#38 Brian Williamson – Down 60 lbs and Cured Depression

I met Brian Williamson at KetoCon last year. After listening to his podcast for an entire year, I was starstruck. He is a down to earth and endearing and I so love hearing him share his story.

BIO

Brian Williamson. I’m a 40-something husband and father of three. I’ve been active my whole life (running, martial arts, lifting, etc.), but I can’t say I’ve always been healthy. I have topped the scales at 270 pounds (I’m 6’2″). My journey toward a ketogenic lifestyle began with some research into methods to alleviate the affects of epilepsy (one of my children has epilepsy). Ketogenic diets have been used for close to 100 years for helping people with epilepsy. That research led me to discover the science behind the ketogenic way of life, and allowed me the tools needed to accomplish the health and fitness goals I wanted achieve.

By adopting the ketogenic way of life, I have lost 60 pounds (so far), improved my mental and physical health, and started enjoying life.

The Ketovangelist is one of my keto heroes. In this episode, Brian Williamson talks about his son with epilsepsy, his depression, and his 60 lb weight loss.

SHOW NOTES: 

• Brian is 44 years old
• A father and a husband
• Lives in Central Texas
• Works for his self now
• Before, he worked in a contracting company that supported veterans administration
• He is an Air force veteran
• His father was in the military and his brother is an army
• I got into Keto through my son
• When he was 12 or 13 years old, he was diagnosed with Epilepsy
• My wife and I were at the movies when we were first confronted with Epilepsy
• As we exited the movie, my wife got a call from our eldest son.
  Basically, he was saying that something is happened to Noah – our little son
• He was not quite sure what, and we are not quite sure what. The bottomline is, he had called the ambulance
• We arrived home to the ambulance on our driveway and our son Noah, very confused, very upset, not sure what was going on
• The EMT basically said, it sounds like some sort of seizure has happened
  
