Keto Frustraton

#1

Super frustrated here.

I have been doing keto on and off since end of March 2018. I was only using the pee strips and couldnt really tell if I was actually in a ketosis state most of the time. I had cheat times with my wedding, honeymoon, moving, etc. I dropped 6 pounds basically immediately though so I was excited. But nothing since then April.

Finally I broke down and bought a blood ketone reader and been in ketosis/optimal ketosis for about a month. (Could be longer but dont have hard data since I was using the pee stips.) I havent lost any weight since the initial 6# so I started tracking how much I was eating calorie wise to make sure I was around what my resting metabolic resting rate calorie intake should be. Plus it was good to see my carb/protein/fat ratio was.

I still am not losing weight nor inches. On top of that my energy level is low a lot which is frustrating cause I love to exercise. I have been trying to train for a triathlon but it seems like since I got the blood ketone reader and know I am in optimal ketosis I still am not seeing the steady energy that everyone speaks of.

I started this to help with my sugar addiction and to lose weight but it just seems like it is not working and I am getting super frustrated. Thoughts or suggestions please?

(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #2

Welcome to the forums! I’m sorry you are so frrustrated.

What and how much are you eating? If you post a couple of days’ worth of typical meals, we could do some troubleshooting. We would also need to know your sex, weight, age, height, etc., to give you a good idea of how to proceed.

In the meantime, some common problems are as follows:

  • restricting calories (the body does funny things)
  • eating too much carbohydrate (often unknowingly, which is why we want to know what you are eating)
  • eating too much/too little protein
  • not eating enough fat
  • fear of fat (fat is your friend)
  • a reaction to some food (often dairy)
  • a reaction to an artificial sweetener (or worse, mistakenly using a brand of artificial sweetener that also contains sugar!)
  • being female (weight loss is often very different for women)
  • being close to goal weight (the last 10-20 pounds can take a long time)

That’s enough to be getting on with, right? :grinning:

Give us some more info, and we’ll do our best for you. And even if we can’t find a solultion for you, we can at least sympathize! :bacon:

(Omar) #3

I do not know about weight loss but my energy never improved until I started IF.

#4

Thank you for the quick response!

I am female, 5’9, 168, 33 years old.

My typical food day has been:

Breakfast - 2 eggs, 2 bacon strips, coffee w/ heavy whipping cream
Lunch - salad consisting of spinach, feta cheese, banana peppers, brussel sprouts, bleu cheese dress and a chicken thigh with skin on
Snack - diet soda and 230 calorie pack of peanuts

if I eat a snack I dont eat dinner.
Dinner - meat (like steak or chicken thigh) with broccoli and butter

So my macros is Carbs/Fat/Protein, 19g/ 134g/ 53g (5%/81%/14%) roughly 1500 calories.

This week I have just been having my breakfast, lunch and snack and not eating after 3 pm. No results.

Let me know if you need more info. Thanks!

(Brian) #5

Ever consider losing the 3 meals (and a snack is as good as a meal to me) and trying just two meals with zero eating in between? It seems to work well for some. That’s how we do it at our house. Occasionally we’ll skip breakfast and it will turn into OMAD but the norm is breakfast and then supper, no snacks and nothing but water in between.

It kinda looks like you might not be giving yourself enough time when the insulin isn’t elevated to deal with food. But that’s just a guess from what you’ve posted.

Good luck!

#6

Thanks for the response!

"It kinda looks like you might not be giving yourself enough time when the insulin isn’t elevated to deal with food. "

What do you mean by this?

Also if you only have one/2 meals a day how many calories do you have for the day? Are you basically putting all three meals into one big meal? Or just one regular meal?

(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #7

Thanks for the info. Here are my thoughts.

Okay, protein looks like a reasonable amount, carbs are good, you’re eating plenty of calories. Are you getting hungry between meals? If so, eat more fat. It sounds as though you are not fat-adapted yet, so at this point you want to be sure your body is getting plenty of calories. If you are eating to satiety, then you are getting enough, but it’s worth thinking about, at least.

Are you getting enough salt? Two and a half teaspons daily (including the salt already in the food) is not too much. That might help with the energy level. Fiddling with your protein might also help. Try eating a more and see if you feel any better. The 53 g you are getting is right in the middle of the recommendations, but you might need more.

At 168 lbs., you may be close to the weight your body considers ideal. In that case, weight loss will be slow, no matter what. There are ways of dealing with that, but wait until full fat-adaptation before trying them.

As a woman, you may find your hormones affecting how much and when you lose. Since you don’t appear to be fat-adapted just yet, don’t worry right now. Keep on with the ketogenic diet for at least another four weeks, and let us know at that point what’s going on. By then you may be fat-adapted. I’m also hoping some of the women here will chime in with advice from a woman’s perspective.

The only things I see that might be interfering are the blue cheese dressing and the diet soda. Double check the list of ingredients on the dressing and make sure sugar is not among the first three or four ingredients. Try cutting out the soda, and see what happens; it’s possible you are reacting to the aspartame. People will cricize the peanuts, but only because they have a lot of carbohydrate, being legumes, which can make it hard to stay under 20g. But you are, so not to worry.

The upshot is, I wouldn’t worry just yet, and I’d see if a bit more protein yields more energy. Give it another four weeks, and then re-evaluate. And keep us updated on how you’re doing. If you’ve only been keto for a month-ish, it’s quite possible that a bit more time will see good things happening.

