Keto Chat Episode 80: Drew Manning Fit 2 Fat 2 Fit Keto

Drew Manning is the NY Times Best Selling Author of the book, Fit2Fat2Fit and is best known for his Fit2Fat2Fit.com experiment that went viral online. He’s been featured on shows like Dr. Oz, Good Morning America, The View and many more. His experiment has become a hit TV show, called Fit to Fat to Fit, airing on A&E!

Drew’s Keto Program:
Keto.Fit2Fat2Fit.com

Drew’s Intermittent Fasting Program:
Healthy21JumpStart.com

TV show:
http://www.aetv.com/shows/fit-to-fat-to-fit

Transcription

Carole: Hey! Welcome everyone to another episode of Keto Chat. I am your host Carole Freeman, the creator of the Fast Track to Keto Success program and a certified nutritionist and all that other blah, blah, blah stuff. I am so excited to be here today with Drew Manning. Not Drew Brees but Drew Manning. We met very briefly at Paleo Affects in Austin, Texas in, what was that like in April or May or something this year and then I got a really cool opportunity to hang out with you at a Seahawks game and we beat your 49’ers so that was really, really great. Welcome, Welcome Drew.

Carole: And, if people don’t … let me just read your bio real quick for those people who, I don’t know if they’ve been living under a rock or something like that, they don’t know who you are but in case you don’t know, Drew Manning is the New York Times bestselling author of the book Fit2Fat2Fit. He is best known for his Fit2Fat2Fit experiment that went viral and he’s been featured on all kinds of shows like Dr. Oz, Good Morning America, The View. I saw a clip of you on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, so on and on and on. All those different shows you’ve been on. And also, he’s got a TV show that’s based on his whole experiment too as well. So, we’ve got a ton of stuff to talk about but welcome Drew, thank you so much for being here.

Drew: Thank you for having me and thanks for reading that bio, because some people get me confused with Drew Brees or Peyton Manning, it’s like a combination of those two people.

Carole: H yeah. Oh yeah. So, definitely not the football player but, did you ever play football in high school?

Drew: I was a football player but not an NFL one.

Carole: Yeah, well so let’s just start like share with us how did you get into fitness in the first place, right? Because the Fit2Fat2Fit, you were fit, you got fat, and now you’re fit again. So, tell us the fit part of that, how did you get into that?

Drew: Great question. I grew up in a family of 11 brothers and sisters and we all played sports. So we were all active. My older brothers played football and wrestling and so I kind of followed suit and that’s what I did as well. I played football and wrestling ever since I was a little kid. So I’ve always been into health and fitness as far as like performance and athletics go. I really didn’t understand nutrition until I became a certified trainer in 2009 but, I’ve always cared about like what my body looked like and being physically fit so I could perform better and I liked to look good too as a little kid. And so, it’s always been a part of me ever since I was little.

Carole: Nice, okay. So, when did you start doing personal training> Was like your first career or did you have some other things you did?

Drew: No, I actually worked as a financial analyst right out of college and then I did a 180, went to the medical field. Was a neuro monitoring technician and then I became a personal trainer in between that transition where I would train people part time. So that kind of leads in to my Fit2Fat2Fit story because I’ve always been in shape but I’ve never known any different. And so when I started to train clients who were overweight, there was an obvious disconnect between them and me. I couldn’t understand why it was so hard for them just to do what I told them to do. Like, “Hey, here’s your meal plans. Why do you keep messing up on them? You just follow it and you stop drinking the soda and eating the junk food and you go to the gym and then it’s not that hard. Like you just do it.”

Drew: And then, they would tell me, “Drew, you don’t understand because for you it’s always been easy and for me it’s hard.” I’m like, “Yeah, I don’t understand why it’s so hard.” So, I kind of took that to heart and then that’s where the idea Fit2Fat2Fit first came about.

Carole: Did you just wake up one day and you’re like, “I’m gonna do this” or …

Drew: It was an epiphany. I was thinking of ideas because when they told me those things, like, “You don’t understand” I kind of took that to heart. I thought okay maybe I need to learn something as a trainer because most trainers are kind of know-it-alls and I was that type of trainer where I’m like, “I know how to fix you.” But, I kind of took that to heart when they told me I didn’t understand. And so, I was thinking of ideas and the idea just kind of struck me like lightening. The idea of getting fat on purpose. Like, boom, it showed up in my head and I’m like oh my gosh. I even Googled it to see if anyone had done it before and nobody ever had, at least no one had done it on purpose.

Drew: I felt like this was my calling. I need to do this. And, I started telling friends, “I think I’m gonna do this crazy idea” and they’re like, “Oh yeah, that sounds awesome. You should do it.” So, I kind of ran with it and it was a very, very humbling experience, way harder than I ever imagined it would be, and here we are today.

