New and looking for reinforcement

(melanie) #1

Hi all. I’m 3-weeks in to my keto journey and here’s the deets on me. I use a keto app (ketodiet) to help me track my macros. I currently strive to eat 142g fat, 67g protein, and 20g carbs. usually isn’t difficult to stay below the carb amount and hit the protein, though it is difficult to hit the fats for the time-window in which I eat. I typically fast from dinner to whenever I get hungry the next day – often times that could be a 14-16hr fast. then I eat a good healthy meal and usually am not hungry again until dinner around 5-6pm. I test ketone level and glucose each morning and evening. I have no real reason to do this except I’m real curious about how my body works. I don’t have any pre-diabetic or other health issues. my blood sugar tests in the 80-90 range most mornings (about an hour after waking with no food, just coffee.) and ketones can be in the 1.2-2.5 range. by the evening my blood sugar is usually in the 70s and sometimes my ketone level is higher than morning but not always.

I have a hard time drinking enough water but can if I concentrate. I also use an electrolyte replenishing powder once during the day, most days.

so here’s my question…I feel pretty good. definitely better when I can exercise (and this also raises ketone level) but it’s been monsoon season in the Shenandoah valley and this rain makes outdoor exercise challenging. I’ve gotten thru all those initial ‘feeling like hell’ symptoms. I didn’t eat alot of processed sugars so my body isn’t missing that but I do miss white rice and I feel like my body is saying, ‘hold up…no more white rice, what have you done…’ ha ha anyways - I’ve only lost about 5 lbs…and my bowels have s l o w e d way down. I’m guessing meeting my water intake goals would help this but I feel like I’m carrying around weight in my colon - gross but true. I started keto at 168 - I’m 5’6" with a strong build. I’m 43 years old and have grown 4 children in this body. and once I grew 2 people at once. I’m thinking I could easily lose 25 lbs but who knows, maybe that’s not what my ‘healthy’ weight is…maybe that’s a weight expectation better placed on a younger person? I’m trying to be realistic with weight desires, while focusing on feeling good. and I do feel very good!

so - my question is this, for all the seasoned keto vets… do I play around with my macros to see if I can release some more weight? does this picture sound good and should I just be patient. I imagine you will say be patient. I’m consistently in ketosis but I don’t completely understand why my numbers vary so much - 2.9 in the morning one day and 1.4 a few days later?

I’ve read alot but still find it easier to learn in conversation with someone. thanks in advance for your time.

(Alec) #2

5lbs in 3 weeks sounds good to me. You are doing just fine. Keep doing what you’re doing. Be patient.

Your ketone levels will go up and down naturally, and how many are in the blood at any one time is affected by a host of factors. Don’t worry about it. If you are intermittent fasting, and eating less than 20g of carbs, you will be in ketosis most of the time.

My opinion is you are doing great, and the most important thing is to keep reading the forums and learning as you execute as you are right now! KCKO.

And don’t worry about eating the advertised fat macro. The rule is eat fat to satiety. If you are not hungry, don’t eat.

(TJ Borden) #3

THIS. Chasing macros and ketone levels makes everything WAY more complicated than it needs to be.

(Deb) #4

I am your stats but older and was 132 before vacation (back up to 143 after! On the way back down now) and it takes longer when you have less to lose. Slow burn strength training changed the game for me. And I tested everything I ate for blood glucose reactions. Now I am patiently losing again! You’ll get there!

(Ken) #5

After three weeks you’ve gone through the major adaptation period and significantly reduced any resistance issues. You can easily drop down from the high fat, Nutty Keto macro which was fine for initial adaptation, to a more normal Evolutionary Macro that will promote body fat loss. It’s 60/35/5%, so your grams will show twice as much protein as fat, but will still give you 60% of your calories as fat. It’s two parts meat to one part fat. You’ll still be soundly Lipolytic. The 5% Carb number is a maximum, so you still want to keep carbs as low as possible. Don’t worry about ketone levels. Eat this macro to satiety, and make sure you’re hungry by the next time you eat and you should be able to sustain a reasonable rate of fat loss. Expect around a pound per week.

(Nathan Toben) #6

Shenandoah! Trail runner here and have spent many days up near you (I’m in central NC).

