New To This -- Am I In Ketosis?

(Elizabeth Brignac) #1

Hi everyone – So I started keto a week ago, and I have been really careful about tracking and all. I have the symptoms I keep reading about – am thirsty a lot, so I have been drinking water constantly, and I feel full more often, but when I did one of those stick tests, it said I had only a small amount of whateveritis in my system. I have been trying to be reasonable about calories (without focusing too much on that), but way more of my energy comes from fat and very little from carbs at this point. So I was sort of surprised about the test not saying that I was ketosising like crazy. What do I do now?

(Georgia) #2

Keep calm and keto on! The ketone sticks are notoriously unreliable.

(Karl) #3

Keto whiz quiz sticks don’t tell you anything useful. Give them to a diabetic pal who’s Type I.

Eat 20g/day or less of carbs and you’ll be in ketosis after a couple of days (blah blah, glycogen stores, yadda yadda). Once there, if you stay at the 20g/day carbs (or less), you’ll be in ketosis (brain can’t live without food, body has to make ketones to avoid brain death, blah blah blah, etc).

If you feel compelled to test, the only accurate way to do so is to test blood with expensive ketone strips. And there’s no good reason (in my opinion) to go that route when you can be 100% successful without it.

(GregoryJames) #4

Don’t worry about always checking if you’re in ketosis. And if your goal is to lose fat safely and faster. Its all about your calories. low carb, moderate protein, and low-moderate fat(healthier fats) Also, just know that eating more fat is not what gets you in ketosis. its the reduction of carbs in your diet that gets you into ketosis. You can still even be in ketosis if your fats are just 40-50 grams and keep your carbs low and protein moderate. If you have a high body fat percentage keep your fats lower and when you reach goal body weight that is when you can eat a little more fats.

#5

Being properly hydrated will cause your urine to be mostly water… Can’t show your true levels. Better to stay hydrated though lol

(Pete A) #6

As those before have said, don’t look for the ketostix to validate what you’re doing, as it sounds like you’re doing everything right. If you are 60-70% fat and under 20 carbs ketosis will follow.

(Elizabeth Brignac) #7

Holy shit! I lost 7 lbs in one week!

Yes, water weight, I know, but still. :star_struck:

(Shantanu) #8

Don’t sweat the measurement thing. Go by how you feel. Here’s what I would look for:

  1. Steady energy throughout the day - no crashes after a meal
  2. Diminished hunger. Even when you are hungry, it isn’t uncomfortable enough to make you ‘hangry’
  3. Non-scale victories (NSV) - do your clothes feel a tad looser?
  4. Absence of gas and bloating

Give yourself 3 - 6 weeks for all of the above to kick in, in a very demonstrable way. 1 week is too soon although I felt all of the above after 3 days but I’m a man and I’ve heard its different for women.

Good luck!