Carole: Yeah. Yeah, and I love that you did this because I work primarily with women that have struggled for decades with their weight and I always acknowledge to them that what they’ve done takes more willpower, to contemplate starting yet one more diet where they’re gonna be tired and hungry and miserable and forcing themselves to exercise when they have no energy. That takes more willpower than I always compare it to those young guys that are personal trainers that have never had to be overweight, they don’t have willpower. They don’t know what it … that’s easy for them. So, the fact that you’ve been through that, like you said, it gives you so much more insight and compassion for what people have been through. So, you gained 80 pounds, is that about right?

Drew: Seventy-six. If you round up, 76 pounds to be exact.

Carole: Yeah, so how tall are you? Let’s get some numbers in this.

Drew: Six-two”. I started out at 193, about eight to nine percent body fat. It was a pinch caliper test, so it wasn’t exact, but then I got up to 32 percent body fat, 269 pounds at my heaviest.

Carole: How long did that take you to get there?

Drew: It was six months of gaining weight, and losing weight. So the idea in a nutshell was like six months I can’t work out to kind of make sure I’m not doing any physical activity other than I had kids at the time so I played with them but nothing structured. And then, eat whatever I wanted to. I could eat an unrestricted diet. I could go to the grocery store and eat whatever I wanted to but what I wanted to do was focus on, instead of doing a Supersize Me like Morgan Spurlock did, where we know fast food’s bad for us. We still eat it but we know it’s bad for us. I wanted to focus on every day American foods that some of us don’t think is that bad for us, like white bread and juices and cereals, and chips, cookies, crackers, granola bars that sometimes are marketed to us as “Oh, it’s fortified with Vitamin A and Vitamin D and it’s all natural. It’s gluten free sometimes” and we’re like, “Oh, it’s healthy for us.” That’s what caused me to gain 76 pounds in six months.

Carole: I can’t imagine going from feeling really great to just starting to eat that way, how miserable you must have felt and how hard it was to keep eating that way. What kept you … I mean we talk about how hard it is to stay on a healthy diet, but I can’t imagine the opposite for you. So what was it that kept you going and motivated to keep eating that way?

Drew: Well, at first it didn’t make me feel miserable right away. At first it was kind of fun. I was like “Oh my gosh, this is like freedom. I can go to the grocery store, eat whatever I wanted to. Don’t have to go to the gym.” So, I kind of had this like sense of freedom, like I’m free to do whatever I want to. But about a month, really quickly things started to become a little bit harder. Yeah, there was moments where I’m like, “This sucks. There’s no way I can do this. I have five months left.” The fact that I was putting it out there on social media live for people to see was like I can’t back down. I’ve been on talk shows and I’m starting to blog about it and put videos up there. I’m like I can’t stop now otherwise I’ll be looked at as a fraud or someone that gave up. And so I’m like … maybe that athletic background and that mentality was like you’ve got to push through this. This is a challenge. You’ve got to finish it, endure to the end kind of thing. So that [crosstalk 00:07:53]

Carole: Yeah. That’s really cool that that’s what helped you push forward. I know in the beginning of my journey, sharing my journey online is also part of what kept me motivated to go and that’s a really big key. I’m sure you find with working with people is having some kind of accountability or finding what motivates you to keep going is really powerful when you have struggles.

Drew: And, it helped on both ends, gaining the weight and losing the weight because even for me as a personal trainer it was really, really hard for me. There was days where I had the cravings of like for example Cinnamon Toast Crunch was one of my favorite foods. I just remember there was times where I wanted it. Every time I’d go in the grocery store, I see it. I know the feeling or I know the taste of what it feels like, how good it makes you feel when it touches your lips. I thought it right now actually. But, it’s so good.

Drew: Cinnamon Toast Crunch is one of my drugs. And so, there was times where I just was like, “You know what, no one’s gonna know”, but I was like, “What if someone ran in to me at the store and they saw my Cinnamon Toast Crunch, what would I say?” I’d be totally freaked out. And so, I was like, “I’ve got to stay accountable to my audience because they’re doing this with me.” And so, I had to live it. And so the power of accountability and having a support system is really powerful for people, whether they’re doing a crazy journey like gaining the weight but also losing the weight. You have to have that support system.

Carole: Did you do any health monitoring during that time, blood tests and things like that?

Drew: Yeah, great question. I had a doctor, my personal doctor, monitor me on a monthly basis where he drew blood every month and it was really, really interesting to see how quickly your body can go downhill. So for example, like just throwing out some numbers, my blood pressure got up to 167/113. My testosterone dropped to the low 200’s, and here I was a 31-year-old male. In those six months I developed a fatty liver. My doctor said I had the kidneys of an alcoholic even though I didn’t drink alcohol during this time, but the non-diet sugary sodas can do a similar type of damage to your insides as if you’re an alcoholic.