• My oldest son, Austin, has a situation that at certain time given certain circumstances, his blood pressure would drop. Which would force him to basically pass out
• Now, it is not really a situation where he is having a seizure, but it is really hard to distinguished the two
• Because if you ever seen someone passed out, when they go about the act of recovery, they do thrash about a little bit
• So, we were thinking, that it is possible that Noah has the same one. It’s called the vasovagal response
• My oldest son, he has been in those situations especially if it’s acute anxieties or a severe pain. It happens
• He’s had that from very early on up until when he was on his early adult years
• So we thought Noah was afflicted to the same thing
• We went to the hospital and the doctor said everything’s checked out
• But, we really want to schedule a brain scan
• The next week, we scheduled a brain scan
• There was an electrical activity that is not in line with normal electrical activity which is the first indicator that epilepsy is at play
• That being the case, we tried to go through a couple of methods of medicinal treatments trying to treat the seizures
• The way epilepsy is handled is that; there is no cure for it. They are just trying to minimize the abnormal electrical behavior in your brain
• There’s also numerous side effects too
• Not only there are emotional side effects such as aggression, depression or other kinds of things
• Because these are psychopathic drugs that are used for things like bipolar depression and other neurological illnesses and affliction
• Aside from that, there are also physiological compensations as well, such as weight gain and lethargy
• And so, all these things are at play and he is not yet quite a teenager and he got all of this stuff
• So there are just a lot of variables going on in his life
• We get the medication dialed in to a particular point were his seizures is once every 3 months. He has a big seizure once every 3 months which we think is relatively manageable
• But, the neurologist was not quite convinced that that’s good enough. So she began changing the medication
• Through this time period, the particular combination he ended up with was not good for him at all
• It ended up him having multiples seizure in a week
• We had a rule, that when he goes to the bathroom, he will not lock the door
• He absently minded locked the door
• As a parent, if you have a child who has epilepsy, you’ve developed very heightened senses. Especially when it comes to hearing
• So we basically spent most of our time just waiting for a particular sound
• So, my son went to the bathroom and we heard a groan and commotion, and he did not respond
• When I got in to the bathroom, he was on floor and he was having seizure so severe that I was convince would be his last. That’s how bad it was
• We called the paramedics
• What you’ll learn is that there is not a lot that can be done after the seizure
• The real damage of the seizure is done if the victim falls
• So if the situation is where there is no damage physically done because of the seizure, there is no reason to take him to the hospital
• So we were face with this opportunity now that we have to readjust his medications
• And the neurologist said, “Okay, we are going to try something else. Oh, by the way, you may consider the Ketogenic diet.”
• This is several years after his diagnosis of epileptic
• I know from my years on the gym what Keto was on a high level, because that’s what bodybuilders used to use to get ready for competition
• So, I was intrigued
• When you don’t know that Keto is so powerful, it is really strange to hear that it has such an effect as to be able to treat something as malicious as epilepsy
• I asked couple of question like how does it works, and she said, “We don’t know.” I asked again, why does it work and she said, “We don’t really know.” And I asked again if she is sure that it would work, and she said, “We don’t really know.”
• So, I thought, Okay. It’s a way of eating, so you got to eat.
  It’s invasive, it’s not medication which is good
• So my son and I sat down and I explained to him what the diet was and he said he don’t want to do it
• So I decided that I would show him it’s possible
• At this time, I was probably 60 pounds overweight
• I owned a small business. I owned a martial arts school
  A year after my son was diagnosed epilepsy and I had to shut down my business
• So, I was in a really bad place
• I decided I was going to do this to show my son that it is possible to eat this way
• So that he would hopefully take that and realize that it is possible, it’s good for you and it has benefits
• I did not know what it would do to me and because of that it completely changed my life
• Turns out, I was depressed. And I did not know that I was depressed
• When you’re depressing, you have no idea that you are depress until a certain point that maybe you are.
• I was in a situation I thought, “Well this is normal and life just suck.”
• So I changed my diet
• Basically, I changed my diet just by adding fat to my coffee
• I woke up one morning and said I am going to mirror this for Noah and show him it’s possible and hopefully he would take the hint that it may be good for him too
• I added some butter to my coffee
• Almost an hour later, I started feeling better
• Normally, when I wake up I would just eat a typical standard western kind of food. And that I did not. I just had coffee and butter
• After sleeping for 4 full hours, getting up, kind of in a fast state and the first thing I do is drink some water
• My body is making some changes
• I started feeling better and I decided to pursue it
• I started doing some research and this was back several years ago when there were hardly resources about Keto
• So, I spent a lot of times on amazon buying obscure books
• In a couple of months, I dropped 50 pounds
• My son noticed and that was the time that they got intrigued
• So he wanted to partake with that
• We let him start – nice and slow
• It took some getting used to him
