Ketogenic Diet for Weight Loss: Scientifically Proven: The Secret Guide to Permanent Weight Loss Using the Ketogenic Diet (Ketogenic Diet for Beginners ... Complexities of a Keto Diet Fully Explained)
Date: 2014-07-01T04:00:00+00:00

Ketogenic Diet for Weight Loss

Scientifically Proven: The Secret Guide to Rapid

And Permanent Weight Loss Using Ketogenic Diet

Rich Farrington

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Table of Contents

Table of Contents

Introduction

The Origins of the Ketogenic Diet

The Ketogenic Diet: Basic Things to Keep in Mind

The Ketogenic Diet and Its Variations

How the Ketogenic Diet Helps with Weight Loss

Can the Ketogenic Diet Be Bad for You?

The Other Things You Should Definitely Know about the Ketogenic Diet

Conclusion

Thank You

Introduction

I want to thank you and congratulate you for downloading the book, “Ketogenic Diet for Weight Loss”.

This book contains proven steps and strategies on how to bring the now famous Ketogenic diet into your life style and how to help yourself lose weight by eating according to this diet’s rules.

The Ketogenic diet has been out there for quite a while, but many people do not understand it very well precisely because there is a lack of information going on. However, the Ketogenic diet can be one of the healthiest choices you can make for yourself and it can bring your life on the right path for sure.

The rules of the Ketogenic diet are, generally speaking, simple. However, you should know that in most of the cases this diet implies a change in your lifestyle – and that may be difficult to handle at first. Hang on to it and you will reap numerous benefits though. You will feel better, you will have much more energy, you will see life through a whole new set of lenses. Your body will look better than ever, your brain will function better than ever and your entire being will thank you for having made the great choice of sticking to this diet.

Hopefully, this book will present you with some of the most important things that are to be born in mind when it comes to the Ketogenic diet. Try to assimilate the information and to bring it into your life because the benefits are just around the corner!

Thanks again for downloading this book, I hope you enjoy it!

The Origins of the Ketogenic Diet

Generally speaking, the origins of a diet are not relevant to understanding how it functions. They may indeed be interesting for those who follow that particular diet and for those who are convinced of its powers, but in the end, understanding the mechanism behind that diet does not have much to do with its history.

And yet, with the Ketogenic diet things are completely different. Understanding how this dietary plan functions is very much related to its history and it is very much related to why it came up in the first place. Thus, for the sake of understanding itself, the first chapter of this ebook will be dedicated towards the history of the Ketogenic diet and all the things associated with it.

You may be surprised to find out that the original Ketogenic diet was developed not as a weight loss program (as all the other diets are), but as a nutritional plan meant to help children with refractory epilepsy that was too hard to control. Later on, nutritionists noticed that the same basic principles of the Keto diet (as it is also referred to in a “friendlier” way) can be applied to weight loss as well.

Thus, to understand exactly how this plan works, you will first have to understand epilepsy and how it functions (and even more than that, what its relationship with the Ketogenic diet is more precisely).

Epilepsy is one of the oldest known and most commonly spread neurological diseases and it is believed that it affects no less than 50 million people worldwide. Basically, patients who suffer from this disease suffer seizures that are caused by the “hyperactivity” of their cortical neurons. These seizures can affect only one part of the brain (dealing with a particular function) or the entire brain. This is why some of the epilepsy patients out there have seizures that affect only the muscles, the senses or other functions, while other epilepsy patients have seizures that render them unconscious.

Epilepsy develops most often after a stroke and the first signs of it are shown in childhood. Since kids are the most difficult to manage, the Ketogenic diet (whose origins will be explained further on) is mainly directed to them and to their parents to help them live a more seizure-free life.

Believe it or not, the very first timid roots of the Keto diet go as far back as Ancient Greece. Most of the Greeks who treated diseases (or studied them, at least) refused to believe that there is any kind of supernatural source for the various medical conditions they encountered along the way and that there is a purely physiological reason these conditions develop in the first place.

Thus, the author of the famous medical work Epidemics up with a theory that was based on the fact that nutrition affects one’s health status, particularly people who suffered from epilepsy. He believed that epilepsy can be cured through fasting and, for millennia there, a lot of people believed it as well. Erasistratus, for example, advised mercilessly making epileptics to fast and so did some other people dealing with the same area of medicine later on.

At the beginning of the 20thcentury, Bernarr Macfadden and Hugh Conklin started prescribing fasting as a cure to epilepsy. The latter believed epilepsy to be related to a special toxin that was released by the intestines and pushed into the bloodstream. Thus, he believed his patients would be cured of epilepsy by following a “water diet” that would last between 18 and 25 days. The results he showed to the world were amazing: 90% of the children showed great results and 50% of the adults did the same as well.

