Muscle fatigue.

gemberly

I've been on the WOE about 21 days now. Felt great, have lost 17 lbs (it only says 2 lol) so far. Beginning yesterday, I've had some pretty weird muscle fatigue. We went biking this AM and just 5 rotations and I was already "feeling it", yesterday I went to area nurseries with my sister and I was wanting to sit down just from that. I kept up both times and hung in there. Tonight I have derby practice and my legs already have a shakiness to them, I'm gonna give it a go and maybe it's a "just go through the motions" day, but I'm not happy about it. I've been keeping my carbs low, under 15. Calories about 1300. Im 218/5'5" The days I have practice I try to eat the carbs about 2 hours before, so I have little extra. I was reading that maybe I'm low on salt, so I had a steak for lunch that we had salt on for about 15 minutes before we washed it off. I also just started on wellbutrin, and deplin, not sure if those should make a difference or not. Is this normal for this diet or am I just having a couple bad days? My legs just feel like I can't do it anymore. TIA

kirkor

1300 seems too low, I'd give yourself closer to 1500-1600.

The "big 3" electrolytes to keep up on with keto are sodium, potassium, and magnesium. Morton's "Lite Salt" has a combo of the Na and K, or you can get "Salt Substitute" to add the K on it's own. People do the mag citrate stuff, but eating fish bones and stuff like spinach and avocado can help.

gemberly

Thanks I'll try that. I wake up in the AM shaky too. I read that can be from the lack of those nutrients, also. I don't plan on stopping my WOE, but modifying where I get nutrients from is going to help. Thanks for the answer, I would have posted on my fb page but people are really on me to eat like 100 carbs. That just doesn't work for me at all.

radiii

Athletic performance suffers a bit until keto adapted. If you're pushing yourself as hard as normal that may explain the muscle fatigue. Making sure you're eating enough to support your activity is of course important as well.

Things like waking up feeling shaky is definitely a reason to pay attention to your electrolytes and make doubly sure you're getting enough. Sodium, Potassium, Magnesium. Personally, I take magnesium citrate every evening, use lite salt and salt everything liberally. If I'm feeling a bit off the first thing I do is heat up some chicken broth and dump some salt in it too and drink that.

Since it sounds like you are pretty darn active, I'd recommend reading the ketogains FAQ over at reddit:

http://www.reddit.com/r/ketogains/wiki/index

Do note that while they talk about TKD and CKD as other protocols that involve some carbs, its really, really, really recommended to be very patient and give your body ample time to adjust before deciding if you really need something else. 3 months of strict standard keto is I believe the recommendation, though if its simply adjusting and adapting to keto that's causing your issues, I'd expect you'll start to see things improve soon.

Lastly, if you feel issues are timed w/ starting wellbutrin, research those side effects. I have no idea what wellbutrin's side effects may be, but as someone who just went through a disastrous period trying to start prozac and experiencing a myriad of side effects from it, its something to be aware of too.

Sounds like you're thinking about all the right things, you'll figure it out

gemberly

My husband just sent me that link too. Lol. I got through 1.5 hours of our 2 hour practice. My heart was up (I'm 45) and I was getting dizzy and shaky. Looked through my potassium counts for the last month and while I'm low on sodium, my potassium is way low. Likely, my biggest issue. I hate a lot more variety prior to the last 3 weeks and I've been paying so much attention to macros I haven't been looking at the big picture. This was helpful! thank you!

embersdream

Interesting stuff . Was wondering about that myself , can barely do 15 min in the bike due to fatigue. I'm joking to go check this out . What a great question.

embersdream

Omg just had a look at levels since beginning keto and these things are super low!!! So a supliment yes?

Lil14U

Thanks radii that post was interesting

sljohnson1207

I'm going to agree that it's most likely low electrolytes (sodium, potassium, magnesium) and the fact that you are not keto-adapted yet, and intense exercise while switching from carb burning to fat burning tends to cause fatigue.

Here are other things to think about:
dehydration
too low blood sugar
over consumption of caffeine
Wellbutrin (buproprion XL) is somewhat of a stimulant and used in combo with other drugs for weight loss. It can cause shaking. http://www.drugs.com/sfx/wellbutrin-xl-side-effects.html

embersdream

sljohnson1207 wrote: »

I'm going to agree that it's most likely low electrolytes (sodium, potassium, magnesium) and the fact that you are not keto-adapted yet, and intense exercise while switching from carb burning to fat burning tends to cause fatigue.

Here are other things to think about:
dehydration
too low blood sugar
over consumption of caffeine
Wellbutrin (buproprion XL) is somewhat of a stimulant and used in combo with other drugs for weight loss. It can cause shaking. http://www.drugs.com/sfx/wellbutrin-xl-side-effects.html

great advice!