Calories

Deborah105

Are they important to limit? I am a woman in her 50s and weight loss is tricky. I'm working with a new doctor to balance my hormones - on week three - and want to jump into keto. I'm been a paleo wannabe for EVER, but super bad carb cravings and caveins frequently derail me.

I'm on day three (I think) of keto. Having a harder time keeping my percentages to 70-25-5 and keeping the calories not insane. So far no lose.

Any tricks to share with me?

amindyleigh

I'm still fairly new with keto so I am no expert. I have had the same kind of questions you have. I was told that in the beginning you may not need to worry as much about calories. You need to focus on the macros. I started at 65-30-5. If you are having trouble losing weight then maybe start limiting your calories. Try using this keto calculator http://keto-calculator.ankerl.com/ to mind out what would work best for you and how much of a calorie deficit you should have.
I realized about a week or two after I started that eating so much fat was actually filling me up. Even though I was used to eating more I just wasn't hungry. I was eating out of habit. I started to eat when I am hungry and stop when I'm full. Now I don't have any trouble staying below 1500 cals and still getting enough fat.
A few of the things that I eat every day...bacon (obviously ), eggs, Quest bars, dry roasted almonds from costco, tuna salad etc.
Have you checked out http://www.reddit.com/r/keto/ or the ladies only version http://www.reddit.com/r/xxketo/
There is tons of great information there!
Good luck!

Deborah105

Thank you for all the info! I'm checking out the ladies site right now.

FXOjafar

This is a fairly long lecture by Gary Taubes, a well known low carb proponent. Cutting calories is not necessarily going to help you lose weight. It all depends on what you eat and what your body does with it that counts.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDneyrETR2o

lrmall01

Keep in mind the carbs (5% in your case) is for Net carbs. Also IMHO 5% may be a little aggressive FWIW. MFP will report the percentage of Total carbs so it might be a little tricky to track properly. Here's a link that might help:

http://cavemanketo.com/configuring-mfp/

Deborah105

Irma - you're right that 5 percent is really aggressive. So far so good, but it's a balancing act getting in all that fat. I'm learning how to make Hollandaise! lol

My age seems to be working against me and when I tried keto last year with higher carbs and higher calories I had absolutely no results. I just don't know what the right thing is to do!

It makes my head hurt sometimes.

susupiet

I'm working on this too...3 weeks into keto and 7lbs down. 6 of that was in the first week. No complaints, though, I feel great and my clothes fit better, so.... As far as the calories go, try Bulletproof Coffee in the morning and clear (no calorie) liquids throughout the day and a nice sized fatty dinner. The Bulletproof Coffee (BPC) is coffee (or tea) mixed with coconut oil, butter and cream (vanilla extract, unsweetened cocoa powder, stevia.....a few flavor options) Put in a blender to frappe and voila! Starbucks- eat your heart out! A 2-cup serving of BPC is about 500 calories, tides you over and leaves a nice amount of calories for dinner. If you do get hungry during lunch time, have a couple of pieces of bacon or some avocado, but don't forget to count those calories!
When people say you don't have to count calories on keto, they mean you're generally satisfied from the fat content and not likely to eat more calories than needed. Until you get the groove of knowing to stop when you feel full (and actually knowing when you feel full!) it's important to count the calories.

parkscs

You should definitely track your calories if you want to get the most out of your diet, and if you're logging your food to track your carb intake, it's literally no additional effort to track your calories and other macros as well. To me a low carb diet is as simple as a) keep carbs low b) hit your protein macro and c) hit your target calories. Just my opinion, but people put too much focus on the fat intake when it's really not the most important factor. Rather, you will have a high fat intake only because when you don't want to overconsume on protein and you're keeping carbs low, fat is the only real source of energy remaining. Focus on accurate logging (read: food scale) and track your carbs/protein/calories, and you should start to see some nice results.

debilang

Deb, being on a Low Carb High Fat way of eating for the past couple of weeks, I have come to APPRECIATE the High Fat portion of my way of eating. I love the book Grain Brain...cause our brain DOES need good fat. I purposely am not doing 20 g carb yet...but have gone from 80 carbs down to yesterday eating only 42 carbs. Yesterday, I felt a craving for sweets...as I am a sugarholic, and usually have 1 serving of dried mango fruit. However, saw my carb total, and did NOT want to go above 50 so had ONE piece...lol (serving is 6 pieces). I still craved...sooo what I did, was take 1 tsp of Nutiva Virgin Coconut oil...and downed with coffee (straight). My CRAVING automatically went away...and I was sooooo HAPPY. I purposely set my Fat macro high above my protein limit...cause I am now frying a lot of my meats...something soooo against what I grew thinking...(Low FAT) is best. When I researched why I got my heart attack in 2009, I discovered it was all the junk food that caused the inflammation to my artery walls allowing cholesterol to seep in and turn to placque, and not the actual cholesterol that our body produces and so many in the medical community are still soo afraid. (I learned this in Grain Brain)...My sis in law just had a big stroke. She always drank pepsi's for breakfast, lunch, and dinner with her meals...all that sugar over years and years, plus high stress got her a stroke...and she is younger than me. It got me to thinking...about what I was continuing to do with my body. My sis is FORTUNATELY recovering. She still needs speech, and physical therapy but her face is not drooping...and she is still beautiful and has all of her mindset. Learning how to communicate is the hardest to see of all, but, she is STRONG and COMMITTED to her family, and we are to her.

I am pretty comfortable now eating low carbs, *and* high fats...I love my bacon and don't even microwave it anymore, but I don't eat it EVERYDAY. I can't seem to go much beyond 1200 calories a day...and I will soon be at MTC...and my calories per MFP will be upped to 1400. Oh My...hehehe...love all this planning :drinker: