9 Potential Reasons You’re Gaining Weight On The Carnivore Diet

Every time you adopt a new diet, you throw yourself in with high hopes that this is it. This is the diet that’s going to change my life forever.

You become filled with high expectations of great quick results. Somehow the consumer culture seeped into our brains in every aspect of our lives, even our health.

If a diet doesn’t give instant results, you become thwarted. Only when you realize that you are ‘’yoyo-dieting’’ start opting for your health over the scale or Instagram pics that you start seeing progress. The carnivore diet is no exception. Even more, you might gain weight especially at first.

This is not uncommon, and you need to understand what’s happening with your body before you switch to a new diet. Here are 9 potential reasons why you might gain weight on the Carnivore diet:

1. Unwarranted expectations

The Carnivore diet isn’t a quick fix. If you come from a low-carb background diet like the Ketogenic diet, you might have enjoyed the quick weight loss at the beginning.

You do know that this is just water weight that you can gain rather quickly if you just ate a piece of fruit. Yet you are psychologically content.

However, the Carnivore diet will not win you over with instant results. Most advocates say to wait at least 1- 3 months before you judge your overall health.

Your fitness and wellbeing are not solely represented by the number you see on your bathroom scale. Instead, it’s advised to focus on health benefits like your new heightened level of energy and focus can help you maintain the diet until you see satisfactory weight loss results.

2. You are reconstructing your body

Most diets, especially different vegetarian diets and especially a vegan diet, tend to leave your body stores depleted. You need animal protein and fat to sequester building blocks and replenish your body.

Therefore, eating healthy nutritious foods is key to kick start your weight loss. Certain processed meats and inorganic products may impede your progress as they are just empty calories with humble levels of vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants that your body desperately needs.

If you are short on ideas, check out this article, “9 Most Underrated Carnivore Diet Dinner Recipes (With Pics).” and also pick up this book written by our friend Jessica Haggard at Primal Edge Health titled, “The Carnivore Cookbook.” (For a limited time use coupon code ANDY5 at checkout for $5.00 off)

Your body needs essential vitamins and minerals for any weight loss process to function properly and a highly palatable repertoire of recipes is key.

Moreover, your hormones will be all over the place initially until your body adapts to this dramatic change and heals itself. It’s only fair to give it time to adjust before you demand results.

3. You are not satiated

Your idea of successful dieting probably translates to a lot of starvation. Unfortunately, you might even feel on track when you are depleted, weak, and hungry.

This will increase your cravings and force you to snack all the time. After a while, you will start trying to ‘’out-smart’’ the diet and eat Carnivore friendly snacks.

This is how you slip and label this diet inefficient and switch to some fad. As always, it’s usually recommended that you eat healthy ingredients and until you are truly satiated.

A few words of wisdom from carnivore diet doctor and advocate Dr. Shawn Baker and author of “The Carnivore Diet.”

“When it comes to long term adherence to a diet, if you’re constantly hungry, it doesn’t seem to work,” says Dr. Baker. “If you don’t enjoy the food, you’ll fail as well. You have to find a diet that’s satiating, palatable, and it doesn’t leave you with hunger.”

If you think about it, it truly is a crazy shift from a low-calorie diet consuming under 1200 calories to 3000 or 4000 calories per day. It is a mental challenge. However, once your body adapts, you will require fewer and fewer calories.

4. You can’t let go of old habits

Were you told not to eat after a specific time like 7 p.m.? or a specific number of meals like 3 meals a day with two snacks in between? These are tactics to control hunger and play along with your insulin spikes.

Obviously, enforcing an eating window is not working out for you. Additionally, you might still feel an urge to track your calories or macros. This is not advised on the carnivore diet, so delete the tracking apps.

If you still feel unsure about this move, you can log in a week’s worth of food, and get an idea of what you eat generally. However, it’s recommended that you try listening to your body for a change; if you are hungry, eat! Just eat right. Ditch your old habits, and just focus on fueling and strengthening your body.