Drew: And so, it was really scary how quickly, because if you think about it, 31 years of my life I was living healthy, fit, and just six months of letting myself go, how rapidly your health declines.

Carole: Well, it’s really …

Drew: [crosstalk 00:10:12] six years or six [crosstalk 00:10:13]

Carole: Yeah. I think that’s really fascinating too because I often think of these things take decades of following this standard American diet, and like you said, it wasn’t like you were binging on junk food and fast food all the time. You were eating a standard American diet and it only took less than six months for you to totally destroy your health. And so, even in somebody who’s really, really healthy, and we think of people that are really healthy as having a lot of resilience and they can eat whatever they want, this and that, but it really shows that it’s not true and things can … not only can they go downhill quickly but they can also reverse quickly.

Drew: Yeah. [crosstalk 00:10:55]

Carole: What was it like then that … was there like the midnight of the final day and, “Tomorrow’s the day I’ve got to get back on track”? What was that tipping point?

Drew: The transition, so I had my last supper, my last meal was a whole box of macaroni and cheese, like the Kraft, you know, macaroni and cheese, and a whole 2-liter bottle of Mountain Dew I think was [crosstalk 00:11:19]

Carole: Oh my god.

Drew: The next morning, I had like a spinach shake and I had chicken and a bunch of vegetables. Part of me was excited, like I can’t wait to get my body back but part of me was so nervous because I’m like, “What if it doesn’t work? What if I’m stuck like this forever?” I was so scared because I have never journeyed down this path before. A lot of anxiety but excitement as well. But, it was really hard. The first two weeks were literally hell because of the withdraw symptoms that I was feeling, those standard American foods was way harder than I thought. And, it helped me finally relate to what my clients were saying because when I would give them a meal plan and expect them to follow it, their bodies fought back.

Drew: My body did the same thing and it opened up my eyes. It clicked. I was like, “Oh my gosh, this is what my clients were telling me. This is why it’s so hard to transition from eating these highly processed foods for your whole life and now it’s all of a sudden you’re trying to eat whole foods.” The food doesn’t taste as good. You don’t feel as great right away. I had headaches. I was grumpy. I was moody and I was like here I am a personal trainer trying to promote living a healthy lifestyle and how good it makes you feel and I felt like crap. I told people about it. I’m like, “Look, this is one of the worst things I’ve ever gone through.”

Drew: It helped me have empathy for my clients who try and transition to living a healthy lifestyle. I understand that it’s not as easy as just willpowering your way through it and saying, “Okay, no more soda.” We all try and do that but then at some point the mental and emotional challenges that we go through come back to bite us. That emotional connection to food is way more powerful than I ever imagined. So, it opened my eyes and it was very humbling, but I’m glad I went through it.

Carole: Yeah, so did you … from all of that experience, did you kind of get some top five tips or really big insights in how people can make that change easier?

Drew: Yeah, so we have kind of already touched on that. First of all, accountability and support system. So, letting people know what your intentions are. If you are trying to live a keto lifestyle, for example, hey, let people know, “I’m trying this keto thing. Help keep me accountable. Maybe at the next family party, you’ll support me by having some keto options there” for example. Or, your friends or family will kind of the next time you go out, “Hey, I thought you were doing that keto thing”, you’re like, “Oh yeah, I kind of want those fries though that you guys are eating.” Hopefully they’re there to support you.

Drew: So, accountability and support system, but also realizing that there is gonna be a transitionary period. It doesn’t have to be night and day, like one night you have your last supper of like “Okay, I stuffed my face with pizza and all the carbs” and then all of a sudden “Okay, no more carbs the next day” and expect to feel great. Understand that there’s an adjustment period, there’s a transitionary period so be patient with yourself during that transitionary period. And so for me, it was really important to go through that.

Carole: Nice. Nice. Awesome. This was how many years ago? Has it been ten? Not ten.

Drew: No, no, six years.

Carole: Six years, okay. Yeah, and so based on what you were talking about that you started your day with, and you weren’t following a ketogenic diet at that time, you were doing a standard like low fat, calorie, more of a calorie counting type thing/

Drew: So keto wasn’t really popular back then in 2012. I kind of knew what it was but no one was … it wasn’t mainstream yet and so I kind of had more of a modified Paleo approach. It wasn’t strict Paleo but it was lower carb but it was high protein, moderate fat. It was like a high protein, moderate amount of fat, lower carb type of diet for the six months. It was five, six meals per day, split out every three hours. Pretty standard for that time. And it works. It still works. If your goal is to lose weight and get fit, you can still use that method and it still works for a lot of people.

Carole: Yeah. Yeah, in a minute I want to ask about how you got on the keto train too, but before that, I’d love to just talk about the TV show that you’ve created as well, so Fit2Fat2Fit TV show. I don’t have cable. I’ll confess, I haven’t watched an episode but now I’m super curious. I’ve got to go binge watch your episodes. What’s the show? What’s the premise of the show and give us some highlights.

