Good morning! I’m so disappointed with my lack of weight loss. I started keto a little over 2 weeks ago. I went from eating tons of carbs (I am Italian after all, hello pasta and bread), to anywhere from 10-20 per day with absolutely no cheating. I am 5’5 was 221.5 when I started, 220.5 as of this am. Same weigh in time/routine. I’m obviously not a tiny person so I expected to see a decent amount of weightloss in these last 2 weeks (5ish pounds, not unrealistic). My clothes are not looser. I’m not tracking my macros but my intake is mostly fats, a good amt of protein, and carbs as previously stated. I have no cravings so it’s been easy not to cheat. I also have to force myself to eat as I can easily wake up at 630a and not eat until the afternoon. I’m sooooo tired. Like NO energy. I look at labels religiously so I’m not fooled by carbs that get snuck in. My water intake could certainly be better, I’m only pushing 60-70oz per day but I’m working on it. Idk what to do. I am not diabetic, borderline or otherwise and no family history either. What can I do?!
2 weeks and 1 lb
Ciao sono italiana anch’io!
I think tracking the macros could help . I would suggest to calculate them in grams and not in percentage.
It is not uncommon, for women especially, to have to wait some before the weight begins to drop. Men drop super fast initially but then plateau. So there is justice, ha ha!
Haha! K I’ll give the macros a try. Any ideas on the tiredness?
Why are you forcing yourself to eat? If you aren’t hungry - don’t eat! Just try to eat a hearty full fat meal when you do.
Two meals a day are better for reducing insulin response which hinders fat loss, although most take many week to get there before they can go all day without eating.
Don’t worry - if you are limiting your carbs to under 20 there is a lot going on internally you cannot see or measure and you will eventually see the scale move or your clothes get looser.
I mean, I’m not big on salt due to flavor and cardiac penalties. But, I have been using more than I used to. I guess I could take some Na tabs…
Yesterday I forced myself to eat 4 slices of roast beef with 3 slices of cheese and some avocado and mayo as roll ups, at 1145a. Then I forced myself again to eat half of a publix ultimate wrap that my husband brought me for dinner at 6p. Granted, they don’t use low carb wraps but it ended up being about 14 carbs in the end. That’s it. And I used to eat all day long. And could literally eat a whole publix sub on bread not as a wrap before getting full.
You may want to check your fat macros, if you have a lot to lose you might not need as much fat as your getting since you have enough on body. I made this mistake and after I fixed it I been slowly loosing again. And that’s not telling you to go low fat just that you might not need as high of fat.
Kellianne –
Don’t eat if you’re not truly hungry. Keto can do that. Use it to your advantage and push out your first (or perhaps only) meal to later in the day. Some people here (including myself sometimes) do OMAD (one meal a day.)
On the flip side, don’t calorie restrict. Do eat if you are hungry.
Don’t take salt tabs. Just normally salt your food.
If you’re tired, go to bed earlier, and do what we all do, drink black coffee. The coffee helps beat back the hunger for those of us who do OMAD.
Get some exercise in the form of walking. That could help with both the weight loss and energy levels.
Be patient. It sounds like you are doing the right things.
if you’re not hungry you shouldn’t force yourself to eat. Even if that means you don’t eat all day, wait for hunger and then eat to satiation. Maybe this is the thing that’s holding you back weight-wise.
The loss of appetite, as you probably know, is due to the fact that now your body is running on fat, your body fat. If possible stick to your protein daily macro, but if you don’t have appetite, screw that too and don’t eat all day if that’s what the body is asking. Also, because if you have little appetite you want to be satiated by proteins more than by fats, so you don’t have muscle loss. When you were adapting high fats were necessary because your body didn’t yet access your body fats, but now it has a great resource. This doesn’t mean you go low fat, just enjoy your butter but don’t over do it like in the adaptation phase.
Salt is really essential and you’re supposed to take 1 1/2 tsp a day I think. I probably take less than that, I take it together with ACV and water and for some reason I like it. Also potassium is important, and magnesium. Also omega 3’s. I think that should address the tiredness.
My experience in the beginning was that I was exhausted all the time - which makes it hard to be enthusiastic. Salt and water did help a bit, but what mostly helped was time. I have a personal theory that in the beginning my body didn’t really know what to do with ketones, it was just feeding the little bit of glucose it could find / manufacture to my brain and basic body functions and leaving me with no energy for anything else. Maybe true, maybe not, but happily at 4 months in I feel a normal energy level again, I guess I’m really “fat adapted” at this point.
ETA: I did find some motivation in reading up about all the other benefits of keto besides weight loss, which was on again, off again. I could be pleased with the idea that I was cleaning up some sludge, balancing my hormones, healing some metabolic dysfunction, decreasing insulin resistance, maybe even clearing up skin tags, killing off cancer cells, reducing arterial calcium or preventing alzheimers. Frankly I don’t know what of that is true and what is wishful thinking, but it certainly helped motivate me to keep going. 
The tiredness is perfectly normal. At 2 weeks in, you are not fat adapted yet (meaning your body is not yet using fat as fuel efficiently) and you are not supplying your body with the glucose it is used to running on. So in essence, you’ve got an energy crisis going on. Once you become fat adapted, meaning your mitochondria have “switched over” to burning fat efficiently, then your energy will return, and you’ll feel like you have an endless amount of energy some days. Making sure you are keeping up with your electrolytes helps out during this transition period as does eating when you are hungry and making sure your carbs (total, not net) remain below 20grams per day so as to not delay the fat adaption process. Just keep calm and keto on (KCKO), stay the course, and you should see an increase in energy soon as well as other health benefits besides weight and inches lost.