So, since I started Keto Jan 2nd, I’ve been tracking all my food everyday. Mainly, this is to understand carb macros and how I feel.
But, about to jump off the ledge here and stop tracking my food. I feel like I’ve got the hang of it, and I think the constant tracking is creating undue stress.
Anyone have tips from being avid tracker and then stopping? Did you see any different results when you stopped?
Am I correct in calling myself ‘lazy keto’ now that I don’t track??
I started about the same time as you, and apart from trying tracking for about a day and a half (which drove me nuts), I basically haven’t tracked a thing. I commend you on doing it for this long!
If that makes me Lazy Keto, then I’m OK with that. I think you should be too 
I have no idea! I never understood what lazy keto meant.
I use to track every single morsel that went in my mouth. I don’t any more but I can tell you that for me … I had to be careful of carb creep. It was easy for me to let a few too many veggies in and let my fats slip. I’m not a good intuitive eater when it comes to that stuff so every once in a while I have to start logging again to get myself back on track.
I think there are lots of different definitions of lazy keto out there and in the strict macro/gram counting communities it tends to have a negative connotation. Having been keto for over 2.5 yrs., I’ve found it works for me for periods of time as I’m not fond of tracking food. Having said that, I wouldn’t have made keto work for me, without tracking. I wasn’t one to under eat but carbs and protein could go too high and raise my BG #'s. I tracked food early on which was a real eye opener and still do, once in a while, when I wonder about BG #'s. My favourite tool has been my BG/ketone meter. I measure FBG’s and BG’s more regularly than ketones (rarely measure). I think once you have a handle on what 20g of carbs looks like, meet your protein requirement and eat your fat, you’re good to go. You won’t know unless you try it and you can always go back to tracking food, if you like.
I tracked for a couple months then stopped once I got the hang of things. But I still track every now and then for a couple days just to make sure I’m still on track.
I think lazy keto means different things to different people. I track when i start, or when I feel like I’m falling off the wagon or not getting the results I’d expect. But im pretty stringent on what I eat most of the time.
I’ve also seen people call it lazy keto when they eat off diet frequently or just eat low carb without the focus on fat.
I think one of the biggest things I’ve gotten out of Keto is the ability to hear what my body is saying to me, and listen to it. If you can do that, and you’re getting the results you want, who cares what you call it?
For me, keto means you’re making detectable levels of ketones on a daily basis.
Whatever you need to do to do that is fine, IMO. Some people just like to record stuff, others need to control their carbs very strictly to stay in ketosis and tracking food helps them do that. But it’s not a matter of virtue or ‘doing it properly’, as far as I’m concerned. I think the term ‘lazy keto’ is a bit derogatory, if I’m honest.
I eat a lot of the same things, so after a solid month of tracking it didn’t make sense to keep putting the same things in over and over. Every time I eat something new I look it up though just to be sure. I keep a running total of carbs in my head on days where I change things up, but rarely track anything.
Unless I eat something unusual, the fat a protein are pretty balanced so if I get enough of one I get enough of the other.
Results haven’t really changed, i’m not actively seeking loss anymore, muscle is coming in fine so I expect there to not be a lot of scale movement. I lost about 20 while tracking, then 40 without tracking to get to where I am now.
It isn’t a one time decision though, trust what you have learned and if you are ever concerned just punch stuff in again for a while.
That’s exactly what I did too. I tracked everything until I got a good idea of how much carb/fat/protein was in different types of commonly used food and now I just look up stuff if it’s new to me or in a restaurant (e.g. no control on my part of what it has in it).
I prefer to call it intuitive keto rather than lazy keto lol.
It’s what people have been doing long before “keto” was even a word! For me I just ate things I’d made before that I knew were fine, and then once I got used to that I expanded.
I’ll still glance at the carb count when making recipes from a website, but since I only eat 2 meals a day there’s not much math involved. Generally it’s like “Under 5g NET carbs per meal? looks good”.
I stopped too…I"ve seen enough of what happens as I eat. I know KETO works and it energizes me so well that this is my way of eating forever.
Yes, intuitive Keto is probably the right term.
I’m sure my tracking will kick back in if I feel I’m derailing for any reason.
Thanks all for your comments!
I tracked religiously for about 8 months, every single thing I put into my body for the same reason you are, I wanted to learn what the food contained that I ate. After the 8 month part I stopped and did good. I do think I went through I several month spell where I was eating too much protein and gained about 10 pounds. I went back to tracking for a couple of weeks and was able to melt off the 10 pounds I gained and stopped once again. I occasionally pull out myfitnesspal and enter a meal to see what is going on or if there is some food I rarely eat but for the most part I have it figured out. I still test my ketones and glucose regularly and as long as those numbers are right and so long as my body composition is not changing I have no need to pay close attention to my macros. I will say though if I did not diligently track everything for the time that I did I would not be in the good place that I am today. For me tracking at the beginning was essential for success.
I think it’ll be fine and I like “intuitive keto”, though “lazy keto” is kind of fun (I’ve never heard that term!). I’m not strictly keto, so maybe I’m “lazy keto”. I’m in good health and don’t have more than vanity pounds to lose but honestly the reason I started it was because I felt like such a sugar addict and I was sick of it. I felt like a smoker who was always trying to quit smoking, but was never able to. I heard that keto cut cravings and I got desperate enough to try. Sure enough, it worked! I stayed pretty strict for a while and then toward the holidays fell off a bit but got back on. These days I’m pretty good at eating what I want (and what I want is real food) – staying keto for the most part, but if DH wants sushi, I eat it. I have a harder time sleeping after I eat something like that, but the next day I just get right back on that keto horse. I know this is different than what most people here are all about but I am so happy that I’ve finally found a way to be at peace with food and I will be forever grateful to keto fans everywhere for helping inspire me.
Oh, meant to add that I never tracked because tracking food can tend to make me kind of nuts obsessing about it and then it all just backfires on me.
Er… no. Having someone else feed you bacon whilst lying down!
Lazy keto sounds a bit like a term used by someone being a judgemental arse to me 
Just do your keto.
Thanks for this – I am so ready to stop tracking (soon, after my latest n=1). I feel like I keep eating to fit what’s left for the day in MFP, instead of listening to my body.
ps. I think Carl used that term ‘lazy keto’ in the podcast.
pps. [quote=“Daisy, post:16, topic:10510”]
Having someone else feed you bacon whilst lying down!
[/quote] Now that’s my kind of keto!
Having someone cook, clean up an then feed me the bacon while layin down. 
My kind of lazy Keto. Can’t seem to teach my furry friend to do this for me.
Quite possibly. I don’t like it as a term same as I don’t like clean/bad eating, cheating and all these kinds of terms. That’s just me though. I come from a background of emotional eating and shaming and guilt would be the biggest driver for me overeating. That is not to say that people mean anything like that when they use the words, it might just be the way the receiver hears them. But the easiest way to avoid someone feeling this way is not to use them. I have been called lazy, greedy, and the like a few too many times in my life so they tend to come with a punch to the guts!