Keto almost 2 months, no results

(Lynnea ) #1

Hi All!

I’m relatively new to keto, started May 28th. I had no issues with the transitions and it seemed incredibly easy. I had no carb cravings, no flu, and always felt full so I would be eating less. Overall, I feel the same as I did before this diet. I havent seen any results in my mood or weight. My weight has been fluctuating up and down 3lbs this entire time and I cant seem to pinpoint where it is happening.

My meals are pretty straightforward and generally the same as I meal prep for the week

Breakfast: 3 eggs, 3 tablespoons cashew milk, 3 tablespoons kale, 2 tablespoons chopped ham, 1 tablespoon flaxseed

Lunch: 1 chicken breast and a cup of broccoli

Dinner: 1 pork chop and a cup of green beans

*lunch and dinner normally varies but it’s always a meat and vegetable

Snacks: almonds (if need be, dont have them often. 300g lasts me about 3 weeks) or a cheese string (maybe 1-3 times a week).

My drinks include: water (I love water constantly drinking), zero coke, and occasionally keto friendly starbucks drink (skinny latte with a sugar free cinnamon dolce shot and soy milk)

I track myself with the ketone urine test strips and I always seem to be in ketosis. Varies from light to large amounts with no rhyme or reason.

I cut out my dairy for 2 weeks to see if I had a dairy intolerance and the only difference I noticed was my face cleared up but my weight stayed the same.

I’m wondering if keto just isnt the right thing for me. Any advise would help

(Bob M) #2

The first thing I’d try is dropping the high Omega 6 foods, such as cashew milk and almonds (and soy milk). Chicken (especially the skin) is also high in Omega 6, and chicken breast might be too lean.

For instance, add bacon or other fatty meat to your breakfast. And why are the calories so low? Two tablespoons of chopped ham is really nothing. (Put it this way, I’ll eat a 5 egg omelet with a half pound or more of ham for “breakfast”, but I won’t eat again for 6-8 hours, and I’m male though not that active.) Are you trying to do a low calorie version of keto? That won’t help.

Drop the zero coke (sweet = bad), and the “keto friendly latte” is far from it. Add real meat instead.

If you can, start intermittent fasting. I started eating no breakfast, then went to some fat in my coffee and no lunch, and then no breakfast or lunch. Try to build up to several times per week. Avoid snacks.

Also, the scale is a horrible instrument. I had many times when I was not losing weight, but lost off my belt. You could be reconfiguring your body and not know it.

(Lynnea ) #3

Thanks for the detailed response!

I’m wondering what is wrong with the high content of Omega 6? I originally was having cream with my eggs but I found too much dairy was causing major break outs on my skin so I switched to cashew/soy/almond milk. Also, do you have any better snack ideas other than almonds? I havent been able to find anything quick and easy in my research.

I used to have bacon instead of ham in my breakfast but I thought the grease of the bacon could have been the original cause of my breakouts, but I can introduce that back into my diet and switch it up. My calories are low not because that’s what I want but during to the fact I have never been a big meat eater. I love vegetables which is the majority of my plate. I normally cook my meat with oil or add butter into my vegetables to increase the fat intake but nothing substantial.

I generally eat breakfast around 8am and it keeps me full until 1-2pm and dinner is always at 6-7pm. I never feel hungry so I wasnt sure if I should increase my calories either. I am thinking of introducing fasting into my days and seeing if that is something that helps but will have to do more research.

Also, do you have any go to drinks that are more healthy? I know the drinks I have are bad but I havent been able to find a good substitute that keeps me satisfied.

And I agree with the scale, I feel like there have been small changes to my body. I’ll try and focus more on how I feel rather than what the scale is telling me.

Thanks so much for your tips and ideas!

(Alec) #4

Hi, I would halve the salad/veg and double (or triple) the fats. For example, instead of chicken breast, eat 3 thighs or legs with the skin. And add a really fatty sauce or eat a large slab of butter at each meal.

Have you measured how many calories you are getting? It just doesn’t seem enough to me. Don’t forget this is NOT a low calorie diet. The mechanisms here are different. You need to eat to get your metabolism going.

What’s your current weight and goal weight, and how tall are you?

(Lynnea ) #5

Thanks!

I’ll try switching that up. I probably have about 1200 cal a day but I have a desk job so get zero exercise throughout the day.

I’ll try and increase my calories but I never feel hungry so didnt think it was an issue. Sometimes I skip lunch and dont even realize it cause my body isnt telling me to eat.

I’m also 5’0 and weight 154lbs at 26yrs.

(Terence Dean) #6

I put your data into my app and it says for your weight and height that you should be on 1445 kcal per day to maintain that weight. See the breakdown on your macros below.

Lynnea-01
Lynnea-01.jpg742×170 24.7 KB

If you wanted to lose a modest 0.5lbs per week you could use the following calculation.

Lynnea-02
Lynnea-02.jpg754×172 24.5 KB

I didn’t bother to enter your daily food intake to see what your macro breakdown was for the day because I didn’t have the exact weights for the pork chop or chicken breast. Either way if you are only eating 1200 calories its probably on the low side, more importantly try to keep the protein as close to 44.0g as you can. Fat you can eat to satiety and carbs as you know try to keep down to 20g or less. Good luck and let us know how you go.

Even if you think you’re satiated check to see whether your fats are high enough (104.4 - 132g), its a common mistake. KCKO. A lot of people don’t like eating animal fat but there are other ways of getting enough fat such as butter, olive oil, fatty fish like salmon & mackerel, tuna in olive oil, macadamia nuts, black olives, cream. Meat eaters don’t usually have a problem.