Brian’s post and your post both popped up, so I’ll take the liberty of responding. What Brian is getting at is that each meal raises your insulin level, so eating too many times a day can prevent it from going down. It’s when insulin is low that we burn fat. So an eating pattern that allows insulin to stay as low as possible for as long as possible can be helpful. You would still be eating the same amount of food, just in a more compressed time window. Something to consider, but perhaps not just yet?

(Brian) #8

The first part… When you eat, it will raise your insulin level. Even if you eat a very keto (low/no carb, moderate protein, high fat) meal, your insulin WILL go up. That’s normal. As long as insulin is up, you are not burning fat. If you keep eating small amounts throughout the day, it will keep boosting that insulin up again and again, sorta like a beech ball that keeps getting bounced up again. Eating usually sees insulin levels higher for several hours after, it varies somewhat. Getting that insulin level down and keeping it down is often a path to weight loss. There are lots of methods… one meal a day, two meals a day, alternate day fasting, and more, but the thing is, it’s more about the amount of time fasting than calorie restriction.

(I don’t know if I said that well or not. I’m sure there will be other replies.)

As for how many calories I get, I haven’t a clue. Don’t care. Never did. (I’m down somewhere close to 70 pounds with maybe 25 to go and it’s still coming off slowly.) As long as I continue heading in the right direction, I have no intention of counting anything. I try not to overdo the carbs, though I think I’m usually over 20, and I make a conscious effort to get my protein since my natural tendency is to under-eat protein. (I like my veggies and can fill up on them pretty easily, and that’s probably where a lot of my carbs come from.)

More specifically, I eat until I don’t want any more. Breakfast is usually smaller. Some days, it’s Greek yogurt, a keto muffin and coffee (with lots of HWC). Some mornings it’s eggs & sausage and coffee. Sunday mornings is keto pancakes with sausage. Supper is more traditional with a protein and some kind of veggie, usually two veggies, and sometimes coffee and/or keto goodie, too. I don’t go hungry. And sometimes, I probably eat a little more than I would if I stopped when I was feeling like I have enough. I don’t eat until I’m uncomfortable. My wife and I have remarked to each other numerous times that we eat really well, like kings. And we do.

The times we eat one meal a day, we’re usually pretty hungry for that one meal that we do eat, almost always supper, and it’ll be a feast. I have no idea how many calories, we just don’t go there.

Maybe not as helpful as others will be but just sharing what happens here. Lazy keto, I guess.

#9

How are you sleeping? Getting a good solid 8 hours? Are you eating much before bed (i.e. keeping your insulin levels slightly higher when asleep; which rightly or possibly wrongly is sometimes considered the time when we actually burn fat)? Just a thought may be wrong.

#10

Thanks for all the information.

How long does it normally take to get fat adapted?

#11

7 to 8 hours a night.

#12

Lucky you! That’s appears good then.

One other comment; I’ve currently stalled; I’m about 1 stone from my ideal weight; I look good I feel good; I wonder if my body thinks this is great and just where I should be? Maybe the Ego to look a particular weight needs to be taken into account of what is actually a healthy weight that your body feels more comfortable at?

(Leslie) #13

Most people are fat adapted within three to eight weeks of strict keto

I want to emphasize something that was said in another reply…diet soda can be a real problem. Insulin can be secreted in the presence of artificial sweeteners and for some people, just by the sweet on the tongue. It’s like a Pavlovian response

Do some research
Study up on intermittent fasting
Also, keep in mind that your body will heal itself before you see measurable results. This might include things like muscle repair, bone restoration, metabolic resetting, etc. If you have a history of deprivation dieting in the past, you may have more damage to repair before your body will allow losses to occur

Hang in there. It will turn around, just stick to the plan.
Keep calm and keto on

(karen) #14

You’re not actually technically overweight, or if so just barely. As someone who is considered “normal” weight but would like to take off a few more pounds, I find I need to fast if I want to reduce my weight without decreasing my metabolic rate. I think my weight setpoint is about where I’m at right now, the same might be true for you.

(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #15

We tell people it takes six to eight weeks to become fat-adapted, and sometimes it takes longer. I remember seeing a post on here from someone who said it took six months. But it’s not a binary on-off thing, it usually comes on gradually. I certainly feel better-adapted now than I did back in October, when I had been ketotic for six months.

The main issue, if I understand correctly, is that the mitochondria in the cells have to switch over from burning glucose to burning fat. I watched a lecture once, which I am trying to find again, talking about how, on too much insulin, the mitochondria (which provide the energy cells use) are often damaged and weak, and cells often don’t have enough mitochondria. It apparently takes time for them to reproduce and grow strong.

(Mitochondria, although they act like other organelles in our cells, are apparently the descendants of bacteria that formed a relationship with our ancestral cells. They have their own DNA, which is different from the DNA in our cell nuclei. Who knew?)

I don’t want to make you even more frustrated, but I am assuming that you are not fully fat-adapted because you posted about “not seeing the steady energy that everyone speaks of.” That, combined with your remark that you’ve been in ketosis for at least a month, makes me think that you will probably start feeling more energetic soon. Also, what I said in my previous post about salt and electrolytes might be relevant, too, since your low energy could be the result of low sodium. Though I tend to think you’d have other symptoms as well, if that were the case.

Sorry to be so vague about some of this, but there is a lot of individual variation within the general shared experience, so it can be hard to give really specific advice, sometimes.