Roughly at the same time, in France, the fasting diet was challenged by some studies. 20 patients were put to a diet that was mainly based on vegetarian products and alternated fasting with purging. Out of them, only 2 showed results, while the other 18 were not able to follow this very strict diet. The 2 who did, however, showed better results than those epilepsy patients who followed prescription medication.

When Conklin’s theory grew more and more popular, even neurologists brought it to people’s attention and started recommending it. Several other people boasted great results, but later on in the 1920s, other types of studies showed that there was not much “meat” to what followed after the fasting period because most of the patients experienced seizures again.

The idea of a diet that would be sustainable on the long term thus started to take shape. In 1921, Rollin Woodyatt came up with a diet based on high intakes of fats and low intakes of carbohydrates. Later on, Russel Wilder perfected this theory into a dietary plan with all its parts: induction, maintenance and so on. He called it “the Ketogenic diet” because it produced large amounts of Ketones in the body.

Following the 1920s, there was a decline in the use of the Keto diet basically because new medication was invented to treat certain epileptic symptoms and types of seizures. With very few rare exceptions, most of the neurologists prescribed anticonvulsants and other similar types of drugs to those patients who suffered from epilepsy or epileptic syndromes.

In the 1960s, however, research showed that medium-chain triglycerides (MCT) have the power to generate more Ketones than other types of fats. Thus, Peter Huttenlocher developed a diet that was based in proportion of 60% on these MCTs. This diet replaced the original Ketogenic diet and allowed people to eat more proteins and carbohydrates, which had been one of the main issues related to the original diet (especially in the case of children, where parents found it extremely difficult to actually build a menu so restrictive as that which was recommended by the Keto diet at the beginning of the 1920s).

The Ketogenic diet was brought to the attention of the world once again at the beginning of the 1990s when Hollywood producer Jim Abrams found out about it and took his epileptic son to a center that offered the treatment. Seeing that the diet showed results, Jim Abrams decided that fund further research in the field and to open a center dedicated entirely to it.

Ever since then, the Keto diet has been out there and you may have actually heard of it – it’s just that you heard of it under different names and variations. Atkins, for example, is a diet that has been made popular due to the fact that many celebrities ranging from Jennifer Anniston to Angelina Jolie have been on it for a long while. Also, it is a diet that is mostly based on the principles of the Ketogenic diet.

The following chapter will explore the basic principles everyone on the Keto diet (or considering the Keto diet) should be familiar with. Further on, you will learn about the variations the Ketogenic diet has suffered in time and this will hopefully give you an insight on how the ideas behind this nutritional plan have changed over the course of the decade.

The Ketogenic Diet: Basic Things to Keep in Mind

The Ketogenic diet draws its name from the process called Ketosis. Basically, this process is that through which the body obtains its energy not from glucose, as it normally does, but from fragment of fats it gets to burn.

Your body does need energy, so the Ketogenic diet will help you make sure that you are provided with just enough energy to get you going. However, it will exclude from your menu a series of products that are turned into glucose when they reach your body. What not many people out there actually know is related to the fact that carbs are transformed into glucose once they reach your body. Thus, they will be excluded from your menus if you choose to go on the Ketogenic diet.

Of course, you will not give up completely on carbs, but you will get a much lower intake than the usual and the fats-carbs ratio will be higher for the first and lower for the latter. In most of the cases, you will have to keep your carbohydrate intake lower than 20-50 grams/day. You will have to have a 5% dietary intake based on carbs, a 20% dietary intake based on protein and the remaining 75% will have to be dedicated to fats coming from various sources (including nuts, but not limited to).

The reason you have to be moderate in your choice of protein intake is related to the idea that proteins affect blood sugar and insulin. It is believed that more than 50% of what exceeds the necessary intake of proteins will be transformed by your body into glucose – which, as it was already mentioned, is something to be avoided on the Ketogenic diet.

Even more than that, you should know that the exact number of proteins you are allowed to eat from each of the 3 groups varies according to gender, age, height and weight. If you want to find out these precise numbers, you can find many resources online that will automatically calculate your necessary intake on the Ketogenic diet.

Even more, you can calculate the approximate number of macronutrients you need as well. To do this, follow the next steps:

•Think of your necessary calorie intake/day. For adults on a diet, this should never go lower than 1500 calories/day.

•Your fat intake has to be of 75%, which means that 1050 of your daily calorie intake will go into fats. On average, 1 gram of fat contains 9 calories, which means that you will have to keep your fat intake somewhere at around 116 grams/day.

