Don’t make weight loss your short-term goal

[allan]

Hey there newbies, thought I’d share some advice on my brief experience with the keto lifestyle and starting out 4 months ago. From what I have learnt personally and with friends and family who have seen my success and decided to tried keto, if you make losing weight your short-term goal for a ketogenic diet you are most likely to fail or make the experience a whole lot more difficult for yourself than it needs to be. By short term I am talking about the first 1 - 2 months of the eating lifestyle.

Before you can truly appreciate all the benefits of a ketogenic diet you must first become fat adapted and this process involves feeding yourself fat and cutting back on all the carbs. The process of fat adaptation is difficult enough having to experience the keto flu, carb cravings and fake hunger signals without focusing on the scales and worrying about calories.

Making fat adaptation your short-term goal and weight loss a medium-term goal will be a much gentler road to success and is much more sustainable.

Day 1 to day 3: Getting into ketosis, this identifies that you are eating correctly.

Day 3 to day 14: Getting over the keto flu, no carbs in your system can really take it out of you.

Day 15 to month 2: Becoming fat adapted. The younger you are the easier this process is.

Ignore the scales, ignore the calories, just eat keto when you are hungry. Don’t eat more than 20g of net carbs a day, protein in moderation (using a keto calculator), and as much fat as your hunger dictates. Don’t worry about when or what to eat (as long as its keto).

This concept was very difficult for me, ignoring the scales after spending 30 years of my life making them the main focus. Ignoring the calories after counting calories my whole life. And trusting strangers who kept telling me “Eat fat, go on, it’s good for you and you will naturally lose weight” required a huge leap of faith. Not having the scales to show results was scary. But I did it, and now I average a weight loss of 1kg a week.

Eating high quantities of fat will not help you lose weight, but will help you along the road to becoming fat adapted.

And this is where the magic happens, once fat adapted you naturally just stop eating all the food, you naturally reduce your calorific intake (and fat intake) and your body gets all the extra calories it needs from your fat stores. Even though orally you are consuming only 1000 calories your metabolism can be using 2,500 calories, where does the extra 1,500 calories come from? Well, all that fat you have stored around your middle.

Losing weight with the ketogenic lifestyle requires a long-term focus. Once adapted you can make losing weight your main goal, adding in things like fasting, adjusting your macro’s, exercise etc. to get that optimal weight loss. Until then, just eat and don’t over complicate things. Be strong and keto on.

[Countdown2020]

This is a fantastic post, Allan. Thank you!

As I’ve mentioned in other posts, I’m long-term Atkins and I figured “getting into ketosis” was it. But you’re right; it’s just the beginning.

It’s wonderful (for me) to have the three steps laid out, as you have done. I think I might print them out…

Thanks again!
Mary

[powertrix]

Ditto, I think this will be the post I send people to when first starting out.

Great work!

[Khaski]

Thanks for this. I’m just starting out and I will use this to keep ,e from getting frustrated!

[KathrynLambkin]

I a newbie, came here wondering about others experiences. I’ve been doing keto (to the best of my knowledge) for 6 days. I, however, have been weighing myself, and have lost 1.4kg (2.8 pounds). Yay!

My disclaimer is that I had the flu (influenza), starting about a month ago now. I barely ate for a good 7 days, probably 2000Kj (500Cal) per day, at a guess. After that, I just never got my full appetite back, it was like my stomach had shrunk.

Unfortunately some “fundraiser cookie dough” that I’d agreed to order a month ago showed up. So I think I ate 1kg of that in a week, raw of course! I realised that whenever I ate just a spoonful, I strongly craved more. My body told me to keep eating, and only to stop when I felt sick, which could be after 250g (1/2 pint). Then somewhere in my reading I read that refined sugar and flour spike your insulin too high, then your body freaks out that it has no way to deal with that insulin than to make you hungry to get more food into you so it can use the insulin. This struck a chord with me. Anyway, that was the last junk food I’ve eaten for a while.

I don’t know if I’m “in ketosis”, because I have cheated a bit, eg. I had sushi a couple of days.

I’m using the LifeSum app on the keto plan, and it tells me most of the energy in blueberries comes from carbs (duh), though this seems quite small. For now, while there is a glut in the market and they’re $2 per 125g punnet fresh (normally up to $7), I’m eating them like lollies! They’re super sweet this season too.

I’m finding the diet super easy, I’m losing weight every day, and I feel so full so easily. This morning I ate like a mouthful of chicken and stopped feeling hungry. I’m findin it hard to force myself to prepare some salad or green vegetables to eat after it, to have a balanced diet and nutrients. I guess I’d better eat the vegetables first!

I wish I’d measured my belly before starting. I can see, visually in the mirror, that it sticks out about 5cm (2 inches) less than it did before. Maybe that’s just bloating. The 1.6kg loss has to come from somewhere, and I can’t feel it anywhere else. I know all the recent weight I’ve put on has been on my gut.

1.6kg down, 16.4kg to go, approx. Hopefully I’ll be building some muscle too, so I’ll refine my goal when I get closed to the mark.

But why did I really come to this topic to post? To say (not to brag) that I’m finding it super easy to stick to and to lose weight. It’s miraculous for me, better than any nutritional changes I’ve ever made before.

I think part of my “secret” is that I can still have treat food, I’ve just changed my definition of a treat.
Items I used to consider luxuries, such as smoked salmon, chicken liver pate, marinated goat’s chevre cheese, blueberries. These seemed expensive. And fatty! Bad bad bad! But I think what was ruining it for me was everything else I was eating them with, ie crackers and bagel crisps, And due to eating those crackers (or “cheese delivery systems” (CSD) as my engineer-ex used to call them) was not only adding massive carbs and Kjs, it was also releasing insulin and making me hungry, or if not hungry, then still able to keep eating till I felt sick. Now I feel sick much faster, I can barely eat a normal meal size. I hope this is due to the amazing keto diet, not just due to my recent bout of the flu. I mean, it doens’t matter what the cause for me, as long as it stays this way. But I’d like to hope it’s the keto diet so that I can recommend it to friends.

