The Effects of A Keto Diet
Learn about the effects of doing a keto diet.
The Keto Diet is the one that consists of a low carb, high fat diet that offers a bunch of health benefits. But, how can that affect your body in a positive or negative way? Let’s go into depth about that!
Many people begin a Keto Diet because they want to loose weight, or even maintain a healthy body. The Keto Diet is overall, not a bad diet. However, experts do say that it can detrimental to your body.
The first effect that your body will go through is The “Keto Flu”.
Reports have shown that people feel sick, during the first few days of starting their Keto Diet. This is due to the fact that your body runs out of sugar (to burn for energy), so now it has to start using fat. The change will effect most people’s body’s negatively for the first few days, but after that your body will circulate better so, as a result it will get used to it.
2. Diarrhea!
This effect is probably the worst one out there. Why does your body go through diarrhea when starting keto? Since your body is already running out of sugar (which your body was used to burn for energy before) it has to use fat. But now, the organ that breaks down the fat in your body (Gallbladder) is having trouble functioning. Diarrhea is also caused by fact that now your body is sensing a lack of fiber that comes with the keto diet.
3. Reduced Athletic Performance
“In 2018 a study in the Journal of Sports Medicine and Physical Fitness, Wiess and his colleagues found out that the participants performed worse on high-intensity cycling and running tasks after four days on a ketogenic diet, compared to those who’d spend four days on a high-carb diet.” – Health.com
This study shows that the Keto diet does exhaust you and your body. Your physical health and endurance is essential when choosing whether or not to do a Keto lifestyle.
4. Weight Regain
If you haven’t already concluded, the Keto Diet is heavily restricted one. It’s so restricted, that health experts have pointed out that “It’s not appropriate plan to follow for long-term.” In this case, this diet is best to follow for 30 to 90 days because Keto is not a sustainable diet. After that period you time, you can follow up with a similar Keto type of diet, and make a sustainable version out of it. The problem is, many people eventually do regain the weight that they had lost (due to intake of carbs again). These types of things can have a higher chance of turning into something worse, especially when you have just lost a lot of weight, and you suddenly gain it back (ex. eating disorders, and beginning to develop a unhealthy relationship with food.)
5. Less Muscle Mass and Decreased Metabolism
Throughout your weight loss journey by doing the Keto Diet, you may actually be losing some muscle mass. (This is quite similar to what happened to those four contestants in the study that was mentioned earlier.) Due to the loss of your muscle mass, since your muscles burn more calories than fat, this will also effect your metabolism. As I talked about before, many people tend to regain the weight that they had lost during this process. Now that your back to your starting weight, you no longer have the muscle mass to burn the calories that you had before.
Notice how everything seems to be going in a chain movement. It’s like if you gain weight from Keto, then you will struggle losing it because you lost muscle mass (from the weight loss) and now your metabolism is slower too. That’s just the reality of how a Keto Diet works! Everything works in a chain connection.
In conclusion, this article states how a Keto diet can change your life (depending on if it effects you in a positive or negative way). The Keto diet has many limiting factors, which is why many people chose not to do it. But, for others this is a miracle for them and they are happy with their choices.
Related Stories:
- https://www.uchicagomedicine.org/forefront/health-and-wellness-articles/ketogenic-diet-what-are-the-risks
- https://www.health.com/weight-loss/keto-diet-side-effects
- https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/should-you-try-the-keto-diet
- https://www.healthline.com/health-news/worst-side-effects-of-the-keto-diet
- https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/dangers-of-keto-diet#2.-May-stress-your-kidneys
Take Action:
- Learn about the Keto Diet more in depth (using the related stories links).
- Ask your guardians or health care providers if this diet could be suitable for you.
- Research about the Keto Diet more in detail!
