", as it won't work to lose fat.

3. Do lose that belly fat; but, more importantly, lower your blood sugar.

4. Luckily, a single intervention addresses both: LCHF/keto (read Taubes for why).

5. Avoid carbs religiously, as if they were poisonous for you. In a way, they are.

6. It's painful, but nowhere near as painful as living with diabetes. And it works.

7. Measure your waistline, fat and glucose regularly, and celebrate your successes.

You have no idea how much I wish someone gave me this one-pager ten years ago.

After years of hard struggle since my diagnosis of type 2 diabetes, I was ultimately able to slim down and bring my blood glucose back to non-diabetic levels.

But only by going against the medical advice I had been given.

I had kept experimenting on myself. When a friend suggested LCHF/keto, it sounded like the dumbest idea in the world. "Eat more fat to lose fat? You must be joking! And where will my cholesterol go if I eat all that fat?" Still, I tried it. It worked. I kept going.

At the next visit, the diabetic nurse noticed the improvements. I told her I no longer ate carbs. Tut-tut, she replied. Fad diet. Don't cut off a whole food group.

I had to make a choice: would I follow the prescriptions of the knowledgeable medical professionals who looked after me, or would I disregard them, to continue with the only intervention that, as my experiments showed, had produced results?

I took a gamble on myself and continued LCHF/keto, against advice.

When the new results came in, no one could argue with them.

I asked to speak with the doctor for a review. Praise and happiness all over for the improved blood glucose, cholesterol and waistline, but I was somewhat resentful.

I only studied biology of cells in high school at 16, I told the doctor. YOU are the one who went to medical school. Why didn't YOU advise me to stop eating carbs? Why did I have to figure it all out by myself? (What if I hadn't?)

You are a trailblazer, she responded. You are trying out the new stuff. Maybe in ten years the NHS will tell me to tell my patients to do just what you are doing. I can't recommend it today because we haven't had enough trials to ensure it's safe for everyone. But if it works for you, more power to you. Keep doing it: I'll support you.

I would have still preferred to have been told. But, once her honesty and open-mindedness sank in, I realised I respected her immensely. Sadly, she took early retirement (she was younger than me). Fortunately my new doctor and diabetic nurse are equally open-minded and supportive of my experiments.

Let's keep doing our best. Together.

IHMO, YMMV, I'm not a medical doctor, etc etc. But the below is what I experienced.

Reason 1: LCHF/Keto Actually Works

It actually burns excess fat. Try for yourself rather than taking my (or anybody's) word for it. I tried many other methods that didn't work, and I'm sure you did too. This one does, and that's more than can be said for most others.

Reason 2: With LCHF/Keto, I Won't Go Hungry

I may eat to satiety at every meal. That's the main reason why I found other diets unsustainable, whereas I've been able to keep up LCHF/Keto for several years.

Reason 3: LCHF/Keto Boosts My Energy Levels

LCHF/keto increased my energy levels, enhancing my overall physical and mental performance. I no longer feel as tired, wake up earlier and am alert for much longer.

Reason 4: LCHF/Keto Does Not Require Me To Count Anything

It's very simple to implement. Contrary to most other diets, I don't have to keep track of the amount of calories or macronutrients I eat. I basically just exclude one food group. Easy peasy. This frees up a lot of mental space.

Reason 5: LCHF/Keto Is Beneficial For Blood Glucose Control

LCHF/Keto makes me lose fat by lowering the hormone that makes me store fat. It breaks the vicious circle that keeps my blood glucose elevated.

To ward off diabetes, this side effect is more valuable than the fat loss itself.

We don't visit my Japanese in-laws that often, since we usually live in another continent. And, since I switched to Low-Carb-High-Fat/keto several years ago, there's now the embarrassing problem that I will no longer eat many Japanese dishes that I used to love: sushi, udon, soba, takoyaki, gyoza, not to mention all the delicious Japanese sweets: daifuku, dorayaki, yokan and so forth. Kind as they are, they always want to treat me, but they're uneasy at not having many food options left. Even the common word for "meal" in Japanese ("gohan") literally means "rice".

So I offered to cook some Italian food for everyone. I volunteered to prepare some authentic ragù alla bolognese (takes about 3 hours). If I made enough of it, I'd cook spaghetti for everyone while I would eat just the meat sauce, without the pasta, as my main course. (Decent recipe at giallozafferano.com, BTW.)

This plan went down very well. If we ignore a slight hiccup along the way (I got distracted and burnt the first batch of ragù about two hours in—so I had to go out, buy the ingredients again and start from scratch; whoops), which fortunately they were kind enough to forgive me for, they all loved the end result. Everyone happy.

My daughter, wife and in-laws are all quite thin: between them, they ate less pasta than would normally satisfy two Italian adults. I had made about 1 kg of ragù and I ended up eating about 3/4 of that. I was very full when we got back home.

Then, the magic of keto. Next morning, my scale said my body fat had gone down.

'nuff said.

Let's be honest about it: it's not all smooth sailing.

Reason 1: Social Awkwardness

Keto won't make you popular with friends and family.

By default, the typical Western meal always contains some carbs. It's hard to eat out (or in!) with other people: some kinds of restaurants just won't serve anything you can eat. You'll be a bit of a pain, like a vegan among non-vegans.

