CHAPTER 6

Action 3:
Fuel Refocus

I’ve met many women who were literally addicted to processed carbohydrates, especially foods high in added sugar. They’d sprinkle sugar on their already sugary cereal in the morning, snack on chocolate nibs throughout the day, and eat ice cream after dinner. They just didn’t seem to be able to get enough sweets.

And no wonder. Sugar is lurking everywhere, and its lure is powerful. Most food manufacturers don’t make it easy on us. In fact, they are at the root of the sugar problem. There are more than 600,000 processed foods in grocery stores, 80 percent of which contain added hidden sugar. As I mentioned earlier, the average American consumes 19 teaspoons of sugar a day. One serving of a popular commercial pasta sauce has more sugar than a serving of Oreo cookies! Sweetened yogurts may be filled with more sugar than a can of soda.

Debate has raged recently about whether junk food—the super-processed, ultra-palatable stuff—is addictive in the same way that heroin or cocaine is addictive. After all, many people often feel overwhelmed with cravings that drive them to seek out sweets and devour them in a flash. Well, the verdict is starting to come in: a 2018 study found that higher sugar, higher glycemic foods can indeed be addictive—and in animal studies, they have been shown to be more addictive than cocaine.

Naturally, there are consequences—serious ones. Processed carbohydrates and added sugar are considered the main detrimental additives in our diets. They’re often cited as the lead contributors to various chronic, inflammation-related illnesses, from obesity to diabetes to Alzheimer’s disease.

Today, a growing body of science suggests that those who are overweight, obese, pre-diabetic or diabetic, or even addicted to processed carbs might do best on a diet that is higher in total fat and lower in carbohydrates. In fact, the proof is overwhelmingly in favor of limiting carbohydrates, increasing good fats, and eating moderate amounts of protein.

This is exactly what the Fuel Refocus phase of the Galveston Diet is all about.

What Is Fuel Refocus?

Our bodies prefer to burn glucose for fuel, derived from the carbohydrates in our diets through a process called gluconeogenesis, which takes place in the liver. Once our sources of glucose are burned up, our bodies then switch to burning body fat for fuel.

But remember, the American diet is loaded with carbohydrates (e.g., bread, pasta, rice, desserts, and added sugars). These flood the body with glucose, which stimulates insulin release. Insulin is the main hormonal driver of fat storage in the body. So, when you eat that way, your body never switches into fat burning mode and yet also stores more of it! It’s a lose-lose situation.

To combat this, it’s vital to refocus your macros (protein, carbohydrates, and fat) and adjust your percentages to those that activate fat burning and stimulate the body to rely on fat as its main source of fuel. When you refocus your macros and adjust your percentages away from the typical American diet and toward percentages that encourage fat burning, your body creates ketone bodies in the process. These fatty acids are a form of fuel that help the body burn fat, instead of using glucose (sugar) from carbs.

This biochemistry is the essence of Action 3: Fuel Refocus.

The Macros in Fuel Refocus

The macronutrient ratio of the typical American diet is as follows: 50 percent of calories from carbohydrates, 15 percent from protein, and 35 percent from fat.

We’re going to change that. On the Galveston Diet, you’ll adjust your macros to enhance fat burning, fueling your body with healthy fats and protein and high-quality carbs in percentages that encourage the body to utilize fat for fuel. Those percentages are as follows: 70 percent healthy fats, 20 percent lean protein, and 10 percent carbohydrates.

The daily meal plans in this program are calibrated for these macros, so it’s easy to meet your macro goals. When you begin to plan meals on your own, you can track your own macros using your nutrition tracker (see page 55).

Here’s an overview of the approved options to help you meet your macros.

70 Percent Healthy Fats

These include avocado, avocado oil, coconut oil, olive oil, olives, seeds (especially chia and flax seeds), butter, raw nuts (especially almonds, macadamia nuts, pecans, and walnuts), nut butters (no sugar added), and mayonnaise (olive oil or avocado oil based).

20 Percent Lean Protein

Choose from grass-fed animal protein (beef, bison, chicken, lamb, pork, turkey), wild-caught fish and seafood, anchovies, sardines, eggs, nitrate-free beef jerky, and protein powder (limited ingredient, low sugar, low-carb).

10 Percent Carbohydrates

Carbohydrates are generally classified as two types, complex and simple. Complex carbohydrates are high-fiber foods, which improve your digestion and overall gut health. They also help stabilize your blood sugar, keep your energy at an even level, and help you feel satisfied longer after meals. They are less likely to be deposited as fat.