•Your protein intake has to be of 20%, which means that 300 calories go into proteins. On average, 1 gram of protein contains about 4 calories, which means that you will have to eat somewhere at around 75 grams of protein/day.

•Your carbohydrate intake has to be of 5%, which means that 150 calories will go into carbs. These macronutrients also contain about 4 calories/ gram, which means that you have to eat somewhere in between 35 and 40 grams of carbs/day.

As for the foods that you are allowed to eat on this diet, the list is quite generous, which is precisely what makes many people choose this particular diet plan instead of others. Generally speaking, what you have heard before to be “healthy” will go very well on the Keto diet as well.

Here are some foods you are allowed to eat and some of the things you should be careful with:

•Vegetables go a very long way, but stay away from the starchy ones since they contain high amounts of carbs.

•Sugars are completely forbidden. Instead, use sugar alternatives such as stevia for example.

•Dairy products are allowed too, but you should go as organic as possible and you should never choose the low-fat versions, but the high fat ones (as surprising as it may seem to anyone who has ever been on another diet before).

•Take your fats from healthy sources, such as avocadoes, coconut oil, olive oil, fish, macadamia nuts and all the foods that are generally labeled as containing “good fats”.

•Spices are more than welcomed, but do bear in mind the fact that they do contain carbs. Yet, pay attention to particular spices that contain a higher dose of carbs. Examples include onion powder, garlic powder, cinnamon, ginger, allspice and bay leaves.

•Fruits are not very good for this diet because they contain fructose, which in itself is a type of sugar.

•Peppers, as well as the products deriving from them contain sugar, so you may want to be careful with them. Be exceptionally careful with anything canned (including tomato-based products) because the companies making them will most likely add tons of sugar to the cans.

•You are allowed to have a diet soda every once in a while, but keep it at bay because it is generally not a very healthy choice.

The Ketogenic Diet and Its Variations

As you would normally expect with something that generated as much fuss as the Keto diet did for such a long time, there will be many theories and sub-theories on the initial one. Thus, there will be certain variations of Ketogenic diets that try to make the original one more efficient for all the purposes it is nowadays used for and more “user-friendly” in the sense that they are easier to stick to.

Put very shortly and leaving aside sub-variations, there are 3 main types of Ketogenic diets out there:

1.The Standard Ketogenic Diet (shortened as “SKD”)

2.The Targeted Ketogenic Diet (shortened as “TKD”)

3.The Cyclical Ketogenic Diet (shortened as “CKD”)

You should know a few basic things about each of these variations because it will help you understand better what can happen with your body once you get on the Ketogenic diet.

1.The Standard Ketogenic Diet

Put very simply, this is the most common type of Keto diet out there – the one you learned about in the previous chapter. This is the diet that keeps your carbs intake to the minimum (a maximum 50 grams of carbohydrates – which was already mentioned before). It is also the diet that forbids you from eating fruits and starchy vegetables, on the account of the fact that they either contain fructose (a type of glucose) or on the account of the fact that they contain carbohydrates (which, as also mentioned before can be transformed into actual sugars when they reach the body).

Ideally, there should be absolutely no carbohydrates in your diet, but that is impossible because it would get you bored very easily and it would not be sustainable on the long term. Even more, your body still needs carbs, but in a low intake and this is why the initial Standard Ketogenic Diet suggested people limiting their carb intake to 5% of the total macronutrients they intake in a day.

As for protein intake, it is worth repeating the fact that, as mentioned in the previous chapter, you will need to keep it within normal limits and that “normal” is pretty much defined by the way in which your body burns protein (how active your body is – which also depends on height, ages and so on).

The Standard Ketogenic Diet is usually recommended for people with low activity levels because they cannot burn the carbohydrate intake through their daily activities only. Thus, if you know that you cannot work out (due to various reasons), you will have to accept the fact that the Ketogenic diet in its Standard variation is your best shot and that you will have to give up on carbs almost completely.

2.The Targeted Ketogenic Diet

Since the Standard Ketogenic Diet used to be much too restrictive, several nutritionists started thinking of an alternative that would provide people with the same benefits as SKD would, but with less disadvantages. However, before you even proceed with reading about this version, you should know that TKD is normally recommended for people who do work out because it is based a lot on the idea that carbs can be easily and efficiently burnt through exercise.

If you understood the basics behind the Ketogenic Standard Diet, you will definitely understand the Targeted variation simply because it is the same thing with only one important difference: the carbs have to be consumed before working out (about 30-60 minutes before it). This allows the body to transform the carbs into glucose which will energize your body on the short term for the “incoming” effort you are about to make. Consequently, this will help you perform better during your exercises.