Thanks for reading

[Dread1840]

Huge, great post my friend.

[cheryl]

This is very good and calming advice.

[Divediva]

I needed this today. I’m 3 months Keto and still struggling to get into ketosis and stay there. Today I decided to Refocus on The Basics. In other words pretend that I am just starting out. This post has grounded me by saying this is your goal so go get it! I know from my short experience the weight loss will come. Thank you

[Lucinda]

This was such an inspirational post: thank you. After initially losing water weight, I stalled. I can easily lose my motivation and felt that maybe keto wasn’t for me BUT I stuck with it and I’m now losing again. You’ve made sense of things for me. Thanks.

[Bluhourbird]

“Cheese delivery systems” - I just found myself replying the other day to the question how I could possibly be happy without bread (the stuff is a big deal here in Germany!) that the only times I missed it was when I wanted to have a convenient way to eat lots of butter - can’t quite eat it with a spoon just yet.

[curlybri]

Thank you for this - this came right on time! I was just getting down on myself because I wanted to be at a different weight by now, but I think I am going to drop the daily weighing. I will commit to not weighing again until December 1 so I can focus on the fat adaption phase.

[Bellyman]

Yup, got a chuckle of out the “cheese delivery systems” comment.

Just have to work on some keto cheese delivery systems. Seems like I saw a recipe somewhere for some keto crackers, gonna have to go try to find it now…

[Annapet]

@allan Thank you for this, and the timing of this thread popping back up is PERFECT. Today is my 30th day on this WOE, and in it for the long haul.

[Manson]

I’ve been advised to eat lots of green leafy vegetables
if you eat enough of something super low carb eventually the carbs are going to add up to over 20.
also what makes you say it’s harder for people that are older
I am 60 and female and I have thought that myself but never read it anywhere else.
I’m one of the unfortunate ones that is not losing but gaining on this diet (lifestyle!).

[4dml]

I’ve been advised to eat lots of green leafy vegetables
if you eat enough of something super low carb eventually the carbs are going to add up to over 20.

You can eat a lot of green leafy vegetables and be very low carb. For example, 3 cups of spinach has only 4 carbs. So you can really go to town on kale, cabbage, collards, and the like. They make a great platform for adding fats like cheese, cream, salad dressing, guacamole, etc.

It is totally possible to gain weight doing keto. My dad (a baby boomer) is one who is trying to do just that. Although it’s not a popular thing to say in the LC community, calories do matter. Especially if you’re older, female, smaller in stature, sedentary, metabolically deranged, etc.

[Manson]

That would be me

[Annapet]

Especially if you’re older, female, smaller in stature, sedentary, metabolically deranged, etc.

You just described me .

Thanks for reaffirming the leafy greens info!

[Manson]

Yes…Amen on the leafy greens!!!

[FatMan]

… Be strong and keto on.

Hi Allen,

I am also four months into keto and my experience has been almost exactly the opposite. My doctor placed me on a ketogenic diet.

Day 1: Sign up for cronometer.com and start tracking every bite of food I eat. Purchase scales from Amazon, one for the FatMan and one for the FatMan’s food.

net carbs < 20g/day
protein < 50g/day
energy < 1000 kcal/day (including wine)

No snacking ever.

Day 2-30 … repeat day 1 over and over again.

I gave up looking for substitutes for foods I could no longer eat. I went in for a follow up with my doctor after one month and asked if I could eat 1200 kcal/day … he said NO. I was, however, given the thumbs up to do some fasting and to be a bit more flexible on when I eat. I took a trip to the Texas Hill Country where Mrs. Hanson recieved a new diamond ring for our 20th Anniversary and we had a $150 a plate dinner (I ate no carbs) in one of our favorite wineries. The following Monday was my first day fasting.

Day 31-90 - repeat day 1 over and over again.

I would fast on Tuesdays most weeks and went to the doctor for a three month follow up. I now fast two days a week, Tuesdays and Wednesdays, and I eat my weeks worth of energy, 7000 kcal, in the remaining five days or 1400 kcal/day.

Day 90 … continue as before …

After four months I have lost 59 pounds and have somewhat north of 20 more pounds of body fat to consume. I go back to the doctor in January, but as I approach my goal I will start increasing my exogenous intake by about 500 kcal per week until I find the level of consumption that will support a stable body mass. The idea is to approach my target weight asymptotically and this will allow me to determine, by n=1 experimentation, how to consume more fat without increasing my carbs and protein.

So … what about keto flue … keto adaptation?

If you eat keto then keto adaptation is going to happen. If you eat fewer calories it is likely to happen sooner. Moreover, for many, the more rapidly new eating behaviors are established, the easier it is to abandon the old. I was truly amazed at how easy it was to consume only 1000 kcal/day.

I thought your post was fantastic and the advice might be perfect for a great many people. I am sharing my experience, not to invalidate anything that you have said, but because a different approach might work better for some other people. My primary goal was to cure my T2D by establishing new eating behaviors; what and when I eat. Keto adaptation and weight loss are natural consequences of achieving that goal and required almost no effort at all. My food diary and scales are just instrumenting my effort so I have the data required to adjust my behaviors to achieving my goals.

Keto for life!

And … be strong and keto on.

Most Respectfully,
Richard

[Annapet]

@FatMan Most excellent post! Thank you for sharing. I, too, weigh my food (was a hobby baker).