Examples of complex carbs are vegetables, legumes, fruits, and whole grains. My favorites are apples, artichokes, asparagus, bell peppers, beets, berries, broccoli, broccoli slaw, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower, leafy greens, nuts and seeds, and pickles. These are carbs to enjoy.

Carbs to avoid are simple carbs. These are smaller molecules of sugar that are digested quickly by the body. They cause a rapid spike in insulin. If not burned off right away, they can be converted to body fat. They are typically found in foods rich in added sugars or processed white flour that has been stripped of fiber and nutrients. Examples are candy and other sweets, bread and other baked goods, and various processed foods.

Once you begin the Galveston Diet for Life program, in Chapter 10—which guides you through maintenance—you’ll refocus your fuel again but over several weeks in order to stabilize your weight and increase your intake of anti-inflammatory foods. For example, you’ll:

1. Start with one or more weeks at 60 percent fat, 20 percent protein, and 20 percent carbohydrates.

2. Progress to additional weeks at 50 percent fat, 20 percent protein, and 30 percent carbohydrate.

3. Stabilize long term at 40 percent fat, 20 percent protein, and 40 percent carbohydrates. These percentages are those that you’ll use forever, after you’ve reached a size you like and are feeling really healthy and energetic.

There’s lots to look forward to!

Hot Flash: Meet Your Carbohydrate Macronutrient Goals with Low-Starch Veggies

As you track your carbohydrate macros, understand that there are two main categories of vegetables: starchy and non-starchy. Starchy veggies include sweet potatoes, corn, beans, and legumes (beans, peas, lentils), while non-starchy types include broccoli, cauliflower, tomatoes, and zucchini.

Both starchy and non-starchy vegetables are complex carbohydrates, but as the category names indicate, the key distinction between the two lies in their total starch content. Cooked starchy vegetables, such as potatoes, pack about 15 grams of carbs and 80 calories per ½ cup, whereas non-starchy types like broccoli contain about 5 grams of carbs and 25 calories in an equivalent portion. Also, starchy vegetables can raise your blood sugar levels faster than non-starchy veggies.

Although both forms of carbs are high in fiber, antioxidants, vitamins, and minerals, if weight loss is your goal, you will want to want to modify your intake of starchy vegetables in order to achieve your daily carb macros and burn fat steadily.

The table on page 106 lists some examples from both categories.

Starchy Non-Starchy
Corn Artichokes Cucumbers
Parsnips Asparagus Eggplant
Peas Green beans Mushrooms
Plantain Italian beans Onions
Potatoes Peppers (all) Broccoli
Squash Salad greens Brussels sprouts
Sweet potatoes Cauliflower Spinach
Succotash Kale Sprouts
Yams Carrots Wax beans
Zucchini Tomatoes

The Important Distinction Between Net Carbs and Total Carbs

On the Galveston Diet, you’ll be tracking net carbs. Net carbs are the total grams of carbohydrates in any given food minus its grams of fiber.

There’s a pretty simple and easy way to figure this out. If you look at the Nutrition Facts label of a given food, you’ll see the total carbohydrates per serving are listed. Indented under total carbohydrates, you’ll find the amount of fiber and the amount of total sugar, which includes added sugars. All these components make up the total carbohydrate number, but because fiber is not absorbed in the digestive process, we’ll subtract them from the total:

Total carbohydrates - Fiber = Net carbohydrates

The idea behind using net carbs is that our body digests each type of carbohydrate differently. Net carbs are the carbohydrates that you digest and use for energy; as mentioned, the remaining fiber passes through the digestive tract without being absorbed and thus does not elevate your blood sugar. Low-net-carb foods do not have a significant impact on your blood sugar and are therefore likely to help support weight loss.

Calculating Net Carbs

Remember, to calculate net carbs you simply subtract the grams of fiber from the grams of total carbohydrates. For the food whose nutritional label is given above, 37 grams (total carbohydrate) minus 4 grams (dietary fiber) equals 33 grams (net carbs).

The Common Challenges with Fuel Refocus

As you refocus your macros, you may be worrying that you’ll miss pasta or bread or potatoes, or you’ll worry about your sweet tooth getting the best of you. But let me reassure you. Your cravings will fall off (along with pounds and inches), you’ll feel more energized, and healthier, and you’ll feel completely satiated on the Galveston Diet. I can say this with confidence because so many women I’ve heard from have told me so!

Still, it’s important to understand that your body has been fueled by carbohydrates for most of your life. You are now asking your metabolism to switch from burning carbs to burning stored fat—which means you’re likely to face a few challenges. But don’t get discouraged! You are not alone in feeling some or all the following as you get started on the Galveston Diet.

