Hey y’all, I was doing awesome, I’m 8 weeks in, lost an initial 10 lbs or so, clearly fat as my clothes are fitting and now I’ve got a rash on my chest partially, in between my breasts and under some. I thought I might have used too much laundry detergent and it irritated my skin or I did change detergents, maybe it was that, then thought maybe it was keto rash. Also, I can’t sleep for the life of me, like I might get to sleep at 4-5am. Is this still normal? I was hoping by now I’d be smooth sailing. Well, I was smooth sailing but now I’m not. I have tried having a bit more carbs to see if that would help, seems to ebb and flow in degree of severity. I’ve played with taking potassium, already take magnesium, might be lacking in salt. Something’s gotta change.
Rash/can't sleep
If you do a search on “keto rash” on these forums, you should get plenty of useful information. You are not alone in having to deal with this.
I have done that to some extent, haven’t found anything helpful really. I’ll keep looking 
thanks Paul.
You may simply have to wait it out, sorry.
But for a skin rash that I get in the wintertime (an eczema-like thing on the backs of my hands), I find that the only thing that helps is cortisone ointment. My doctor disapproves, but it’s the only thing that works. Fortunately, the longer I stay on a ketogenic diet, the less the rash seems to trouble me. It will be interesting to see whether it even shows up this winter.
Thats what I’ll do then, wait it out…if it is a keto rash. I’ll change my detergent just to make sure altho you’d think I’d have it elsewhere if it was that.
For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things, to Him be the glory forever. Amen Rom 11:36
Addressing your other issue re lack of sleep. Many folks report having difficulty sleeping after starting keto and the primary suspect for this effect is increased ketones to the brain. Ketones are better fuel than glucose for several reasons, and the brain can go on a sort of ‘activity binge’ that doesn’t decrease when you need to sleep. While awake, you may also experience a sort of ‘clarity’ you’ve not experienced previously. A lot of folks talk about this. Even though the sleep-time alertness can be a bit of a nuisance, rest assured that it will pass as your brain gets used to having ketones in quantity. Eventually, most folks report that they sleep better in ketosis than ever before.
This is one of those subjective things that is hard to measure, besides being different on keto. The individual need for sleep is quite variable, in the first place, so I mistrust advice to get so many hours’ sleep a night. How do they know what’s right for me? Also, I find there is a big difference between wanting to go to sleep and needing sleep. It turns out that if I am fine the next day, it doesn’t really matter how many hours’ sleep I got the night before.
Lastly, I’ve seen reports suggesting that a lot of people get a lot more sleep than they realise, even when they think they were awake all night. And apparently, other people who think they were asleep all night actually get very little sleep. I don’t know what to make of this, nor do I understand how “they” think they know these things, so I just try not to worry about it.
Personal experience of night before last. I had the early shift at work the next morning which means I have to get up at about 04:15 so went to bed at 10PM. Fell asleep quickly so all good so far. Then I had a dream: as I attempted to walk down a flight of stairs a cat (yes, typical domestic feline) attacked my left foot, biting and scratching. In the dream I attempted to kick and push away the cat to no avail. This went on for some time until I finally awakened - to discover I was having a cramp in the top of my left foot! I managed to alleviate the cramp, but spent the next couple of hours wide-awake thinking about my turtles. Consequently, I got only about half the sleep I need for a workday.
I was tired at work, yes, but not overly so. Certainly not so tired as one might expect from getting only half the sleep I normally require. When I got home later afternoon I took a nap that made up for the lost sleep and then some! But while at work, I functioned quite normally.
Hey there Michael, funny dream! Lol and to wake up with an actual cramp! Lol So funny! I was sleeping great, now… Not so much. I thought I was over there"hump" of issues, or maybe was hoping. I thought I would be dragging today from last night but coffee makes all the difference!
I agree Paul, but when you go to bed at 9, (yes, I usually go at 9 and sleep all night,) and check your watch all night, I can see the clock ticking away. Very frustrating.
My husband and I both experienced some issues with waking in the night when we first started keto. It’s settled down now. For years I had a terrible time falling asleep. The older I get, the better it gets. I think it’s because I have less to worry about (aka not giving an F).