Comment by busymom0 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by busymom0 | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

I have done Keto myself and personally I would not recommend it. I would actually love to do keto forever as I love eating meat but it will pretty much ruin most of your social eating out habits unless you are okay with not going out for things like Sushi (not eating rolls), ice cream etc. I also do powerlifting and my calorie requirements are much higher. Strength wise, my strength took a dip initially but it mostly came back after about 1-2 weeks. But my endurance was absolutely horrible (this is due to your body having to first convert the fats to glycogen, then using the energy instead of readily available carb sourced glycogen).

Anyway, I personally did it for about 2 months and even though I enjoyed it, I would not recommend it for most people. I tried it because I don't like dissing something without trying it first, so I put myself on Keto for 2 months to see what it was all about. I would recommend the same - try it for about 2 months and then decide it for yourself. Note that you will have to bear through the first 1-2 weeks of brain fogginess and low energy as your body adapts to it. But once that's over and you are in Ketosis, you will feel much better. Another thing to be careful about is that your body will go out of ketosis very easily if you eat carbs (ice cream for example). Don't use it as a way to lose body weight as most of the weight people lose is actually water weight due to the lack of carbs based glycogen.

I would recommend this Jeff Nippard's YouTube video on Keto too:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qxmVsT_ZeNs

Usually, the diet is also high in dietary fat, at least long term. In a more short-term diet, this is not always necessary. It’s possible to instead be fueled via your own fat stores, as long as you have excess weight to lose. https://medium.com/@jovialdiets1/complete-guide-for-keto-die...

2 Months is absolutely nothing in Ketogenic diet, what you've likely experienced in those two months was mostly the transitioning side-effects from carbs to fat, it takes at least 6-12 months to be fully fat-adapted (mitochondrial changes) especially if you're an athlete.(See Ultra runner Zach Bitter)

I guess you could be right but for me, I couldn't afford 6-12 months of low endurance as I was about to start a specific workout program which also needed me to be in caloric surplus and have high endurance. Maybe I would try it out again in the future.

But another main reason as I pointed out was that Keto was severely limiting my social eating habits. I personally did not do it for losing body fat, I did it mostly to see how it is. I still loved eating out with friends - things like sushi rolls, ice cream etc. Keto wasn't allowing me those things.

I would actually love to do keto because I love eating meat (steak), butter, avocados etc but right now isn't the right time for me from a social point of view.

Given that the brain's main source of energy is sugar and the heart's main source of energy is fat, and the complexity of the body's organs, I think any type of diet that limits specific types of energy sources should carry disclaimers.

For example, if you are on a keto diet and your diet is well-defined, what are the risks? Fatigue is one thing, but organ damage or otherwise dangerous effects should be discussed frankly and clearly.

I have not really found resources that don't have inherent conflicts of interest.

People who study to become dieticians have a much more straightforward and high level approach, e.g.: "You have a iron deficiency and don't get in enough protein, and I would advise eating more red meat."

Brain uses both. There's an interesting talk [1] about how brain's ability to use glucose lowers before Alzhaimers disease and others. There seems to be some link between brain diseases and glucose metabolism.

[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XxGiQ7YrUYE

thanks for the interesting response and the link.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com