Hi Everyone, I am newbie to Keto diet.
I did my blood work last year and my doctor warned me that I had A1C 5.7, he suggested me eat less carb & sugar. For the last 6 months I’ve tried cutting my sugar and carb, but I could never got to Keto because I still drink my latte every morning. I like my coffee with milk.
I am at age of 44, 5’4 , 105LB, I think I am a bit underweight , so my main purpose of doing Keto is not to lost weight but lower my blood sugar & other health benefit.
I go to the pool almost everyday for an hour, swim like 2300-2500 meters most of the time, moderate to high intensive, I wonder if I can still keep doing milk everyday or I should give it up. Should I do Keto or low carb? any suggestion would be appreciated, thank you .
Keto or low carb which is good for me?
I’d say try lower carb. See how that works.
Do you make your own latte? Or buy one? If you make your own, you could use half and half (half milk, half cream) to save some carbs.
On the other hand, milk doesn’t seem to be that high in carbs:
Edit: here’s the website:
https://www.fatsecret.com/calories-nutrition/food/milk
If you’re swimming that much daily, I can’t see that impacting you too much.
It’s really bread, sugar, potatoes, junk food, and the like that are the bad actors. And even I’ll eat a potato every once in a while (sometimes, I’ll forget to substitute for a potato, or they won’t let me substitute; I usually don’t eat the whole thing, though).
If your carbohydrate intake is low enough to allow your insulin to permit your liver to make ketone bodies, then your diet is ketogenic, regardless of how much carbohydrate you are actually eating. We recommend not eating more than 20 g of carbohydrate a day, because it’s a level of intake that is successful for everyone except people whose metabolisms are exceptionally damaged. Once your muscles adapt to metabolising fat instead of glucose, you can experiment to see where your carb threshold actually lies.
There is a certain amount of carbohydrate in whole milk, but almost none in cream. If those carbs concern you, you might try switching to cream in your coffee, instead of milk.
We advise eating a ketogenic diet to satiety, because deliberately cutting calories risks putting the body into famine mode, in which it lowers the metabolic rate and hangs on to its resources. Eating to satisfy your hunger, on the other hand, gives your body plenty of nutrients and makes it willing to shed excess stored fat.
Greetings - sounds like you’ve got a fairly well-informed, up-to-date physician making the straightforward recommendation to lower your blood sugar. He says to cut out the sugar and the carbohydrates.
Question: Are you actually following his advice?
When you say you never “got to Keto” because you drink latte, I’m unclear on what else you might be eating during the rest of the day.
Yeah, a glass of 2% milk has about 12 grams of carbohydrate. Not ideal for carb restriction, but it may pale by comparison to what else you may be eating during the rest of the day.
Are you eating starches, rice, potatoes, bread, pasta, etc?
Lots of folks who are highly successful at keto eating (= highly carb-restricted) have coffee in the morning loaded with sources of healthy fat (not 2% milk, but heavy cream, even butter). And since you’re not trying to lose weight, fear of fat wouldn’t likely be a concern in any case. (Sounds like your doctor agrees?)
So, when you ask “keto or low carb…?” it’d be good to understand that the terms are often used interchangeably. It’s about restricting carbs throughout t he whole day, not just at breakfast time 
Thoughts?
I am not a doctor, but I would ask your doctor to do a post-meal blood glucose test. An A1c at 5.7 is right on the line. However, you seem to be healthy. In healthy individuals, the A1c marker has been shown to be unreliable. In normal non-diabetics, hemoglobin has been shown to last as long as 150= days (not 3 months) thus more time to accumulate sugar and a higher A1c. This will drive up the A1c test result, but it does not mean that you have too much sugar in your blood. The result is that people with normal blood sugar often test with unexpectedly high levels of A1c. What are your fasting blood glucose and post-meal blood sugar numbers?
At high intensity, you will need carbs as fuel or your performance will suffer. Lower the intensity. Upper zone 2 or lower zone 3 (5 zones). Work out at the lower intensities in a fasted state.
I like to steam milk to make my latte with a bit of latte art every morning, it’s hard to give up because it makes me happy. But, when I realize there are certain % of carb in the milk, I feel like I shouldn’t take it, but keep telling myself maybe low carb is fine with me. I am always debating to myself . Beside the cup of milk, I really don’t eat too much carb, but my intake of protein level might exceed the requirement for Keto as I understand that protein also spike insulin.
I don’t have anything to monitor my ketone level, but I try not to consume too much carb as possible. I gave up on most of what I normally eat in the past like pizza, pasta, all kinds of dessert, potato chips, fries , burger ect… from time to time, I have no choice to do a cheat meal with family or friends gathering, that’s why I never know if I could ever get into Ketosis.