Drew: Well, here’s the thing, so Fit2Fat2Fit happened … I wrote a book, which became a New York Times best seller, then I got connected with a production company out of L.A. We went and pitched the TV show to all of the networks. Eventually, after years, A&E picked it up because here’s the thing, I can only do this once, you guys. I can’t keep getting fat over and over and over again. It’s way too hard. So instead of me doing it, what we decided to do is we have other trainers from across the country where I coach them and put them through the same process because there’s so many trainers that are very similar to me. They grew up their entire lives in shape. They think it’s non-judgemental. They’re a little bit self-obsessed, and that’s who I was and now we’re picking trainers from across the country and putting them through this process for four months instead of six months. See how those go.

Drew: After four months of gaining weight and now as a fat trainer, they have to lose the weight with their client. And so this is the first they’ve gone through this experience and it’s so interesting to see almost every single trainer suffer through the same physical, mental, and emotional issues that I did, but it makes them more empathetic, have more respect, and a better understanding for their clients after having gone through this eight-month process.

Drew: And so Season One, there was ten episodes. Each episode is a new trainer, a new story, a new client, and there’s a lot of drama of course. It is reality TV show. I mean I think it’s really good, but I’m a little bit biased. Season Two … so Season One was on A&E. You can’t find it on Demand online. And then Season Two comes out in January of 2018, but it will be on Lifetime, which is owned by A&E. So January 2018. We don’t have a launch date yet but January of 2018 for Season Two of the show.

Carole: Oh cool. I am totally gonna watch that now. That’s awesome.

Drew: Watch it while eating cookies and eating ice cream.

Carole: Oh yeah. No, that’s so funny because like back before when I was in my pre-keto days and I would secretly … I liked to watch the weight loss shows, like eating junk food or something, just kind of like a “Ha, ha, ha, I’m sitting here in spite of what you’re doing.” I’ve had other friends confess the same thing, that they loved to sit and eat junk food and watch the shows. It’s terrible. Well, I promise I won’t be doing that while I’m watching. Okay, so fastfoward four or five years and how did you … you said you’d heard about keto back then but what was kind of the transition? How did you get involved with a ketogenic diet? What made you decide to try it and how’s it been for you?

Drew: Yeah, so it was about two-and-a-half years ago I remember hearing Dr. Dominic D’agostino on the Tim Ferriss podcast and when he was talking about the science behind the ketogenic diet, I felt like okay, this is something I need to experiment with because I’ve heard of it before but I didn’t really understand any of the science behind it until he brought it up and then I was like, “Okay, well, here I am a self-experimenter. That’s what I do for a living kind of.”

Carole: Yeah.

Drew: I’ll give this a shot. And so I decided to go strict for 60 days after listening to it. I made a plan, followed it strictly for 60 days and I remember here’s the thing, the biggest surprise, my body … I was already lean to begin with. My body composition didn’t change a whole lot. My performance in the gym was about the same. The biggest thing that I noticed in those 60 days was how much sharper my brain felt. My cognitive function and mental clarity was like night and day compared to before. Whereas, [inaudible 00:19:11] six meals a day to eating two meals a day and feeling fantastic in the gym and my brain was so much sharper. I’m like, “This feels so amazing.”

Drew: So, it felt more like nutrition for my brain and although fat loss and weight loss is a byproduct of it, it can be that, there’s so many other therapeutic applications to it. So, I instantly became sold within those 60 days, started posting about it and promoting it and then fastfoward about six months. I had the opportunity to go on the Dr. Oz show talking about the ketogenic diet. Now, I’ll tell you a funny story about that. So Dr. Dominic D’agostino was … we were kind of talking at the time and he was getting married. So, he’s like, “Hey, Drew, would you mind going on the show for me because I’m gonna be on my honeymoon?” I’m like, “Are you kidding me? Like, wow!” I’ve already been on the Dr. Oz show once for my Fit2Fat2Fit journey and now I have the opportunity to go back on in his place to talk about the ketogenic diet. So, it was a really cool opportunity for me to go.

Drew: I think whether you love or hate Dr. Oz, the fact that the sheer number of people that he can reach and bring it to the masses is unbelievable. So for me, being able to talk about the ketogenic diet and legitimize it in a way and bring it to the masses out there I think was really, really a great thing because then after that, the ketogenic diet has just exploded in popularity with other celebrities doing it now and actors. So many people are jumping on this bandwagon because they’re hearing about it from so many other sources. So, it’s really cool to see where it’s going and see where it will continue to go from here.

Drew: Yeah, so I’ve been doing it. I don’t do it strict all the time. I’m not like 100 percent strict. We had some wine at Seattle’s … well, I probably had more because the 49’ers lost but I do enjoy life but at the same time, I’m pretty much more keto than I’m … I’m more in ketosis than I am not in ketosis.

