SOOOOOO Tired!

(stacey stegall) #1

I’m 6 weeks in, feel like I’m fat adapted because I’m not ever really hungry - but I’m SOOOOOOOO tired! When I get home from work I could literally go to sleep! Not just mentally tired - there are physical signs - eyes burning, and truly sleepy. I feel like I sleep well at night and probably average 8 hours nightly. I wake up kind of dragging, mid day is better, but around 4pm or so I’m ready to crawl in my bed!

I’m staying under 20 net carbs each day, and have been since I’ve started. Blood ketones are good, pee stick is always really dark.

Surely I’m so tired because my body is using up all my energy burning fat? haha - but seriously - any tips on getting some energy?

(Failed) #2

This thread has a lot of great information in it. Take a look.

(Full Metal KETO AF) #3

It’s more likely you are using all the body fat calories you are able to access in a day and don’t get enough fuel to keep going. You can get approximately 30-35 kcals per pound of body fat per day. I went through crash and burn about three months ago usually about 4-5pm. Often this means you don’t have enough body fat to supply a deficit in your food intake. Try adding some additional fat and make sure you’re keeping salt intake up. It worked for me.

Also I use cannabis and basically have almost stopped during daytime hours. This didn’t affect me as much in the past, especially when I ate carb foods. I only sleep 5-6 hours per night. I will drink coffee in the late afternoon to stay awake often, trying to keep my circadian rhythms from getting too messed up by going to bed early. I’m in bed at 11-12pm and wake up before sunrise as it is, if I go to sleep early I will wake up at 3:30-4:00am…not good!

I hope things get back to normal for you again soon. :cowboy_hat_face:

(squirrel-kissing paper tamer) #4

As a side note, I’ve been tired lately too but I know my seasonal allergies are kicking up. I feel like I just need to close my burning eyes by 7 pm. Caffeine after lunch can help. I still haven’t figured out why some days I have a lot of energy and other days I am dragging. I hope you feel better soon!

(stacey stegall) #5

I also drink a lot of water. Probably the equivalent of 8-10 16oz bottles a day. I’m wondering if it’s possible that I’m drinking too much? Maybe I’m flushing out too much of my salt or other things?

(Wendy) #6

Quite possibly. Make sure your adding enough salt to your diet.
You could just not be totally fat adapted yet. I remember being really tied for a while. I rested when I could. I came home from work exhausted. I figure there’s a lot of changes happening and healing. The body does most of it’s repairs while we sleep.

#7

So if I have 18 pounds of fat I can only tap into 600 calories a day? Backpacking at 180 pounds plus 25 pound on my back I’m suppose to be burning 3500-4000 but I’m only eating 1800 to 2000 cal a day. There’s no way I could hike 25 miles with 3k elevation gain on 2600 calories burned. And then there’s the fact that I’m burning most or all of that above 1000 calories (half of my base) in just half a day (6am to 6-7pm). So that must be for sedentary people. I lose 5+ lbs per week. That’s 1250 body fat calories per day but I’m not at the exact same intensity every day. Some days I only hike 18 miles and 2k elevation gain but that’s still a LOT of calories. One day I hiked 25 miles with close to 7k ft of elevation gain on 1800 calories. That’s 13 hours of uphill hiking (with water breaks)

Yes! . . . it was painful at my age

(mole person) #8

@Hap I’ve long questioned the applicability of these numbers to people on a ketogenic diet. They were derived from the men on the starvation experiments and they were on a seriously restricted almost entirely carbohydrate diet.

According to those numbers I shouldn’t be able to even OMAD at my current weight without courting metabolic slowdown. Well I’ve been doing it for most of the last two years with no issues at all. Also, how did our ancestors manage not to have destroyed metabolisms? They would have been likely very lean for much of the time and their feeding would have frequently been very intermittent. And why don’t lions have extremely slow metabolisms? They are lean and only need to eat once every few days. I think there is a large interaction effect that had to do with nutrient make up that the one starvation experiment has simply not teased out.

(Marianne) #9

Yes, make sure you get enough salt. I have to drink strong salt water to get enough. I just choke it down; you get used to it. Only thing on keto I’m not crazy about - small price, however.

I would read here from people that fat adaptation could take up to four months. I felt certain that that wasn’t going to be me because I was full keto from the start, ate ample fat, very low carb, didn’t snack and never cheated. It still took me I’d say 4.5 months when I became fat adapted.

The difference was clear. Before that, I couldn’t sustain any physical activity or exertion, like gardening, or housecleaning without getting winded and tired after a short while. I would have to sit and rest. After becoming fat adapted, I could go hours like an energizer bunny, without stopping and then on to the next thing. No hunger and no feeling like I had to refuel or rest.