Keto Question \ Possibly Very Dumb
slipfox
Posts: 1 Member
Howdy,
I think it probably helps to give some background..
I have been eating keto for 26 days now, and have been eating clean/healthy for about 60 days now. I kind of jumped around with my diet, at first I was following the p90x 'fat shredder' phase of the program, but after talking with a friend I decided to try Keto. Haven't looked back. Lost close to 30 lbs all told. I was 300 even when I started.
I recently switched jobs, moving from a position that allowed me to eat terribly and do NOTHING, to a job that involves doing manual labor outside for 8-12 hours a day, and having to bring my own lunches for the most part - although in the past week or so I've had to settle for all kinds of grilled chicken salads at the various fast food places nearby my job site. I've stayed under 50g carbs this entire time, and most days under 20g. I drink about 2L of water on days off and 4-12L on days I work.
Anyways, to the point - obviously I'm out of shape, but I haven't had a 'hard' day of labor since I started Keto about a month ago. On Tuesday, it was 38 degrees outside, we wear full coveralls and protective equipment, and we were literally hiking through dense forest up the side of a mountain. I felt awful about ten minutes into the climb, and after about 35 minutes I wasn't able to continue, I was hyper ventilating, had stopped sweating altogether, and was dizzy/light headed. The other guys in the crew figured I was on the verge of death - and frankly I kind of thought so too - so gave me orange juice and bananas, thinking it had something to do with blood sugar (and maybe it did?). I had about 200g of carbs in a sitting. I had already drank about 2.5L of water so far that day, and this was our first venture out of the truck. Needless to say I was mostly useless for the rest of the shift, but afterwards I felt fine. I went back to low-carbing immediately.
I just don't know what happened. Is it normal? I had thought I was well over the 'flu' stage of keto. I had not felt that weak in my entire life, and it didn't last for more than that day. To make things even more confusing I used a couple Ketostix since then to see if I had indeed been knocked out of ketosis (because of course I should have been) and they are showing purple still. I haven't put any weight back on since. Could dehydration be throwing up false positives for the Ketostix? (yes I know they are inaccurate but are they THAT inaccurate?)
Should I just skip all this and hit up a DR? Has this happened to anyone else? Is this a side effect of having super low carbs and doing a very physical job?
Thanks for your patience and reading all of this!
Regards,
R.
I think it probably helps to give some background..
I have been eating keto for 26 days now, and have been eating clean/healthy for about 60 days now. I kind of jumped around with my diet, at first I was following the p90x 'fat shredder' phase of the program, but after talking with a friend I decided to try Keto. Haven't looked back. Lost close to 30 lbs all told. I was 300 even when I started.
I recently switched jobs, moving from a position that allowed me to eat terribly and do NOTHING, to a job that involves doing manual labor outside for 8-12 hours a day, and having to bring my own lunches for the most part - although in the past week or so I've had to settle for all kinds of grilled chicken salads at the various fast food places nearby my job site. I've stayed under 50g carbs this entire time, and most days under 20g. I drink about 2L of water on days off and 4-12L on days I work.
Anyways, to the point - obviously I'm out of shape, but I haven't had a 'hard' day of labor since I started Keto about a month ago. On Tuesday, it was 38 degrees outside, we wear full coveralls and protective equipment, and we were literally hiking through dense forest up the side of a mountain. I felt awful about ten minutes into the climb, and after about 35 minutes I wasn't able to continue, I was hyper ventilating, had stopped sweating altogether, and was dizzy/light headed. The other guys in the crew figured I was on the verge of death - and frankly I kind of thought so too - so gave me orange juice and bananas, thinking it had something to do with blood sugar (and maybe it did?). I had about 200g of carbs in a sitting. I had already drank about 2.5L of water so far that day, and this was our first venture out of the truck. Needless to say I was mostly useless for the rest of the shift, but afterwards I felt fine. I went back to low-carbing immediately.
I just don't know what happened. Is it normal? I had thought I was well over the 'flu' stage of keto. I had not felt that weak in my entire life, and it didn't last for more than that day. To make things even more confusing I used a couple Ketostix since then to see if I had indeed been knocked out of ketosis (because of course I should have been) and they are showing purple still. I haven't put any weight back on since. Could dehydration be throwing up false positives for the Ketostix? (yes I know they are inaccurate but are they THAT inaccurate?)
Should I just skip all this and hit up a DR? Has this happened to anyone else? Is this a side effect of having super low carbs and doing a very physical job?
Thanks for your patience and reading all of this!
Regards,
R.
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Replies
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It takes a while to became Keto adaptive. During that time physical activities can be harder to do. This lasts longer then the Keto flu stage.0
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I went through the same phase of being light headed and feeling dizzy when I started working out on keto. It went away after 3-4 weeks. For me it was light salt which helped me the most. Light salt has both sodium and pottassium. The Ketostix are useless, I can eat cup cakes and they still show pink. You can eat 20g of complex low sugar carbs before heavy work initially and reduce it over a period of time. I personally pushed through with out carbs and my body adjusted after few weeks of being light headed and dizzy.0
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Maybe your sodium/magnesium/potassium are out of balance... are you monitoring those? I tried not to do any exercise for the first month while my body adapted... after that, I've been doing great doing fasted cardio, though I try not to over do-it.0
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slipfox, you just pushed too hard, going from sedentary to manual labor, then an intensive climb in lots of gear, during the first month. I think we've all had those moments, where we got through the flu and thought we were golden. Unfortunately, that's not always the case.
Good for you for getting right back at it!!
Up your sodium, make sure you've had some carbs in the morning (I never have any until the end of the day and if I have a busy day, I crash in the afternoon, every time, and feel just like you did).
Congratulations on your weight loss!! Amazing work!0 -
It's somewhat normal until you are actually keto-adapted, which can take several weeks to months. I personally think that if your new job is that physically demanding, that you will be in ketosis at a lot higher number of net carbs than what most on here do (<20g). Why not try 50 net carbs per day and see how your energy is for work. I bet you'll still lose weight like gangbusters, and you'll still be in ketosis. Very, very active people may need a little extra carbs. Besides, why restrict them so low if you can be in ketosis with them higher?0
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sljohnson1207 wrote: »Why not try 50 net carbs per day and see how your energy is for work. I bet you'll still lose weight like gangbusters, and you'll still be in ketosis. Very, very active people may need a little extra carbs. Besides, why restrict them so low if you can be in ketosis with them higher?
Not everyone can have them higher though, it varies person to person. I know that if I go over 30g I get kicked out of ketosis, so 20 is fine. Besides, the main point of keto is that fat gives us the energy our body needs to surely the thing to be suggesting is a little more fat?
Aside from that, it sounds like your electrolytes were out of whack OP. Don't forget to supplement your diet with sodium/potassium (in the form of lite salt is easiest) and magnesium (veggies!) - though I realise by the time you read this, if you read it at all you'll be nearly 3 months in and a keto veteran
KCKO!
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