5. You are stressed

We often forget that external factors like our emotional and mental status affect our weight too. When you are stressed, your body releases stress-coping hormones like cortisol.

Cortisol disturbs your insulin levels, interrupts your sleep, and makes you feel more anxious and depressed.

It also encourages fat deposition in your abdominal area. This seriously thwarts any weight loss efforts. It is important to note this factor is highly influenced by your genetics too as your genes dictate your sensitivity and response to steroids in general (1).

6. You don’t get enough sleep

Lack of sleep messes with your hormones. In a randomized crossover study, researchers studied the hormonal profiles of a group of subjects when they are sleep deprived and when they are not.

They found out that sleep restriction is associated with activation of the endocannabinoid system (2).

This system is still under study, but researchers know that it is involved in regulating physiological and cognitive processes, various activities of the immune system, appetite, pain-sensation, mood, and memory.

This study concluded that the endocannabinoid system may be involved in excessive food intake and contributed to the increased risk of obesity-associated with insufficient sleep.

7. You are under or over-exercising

While exercise is crucial to improve your fitness level and helps you lose weight, there appears to be a healthy exercise limit and pattern for everyone.

It seems a lot of people who want to lose weight abuse cardio workouts which makes them hungry and tired all the time without bettering their figure as they please.

If you don’t feel that your exercise plan is satisfactory, get a trainer, or read more and educate yourself.

The internet is loaded with exercise routines, but you have to make sure that you reach out to trusted sources. You will be surprised by the number of workouts and activities that are much more fun and more efficient for you, and it will be life-changing.

8. Your health is compromised

Although it is rare, many people can live their lives undiagnosed while having serious health conditions that affect weight dramatically like PCOS, hypothyroidism, Cushing’s, and even depression.

A family history of any of these conditions and others can be your clue. Generally, you want to stay up to date with your overall health. Resistant weight loss demands a doctor’s consult. In fact with anything regarding diet and nutrition you should consult with your doctor.

9. You are not enjoying the journey

The Carnivore diet is all about your overall health and wellbeing. This is not a quick fix to fit into a dress or achieve a certain look for an event.

This diet plan needs an honest effort and diligence to succeed, but the results are worth it. If you only focus on weight loss, you will end up missing out on all the other benefits this diet has to offer.

Gaining weight for weeks when you don’t want to is frustrating no matter what, but does it make sense to damage something in years, and expect to fix it in days or weeks? Absolutely, not!

Give your body a chance to get rid of toxins, switch metabolic pathways, heal, and then ask it to conform to your demands. If you see space for adjustments and improvements, do it. Invest both time and effort in your body, and stop switching diets and trying fads. Just don’t give up on yourself, and have fun.

The #1 Carnivore Supplement

This one is going to trick you a little as you are thinking of a pill to swallow but in fact, one of the best things you can do is hire a carnivore diet coach!

Like anything in life worth pursuing, commitment is what is most valuable, and with a coach helping you along the way you are less likely to falter and give up.

Check out MeatRX and their amazing roster of carnivore diet coaches. You can even hire me as your one on one coach to help with motivation and inspiration.

Also it’s advised to pick up one of these books to learn more knowledge about this style of eating.

• The Carnivore Diet by Dr. Shawn Baker
• The Carnivore Code by Dr. Paul Saladino

And of course we have some more highly helpful articles.

• 21 Essential Carnivore Diet Products You Need On Your Shopping List
• 11 Reasons to Quit Alcohol on a Carnivore Diet (#2 is Scary)
• How to Get Electrolytes on a Carnivore Diet: An Essential Guide

Wild Lumens YouTube Chanel Carnivore Recipes!

Thanks for reading! And I wish you success.

Disclaimer: I’m not a doctor. Consult with and ask your doctor about any diet or medical-related questions. No information on this site should be used to diagnose, treat, prevent, or cure any disease or condition.

References

1. Stress and Obesity: Are There More Susceptible Individuals?
2. Sleep Restriction Enhances the Daily Rhythm of Circulating Levels of Endocannabinoid 2-Arachidonoylglycerol