12 days in with a few concerns

(Joni Ivy) #1

Hello everyone!

I’ve been lurking on this forum for some time while researching keto. Love all of the honest and quality information here.

Quick timeline and background. I’ve been following the keto diet for 12 days now. Prior to that my husband and I decided to try and get our SAD under control and took on the Whole30 diet. It was a fantastic experience for both of us, and we extended it to 60 days. I decided to pursue keto for several reasons, the top three being 1. Access to this legendary rumor of stable energy 2. To finally take control of my life away from sugar and 3. To lose the 20 pounds I have gained over these past three years. We bought a business, built our own house, and totally put health on the back burner. I would love to get back to the active, strong, healthy individual I used to be before life got crazy.

Despite doing piles of research before starting this, I can’t help but feel like I have no idea what I’m doing. Starting to feel a little unsure about the sustainability of this diet. Here’s a few questions:

  1. Tracking food is a mission. I’m using My Fitness Pal which honestly is such an impressive app. Don’t know how I would do it without it. But does it get easier? Is there ever a point where you don’t feel like you need to track numbers anymore and you just know? I hate being bound to these numbers every time I want to eat something.

  2. I have been restricting my calories (200-500 deficit a day) Which I did not realize it was so ill advised. Just figured it made sense and that the two go hand in hand when trying to lose weight. But these past 12 days I have felt so incredibly exhausted and foggy headed, which I have just attributed to the keto flu. But perhaps I am stressing my body too much. Now that I know calorie restriction is not advised, I am curious what the optimal intake is? Same as expenditure or more?

  3. I am curious and nervous to find out how keto works with our backpacking trips this summer and fall. We try and spend almost every weekend on overnight scouting trips in preparation for fall archery season. Come September we will spend most of that month in a tent. Does anyone else out there have experience with packing for long backpacking trips on the keto diet? I have found a few sources online but would love to hear personally from someone’s experience

  4. does EVERYONES hair fall out?! D-:

  5. I’m going on a trip to South Africa for 3 weeks in May. I am really bummed out about the timing, because I may just be really getting into the swing of things by then. I will be staying in some pretty remote locations and will have very little control over what I eat. When I come home, will going through keto flu be just as miserable as it’s been this first time around?

Thanks

#2

  1. I’ve been on Ketovore for about a year, and I rarely track anything anymore. You’ll get to a point where you just know how many carbs are in the things you eat, and I don’t care about calories so I have no purpose in tracking.

  2. Keto Flu is electrolyte deficiency. Without water retention assisted by carb-load, you’re flushing out sodium, potassium, and magnesium fast, and you have to keep them up. Be liberal with your salt, and that should help the brain fog. And yes, it’s generally advised to not count calories, especially when you’re starting out. Eat when you’re hungry and eat until you’re full.

  3. Can’t help you here.

  4. Not everyone’s, but any major diet change can result in temporary hair-thinning. It fixes itself.

  5. It’s possible. When in South Africa, try to maintain your diet with meat and low-carb veggies, it’s the safest bet.

(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #3

What would happen if you didn’t track? We advise eating to satiety, while keeping carbohydrate under 20 grams a day. There’s no tracking implied there, except for weighing your vegetables.

[quote=“Slingingarrows, post:1, topic:79699”]

  • I have been restricting my calories (200-500 deficit a day). . . . I am curious what the optimal intake is? [/quote]

Eat to satiety. Your body will tell you what is optimal. Phinney and Volek found that people who start a ketogenic diet and have excess fat to lose often automatically restrict their intake by listening to their bodies, but some eat surprisingly much and still lose fat. Of course, once all the excess fat is gone, if we continue eating to satiety, we will automatically be getting our entire daily energy needs from the food we eat.

If you use the forum search function, I’m sure you will turn up some posts on the topic.

This is common for anyone making any kind of major change in how the eat. It is not limited to folks embarking on a ketogenic diet, nor does it happen to everyone.

Good for you! Just tell everyone you’re banting. They’ll know what you’re talking about. Banting is a low-carb, ketogenic, whole foods diet named in honor of William Banting, Queen Victoria’s undertaker, who was one of the first people to write about his experience (his book, which went through something like fifteen printings, was entitled A Letter on Corpulence).

(Little Miss Scare-All) #4

I always learn something from you @PaulL

What a random bit of knowledge. Those tid bits are the best kinds lol. You need to go on Jeopardy.

(Full Metal KETO AF) #5

@x-Dena-x Check it out, it’s a good read.

http://www.lowcarb.ca/corpulence/corpulence_18.html

@Slinginarrows some ideas for backpacking might be jerky, nuts, dry salami, hard cheese, olives, hard boiled eggs in the shell or raw eggs or dehydrated eggs, coconut oil, pickles, sauerkraut, sardines, tuna or chicken in pouches, and homemade keto crackers.

South Africa is famous for Bitong, a delicious cured spiced kind of sun dried jerky. Carry a good supply into the bush to make sure you have keto options along with most of the stuff I mentioned above if they’re offering carb heavy foods.

KCKO and enjoy your travels. :cowboy_hat_face:

(Carl Keller) #6

I find that if I eat single item whole foods, it’s very easy to keep my carbs under 20g per day. I just focus on moderately fatty protein as my main entree and supplement with low carb vegetables. It might seem restrictive for the first month or so but eventually it became habit for me and it certainly helps that I enjoy the food I am eating.

If at all possible, try to avoid processed foods and things with processed sugar and try take along things that @David_Stilley suggested to limit the damage.

If you are getting two+ teaspoons of sodium per day, you may never have to endure keto “flu” symptoms.

(Sonja Arlow) #7

I am South African and there are definitely lots of low-carb options available. With Tim Noakes’s Real Meal Revolution efforts there are even keto friendly pre-packaged food options in the major food outlets. Hope you have a fantastic time in my beautiful country.