Impatience with Fat Adaptation

When you start the program you’ll be training your body to adapt to burning fat as its main fuel source rather than carbohydrates. This doesn’t happen overnight, however. Studies show that becoming fat-adapted happens over weeks, not days. Most people actually need three to four weeks to reach peak fat-burning adaptation. What this means as a practical matter is that you may not see or feel big results for several weeks. Be patient! Once your body adapts to burning fat, the changes will come fast!

Carbohydrate Withdrawal

If you’ve been eating lots of complex carbs, you can expect some changes to your mood and energy levels when you switch your macronutrient intake to 10 percent carbohydrates. Indeed, this restriction can produce some withdrawal effects in the early stages. For instance, you may experience:

Ironically, if you experience any of these symptoms, it’s actually a good sign. It means that at one time your body was dependent on burning glucose for fuel. Now your metabolism is shifting to rely on fat for fuel. You are simply going through withdrawal from sugar and high-carbohydrate foods and are moving into fat-burning mode (fat adaptation!).

Carbohydrate withdrawal is not fun, but hang in there. You can minimize the side effects, even if you can’t eliminate them completely. One of the best ways is to replenish your electrolytes. Electrolytes include important minerals such as magnesium, potassium, sodium, calcium, phosphorus, and chloride, and they are vital in that they enable cells to generate energy, maintain the stability of their membranes, and function optimally in general. They also generate electricity, assist muscle contraction, transport water and fluids within the body, and participate in many other activities.

You can replenish your electrolytes by drinking adequate water throughout the day and introducing foods that are high in electrolytes into your diet.

To get enough potassium, for example, enjoy lots of green leafy vegetables and avocados. Honestly, I recommend eating at least one avocado a day. As for magnesium, nuts such as walnuts, almonds, pistachios, and pecans, as well as pumpkin and sunflower seeds, are wonderful sources and easy to add to any meal or snack.

Other electrolytes (especially calcium) are plentiful in green vegetables, and you can get sodium and chloride from gently salting your foods. Proteins such as tuna and chicken are rich in phosphorus.

Not Getting Enough Fat

Perhaps in the past you’ve been told to cut back on fats. But on this plan, fat is your new energy source. You need it. If you don’t get enough fat, your energy levels will suffer, and this plan may become difficult.

The best way to think of the Galveston Diet is that it’s not simply a lower-carb diet; it’s a high-healthy-fat diet. You may need to change your mindset from “eliminate carbs” to “get enough fat.”

With Fuel Refocus, about 70 percent of your calories should come from fat; that means enjoying foods such as eggs, uncured bacon, nuts, seeds, avocados, avocado oil, olive oil, coconut oil, and butter.

Avoiding Hidden Carbs

Carbs and added sugar are sneaky, and avoiding them can be quite a challenge. Many foods hide significantly more sugar and processed carbohydrates than you might realize, so it is important not only to read the nutrition labels but also to understand how the food was prepared and figure out how many carbs you’re eating.

Carbs aren’t just lurking in the obvious foods; they’re also hiding out in seemingly innocent foods. Here’s a short list of places where you’ll find hidden carbs and added sugar:

Hot Flash: Carb Swaps for Success

Here are some delicious substitutions for high-carb foods that will help you reach and maintain your carb macro goal of 10 percent.

High-Carb Food Low-Carb Swap
Bread Lettuce wraps or low-carb tortillas
Breading Grated cheese or almond flour
Chips Parmesan cheese crisps
Mashed potatoes Mashed cauliflower
Pasta Zoodles or other spiralized non-starchy vegetables
Rice Cauliflower rice
Soda Sparkling water
Wheat flour Almond flour

Consuming Enough Protein

The challenge of eating enough protein is in figuring out when you should eat it.

Most people eat protein at just one meal—say, dinner—but to maintain muscle at any age, it’s best to eat your protein throughout your 8-hour feeding window. This helps prevent muscle loss, which is important for women approaching and entering midlife. It also helps the hormones that control hunger and satiety, leptin and ghrelin, stay in balance.

And you don’t have to necessarily eat protein after a workout. You may have heard that protein is needed 30 minutes to 1 hour after exercising. I believed this advice for years, until I found out that it was based on a study involving 25-year-old male athletes. Those subjects who took in protein within 30 minutes of working out gained more muscle mass when compared to those who did not (although they still gained muscle, just not as much). These findings are irrelevant to us because they apply to young men. Plus, most of us are not looking to gain a crazy amount of muscle.

For some guidelines, aim to eat 25 to 30 grams of protein, or 3 ounces, at each of your meals and 10 to 20 grams of protein, or 1.5 ounces, for your snacks. Be sure to have your protein along with healthy fats and carbs to promote fullness.