Generally speaking, there is no advice on the precise type of carbs you should eat before the workout. However, it is generally recommended that you eat high glycemic index foods, such as fruits, for example, because they will provide your body with plenty of energy to boost the performance during the workout without upsetting your stomach. Also, you should not worry about the Ketosis process because eating carbs before the workout will not affect it.

Furthermore, you should know that you should eat foods that are low in fat and high in protein after the workout as well. You should do this because your body needs to recover from the effort and because your muscles will do very well with the good protein portion you will offer them with after putting in the effort of sustaining you throughout the entire exercising routine.

3.The Cyclic Ketogenic Diet

The third variation of the Keto diet is quite similar to the second one as well. The main difference between the two is related to the fact that, instead of providing your body with an extra-dose of carbohydrates right before the workout, you will take a “break” from the Ketogenic diet one or two days every week and get a higher intake of carbohydrates then.

Those who sustain this particular sub-theory of the Ketogenic diet say that this is how you will refill your muscles with glycogen during the off-Keto period and that will improve your performance during your workouts.

Generally speaking, the cycles are one week long, but there are people out there who choose to follow cycles that are more than that in length (such as 10 days, for example). However, one week works well because it can fit into one’s work schedule and it is more convenient when it comes to counting down the days. So, the basic idea is this: you eat a Ketogenic diet for 5-6 days and then a higher-carb diet for the other 1-2 days.

How much of a carb intake will you need for this particular version? Typically, you will need to sustain your carb intake at 5% during the Ketogenic diet phase. But when you go off the Keto diet, you will have to increase that by 9 or 10 times, which makes for almost 45% or even 50% of carbs for your daily intake. In other words, if you normally eat 40 grams of carbohydrates/day on the Keto phase, you will need 400 grams of these macronutrients when you get your 1-2 days break.

This does sound like the ideal version and, for many people, it actually is. However, do bear in mind that it does not mean that you can diet for 5 days and then binge on unhealthy foods for the following 2 days. Actually, following the high-carb intake phase, you will have to make sure that your workouts are twice as difficult as they normally are. Thus, if you do 3 reps of heavy weight lift training on Friday, you will have to do 6 of them on Monday, after the last day of high carb intake.

How hard you need to work out following the second CKD phase depends on a series of factors, but the most important ones are the type of workout you are doing (and how intense it is), as well as on your particular body and how it burns the carbs in general.

The Atkins diet has been mentioned before here and it is definitely one of the most famous “nephews” of the original Ketogenic diet. However, it is based on something quite similar. Yes, it promotes eating of fats and proteins and a high level restriction of carbs, but the way in which it is supposed to help people is by simply reducing the number of calories.

Atkins allows you to eat as much fat and as much protein as you want – but limits your carbs, which consequently leads to limiting your calories (or at least this is so according to the nutritionists sustaining it). However, this theory has been faced with criticism due to the fact that people are enabled to eat very high amounts of fats and proteins which may damage their bodies from other points of view.

The Ketogenic diet can indeed help you lose weight and this is true. But, same as with the Atkins diet and with any other diet in the world, it will need you to actually lower the calorie intake so that you create a deficit. What it does differently than other diets, however, is not only helping your body shed weight, but shed weight the right, healthy and long-lasting way.

The following chapter will explore the way in which the Keto diet can help you lose weight. If that is your main goal with this diet plan, the read carefully and follow what is written throughout the rest of the book here.

How the Ketogenic Diet Helps with Weight Loss

Weight loss should never be about your looks only and it should never be an obsessive thing that wastes your life over. Weight loss should be about regaining health and energy and not about losing it. Ultimately, weight loss is not a matter of fashion or of fitting into a smaller pair of jeans, but about making your body function properly again. These are things you just have to understand before enrolling in any kind of weight loss program out there and things that will have to dominate your thinking when you start out on a diet.

Even more, you should understand that no diet in the world and no weight loss product in the world will ever be able to make you lose weight without you putting in some effort. The effort can come in many ways and it can take many shapes – but at the end of the day, it will still be effort. There is no such thing as a magic potion, a magic pill or a magic program you can take or follow that will simply make extra pounds disappear.

Another thing you have to understand about weight loss is related to the fact that, if you want its effects to last, it will have to be a thorough and long-term process. Sticking to an ultra-fashionable and promising diet for 10 days and then going back to your old lifestyle and eating habits will do you no good – even though it will feel like it. As a matter of fact, this is where most of the people make mistakes when it comes to losing weight: they want it all and they want it “now”.

