Many people think that the keto diet is when people sit in the middle of the kitchen with a pot of fat and eat that every day, so they look at the keto diet with disgust. However, to eat 75% fat means a totally different thing. Millions of people can’t imagine how to lose weight at all by eating fat and they are afraid of high cholesterol. These are all common misconceptions like that the human body needs carbohydrates to sustain itself. This time I would like to dispel these myths with the help of the following experts and doctors who we follow and learn from them all the time:
- Dr. Sten Ekberg
- Dr. Eric Berg
- Dr. Ken D. Berry
- Dr. Boz
- Dr Jason Fung
- Mark Sisson
- Tom Bilyeu
- Thomas DeLauer
Read more about our sources: here
I have gathered some basic information for you to look into and learn about ketogenic diet and lifestyle:
What is Keto Diet?
Ketogenic, or Keto diet is a completely simple diet with High Fat, Moderate Protein and Low Carbohydrate. This diet, due to its low carbohydrate content, forces the body to use so-called ketones instead of carbohydrate (sugar, fiber, starch) fuel. Ketones are actually very effective fuel, that are produced when the body starts burning stored or ingested fat as fuel, but you only know this when your carbohydrate intake is very low. With high carbohydrate intake, ketones are not formed because the body always uses carbohydrates as fuel first, and stores fats. Our body also converts unused carbohydrates into fat and stores it. So, if you live on an average “eat everything in moderation” diet, your metabolism is in carbohydrate burning mode and your body will burn as many carbohydrates as you need at first, then it converts the excess into fat and stores it along with fat, which you consume. However, if you switch to a high-fat diet and limit your net carb intake, your body will start producing ketones as energy and as a result will automatically start burning fat.
In a keto diet, the goal is for the body to switch from carbohydrate-based metabolism to fat-based metabolism, i.e., burning fatty fuel instead of sugar fuel.
How can to get into ketosis and how can this condition be maintained?
“Ketosis” is a condition in which the body gets its energy from fats.
The diet in which we can maintain ketosis in our body is called a “ketogenic diet”. The purpose of a ketogenic diet is to get the body into ketosis and keep it there, and that process which puts the body into ketosis is called “ketogenesis”.
A ketogenic diet can be achieved with the following food ratios:
Fat: 70-80%
Protein: 10-20%
Carbohydrates: 5-10%
For example, in a 2,000-calorie diet, this means about 165 grams of fat, 75 grams of protein, and 40 grams of carbohydrates.
Excessive carbohydrate intake as well as high protein levels will kick you out of ketosis, as do frequent meals.
How many carbs can eat a day to keep in ketosis?
A ketogenic diet typically reduces your total carbohydrate intake to less than 50 grams per day, but it can be as high as 20 grams per day. For example, a medium plain bagel contains less than 50 grams of carbohydrates.
Consuming too much protein endangers ketosis because the amino acids in the protein can be converted to glucose. This is why the ketogenic diet defines moderate protein to maintain body weight (including muscle), which continues to cause ketosis.
When my husband and I began the keto diet, our goal was to reduce carbohydrate intake to less than 50 grams. My husband started to lose weight very quickly, but for me it went a little bit slower. It took me a couple of months to show some positive results. When we want to lose weight, we try to stay closer to daily consumption of 20g of carbs, other times we’re fine with around 50g as well. Sometimes, of course, it happens when we eat all sorts of things we haven’t been used to in a while. For example, we didn’t eat rice or pasta for at least a year, or bread for months at all, and then the occasion brought us to eating them again. We didn’t protest, but in retrospect, it may not always have gone well because we were bloated. Marathoner and ironman triathlete Mark Sisson talks about the fact that sometimes it is necessary to eat different foods (eg with more carbohydrates) in order to maintain our adaptability (this, of course, does not apply to those whose goal is to recover from any disease, because in this case recovery is the primary priority for their organization, not the ability to adapt).
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