Carole: Yeah, well, and that’s the experience I’ve heard for a lot of people that they’re … it doesn’t sound like you’re really skeptical, but I always hear that once people have tried it themselves, the difference is so night and day, just the way they feel is like, “Oh yeah, this is a no-brainer. Of course I want to keep feeling like this.” Do you get a lot of skeptics that are like, “Oh, you’re gonna have a heart attack now, Drew. What are you doing? You’re gonna gain all the weight eating all that fat.”

Drew: Yeah, and it’s hard because we’ve been so ingrained with those thoughts for so long that, but now we’re just kind of starting to, I call it coming out of the matrix a little bit and realizing that “Oh, we’ve been taught this one path and now we’re starting to realize that path is wrong.” It’s taking a while for people to come around to it but the more people going on Dr. Oz or talking about it and bringing it out to the masses, we’re going to start to retrain those thoughts of the way we use to think it was, and now realizing, “Okay, it’s not that way.”

Drew: And so, it’s hard because then you have like people like the American HEArt Association coming out with their statements or certain documentaries coming out saying, “Oh, this is bad. Fats are still bad for you.” People are like, “Well, what are we suppose to do?” And so anyways, it’s hard. It’s an uphill battle, but one day at a time. But yeah, there’s obviously gonna be haters no matter what diet protocol you choose. It’s weird how we’ve turned it in to a religion almost and it bugs me. It bugs the crap out of me but you can become so extreme. Like, “Hey, which team are you on?” It’s like, “Hey, I’m on team human.” It’s all just get along, love each other. If you eat [inaudible 00:22:48] that’s fine. Do what works for you.

Carole: Yeah, no, and not only do we have like all this battle of what’s the perfect best diet but then even in the keto world, we’ve got everybody saying, “No, my keto’s the best.” “No, mine” and this is … and the truth is is that it’s gonna vary from person to person. That’s why there’s so many approaches out there, is that each person’s approach to keto is gonna be different because of a bunch of factors. So, there is no one perfect keto. I’m sorry to break the news to everybody. But, wait, that’s a product I didn’t mean to plug.

Carole: So how are you supporting … I mean I see your ads out there on Facebook. They pop up all the time for me, so how are you supporting people on keto? What kind of services do you have available that support that?

Drew: Yeah, so I have some online programs where people … like e-books that people can purchase. The hard part, you’ve probably found this with keto is you’re trying to put the masses in to a box of this is kind of the macronutrient ratio you’re suppose to eat because people want to be told exactly what they’re suppose to eat, number of calories, number of [crosstalk 00:23:47]

Carole: Yeah.

Drew: … and follow it to a tee and expect, boom, instant results, but the problem is that we’re all so different so it’s hard to say, “Hey, this is the exact way that you will follow it and you’ll feel the best this way.” So, I do have e-books that kind of put people in to a general macronutrients profile, but it does teach you how to customize it to your needs after maybe a couple of weeks. But, so there’s those e-books and then I also have private Facebook groups that people can join because that’s the number one thing that people have issues with is like if they have a question but they don’t know where to go. So, if they buy an e-book, it’s like okay, cool, but I don’t really know how … like, “What do I do in this situation” or “If I don’t like avocados” or “I’m a vegetarian”, or “I’m a vegan”. “What if I go over one gram of carbohydrates, am I out of ketosis?” “How do I test for ketosis?”

Drew: All of these questions, these support groups I think are really powerful to help people kind of ask those questions, get their hand held at first in the first like month or two, then they’re like oh, they know how to tweak it. They know how to live it, and then they see the results and then they know how to teach other people that are just coming because keto is so big and so popular there’s constantly people coming in, buying it.

Drew: And so yes, I do have the Facebook ads that definitely put it out there in front of people and then we have e-books and then the private Facebook groups I think is the way I have it set up to help people really understand how to live this as a lifestyle.

Carole: Yeah. Awesome. And of course we’re gonna link stuff down below, you guys if you’re watching. But, yeah, okay, so I want to ask then too about … so when you were first starting out on keto and you said that your performance in the gym, you didn’t notice any difference, was there though that transition period? So, who was it, Dr. .. I think it’s Dr. Lyle that talks about there’s … it takes two to three weeks for the muscles to switch over from using ketones to fatty acids, did you experience that dip in your performance at all or was it a smooth transition?

Drew: No, it was … I did experience it a little bit but I was cool because I had someone like Dr. Dom kind of explain it to me what to expect. I was doing crossfit style workouts, which is very glycolytic, and so I just remember him telling me “Hey, back off on the intensity. Don’t go super hardcore like you use to try and beat everybody else in the gym. Just back off on the intensity for the first three to four weeks and just don’t care about having to beat everybody, but just go at a moderate pace and then from there you can ramp it up after about three to four weeks.”