Don’t overdo your protein intake, however; that is, don’t exceed these recommendations. If there is excess amino acid floating around in your bloodstream, your body will convert it to glucose to use for fuel, defeating the body’s ability to burn fat.

Get Off Sugar in 10 Days—My Sugar Detox

Our bodies get used to a certain amount of sugar. The more sugar we eat, the more sugar we crave, and I’m talking about “added sugar”—the type that is added during the processing of foods, as well as table sugar, honey, syrups, or any sugars that we add to our food. The good news is that it’s possible to reverse that trend and eliminate your sweet tooth.

The proof for this is in a study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. The researchers enlisted 29 volunteers who habitually drank at least two sugar-sweetened beverages a day. As part of the experiment, the volunteers were asked to rate the sweetness of some sweetened puddings and drinks. The researchers then asked half the people to cut back on their sugar by 40 percent, and they allowed the other half to continue with their regular diets.

After three months, the people in the study went back to eating whatever they wanted to eat for a month. The researchers asked the participants to rate the sweetened puddings and beverages again. The people who had lowered their intake of sugar thought the pudding and beverages were too sweet and liked them less. They had actually lost their desire for sweets!

If you have a sweet tooth, this means that after you wean yourself off sugar, it loses its addictive grip on you. To get you started on that, try my 10-day sugar detox and repeat as necessary.

Day 1. In your journal, write down your goals for breaking your sugar addiction. For example:

Day 2. Starting today, track your added sugar intake in your app. You may be really surprised by the total amounts you start to see. Remember, for women, the American Heart Association recommends no more than 25 grams of added sugars per day. Seeing how much more than that you are regularly consuming can be shocking—and motivating!

Day 3. If you’re still drinking soft drinks, sweetened tea or coffee, sweet cocktail mixers, commercial juices, and so forth, start drinking carbonated waters infused with citrus fruit or cucumbers instead. Take the additional step of getting rid of all sweetened beverages you’ve got in the house.

Day 4. Stress affects your food choices and amplifies your cravings for sweets, so you’ll want to do stress-relieving activities like yoga and meditation. Also, reach for high-magnesium foods, since magnesium helps calm the body. Examples are apples, avocados, or almonds. Have those with an egg or two (rich in brain-friendly vitamins) or fatty fish (packed with depression-lifting omega-3 fatty acids).

Day 5. Foods high in added sugar, such as packaged foods loaded with high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS), feed your addiction and fuel your hunger and cravings for more. Today, start creating satiating meals and snacks by pairing a healthy carb with protein or a healthy fat. Instead of a cookie or handful of crackers or chips, for example, try pairing an apple with a small handful of almonds or yellow squash plus hummus.

Day 6. Start a label-reading habit if you haven’t begun already. Remember, many foods and condiments are sneaky sources of processed carbs and added sugar. Check the labels of products like salad dressings, condiments, sauces, and other foods to scan for sneaky carbs.

Day 7. Can’t yet ditch your usual sugary dessert? Ask yourself: Are you actually hungry or is your nightly sugar fix a hard-to-break habit? If you’re truly hungry, prepare something high in protein with a healthy fat—say, a handful of walnuts or unsweetened Greek yogurt with berries and unsweetened coconut. This kind of combo can replace your nightly dessert in a highly satisfying way.

Day 8. Little-known fact: Drinking ample water each day can help you manage sugar cravings. What’s ample? Aim for 64 fluid ounces a day; that’s 8 cups a day. Feel free to add some citrus or fresh herbs to your water to make it more interesting.

Day 9. Time to ease off artificial sweeteners, too. They may seem like a good idea while you’re getting off the added sugar, but they can mess up your efforts. Research suggests that artificial sweeteners may promote metabolic changes that actually increase cravings, food intake, and weight gain. Start easing off these sweeteners by using half the amount you’ve been accustomed to and halve that amount again every couple of days. If you still need some sweetness, switch to stevia or erythritol.

Day 10. Congratulations—you’re really on your way. You’re likely already craving sweets a whole lot less, and maybe you’ve weaned yourself off added sugars entirely. Keep halving the amount of artificial sweeteners you’ve been using or ingesting. Keep drinking lots of water. And reflect on the goals you set out at the beginning of this 10-day process. Record your successes in your journal and write down how you feel, now that you’ve cut back on or eliminated added sugars.

The truth is that sugar isn’t required in any diet. You must consume protein. You must consume quality carbs. You must consume healthy fat. You don’t need to consume any sugar. The Galveston Diet was developed with these facts in mind. And the program will help you break your sugar addiction. I promise you can do it. Once you do, your love affair with added sugar will be a thing of the past.