That’s not the way things work. Your body does not grow up in 10 days and you haven’t even put on all the extra weight in 10 days. Most likely, the body you own nowadays is the result of a longer period of time in which you made poor dietary and lifestyle choices. That means that you cannot simply wake up one day and “switch” a button and get a healthy, fit body.

Even more than that, you should understand the fact that any kind of diet that makes you lose weight fast will make you put it back even faster. That is so because your body works as a perfect mechanism. When you starve and when your body lacks the right nutrients and the number of calories it needs in order to get you through the day, it will start actually eating out of itself (and bear in mind: this means it will “eat” both fat and muscles as well). At a certain point, after a longer period of not providing it with the necessary calories, it will slow down its metabolic rate because it will “think” you are going through a famine (thousands and thousands of years have “taught” our bodies that they should preserve themselves under such circumstances).

The moment you start eating “normally” again, your body will start rebuilding its fat storage until it brings it back to what it used to be – your initial weight before you started off on the diet itself. Moreover, you will tend to put on even more pounds than you initially had – and this is known as the “yo-yo” effect in the world of dieting and weight loss.

Eventually, if you crash diet on multiple occasions, you will need to lower the calories to impossible numbers because your body will not react to your “usual” diet any longer. That also means that you risk developing very serious eating disorders such as anorexia (refusing to eat anything) and bulimia (purging everything you eat). These eating disorders can lead to very, very serious health issues and they can even cause death (there are a lot of such cases out there and if you are not yet convinced of the fact that this is not the right path to walk on with your weight loss, then document yourself and you will definitely want to avoid it once you learn of the severe anorexia and bulimia cases out there).

With that being said, how many calories should you actually eat?

This question is difficult to answer straight up. It depends. It depends on your weight, on your height, on where you want to go, on when you reach your goal, on your general metabolism and on many other factors. But you can calculate it.

Put shortly, to lose 1 pound of fat, you will need to waste 3500 calories. If you want to lose 2 pounds of fat/week (which is unlikely to keep going the same way over the course of the entire diet), you will have to lose 1000 calories out of your daily intake. You can work out the equivalent of 600 burnt calories, for example and then reduce the necessary calorie intake by 400.

To calculate the necessary calorie intake for maintaining your current weight (this is where you will have to subtract the given 400-calorie example), you should follow a process that goes like this:

1.First, calculate your BMR – Basal Metabolic Rate (the rate at which your body burns calories in its natural state). The formula for this is different in the case of men than in the case of women:

•Men: BMR = 88.362 + (13.397 x weight in kg) + (4.799 x height in cm) - (5.677 x age in years)

•Women: BMR = 447.593 + (9.247 x weight in kg) + (3.098 x height in cm) - (4.330 x age in years)

2.Calculate your necessary calorie intake by using the following formulae, according to that which applies to your particular case right now:

•Almost no exercise at all (or none at all whatsoever): BMR X 1.2

•Exercising 1-3 days/week: 1.375

•Exercising 3-5 days/week: 1.55

•Exercising 6-7 days/week: 1.725

•Very heavy exercise, 2 times/day, 7 days/week: 1.9

So, going back to the Ketogenic diet, how does it really help with weight loss?

In its very essence, the Keto diet was not created as a weight loss program, and this was shown throughout the very first chapter of this book. However, if you lower the number of calories to a minimum allowed and if you follow any of the 3 versions of the Ketogenic diet, you will bring your body to a state where it is healthy and where it will find its right weight.

Why the Ketogenic diet and not just any kind of diet that lowers calories, then? Here are some of the reasons this low-carb diet will work better than any other programs:

1.You are allowed to eat proteins and fats (!), which consequently means that you will not feel hunger any longer. What many of the other diets out there advise is reducing the amount of fats (and even the amount of proteins in some of the cases), which is neither great for your palates, nor excellent for your body either because, believe it or not, your body does need those macronutrients to function properly. Even more than that, proteins keep your stomach full because they will give it some “working out” to do, which consequently means that you will not feel like jumping on the first double-cheeseburger that comes in your way from work to home.

2.You will lose fat. Not muscles. Not bones. Not your brain’s ability to function better. You will actually use that annoying flab circling your body and your life. And even more than that, you will lose more fat from the abdominal area, which is both the most difficult part of the body from which one can lose weight and the unhealthiest one, since high fat percentage around the waistline is associated with heart diseases and diabetes.

3.Many people live under the impression that carbohydrates fill them up better, but that is not necessarily true. Yes, they do. But they are also digested much faster, which consequently means that you will get hungry faster (which is the opposite of a low-carb diet such as the Keto one).