Drew: And so, yes, there was a transitionary period where I’m like, “Okay, I’m not going as hard and I definitely feel a lack of energy during some of the longer wads.” But after about three to four weeks, I was back up to where it was. You can kind of … the cool thing with crossfit is you can kind of test to see okay, I’m around the area of these people in the gym. I can beat them some days, some days they beat me, but I’m generally like right in this area. So, it’s kind of cool how you can kind of track that. But, if you’re just working out by yourself it’s harder to track that.

Drew: So, I noticed about after about three to four weeks I could kind of stay in that same category of that threshold of those people and kind of maintain that. So, that was really cool. I’m like, “Man, I’m only eating twice a day versus six meals a day. I’m working out on a fasted state and I’m not losing my muscle mass. My muscle mass and my strength are about the same.” But, not being a slave to food was really cool. You know

Carole: Yeah. Yeah. That’s one of the things my ladies often say is it’s the first time in their life that they’re not just consumed and obsessed with food and just really a lot of freedom. I came out of school with training in both nutrition and psychology and we learned that you shouldn’t put people on restricted diets because it just makes them more obsessed with food and it makes them more … feel more like a failure and hate themselves because they can’t stick with it, whereas with keto, people have that same misconception. They think “Oh, you’re putting people on these really restricted diets. They’re just gonna feel miserable”, but everybody always “Oh my gosh, this is the first time I finally feel freedom from obsession of food.”

Drew: Yeah. Well, it’s kind of sad because the other alternative is they’re stuck in this vicious cycle of like, “Okay, well, it’s too restrictive. Okay, well then what’s the other options? Just keep eating this food that’s not meant to be consumed by humans but it’s so cheap and affordable and convenient.” And, it tastes really, really good, don’t get me wrong. Some of it’s sold to us as health food sometimes. And so we’re like, “Everyone else is doing it. We’ve always ate this way” or at least our generation, so it’s like “We’re doing all right”. Man, it’s scary how quickly our health is declining as a society.

Carole: Yeah. Yeah. So what are some of the top mistakes that you see people making when they’re starting out with keto?

Drew: Yeah, that’s a great … I’ll talk about a few things. One is the basics, not enough water or they’re not balancing out their electrolytes so they’re not supplementing the salt. They’re not adding in magnesium and potassium for some people. They experience the keto flu and then they stop about a week or two in. They’re like, “I feel horrible. I need my carbs.” But 30 to 60 to 90 days of really becoming efficient at using ketones as energy source, and then from there, after that initiation phase of the 30 to 90 days, I usually say a minimum of 60 days, but from there, then they can mess around with their carb threshold and their protein threshold.

Drew: And so as they get to a 70/25/5 for the rest of the life and being strict for the rest of their life, I think our bodies change and adapt and maybe sometimes we need more carbohydrates after 90 to 120 days and maybe we need more protein and less fat. It depends on your lifestyle. But, finding what’s optimal for you is very, very important instead of just following the same macronutrient ratio the rest of you life and expecting to feel optimal all the time, I think we need to constantly be testing and checking based on our lifestyle.

Drew: So, what I recommend is after the 60 to 90 day initiation period, get a blood ketone meter, test your blood ketones and then see what your carb threshold is. So, maybe at first you can only eat 20 grams of carbs per day and stay in ketosis. Maybe you’ve burned some fat. You’ve gained some lean muscle mass now, maybe you can get away with 30 or 40 grams of carbohydrates and different types of carbohydrates, like sweet potatoes versus rice versus cookies versus bananas.

Drew: Find out what your thresholds are with certain types of carbs and then from there, find out what your protein threshold is. Can you get away with more protein and still stay in the state of ketosis. Some people can. Some people can’t. The only way to know for sure is to test your blood ketones. So, I just think it’s really important for people to become their own self-experimentation. I think that’s the biggest mistake people make is like, “Oh, I have to stay in this micronutrient ratio the rest oF my life. I never eat carbs again and I’ll live happily ever after.” For some people, maybe but I think for other people it’s just as important to find out what’s optimal for you.

Carole: Yeah. Great. Yeah, I’m of the mindset that … or of the belief that our bodies are really designed to go in and out of ketosis, natural, whether it’s food scarcity and abundance in our environment that we use to have thousands of years ago, that that is a sign of metabolic flexibility, is that occasionally you can have some carbs and you don’t die, and you can just get right back on track if you need to.

Drew: Yeah, exactly, or if your team loses to the rivals and you just want to drink your sorrows away. One game. I’m not sure when this podcast will air, but we won the game [crosstalk 00:30:59]

Carole: Okay. We’ll we’re just coming off of the week where they make us play two games in the same calendar week actually and we just lost Sherman. He just blew out his achilles tendon, so yeah, this will be coming out. But hopefully by the time this comes out the Seahawks are still in the playoffs.

