Creative ways to break through a stall?

(Michele Wilson) #1

Hi keto friends,

I’ve been keto for 10 months now and love the results! I’ve stalled multiple times and have successfully broken through my stalls multiple times. The problem is that my stall-breaking-tricks only work once or twice!

I guess I should be happy that my body is so smart, huh?

Anyways, I thought that my tricks may be helpful and would love to gather info on other people’s :grinning:.

Here are mine:
Fasting (duh!)
Cutting out nuts for a week or so
Going on a really long hike
Bikrim yoga
Sleeping for a long time (10+ hrs- I know, I’m a freak!)
A little bit of wine at night (but not too much, that has the opposite effect)

(migorstmarseille) #2

For me, dropping cheese helps.

(Jenn Monaghan) #3

Cutting out Diet Coke and drastically reducing the use of artificial sweetners helped me.

(Mike Glasbrener) #4

Are your fasts a feast/fast thing like megan ramos recommends?My last fast was like that and the feast did not add weight and my fast loss seemed to “stick”.

(Michele Wilson) #5

Yes, feasting is the best part!

I admit that I could play around more with fasting. It’s one of my least favorite tricks though since I still get brain fog and general grumpiness (even with a whole lot of salt).

(Arlene) #6

I don’t enjoy fasting either, other than normal space between early dinner and next day lunch. Longer than that I get muscle cramping and a general feeling of being unwell. I even get ringing in the ears. I’ve pushed through, even to 9 days once, but I never felt well. I am very envious of those who claim to enjoy fasting. Wow, imagine that!

(Michelle C.) #7

I agree with the Megan Ramos method. I really ramp of the fat with avocado and macadamia nuts a few days before and extended fast. This revs up my metabolism before an extended (72h+ fast). It works like a champ. Best of luck!

(Siobhan) #8

In my experience, cramping or muscle twitching during a fast can be due to low magnesium or potassium. If low magnesium try epsom salt (magnesium) baths.

Mine:
feast/fast cycling
egg fast (this had the benefit of lowering protein and carbs as a consequence and taught me I need to lower protein to continue losing!)
waiting (at the 6 month point stall)

(Michele Wilson) #9

Ohhhhhh, an egg fast sounds fun! How long do you go? And do you add any butter or other fat to the eggs?

(Siobhan) #10

At least 6 eggs a day (I was using small eggs so ended up with about 53g of protein per day)
Up to 4oz of cheese
1tbsp of fat (mayo, butter, coconut oil, etc) per each egg you eat - I upped to 1.5tbsp per egg because 1 wasnt enough
I went for 8 days but average is 3-5 days
After the 8 days I full on fasted for 2 or so days, then went into normal eating but at the amount of protein I was eating on the egg fast

Theres a thread about it on the forums!

imo it is a good tool to use to figure out if too much protein is the cause of the stall because it limits it quite nicely as eggs are very easy to count

(Andrew Anderson) #11

I’ve been playing around with the 24-30 hour fasts on consecutive days,then spend a couple days with the 20/4 or 18/6 windows, and feast on Friday and Saturday. I hope it’s slowly dropping my internal thermostat.

(Arlene) #12

Thank you, Siobhan. In the winter I take lots of baths, always with epsom salts. Never seems to make any difference with cramping. I have been working on raising my magnesium levels using various brands and products. Currently I have started using a chelated magnesium. So far that is showing the most promise. As for potassium, I do put some potassium powder in water every day, but I’m afraid to put too much in. Jason Fung doesn’t prescribe potassium much at all, according to Megan Ramos. She said most patients have plenty or even too much potassium. I just don’t know what to believe, or even what to safely try. I have also started taking some calcium, though that is supposedly risky too. I wish my minerals would just stay happily balanced so I wouldn’t have to worry about supplementing correctly.

#13

In case this helps: I once (a few years ago) started supplementing with potassium and within a day or two started getting heart palpitations. I read more about it and - yikes! - stopped immediately.
During my last fast, I was running into cramping and upped my sodium and magnesium but also cut a potassium tablet (sorry, I don’t remember the dosage) into 4 pieces and took 1 at a time spread out over a few days (so I ended up with probably 3/4 of the tablet over three days or so?). The cramps went away and of course I’m not sure exactly what helped, but it was nice to feel like I could experiment with the potassium without taking a lot at once.

(Arlene) #14

Thank you, Madeleine. I’m pretty sure this is mostly about getting more salt, and absorbing more magnesium. I have greatly appreciated the recent posts about salt, and I am now upping my salt intake even more. Previous to these posts, I would have never imagined anyone consuming over a tablespoon of salt each day.
It is heartening to hear that others have suffered with cramping when fasting too. It makes me feel like there must be an answer to correct the problem so I can safely fast. I believe in fasting. I believe it is a very natural and healthy thing for humans to do regularly, as we would have done this naturally in lean times before modern food supplies came into play.

As I said before, the chelated magnesium is really making a difference so far, but I’ve only been taking it for a few days. That will be an on-going experiment. The one change I am now making is to increase my salt intake. I really hope this allows me to fast comfortably.