4.The Ketogenic weight loss program is sustainable on the long term. You are allowed to eat fats, proteins, you don’t have to always think of low-fat products that are usually tasteless and, every once in a while, you are allowed a small carb intake as well. Even more, if you go for the Cyclic variant of the Standard Ketogenic Diet, you will get 2 full days in which you can have your favorite carbs. Yes, you will have to work hard for them, but then again the results will be noticeable as well.

5.You are encouraged to work out. If you like carbs, then you will want them and the Ketogenic diet allows you to eat them as well – but you will have to exercise in exchange. This means that this is not a diet that simply promises you to lose weight (no matter what kind of weight), but a diet that promises you to get you a lean body simply because you will be obliged by its principles to work out regularly.

6.Speaking of losing any kind of weight, this usually comes with a downfall: you can be 100 pounds, but your body will still not be completely toned up. Losing fat, on the other hand and working out at the same time may not show up great on the scales, but it will show great on your body.

7.The Ketogenic diet will not make you grow obsessed over the scales. When you lose, for instance, 5 pounds of fat and put on 2 pounds of muscles, your scales will show that you lost 3 pounds only – but that is not realistic because your body will look and feel much better than that.

8.Last, but not least, the Ketogenic diet is healthy for your entire body. It helps your brain function well, it helps your body and it helps your mood. Since the Ketogenic diet promotes eating healthy fats, it will also help your skin and your hair look better, it will allow your concentration power to increase and there will be a long, long list of other benefits that derive from all these.

Can the Ketogenic Diet Be Bad for You?

Nutrition is still not give with enough attention in the world and that is one of the worst things that can happen to humanity and its general state of health. Nutrition is not something to be taken jokingly and it is not something to discard. It is absolutely essential for living right – and for living healthy.

The Ketogenic diet is tightly connected to nutrition. Thus, it is not to be taken jokingly either. Even more, do bear in mind that it wasn’t even developed as holistic type of treatment of any kind and that it is not just a weight loss fad – but an actual health management technique that is still applied in the case of those who suffer from epilepsy (particularly children, as it was already mentioned too).

Yes, you should definitely know the fact that the Ketogenic diet can have disadvantages and downfalls as well and that there may even be certain circumstances in which it should be contraindicated. This chapter is dedicated to those things you have to know before embarking on this journey and to making sure that your health will be safe and that you know what to expect from the very first months of going Keto.

Here are some of the most important things you should know about the contraindications and about the potential adverse effects of this diet:

1.If you suffer from certain medical conditions, you should avoid the Ketogenic diet. Here are some of the most important such medical conditions:

•Improper liver function

•Improper digestion of fats

•Pancreatitis

•Gastric bypass surgery

•Kidney failure

•Abdominal tumors

•Porphyria

•Beta-oxidation defects

•Primary carnitine deficiency

•A low gastrointestinal motility (sometimes associated with cancer treatment)

2.You should bear in mind the fact that the Ketogenic diet alters your metabolism and that any kind of disease or medical condition associated with it may prevent you from going “Keto”. Pryuvate dehydrogenase (E1) deficiency is just one of these conditions where the Ketogenic diet will be completely contraindicated.

3.Please do keep in mind that the above-mentioned medical conditions are just some of those that may not react well with a low-carb, high fat diet such as the Ketogenic diet. The very best way to go around this is to consult with your physician since he/she will be familiar with your medical history and he/she will also be able to run tests (or to have you run tests) that may show certain deficiencies or nutritional imbalances in whose case it is not recommended to follow the Keto nutritional plan.

4.There is also a list of potential adverse effects that are associated especially with the first period of your going on this diet. Although in most of the cases they will not be extremely serious, it is worth taking them into consideration before you start out on this diet because this way you will know what to expect. Here they are:

•You will urinate more frequently, especially in the first few days following your start on this diet.

•As a result of the frequent urination, you may start feeling a bit dizzy. However, this can be counter-balanced if you increase your salt intake by a bit and if you eat at least two cups of dark green vegetables/day (because these veggies are very high in potassium, one of the things you will start losing if you urinate more frequently than your body is used to).

•Constipation may appear as well and it is also a result of dehydration. You should decrease your calcium and dairy intake and balance it out with the magnesium one, since this is what this kind of constipation ultimately comes down to.

•Reactive hypoglycemia is another side effect quite common and it is related to the fact that you will drop the sugar in your blood quite suddenly (as a result of the fact that you will stop eating carbs). However, this is something that regulates in time and although it may feel scary, you should try to focus. You may experience weakness and shakiness as a result of the hypoglycemia, but the first thing you should do is not bring any sugar back into your body, but increase your protein intake by a bit. Also, you can try mixing ¼ teaspoon salt with a glass of water and drinking it, since this is likely to restore your normal state.