(Scott) #8

MFP folks as a whole are not keto friendly. Anyway what I like about this over CICO logging is you don’t need to log. Keto naturally limits your desire to overeat.

This WOE is not about restricting, embrace it.

This is not the same as Ketosis. Training your muscles to adapt to ketones for fuel is better described as fat adaption. I am a runner and it took me three months to get my energy back and not need to insert walking breaks. I think it would be fantastic for hiking and you won’t need to pack granola bars for the trip. I just got back from skiing and in the past I needed to eat a snack bar at 10:00 for energy but no more because I have loads of energy now.

(Joni Ivy) #9

Thanks for your response and reassurance! Been taking lots of electrolyte supplements and it is amazing how much of a difference I noticed when I do. Perhaps have not been taking enough, so going to try to bulk up a bit this week.

(Joni Ivy) #10

Paul, thank you very much for your insight! I feel a little stupid, but I never actually considered just tracking my carbs. It kind of felt like I needed to micromanage every little thing going into my body and make sure all of my ratios were correct, that I wasn’t consuming too many calories, etc. The more I ponder this, the more sense it makes. Going to chill out a bit on the tracking and just follow my carb numbers for now. I’m sure that will relieve a lot of stress!

(Joni Ivy) #11

I’m so glad you brought up biltong! Until I married my husband (South African) I had never heard of such a thing. We met in the bow hunting world and he moved out to the states about four years ago and brought this magical knowledge with him. We hardly ever make conventional jerky anymore from our wild game. Sometimes as much as 25% of an animal might end up as biltong! I feel silly but I didn’t even consider that. I can’t wait to get my hands on some when we get over there!

(Joni Ivy) #12

I felt like I was consuming plenty of sodium already, but it’s definitely nowhere near 2+ teaspoons! Going to try that today and see if I feel any better, thanks for the suggestion!

(Carl Keller) #13

Hope it helps you Joni!

(Joni Ivy) #14

Hello Sonja! Exciting to find a South African on here! I married one four years ago and he decided to move out here in Colorado (Where I’m from) life’s been hectic and we are just now getting around to making the trip over there and I am so excited! Thank you for your keto friendly tips, I will definitely keep all of that in mind.

We will be staying at his family’s “farm” in the Limpopo province for 2 weeks. It’s primarily a hunting operation, but I believe they also have about 500 head of cattle and farm quite a bit of fruit (Guava, pawpaw, lychee). His aunt is in charge of the kitchen and cooking for guests, and I definitely don’t want to offend her by turning something down. Traveling and experiencing other cultures is also so wonderful so I don’t really want to miss out on anything either. The second half of the trip will be spent in Kruger national Park. I believe 12 days in total. Not sure what foods are available on that trip, but maybe we could do a big shop beforehand and I will look into some of your suggestions!

#15

You wont need to be as strict about carbs backpacking because you will be burning SOOOO many calories that you can eat more and keep the same ratio and your insulin will stay low. It’s the perfect sport for keto because it’s endurance which is where keto shines brightest and your not running so your adaptation is faster. The problem with eating carbs all day backpacking is you are hungry all the time which often makes you eat constantly which definitely raises insulin all day long. But this also depends on the length of your backpacking trip. I plan on doing some section hikes and being keto adapted before you start is a HUGE advantage. Many people that know nothing about keto get the “keto flue” backpacking even though they are not on a keto diet. A lot of trail mixes are great backpacking food due to the high calorie to weight ratio and there are some good high fat jerkys.

(Little Miss Scare-All) #16

Who you callin a fat jerky! lol jk. Just a little humor to brighten my own day :slight_smile:

Though, I have known quite a few fat jerkys in my day.

#17

@Slinginarrows Hi Joni and welcome!

As @Hap mentioned, if you’re active you can probably handle more carbs and stay in ketosis.

If it comes down to it, I’ll generally eat what’s in front of me rather than risk offending anyone, and I think that unless you’re in a serious medical situation that’s a much easier way to handle things, but I’ll mention my favorite way to deal with other people’s cooking if/when possible: be super enthusiastic about the things that you want to be eating. Relish those those dishes, praise them, ask for seconds. When the sweets/starches come around you can say something mild like “thanks… I’m not really a bread/dessert person… but is there enough for me to have more ----? that’s so good! Can you share the recipe/show me how to make it?”

I would agree in general, though, about tasting and experiencing new things, and you can focus the carbs you do have on stuff that’s genuinely interesting and new (and not on carby snacks that are not particularly special).

I hope you have an amazing trip!!

#18

I was keto adapted before I ever hear of Keto three months ago because I was hiking 16 miles while fasting and reading up on low carb because I’m insulin resistant. Not a real fast but 16 miles with 3K elevation gain on nothing but a piece of cheese and a cup of coffee and then coming home and eating a steak or chicken and salad is what was getting me into keto. But I was starting from a pretty unfit and overweight condition because I just sat on my butt for 7 years after having kidney cancer and having the kidney removed. I was motivated by just being angry at myself and figured I could die from being unfit or I could die from trying to get fit and chose the latter LOL

(Full Metal KETO AF) #19

Same thing happened to me, renal carcinoma, kidney removal, dialysis soon after in my case for 10 years and I got less and less healthy as my weight went up and energy went down. Turning it all around with a transplant and keto. My nephrologist is very happy that I am doing keto. :cowboy_hat_face:

(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #20

Ask him about boerewors, too! My ex was South African, and my sister has spent a large chunk of her professional life over there, too.

I think you’ll find that Africa is a whole gnu experience for you. I won’t Boer you with all the details, but the mane thing is I have my pride, I ain’t lion! :rofl::rofl::rofl::rofl: