First time keto with Hashimoto's

(Lola) #1

Hi everyone

Background
37yrs, 5’5”, 146lbs current weight, planning to lose 30lbs. Have Hashimoto’s. First time trying keto. On 3rd day now. I’m a sensitive person physically, I’ve this stubborn weight which wouldn’t go since many years after doing different patterns of diet and exercising. And then I put on 10 pounds last few months. I decided to try keto.

As per carb manager, I’m doing 16g carbs, 82g protein, 102g fat. Feeling hungry a-lot. Sorry, if I’m not making sense about the terms I’m using. Not taking any pills yet.

My diet mostly consists of (utilizing what I’ve at home)
BF - eggs boiled/scrambled with cream/plain/veg omelette; 5 nuts(pecans/almonds/walnuts)
Snack - Cheese spread 3 tbsp or peanut/almond butter 3tbsp
Lunch - Chicken breasts grilled or cocoa chia pudding with coconut milk
Snack - BPC or strawberries 4
Dinner - Veg soup homemade / Chobani greek yogurt

Physical activity - taking care of 2 kids, cooking, college stuff, playing with kids takes lot of my energy. I feel tired, always feel hungry, can’t sleep much and I’m a bit insomniac.

I’ m going to maintain almost the same diet the first week. But, this evening, my hands started shaking, drank salt water and gatorade. I slept an hour in the afternoon, have absolutely no energy to stay active. I’ve an appointment with my Endocrinologist tomorrow, thought I’ll check with her.

My concern is, am I doing too much or less? I’ve checked my weight few times, but no changes. It is going to be too tough for me to maintain this diet and doing my regular physical activities. I’m always under impression that, people with thyroid/Hashimoto’s cannot lose weight faster. Is anyone on Hashimoto’s share any light on this?

Thanks

(Michael - When reality fails to meet expectations, the problem is not reality.) #2

Hashimoto complicates things so I’m not going to say anything other than I think you’re not eating enough overall and probably not enough fat. Based on the info you provided, and Carb Manager not withstanding, I suspect you’re eating more than 16 grams of carbs and possibly interfering with ketosis. Are you weighing food or just guestimating? If you eat adequately, you don’t generally feel hungry on keto while losing weight. I’ll let others familiar with Hashimoto advise you more specifically.

A question: current weight ‘146’ pounds, kilos, stones? Same for the ‘30’ you want to lose.

(Lola) #3

Hi

Thanks for the reply. Updated the post, I’m 146 lbs. I’m not using food scale. I can eat more fat, but I have issues with dairy. If I take lot of dairy especially whole milk and whole milk based products, I put on weight and get acne/zits. I only used few dairy items as mentioned in the diet above.

Do I need to use food scale and any other keto apps to check my macros?

Thanks

(Vladaar Malane) #4

I use my fitness pal to just keep track of what I’m eating. Probably a good idea especially with Hashimotos.

(Vladaar Malane) #5

Also sleep is very important for weight loss. Try to get at least 7 hours of sleep. I fail miserably at this often too.

(Lola) #6

Hi

Will try fitness pal. I know, sleep is really important, I try harder to make it 8 hrs but I usually sleep 5-6hrs before keto. From second day on keto, I lay on bed but no sleep for hours even though I’m sleeping by 10. And I’ve got light headache as well. I drink 2 litres water, including green tea. I’m hoping, my body will get used to this routine soon.

(Michael - When reality fails to meet expectations, the problem is not reality.) #7

Lots of folks have problems with dairy, so you’re definitely not alone! There are many sources of good fats other than dairy. Fatty cuts of meat, bacon, fatty fish, eggs, lard, tallow, coconut/mct, red palm, cacao oils, olives and avocados. If you want oils, stick with EVOO and avocado oils in modest amounts. I’d good lightly on nuts, too. A few have lots of oil, but primarily PUFAs with not so good omega 6/3 ratios. Also, they have plenty of carbs that can mess up your carb totals very quickly if you’re not careful. Macadamias are probably the best, but terribly expensive.

I think it’s a very good idea to weigh your food, especially anything that contains carbs. Guestimating is just another name for wishful thinking. 20 grams of carbs is a very small amount and I don’t care what anyone says, you can not accurately estimate it just by looking at it. For example:

Some of the stuff listed is obvious, some surprising. But the point is, how do you guess whether you ate 5 grams, 10 grams or more than 20? Keep in mind that this talks about only the sucrose/fructose content. There are other carbs in all this stuff as well. How do you guess their amounts?

(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #8

This works out to 1300 calories. That’s not much. The Minnesota Starvation Study during World War II considered 1600 calories a starvation diet.

You are doing great by keeping your carbohydrate under 20 g/day. But you probably need a bit more protein and a lot more fat, in order to get enough energy. At your age, and about your height, my ex looked emaciated at 146 lbs. He didn’t start looking healthily thin until he gained 10 or 15 pounds. What you probably need is to promote body recomposition, not actual weight loss. In other words, you want more muscle and denser bones, even as you lose fat. And a ketogenic diet should be of great help here.

We strongly advise not eating to a caloric target, which can cause the body to get stubborn about shedding excess fat. What helps greatly is, while keeping carb intake as low as possible, to get a decent amount of protein and fill in with fat to assuage your hunger. You don’t necessarily need to go hog wild with the fat, just cook with butter, lard, bacon grease, and the like, don’t trim fat off your meat, eat chicken with the skin on, have bacon and eggs (cooked in bacon grease, yum!), all that good stuff. Put gravy made with heavy cream on your meat, and cheese sauce ditto on your broccoli. You get the idea.

#9

While others have a very fatty belly at 136, I had that. It’s individual and our muscle mass is a very important factor. The weight doesn’t really matter but we don’t need all the extra fat even if we aren’t muscular.

@lolaketo, I know almost nothing about Hashimoto but if you are hungry, eat more… You just started keto, get used to it first but even later, eat if you are hungry. If that proves to be not good enough, change something, choosing my food items better (and not eating just because it’s mealtime or I fancy food without need) seems to work for me and many others even if simply ketosis isn’t enough. But again, I know very little about Hashimoto, I read someone’s blog with it and it’s tricky but it must be horrible to be hungry and weak all the time, try to eat more, maybe it won’t make you gain weight and for now, it should be enough. It should be easier later but keto alone can be enough change for us. You adapt and then you can change your ways to ensure losing fat if it doesn’t happen before.

(Lola) #10

Thank you for all the replies :pray:t2:

I was at a stage, to become fully vegan. When my exercising/dieting for 3 months didn’t work and decided to do keto, I got eggs and chicken into my diet. Don’t like seafood at all, but for weight loss purpose can bear salmon. Sorry, cannot eat any other meat. Will definitely get food scale.

Its not many calories, but I’m trying to see if I can lose good amount in first 2 weeks. I don’t look emaciated though, rather nicely plump :frowning:. My pre preg weight was 110 lbs, after two pregnancies(while pregnant 170lbs), I made it to 135 lbs. With all on and off exercising and good lifestyle, I never went below 135. Not sure, if 110lbs is good weight for my age/height, but aiming for at least 120lbs. Whenever I exercise, i build muscle not losing inch of fat.(all home made exercises and weight lifting). Now I just do simple walking while on keto.

As per wiki, Hashimoto’s disease is an autoimmune condition where the immune system mistakenly attacks the thyroid gland. … Hypothyroidism is a condition in which the thyroid is not releasing enough of the two main hormones it produces, T3 (triiodothyronine) and T4 (thyroxine). Got Hashimoto’s a year after I delivered my first kid. With this condition, it is tough to lose weight because of slow metabolism.

My actual update - sorry if it is TMI, got diarrhea, totally wiped out, was on bed most of the day. I still met my targets today. My doctor said, i have to get my levels tested first, and take it slowly. And get my levels tested every 3 months, if I’m continuing keto lifestyle.

How I will know if I entered ketosis stage? So far, headaches, tiredness, diarrhea, stomach cramps. By the way, sorry to ask, does this effect menstrual cycles? I’m about to start cycle in a day or two.

(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #11

Eating a ketogenic diet is a long-term strategy for metabolic health and weight normalisation, it is not a lose-fat-quick diet scheme. Although people enter ketosis quite quickly after cutting their carbohydrate intake, adapting to fatty-acid metabolism takes somewhere in the neighbourhood of six to eight weeks, sometimes longer. Moreover, many women find that it takes a month for their hormones to re-regulate themselves, before fat loss even begins. If you really need to lose weight that fast, then some other diet might be a better choice.

As far as Hashimoto’s disease is concerned, there are quite a few forum members with that condition, so you might do a forum search and see what useful information turns up. The search function on this site actually works pretty well.

(Lola) #12

Of course, it is not. What I meant was, by following strict calorie diet first two weeks, if it helps to reduce my water weight or some weight, even a pound helps me. I’ve seen other’s posts, where they mentioned, they lost 2-6 lbs. I’m aware, every body is different, and I’m sure mine will take time, as I’ve this condition. Just hoping. Soon, I will be going back to work, which will add to my current responsibilities. So, I’m trying to do how much ever I can to be within the calorie limits and meeting macros. I’ve gone through few Hashimoto’s posts, will check more.