•Sugar and carbohydrate cravings will also naturally appear, especially in the first 10 days of your diet. However, you should stick to the diet because once the first days are gone, your cravings will significantly lower and you will be able to go on with the new dietary plan. If you really cannot take it anymore, eat something that contains a sugar replacement of some sort (stevia, for instance), but make sure it’s something small and low-caloric (such as a tea sweetened with such a replacement for example).

•Sleep issues may appear as well and in most of the cases they are connected to a drop in the level of insulin and serotonin. Out of the 30-50 grams of carbs you eat in one day, spare some for the meal you take right before you go to bed and combine it with some proteins as well. This will increase your serotonin levels, it will calm out your body and it will make you fall asleep easier.

•If you get dehydrated and you lose magnesium, then you may experience muscle cramps as well. They can be defeated by adding a bit of extra magnesium to your daily intake by taking slow-releasing magnesium pills 3 times/day for 20 days and then 1 time/day for the rest of the days. However, do consult with your doctor on this before you do anything!

•Diarrhea can be quite commonly encountered as well and it is connected to one major mistake people on low-carb diets make: limiting their fat intake as well. This consequently leads to a high protein intake and this can make your entire digestive system jump out of its “socket”. Don’t limit your fat intake but to the 75% recommended in the beginning of this book and you should be fine from this point of view.

5.It was also mentioned before, but if you have any kind of kidney condition, avoid the Ketogenic diet because it usually involves eating more salt to counter-balance the other effects and because it can lead to the formation of calcium-based kidney stones. If you are healthy though, you can counter-balance this potential side effect by eating foods high in fat and low in carb at the same time (avocadoes, chicken, low-fat yogurt, and so on).

6.This should be emphasized once more: consult with your doctor for any kind of diet you start out on because you can never know how the alterations it will make in your body will actually interact with particular conditions you may suffer from. Everybody’s body is different and that’s something you just have to accept if you want to stay health.

The Other Things You Should Definitely Know about the Ketogenic Diet

You don’t have to feel scared of the potential side effects mentioned in the previous chapter. As long as you keep yourself balanced (both in what you eat and in your general lifestyle), you should be more than just fine.

You should actually start seeing beneficial results of the Ketogenic diet. Other than weight loss and improvement of the epileptic syndrome conditions, are there any other benefits though?

Yes. Most certainly. Here are just some of them:

1.It lowers the blood pressure. Studies have shown that reducing the carbohydrate daily intake can actually lead to lowering the blood pressure as well.

2.It can lower the cholesterol levels in your blood. It may seem like a paradox to believe that a diet high in fats lowers the cholesterol, but the truth is that in most of the cases high cholesterol is more related to high carb intake, rather than fat intake. Even more, the Ketogenic diet does not necessarily promote the use of just any kind of fats, but of those that are healthy. That means that fast food products and other bad-fat products are still a no-no even on a high fat diet (not to mention that they usually have incredible amounts of sugar in them even when they are “spicy” or “salty”).

3.Triglycerides can also drop as a result of going on the Ketogenic diet. They are also related to high carb/sugar intake (especially high fructose intake), so once you go low on these, you will be able to see the difference in the triglyceride levels as well.

4.When you were little, your grandmother probably advised you on eating something sweet when you want to have more energy. Yes, that is true. But what she did not know very well is related to the fact that sweets only give short-term energy. This is why energy drinks will only have effect right after drinking them. This is why eating a whole chocolate won’t keep you awake for the entire night. This is why even if you do eat some candy before working out, you will still not be energy-packed.

On the other hand though, eating fats and proteins gives you long-term energy. You may not even realize that you are low-energy right now, but once you will go on the Ketogenic diet and you will start feeling its results, you will realize what feeling truly energetic means.

5.Your brain will actually function better and this is no joke. Because you increase the levels of good fats (some of which are rich in omega-3 and other essential oils), your brain will be better fueled. Thus, you will think straighter. Of course, you may feel dizzy during the first few days, but once that disappears, you will discover your ultra-power of thinking, concentration and memorizing. Thus, “I have to study” is absolutely no excuse for not choosing to go on the Ketogenic diet.

6.Your sleep patterns will change – for the better. Yes, you may experience issues in your sleeping at first, but if you manage to stat strong and get through this period, you will see that you will sleep better.

7.Better teeth. The fact that sugars damage your teeth should be more than just well-known. Well, the Ketogenic diet will decrease your sugar intake and thus your teeth and gums will start feeling a lot better and you will be able to maintain them with more ease.