Reason 2: Constipation

Much dietary fibre (bran, whole wheat, etc) is carbs. Stop eating that, and something else also stops. I found ways around it but it's been quite unpleasant.

Reason 3: Exclusion of Preferred Tasty Foods

There's a bunch of stuff you want but can no longer eat.

Unfortunately, much of it is precisely the foods that you liked the most. The carb-rich foods you craved made you fat, by elevating your insulin, and the resulting energy depletion made you desire more carbs. Vicious circle.

Reason 4: Difficulty Maintaining Ketosis

Initially, you can't tell whether you even are in ketosis. You must measure it, and the reliable methods (blood test strips) are expensive. And, even when you measure, you need lots of fine tuning and experimentation to achieve more than mild ketosis.

And it gets worse with age, as your hormones change and metabolism slows down.

But watch out for the companion piece—why keto is better than the alternatives

Over the past 25 years, I tried countless methods, courses and books to lose belly fat—first for merely for aesthetics, later for serious medical reasons. While many of these had some small, temporary effect, and a few taught me "tricks" I still consider useful, none of them (including advice from medics) truly worked long-term.

Until, in summer 2019, a friend gave me this NYT bestseller. You must be a bit nerdy / intellectual to enjoy its scientific slant, but it truly had a life-changing impact on me.

Why we get fat by Gary Taubes

Some of my biggest takeaways:

• Neither reducing caloric intake, nor increasing caloric expenditure, will necessarily burn our stored fat. (Really? Yes! And he explains why.)

• Blaming fat people's lack of willpower is cruel and incorrect. The biological reason for fat accumulation is not psychological but a hormonal disfunction.

• A hormonally-regulated biological feedback loop determines whether cells should store fat for later or release it. When this metabolic feedback loop is out of whack, we get fat no matter how little we eat or how much we exercise.

• It is possible to reset our out-of-whack metabolism by changing what we eat—specifically, by avoiding the carbohydrates that trigger the imbalance.

• I thought medical science had it all worked out by now—it's the 21st century after all. Instead, Taubes spends several well-documented chapters to prove that medical researchers still disagree wildly on what makes us fat—and that's why official medical advice (including that which I had received) often doesn't work.

This book had a dramatic effect on me. I adopted the LCHF/keto diet it describes and, in due course, I observed fantastic results. I kept losing 1-2 kg of fat per month, my blood readings improved and my incurable disease went into remission—to the surprise of the medical professionals who had dismissed LCHF as another fad diet. Forever grateful to @garytaubes! Looking forward to reading his new diabetes book.

Going to the gym to get fit? Sorry, you've got it all backwards.

(And that's why you'll quit after a while—as you already know.)

Mistake 1: Trying to lose fat by exercising

Do you suffer from stubborn fat you haven't been able to shift? Attempting to burn more calories won't help, if your hormones are telling your cells to hold on to fat. What will work is to rebalance your metabolism. To lose fat, nutrition beats exercise.

Mistake 2: Trying to build up muscle by drinking protein shakes

Protein is biologically necessary to build muscle, but not sufficient. To build muscle, we must primarily use muscle. Intensively. That's where exercise beats nutrition.

Mistake 3: Trying to get fit by going to the gym

That's where the most significant mental reframing is necessary. Going to the gym in order to get fit is hard to sustain long term if it's a chore—if it's the hard price to pay to look good and to increase your chances of reproductive success.

WRONG: exercise (while puffing and hating it) in order to be healthy

RIGHT: be healthy in order to continue to engage in the exercise you love

Me? I don't go to the dojo to get fit. I try to stay healthy (managing disease through nutrition etc) so that I will be able to continue to go to the dojo into my 80s and 90s.

From a whole-life perspective, exercise only really works when it is its own reward.

This is the book that will help you fine-tune and optimise your LCHF/keto regime.

I went on the keto diet in 2019 and, with very positive reinforcement from early results, have kept it up since. Given the health benefits, I plan to remain on in indefinitely. But things gradually change, fat may creep back up, and constant monitoring and tuning is needed. This book helped me get back on track.

The Art and Science of Low Carbohydrate Performance, by Jeff Volek & Stephen Phinney 

These highly qualified authors offer an in-depth understanding of the biology of ketosis, backed by scientific experiments from the literature and their own experience. They advocate regular measuring to monitor the efficacy of any interventions, just as I had already been doing for years, so I immediately liked them.

I was primarily just cutting carbs. But my daily measurements showed I was only achieving very mild ketosis (0.5 to 1 mmol/l). They helped me understand that the balance of my food intake contained too much protein and too little fat, and that too much protein won't allow you to stay in deeper ketosis. (They explain why).

By acting on that, I could halve my body fat in three months: it had crept back up to 18% and I brought it to 9% (monthly average). Wow. Evidence-backed results.

Another eminently actionable contribution was the wealth of tables with the content of various kinds of food. Really specific and detailed. I keep referring to them.

Last but not least, this book is specifically written for athletes and goes in depth into how and why keto will provide superior endurance in a way that carb-fuelled nutrition can't. Although I am not a professional athlete, I have been running a dojo for 20+ years. As a martial arts coach I perform intense physical activity regularly and these insights helped me improve my own athletic performance.

Perhaps slightly too technical as a starter book. But for people who have already seriously committed to keto, it's the go-to resource to get the most from it.