• I turned to my wife one day and I was like, “Is this how normal people feel?” and she said yes
• As I kept doing some research, there was more to it that weight loss or neurological benefits
• It healed my depression and my son’s epilepsy
• So, I started a blog and a podcast just to get the word out
• It has been wonderful to me
• The results for my son is that he went seizure free for about 2 years
• He is going to school, he is living on his own and he’s doing all the thing we were afraid he would never be able to do
• My nephew was a high functioning autistic on the spectrum
• And I got my brother, his wife and their 2 kids converted to Keto
• Their son is now looking to live on his own
• I think I was built for Keto anyway
• I never liked vegetables
• I’ve always like the fatty kinds of meat
• I was working from home and I had a coffee, and I sat there and when you live a certain way for so many years, anything different, you take immediate notice right away
• That’s sort of my elevator pitch about how it started for me
• I felt good within an hour
• I just decided that I want to continue it
• After several hours, I was a little hungry and I said, “Let’s put this to a test.”
• I ate bacon and eggs
• And I can barely eat anything. I was completely full
• It was kind of neat to see the stuff that I was read in theory actually played out as I was doing it
• I have experimented with some vegetables over the years
• But I think vegetables are terrible. They are not part of my diet at all
• I am carnivore but not intentionally. I like meat. Meat is good
• But I eat vegetables sometimes
• My wife likes vegetables, so if she makes a particular meal she’ll add vegetables on it and I’ll eat it
• So I am not running away from vegetables, but I just like meat
• I do eat nuts, butter and yogurt
• I am not saying that you have to have macros in a certain general way
• You have to figure out what macros works for you
• As a general guideline, I recommend 20 grams or less carbs for a day
• Anything you ingest has an impact for your body
• My personal recommendation is there is no such thing as net
• Carbs is a carbs, regardless it is a fiber or not
• Same thing with sugar alcohol or sweeteners, etc.
• I would start with your protein macro in grams as a general recommendation
• For females, it’s a good thing to start for 50 or 75 grams of protein for day
• Some females will require less, some will require more. It is up to you to figure that out
• For males, I recommend a 100 or 1235 grams per day. Again, some will require less, some will require more
• Your protein requirement is based upon od what you did yesterday or how much stress do you have, or what kind of sleep did you get
• It really varies
• When you are someone who is working out, of course you can tolerate higher
• Those are just generalize guidelines
• Give yourself a few weeks at what numbers you picked and see how you’re doing it
• The 3 questions I always ask people need to answer are, are you hungry? Do you have energy? And are all your clothes fitting?
• Those protein ranges that I mentioned, I advocate for well-formulated Ketogenic diet that is postulated by art and science of carbohydrate living and the art and science of carbohydrate low performance
• Their constituent macro make-up is for fat it 60% and 80% of your total dietary intake
• That being the case, it is really easy to figure out your fat
• What I really love about Keto is it really puts a lot the individual to take control
• Like, you’re to drive the train that you’re on and decide where you want to go
• When you take control of insulin, you the put yourself in a much more advantages position to be able to dictate the outcome from day to day
• In a situation that they are under 800 calories per day, if they are not feeling energetic, if they are feeling lethargic or if they are constantly thinking about food – that is not normal
• So they want to adjust accordingly
• I really think what’s natural thing to do is to listen to your body
• I don’t track anything. I never had
• I have always been intuitive
• And I guess that is one of the reasons why it seem so easy for me
• I did not start Keto for weight loss, but at the same time I was also going to lose the weight that I had by running everyday
• And what ended up by doing it is it sent me by depression
• So I ended up running 5 miles everyday
• It got me to the point that I was just sad. I was crying in my head
• So I ran 5 miles a day for about 3 months, everyday 7 days a week and I got fatter
• When you ran 3 miles or 5 miles and you are in the mindset of “Yay! I did it. Now it’s time for reward.” The reward negates all the effort that you put inti it because you’re going to over eat
• So, I did that for 3 months then I got so sad that I have to stop
• Fast forward to me starting Keto, I was not exercising at that time.
• I just changed the way I ate and suddenly I lost all the weight and starting to feel better
• It was magical
• When I was in the midst of depression, I did not like anything. I did not enjoy anything
• The only reason I get up from bed is because I have obligations – I have a family. If it was not for them, I would not get up from bed

FAVORITE MEAL

• There are 4 major barbecue joint in this town
• One of them is called Cheese and Trail. In this restaurant they have a fajita that is smoked the same way that they prepare their brisket and I can eat that everyday,
• I am also a ice cream junkie
• A fajita with Keto hazelnut not ice cream would be like my favorite meal

WHAT’S NEXT FOR YOU

• I have got a little conference called KetoCon at Austin Texas, coming up thing June 15, 2018
• We are hoping to make it better that last year
• We hope to deepen the connections and the community so that people will continue to spread the word like yourself

HOW CAN PEOPLE FOUND YOU?

• www.ketovangelist.com
• Ketovangelist podcast
• Ketogenic athlete podcast with Danny Vega
• Facebook group: Ketovangenic Success

Check out the previous episode of Be Well, Be Keto podcast here

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