8.You will have a better mood. Remember the healthy fats this book has been talking about ever since the beginning? Yes, they will be responsible with enhancing your mood. Therefore, not even the “I feel depressed” excuse will be able to work in the case of this diet. You will not even feel the need to eat comfort food (mainly based on carbs in most of the cases) because your body will regulate itself properly.

There are many ideas going on out there when it comes to low-carb diets in general. Some of them are plainly ridiculous, others are based on mere misunderstandings of the entire concept behind the Ketogenic diet (and behind other low-carb diets as well). Here are some of the myths that should be dispelled from your mind before you start out on the Keto diet:

1.Low-carb diets (including this one) are not sustainable. This is half-true because yes, a diet that excludes carbs out of it almost completely is not sustainable on the long term in most of the cases. This is why the Cyclic and the Targeted versions of the Ketogenic diet work better in most of the cases: they offer you with enough carbs to get you through your cravings and through your body’s needs.

2.They cause kidney damage. In general, yes, they can cause kidney damage, but this has to be somewhat related to a previous condition as well. This is why (and it is emphasized – again) you should be looking for your doctor’s advice first.

3.You are not allowed caffeine because it increases the insulin levels, which consequently disrupts the Ketosis process. This is another unfounded belief and, in fact, caffeine can raise the insulin levels under the Ketogenic diet only as a secondary action and only rarely. However, don’t take your coffee with sugar because sugars are not allowed on the Keto diet whatsoever.

4.Alcohol is forbidden. Actually, this is not a myth, but a fact. It should be forbidden for multiple reasons: it contains carbs, sugars, it makes you take in more calories than you even imagine and, ultimately, it interacts with the Ketosis process and it can lead to intoxication.

5.You should not be drinking too much water. You really need to keep your body hydrated so please don’t believe in this myth. Although huge amounts of water are not recommended (because they dilute the Ketones), that does not mean that you should hydrate yourself by the spoonful.

In general, as long as you keep your entire view on this diet as balanced as possible and as long as you inform yourself properly before believing anything that comes along, you will reap all the benefits this amazing nutritional plan has for you. So keep your eyes open, keep your ears open and learn as much as you can because there is no such thing as “too much learning”

Conclusion

Thank you again for downloading this book!

I hope this book was able to help you to understand what the Ketogenic diet really is, what its benefits are and how you can reap them the best way possible.

The next step is to change your life and your entire health status.

Before you close down this book, you will have to keep in mind certain things though. These are more of a recap of all that was written in this book and they are extremely important if you really want to reap the benefits of the much discussed Ketogenic diet.

1.Never, ever go on any kind of diet (Atkins, Keto, paleo or any other type of diet out there) without consulting with your doctor first. This is of the utmost importance because nutrition is very much related to health and to various medical conditions and you don’t want any worsening of your condition to come along with your wish to actually get healthier.

2.The Ketogenic diet is not a fad diet. It has been out there for one century, in one form or another. Of course, it has been improved over time, but all in all, it is not something new or fashionable.

3.The Ketogenic diet is not unbalanced. On the contrary. If you work out regularly, you can balance your diet perfectly and still reap the benefits the process known as Ketosis has to offer to your body.

4.You may not feel excellent in the first few days – but then again, that is something that goes the same way with other diets too. Stick to your original plan and, if you feel bad, visit your doctor and see if he/she can prescribe you something to balance out the mineral loss or to help you get used with your new diet.

5.Exercise! No diet out there will ever be able to offer you with that gorgeous, toned up body if you don’t exercise. Even more, if you exercise while on the Ketogenic diet, you will be able to get better muscles and less cravings for carbs because you will be allowed to eat more of them.

6.Be optimistic. You really need to start out on the right foot because otherwise, your mind state will interfere with your ability to stick to your diet. Great things happen to positive people – keep that in mind with everything you do!

Finally, if you enjoyed this book, please take the time to share your thoughts and post a review on Amazon. It’d be greatly appreciated!

Thank You

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Thanks a million for reading this book all the way to very end!

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Table of Contents

- Title Page
- Bonus: Download my Free E-book
- Copyright © 2014
- Disclaimer
- Table of Contents
- Introduction
- The Origins of the Ketogenic Diet

- The Ketogenic Diet: Basic Things to Keep in Mind

- The Ketogenic Diet and Its Variations

- How the Ketogenic Diet Helps with Weight Loss

- Can the Ketogenic Diet Be Bad for You?

- The Other Things You Should Definitely Know about the Ketogenic Diet

- Conclusion

- Thank You