Drew: They’ll be fine, I’m sure.

Carole: Yeah. Yeah. Oh gosh, okay, so what else should we talk about? What projects do you got brewing? Anything secret or can you tell us anything?

Drew: I just launched a kind of intermittent fasting program. It’s a 21-day jumpstart program. It’s called Healthy21Jumpstart.com. Basically it’s a intro version to the intermittent fasting. So, you can get the benefit of ketosis without having to be strict keto all the time because it walks you how to do intermittent fasting at a beginner’s pace and then it advances by the end of the 21 days to more of a 16/8 protocol, which is the most popular where it’s just … it will give you the most bang for your buck.

Drew: And so, it is lower carb but we do eat certain carbs at certain times of the day and certain days of the week. So, you will probably get in to a mild state of ketosis. You’re not getting probably above one or two blood millimolers of blood ketones but you’re probably hovering around .5 to .8 for most people during those periods of fasting. And so, it’s a little bit more flexible for certain people that don’t want to go strict keto. Maybe in the beginning, so it’s an easier program for them to follow.

Drew: Like I said, Season Two is coming out in January 2018. Let’s see, I still have my podcast, been going over two years now. It’s going strong. I still have my book, Fit2Fat2Fit. And, there’s a possibility, I’m in the beginning stages of writing a keto book but I can’t really talk about …

Carole: Oh, secrets.

Drew: Yeah. Yeah, we still have to sell it, so.

Carole: Oh yeah. Okay. Awesome. Awesome. Yeah, well, okay, lots of cool stuff coming. So basically you’re kind of busy, huh?

Drew: Yeah, just a little bit. I travel a lot. I’m headed to Spain next week for work filming some stuff. And then …

Carole: Oh, you’re not going to the … so right now, this week, they’ve got Low Carb Universe in Majorca, Spain right now. I think it starts Wednesday. So you’re not going for that then?

Drew: No, but that sounds really interesting. Yeah, it’s with this other company, but yeah, super exciting stuff. I’ll have to check it out, Low Carb Universe, that sounds amazing.

Carole: Yeah. Yeah, Spain. Do you know Franziska Spritzler?

Drew: No.

Carole: Okay, she’s known … she’s the low-carb dietician so she’s one of the speakers there. Yeah. Yeah. So, well, okay, so you’re not going for that, but it’ll be beautiful anyways, right?

Drew: If it’s near Madrid maybe I’ll check it out.

Carole: Yeah. Yeah. Well, awesome. Well, Drew, was there anything else that you were hoping I would ask you about or that you wanted to talk about?

Drew: I thought you were gonna ask me my whole life story, but you know.

Carole: Oh.

Drew: Only kidding.

Carole: We already talked about that. Your childhood of 11 and …

Drew: No, I’m totally kidding. No, I mean if anyone wants to find me online, all of my stuff is branded Fit2Fat2Fit, my website, my Facebook, my Twitter, my Instagram, my book, my podcast. The TV show, the only thing that’s different about it is it’s Fit to Fat to Fit instead of my brand. That’s the only thing that’s different out there. But, yeah, feel free to reach out to me. If you want to check out my programs, I’m totally cool with that. If not, it’s all good.

Drew: Like I said, I’m on Team Human. Let’s all be nice to each other and let’s find what works best for us without bringing other people down. Love yourself while you’re on your journey to become a better version of yourself. I mean that’s the hard part for people to understand is that they think “Oh, I’ll love myself once I look this way or lose weight, but until then, I’m just gonna kind of hate myself until I get there”, and that’s [crosstalk 00:35:13]

Carole: Yeah. Yeah. Oh yeah.

Drew: You know. So anyways, that’s my advice.

Carole: I love that. High five. I love that. And, I have to say that meeting you in person, all the traveling and the conferences I’ve gone to and all the speakers, I definitely have to say that you’re just a real nice guy. You’re a real approachable guy and getting to spend some time with you at the Seahawks game, you’re just a really nice, decent guy. You’ve got to want to work with people like that more, and so I just really appreciate that, especially there’s plenty of the nutrition health industry celebrities that I’ve met that did not give off that same approachableness. You just seem like, “Yeah, let’s talk and hang out” whereas other people are like, “Oh, who are you?” So yeah, I appreciate that about you a lot. Perhaps that’s just who you are or perhaps some of that came from your journey to get better as well as having more …

Drew: You know, for example, this book Ego is the Enemy really stands out and that really changed my life of letting go of your ego. [crosstalk 00:36:15]

Carole: Okay.

Drew: … people are because they hold on to their ego and they think they’re better than or higher than and that’s caused misery in the end for you. And so, I’ve learned to try my best to let go of my ego for the most part. I’m not perfect but that book kind of helped me on my journey to let go and not have an ego. But yeah, thank you.

