Question about Keto strips

choconuts

I test 2-3 times a day. I am consistently Trace-Light in the mornings, a little darker in the afternoons, and at the higher end in the evenings.

On days I only test twice, I'm still light in mornings and much darker in evenings.

Is this normal, for it to fluctuate through the day? My mornings are full of tons of coffee and water, I don't test with first morning bathroom trip. Could this be affecting it?

doneatfour

I always test negative in the morning (or a very, very light trace) but darker by mid afternoon. I just this morning came up with a theory about that. I'm probably wrong. :laugh:

So, I thought that maybe I digest my food for the day at night. I read that it can take a couple of hours to a couple of days to digest food fully. So, the carbs I had during the day are readily available for my body to use at that point and it doesn't need to burn fat, or as much fat. Plus, since I'm sleeping, I'm not burning off as much of the carbs as I would during the day. So I'm either out of ketosis or (more likely) my body isn't burning enough fat to produce excess ketones, hence a negative reading. However, because I'm low carbing, there is less glucose available for my body to use when I'm most active, so it uses more fat, producing excess ketones as the day progresses.

Did I explain myself well? Plausible? I don't really know as I'm not very knowledgeable about digestion. I also don't know the nitty-gritty about how our bodies process carbs and metabolizes fat. All I know is that in the absence of sufficient dietary carbs, there is less glucose, so the body has to use fat for energy.

I've read on various forums about people experiencing just the opposite (darker in the morning after their "fast" during the night). Plus, there is the water issue diluting the reading. Since I don't drink when I'm sleeping it doesn't make sense that that is the reason I test negative/trace in the morning. During the day depending on my hydration I can have anywhere from a clearly trace to a "small" result. Sometimes I'm darker, but I try not to get to that point. I do like my tests to show "small" though.

Hopefully someone else chimes in with their ideas...

kiramaniac

Any level of ketones means you are in ketosis. Ketostix are simply measuring the density of ketones in your urine. If you are measuring dark this could be because you are burning more fat, and have more ketones, or it could be that the density is higher because of drinking less water.

If you want to be serious about measuring ketones, get one of the blood ketone testing kits. Much more accurate, but it's a lot more expensive.

But if you stick with ketostix, just focus on whether you are showing any level of ketosis or not, and don't stress about how light and dark.

GloMash710

My results fluctuate too, similarly to what you explained. I notice the more water I drink the lighter they are. I curb my water intake in the evenings so I don't have to get up a lot and notice when I test in the evenings they are darker.

Most important is that we are in ketosis! Congrats to you.

Dawnomite

Awesome info!!

OneDimSim

i did find out the "discard the day after opening" date is kind of serious - i used up a can of old ones and i was in light-moderate -

New can says large-very large! Eggplant purple!

stl_nana

Wow! I never noticed that they are to be discarded the day after opening. I don't use them up in that short of time

BlessedWith3

I am the same, light morning and dark in afternoon. I tend to think like doneatfour stated...I think that because we are sleeping, we don't burn as efficiently. Which goes along with the thought that you need to eat breakfast to break the fast.