I echo what others have said. It sounds like you are right on the pulse. I don’t think your weight goals are unrealistic especially since it sounds like you are, and have been, an active individual for a long time.

One of the few things I think I am qualified to speak on (I’m 30 days in) is aerobic activity. It sounds like you workout already. If you are not too married to your regime and want to reinforce your weight loss journey during fat-adaption phase, I suggest the tried and true method of removing strength conditioning and speed work from your regiment and totally exploiting long slow distance (LSD).

Hikes, light runs, spins on the bike, canoeing etc. This will serve multiple purposes at once. I find that it helps my digestion; an emptying effect. It burns off glycogen while simultaneously keeping cortisol low. And it obviously increases your daily caloric burn, which for some, makes it a little easier to lose weight.

The challenge becomes primarily mental when one does this. It takes a certain amount of mental fortitude similar to adhering to a diet. Because all workout efforts become almost laughably slow, the mind produces all the reasons why we should stop, why it isn’t doing anything, why we shouldn’t let that old man pass us on the trail. But after a few weeks of this, the lights turn on, insulin sensitivity jumps, and if there ever comes a moment when you need fight or flight tokick in, it will be there on the ready.

The other challenge is Time Budget. Because all aerobic is super easy, the more you can do weekly, within reason, the greater the adaptations towards fat-burning and a myriad other things. But we only have so much time in a day.

Anyways, I’m going on and on. Sounds like you are on your way. 5 lbs in 2 weeks is awesome. Cheers

(melanie) #7

y’all are fantastic - and so encouraging! thank you. will continue on and remain patient! I’ll enjoy reading more comments!

#8

Hey Nathan,

Central NC here too (Raleigh). I’m curious about the recommendation to do long slow distance instead of strength/speed (I assume HIIT would be in that group too). I have always loathed “running” (medium-slow jog is really about all I can accomplish) but recently have been forcing myself to do it. I’m about 2.5 months into keto, not sure if I’m fat-adapted, and have hit a weight loss stall. It sounds like you would recommend 1hr of walking instead of 30mins of jogging. Is that right?

(Nathan Toben) #9

@MrMartyJones, that’s an interesting question.

I guess it depends.

Both are good. I would say that if one were to walk an hour over jogging thirty minutes, ideally it would be less of a walk and more of a “power hike”. Swinging the arms, engaging the gluteus, driving the knees forward and keeping the pace steady but above a casual walk.

And even though it may feel like just a jog, I would make sure that “jogging” is at a pace where if you closed your mouth, you could easily keep up with your breathing exclusively through your nose. Another way of thinking about it is whether powerhiking or jogging, everything is at a conversational is-this-actually-doing-anything pace :slight_smile:.

The way I think about it in keto terms is this:

Just as with keto, we want the vehicle of most all of our calories to be fat so that we minimize an insulin response, with long slow aerobic efforts, we want to maximize our moving time while minimizing any moments where we reach our metabolic threshold between fat-burning and sugar-burning.

Keep exercise couched in aerobic effort in the same way we keep carbs and protein couched in healthy fats.

Staying aerobic means we are fueling that workout primarily on fat. The more we do that, the better at it we get.

I would suggest jogging some, powerhiking some, but most importantly, taking a long term approach; gradually increasing your TOTAL weekly moving time at this conversational pace.

What you will see happen is: the effort it took you to, say, walk a 16-minute mile becomes a 14-minutes mile. Becomes jogging a 12-minute mile. And if you really stay loyal over months, then you will find yourself running 9-minute miles at the same perceived effort it once took you to walk that 16-minutes mile.

Then HIIT and the benefits of high intensity training could come into the picture.

#10

Ok, thanks. That makes sense. I used to be quite athletic and (like you alluded to) I feel like I’m cheating if I’m just walking. I think I’ll try to up the walking pace and go for longer duration. Thanks for offering your point of view!__

(melanie) #11

I try to go for an hour+ walk every few days. on those days with more time and less kids in tow I walk for about 45 minutes and then do a run/walk. my body does much better with jogging if I’m warmed up. I agree - there are only so many minutes in the day - I wish I had hours…I could really walk/hike for hours.

thanks for this touchstone - that longer walks are good and beneficial!