I actually eat a lower fat, higher protein keto diet. I find this to cause more satiety than a high fat diet. And I’ve tried high fat many times, always with little to no satiety.
Does protein spike insulin? Yes. Is that bad? Maybe not. It depends. If you’re really insulin resistant and heavy, higher protein might not be the best idea. If you’ve been exercising a lot, it might not mean much at all, especially if you aren’t eating many meals a day.
Now, does eating higher protein mean higher glucose and lower ketones? Personally, I could never test this. I wore a CGM for quite a while, and after 16 months, my average blood sugar over several weeks was basically exactly the same. My ketones are low, but is that a bad thing? I’ve lost almost all the 20+ pounds I gained trying The Croissant Diet, and I’ve done that with insanely low ketones.
For me, there are more questions about protein than I have answers.
But if your A1c is “high”, try to figure out why. As someone else remarked, A1c isn’t always the best metric, as it’s affected by a lot, including how long your red blood cells live. One month of a CGM, if you can get it and afford it, would help a lot to figure out what your blood sugar really is. You can do this with pin-prick monitors, too, it’s just a lot harder, typically with more error.
Try steaming cream instead of milk to keep the lattes. You will probably be ok on low carbs since you don’t have a weight issue to battle. Eliminating rice and other grains will probably work well for you.
Here is a link to the carb graphics over on dietdoctor.com, they can help you decide what to eat very easily. Lots of info on low carb and Keto eating on that site and the podcast is great too.
Your Dr. gave you useful advice. Keto isn’t for everyone, my husband is low carb and T2D who keeps his numbers good with eating and exercise, no meds.
I was actually shock when my doctor informed me about my A1C, I always think that I am so active, I am not overweight, I should be ok to eat almost everything if I wanted. I started to change my diet almost instantly the next day. I quit most of the carb intake , I used to have a bowl of creal (sweet) with milk and a egg for my breakfast, I brought my own lunch , usually are vegetable , meat with bread or rice, dinner was about the same as lunch. I snacked a lot , potato chips , ice cream, dessert , I snacked even I didn’t feel hungry. I quit all those bad habits , for now, I only eat vegetable ,meat , cream, cheese for my main food, I snack only a bit of nuts, I also made my own cookie with almond and monk fruit. the only thing I still keep having is the cup of milk in the morning. But I still do cheat meals from time to time with friends and family. So I guess I might be in and out of Ketosis or I’ve never met the 20g intake of carb per day with my glass of milk.
I bought a blood sugar monitor recently to monitor my post-meal blood sugar , it seems normal at 5.4-5.7 (I tested it 2 hours after the first bite of my meal, but I didn’t eat pure carb, just vegetable and meat ). My fast blood glucose on my blood work was at 4.8. I thought A1c is more accurate to look at other than fasting or post-meal glucose. One thing I realize since I do low carb/ keto diet is that I don’t feel sleepy after meal anymore. I used to feel so tire especially after dinner, sometimes I just sit on sofa and felt asleep for half an hour. I thought I was tired, but it seems that it was my insulin level making me feel sleepy.
It’s possible to have one cheat meal and if you go right back to keto, you also right back to ketosis. No worries.
All in all, sounds like you are doing great. Lots of keto folks got most of their carbs from veggies. Also, I have heavy whipping cram with my coffee. If I add a bit of water to the container and shake it a while, it will even be frothy. Best of all worlds. (Unless dairy is an issue for me.) Keep on doing what is working for you. Doesn’t matter what label you slap on your “diet”…. If you are restricting carbs you are already winning.You got this.
Almost everyone will slide in and out of ketosis. So don’t worry too much about that.
You sound like a TOFI, thin outside, fat inside. My husband is one of those.
All the best in getting good results, cutting sugar and grains worked well for me hopefully, you’ll do the same.
“Low carb” is fine, as long as it’s low enough to get you into ketosis. “Low carb” that is still above your carb tolerance, however, is going to have the same effect on your body as higher carb.
We always have a choice. If your choice is to stray from your normal way of eating, then so be it. Myself, I find that it’s usually possible to stick to keto options, or simply to fast if there are none.
Me too, just order the steak with nothing but a side salad. Works everywhere. When I eat carbs it is always by my own choice.
Just some milk in a latte isn’t going to matter, way more about your diet got your A1C up than that.
It all comes down to what else are you eating in the day. You noted vegetables, but which ones specifically and in what quantities. This will determine if you can “fit” in the milk and still remain low carb or keto even.