WHY KETO
So, let me provide some context. I am already mostly gluten free as it seems to make me sick, so I usually sub out breads for gluten free bread, rice cakes, sweet potato, etc. I also don’t really do well with dairy- it usually also makes me sick (though I often cheat and eat cheese and ice cream anyways because I love it so deeply). SO, after about a few months where I personally overdid it on the snacks, popcorn, food that doesn't sit well with me, french fries and chocolate, I felt sluggish and gross and had heard good things about Keto. It seemed like an easy one for me, with a lot of health benefits. I already don’t do many carbs and I mostly needed to reign in my sugar habits and I LOVE a strict plan to get my head in the game.
Note that I aimed for “ketosis” meaning, less than 20 Net Carbs per day.
BENEFITS OF KETO
Listen, I’m no scientist nor will I ever claim to be one loll, BUT these are the REAL LIFE benefits I felt.
- I got my period for the first time in months. I found that interesting. Despite being on the pill I often don’t get it and my gyno thought it was from not eating enough fats. She may be right. I take this as a sign of good health that I finally got it.
- My canker sores went away. Okay whenever I get run down or stressed my mouth gets TAKEN over by cankers. If you have ever travelled with me you will know that I complain about them the whole time. For the first time in my LIFE, I felt them coming on and then they went away before they even started. This is enough for me to want to stay keto forever.
- More energy in the morning- I felt like I have been waking up more energized before coffee
- Less hunger- I definitely felt more full and less interested in snacking all the time
THE CONS
- Giving up what I consider to be healthy foods and sweeteners, like honey, bananas, smoothies. A lot of the stuff I like has added sugars and I personally don’t like using Stevia/Splenda in everything. That fake sugar taste I can always pick up right away and think natural is always better than man made chemicals (in moderation) *though I understand that Stevia is natural, it still tastes off to me.
- I don’t love nuts and I don’t love a lot of meats. It was like, too much meat and eggs and nuts for my liking. I can be a really picky eater and if it doesn’t appeal to me, I often just won’t eat, so I found myself starving myself a bit, which is NOT HEALTHY and NOT OK.
- I felt kind of weak. This might be from the above comment and me not having enough proteins but I felt weak. Workouts were not enjoyable and didn’t make me feel great when I did them.
- Its hard to find stuff when you are on the go. I find dinner to be super easy (like a salad and chicken) but when I am out and about and I don’t like nuts that much I found there was nothing to eat and I didn’t have the skills to know what to look for in places. Left me feeling a bit overwhelmed and exhausted and I really like food to be easy. I missed my smoothies and energy bites and didn’t like the sounds of any “fat bomb” recipes I looked up.
Overall- I’ll keep with a low carb diet and will be more conscious of my sugar intake. I don’t really want to be filling up on fats even if it is healthy. It definitely gets easier as the days go by and I thought I was only going to do a week but oddly haven’t broken today because I do like how it makes me feel. I’m going to make my paleo- blueberry/banana/honey muffins tonight though because I don’t think I can live my life without the healthy sugars and carbs.
I did lose some weight in the first week, lost a lot of bloat – and would encourage people to do more research than I did before starting. I actually didn't realize how many carbs and sugars were in things so it was more restricting than I realized!
Let me know if you have an other questions, or want some of the keto recipes I did love!