Actually now that I look at those numbers 1200 cal is probably about right, so I’m guessing that you may not be eating the minimum amount of fat here 104.4g. You could try eating 1445 kcals to see if that does the job too.

I agree about dropping the zero coke. I weaned myself off 3 teaspoons of sugar in coffee by switching to 1 teaspoon of honey but then dropped coffee altogether and drink tea. I don’t like tea with sugar so that solved the sugar addiction issue.

(Alec) #7

That’s because you are eating too many veg/salad. Cut them down and eat more fat. Don’t try to undereat by “filling up” with veg/salads. That is old thinking. What you need is fat to help your body to heal.

(Emma Cohn) #8

Eat more fat and stop drinking the skinny lattes. Nothing about that is keto friendly. Soy milk from coffee shops is sweetened. The Starbucks website says a grande has 24g carbs. https://www.starbucks.com/menu/drinks/espresso/caffe-latte#size=42&milk=64
If you drank this every day it could be enough to keep you out of ketosis and prevent you from becoming fat adapted. The good news is, two months of low carb will make transitioning to keto even easier.

(Chris Robertson) #9

I find that the key to weigtloss is fasting. Keto helps some people lose weight but many who don’t lose weight use keto as a tool to make fasting easier.

(Consensus is Politics) #10

Omega-6 is bad, it counters Omega-3. Omega-6 if I remember correctly, causes inflammation. Inflammation causes cortisol to increase. Cortisol causes a rise in blood glucose. Glucose causes a rise in insulin. Insulin blocks fat burning. It’s a train of causation. The end result is can’t burn fat.

With elevated insulin, any fat you eat goes into storage. Your body won’t be burning any fat either.

Don’t use any vegetable oil for cooking other than extra virgin olive oil, or avocado oil. Those are healthy fats and won’t cause cortisol to rise. Standard cooking oils do, and I beleive cause other issues as well.

Since I mentioned Extra Virgin Olive oil. Virgin is no good. Just plain olive oil as well. Must be Extra Virgin. The reason for this is how it’s made. Extra Virgin is made by squeezing out the oil. Plain and simple. But for the rest, chemicals need to be used to extract the oils out. This goes for normal vegetable oils as well. Where does corn oil come from? You can’t squeeze oil out of it, so chemicals are used to pull the oils out of it. The only one I remember off the top of my head is hexane. And if I remember, it’s highly toxic, but is ok for food use because (when heated to 154 Fahrenheit) it evaporates off rather quickly. Yeah, I trust that too :roll_eyes:.

(Consensus is Politics) #11

FYI on hexane.

https://pubchem.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/compound/hexane#section=Top

(mole person) #12

I see two areas where you are likely going wrong. The first is that you are consuming carbs too many times during the day. The reason keto works is through severely lowered insulin most of the time allowing your body time to dig in to your fat stores. Almost no one here snacks. Being fat adapted means that you can go many hours without calories before having a meal that fills the tank. That allows your insulin to get really low and then FAT on your body MUST be metabolized for fuel. The main difference between people with respect to how easily they lose weight is how insulin resistant they are. The more resistant the longer stretches they need without anything that stimulates insulin production before their own insulin drops low enough to start fat breakdown. The good news is that over time on keto your insulin resistance will get better. High insulin resistance comes from eating too many carbs over your lifetime, but can be turned around. Get rid of those snacks and after your used to that consider ditching breakfast also. I eat only one large meal most days now and it’s only when I do that that I get to my target weight.

Second, drop the artificial sweeteners. They just feeds the food addiction and makes you hungrier. There is evidence now that artificial sweeteners change glucose transport into cells. People think that if they aren’t affecting blood glucose or insulin then they are fine but we have zero evidence to think that’s true and a growing pile to suggest it’s false.

(Melissa Marie) #13

Not to cause extra confusion but there are lots of sources that say some types of omega 6 reduce inflamation. Specifically lineolic acid (GLA). I actually supplement either evening primrose or borage (for one health reason) and then olive oil & fish oil later at a different time during the day (for another) as I realize it competes for absorbtion.

#14

The most common approach to eating HFLC is to obsess over macros, eliminate this or that food, focus on inputs. It’s just guessing, but it works for many folks. It seems like you’re not one of them. I’ll offer a different approach. Focus on output- how your body responds to inputs. Weight is largely regulated by hormones. Unfortunately to there is no way to track them on a daily basis. The best approximation available to us is blood glucose. Instead of tracking food, track BG and use that to determine what and when to eat.

(Consensus is Politics) #15

Interesting. Obviously I didn’t know about this. I will have to follow up. Will post a correction if I can find anything. Feel free to pint me somewhere to expedite this :sunglasses:

(Consensus is Politics) #16

Unfortunately, BG meters are notoriously inaccurate for this. They are calibrated to be within 20%. That equates to two BG tests back to back. One can show 80 the next can show 120. Really, the only thing BG meters are good for is tracking long term trends. As in BG is rising trending up.

(Ron) #17
(Melissa Marie) #18

http://www.lifeextension.com/magazine/2011/1/the-beneficial-omega-6-fatty-acid/page-01

This seems to be a decent article with sources explaining GLA /omega 6

#19

I strongly disagree. Glucometers are accurate enough to provide actionable feedback on a daily basis. That’s why diabetics use them. Their life depends on them.

(Ron) #20

Not as accurate as you might think.
https://www.healthline.com/diabetesmine/why-meters-cant-tell-us-our-blood-sugar-levels#1