Carole: Yeah. I just thought of another question. So, it’s pretty obvious for your journey Fit2Fat2Fit, like kind of physical stuff and everything else but what was kind of some of the biggest surprise or some of the surprises of how that affected your life in ways that you didn’t expect?

Drew: Yeah, so one, Fit2Fat2Fit, I had no idea would go viral or become big. I would go on all of these TV shows. I had no marketing strategy other than create a website, create a YouTube channel and put it out there on Facebook and that was it. And then, I had no media connections with these producers from these TV shows. A lot of it was luck. I’m not gonna lie, and I feel very blessed and very fortunate, but it totally changed my life. I had to quit my job in the medical field to do this full time. I had to make that decision because that was my safe kind of non-risky path in life and now here I was doing something I was passionate about but it wasn’t guaranteed.

Drew: Here I am six years later and feel super blessed and fortunate to have kept it going, even though there was times where I’m like, “Oh, should I go back in to the corporate world? Should I go back in to these other jobs or should I keep Fit2Fat2Fit going” and I’m so glad that I did because it’s definitely very blessed to have it where it’s at today. And to be able to be paid to do something you’re passionate about I think is [crosstalk 00:37:54] and so I would wish that on anybody.

Carole: Yeah. Well, along those lines, then do you have any … we’ve talked a lot about people getting healthy in general, but do you have any tips then for entrepreneurs, like people out there that are whether they’re health coaches or personal trainers or whatever else out there, do you have any tips for them?

Drew: A couple of things. One is be patient with yourself while you’re trying to find out, “Okay, what is that passion? I have no idea.” I didn’t know it either. I’ve always known I’ve been in to health and fitness but I’m like, “Okay, how can I make this successful without just being a personal trainer and trying to fit in as many clients as possible?” You really do have to think outside the box. When I came up with this idea, that’s why I really felt like it felt like, “Hell yes.” It was like a lightning strike to my brain. I’m like, “This is what I was meant to do”, but it wasn’t until I was 31 years old.

Drew: So, sometimes it doesn’t happen right away, so just be patient with yourself when you’re trying to find out what your true passion is. And then, just understand that sometimes luck is a part of the process. It’s not always about having the best marketing strategy and the best plans. It’s sometimes being in the right place at the right time.

Drew: And so, understanding that but also being willing to take risks. And so for me, it was really hard. I had two kids at the time and I had to make that leap of faith, and we all have to do it some point in our life. If you’re going to be an entrepreneur, you’re gonna have to make that leap of faith. And if you fail, it’s all good. If you fail, it’s all good. Something that you’d learned what you’re not gonna be doing. So, don’t be afraid to fail in those situations, even though it’s risky and sometimes you have a family that’s counting on you. Obviously, you know, it’s different if you have a wife kind of telling you you should be doing this. It’s a little bit different but if you have the support of your family, then go in full force and don’t be afraid to fail. So, be patient with yourself and don’t be afraid to fail.

Carole: Yeah. That’s great. Words of wisdom from Drew. Have a little The More You Know music at the end there. Yeah. Well, awesome. I appreciate everything that you’ve shared. This has been awesome and just really inspirational story and I love that you’ve just … because Team Human, you’re on Team Human so much that you’ve been willing to put your body through this to be able to understand what people are going through.

Carole: So, my final question for you is it’s your last day on earth, the meteor’s coming at us, we’re all gonna be wiped out today, what’s gonna be your final meal?

Drew: Oh, my final meal? Ew, okay, hold on a second. Let me think about this. Something coconut because I’m a lover of coconut. I’m a single guy and if I could marry coconut I probably would. But, it would have to be some type of like either coconut cream pie or coconut cheesecake of some type, anything with coconut I would [crosstalk 00:40:49]

Carole: Okay. Coconut water, coconut milk, and coconut curry all with … so you must have had a great time in Hawaii then? Did you get plenty of coconut while you were there?

Drew: Plenty of coconut treats out there. One of my favorite things is Masadas, which is this fried ball of dough and then they put haupia, which is coconut cream in the middle with coconut flakes. Like a doughnut and they roll it in sugar and you open it up and it’s like coconut cream filling in it.

Carole: Sounds like it tastes terrible.

Drew: It does.

Carole: Well, awesome. Thank you so much for everything. Thanks for being here. I really appreciate it. I know you’re coming off with no sleep too, so you’ve been great. It’s those ketones on the brain.

Drew: Yes, I’m definitely in a state of ketosis today because otherwise I’d be like, “Uh, what are you talking about?”

Carole: Yeah. Well, best of luck with everything you’ve got coming up. And hey guys, if you like this, give us a thumbs up or you can only give us one thumbs up on YouTube, but and subscribe if you want to see more. We’ve got all of Drew’s contact info down there in the show notes there. Thanks for watching. We’ll see you next time. Bye.