The Keto Flu
One of the reasons why you may not have started the keto diet or why maybe some of your friends are afraid to start it is because they’ve heard of the keto flu.
Now the common misconception is that with the keto flu you’re going to completely just feel like you have the flu. You’re going to feel lethargic. You’re going to feel sick. You’re going to be vomiting. Having the keto flu does not quite work that way. I think some of its psychosomatic.
The reality is you that it makes you feel a little bit rundown, fatigued, you’ll have a headache, you’ll feel kind of like how you would feel if you didn’t replenish your electrolytes after a long workout or a long hard outdoor workout in the sun.
The truth is… that’s exactly what’s happening.
Water Weight on Keto
When you start a ketogenic diet you’ll find that you lose 3, 4, 5 pounds right away. This is simply because you are initially losing water weight, but don’t worry that’s just initial water weight. The rest of it is fat that you’re truly losing.
What ends up happening is for every 1 gram of carbohydrate that you normally are storing you hold over 3-grams of water.
Normally when you’re consuming carbs you’re holding a bunch of water. By switching to the keto diet, all of a sudden you get rid of the carbs and you start losing all that water.
Lack of Electrolytes on the Keto Diet
Well along with that water goes electrolytes, and your electrolytes are totally out of whack.
This makes your body get out of balance and what ends up happening is that the body doesn’t know what to do. It thinks that your sodium levels, your potassium levels, and your magnesium levels are completely out of whack.
It’s very important that you add electrolytes back into your body. This will make it easier to deal with the symptoms of the keto flu.
Feel Bad? Keep Eating Fats
Another thing to combat the keto flu symptoms to make sure you keep your fats high enough so that you’re producing ketones and you’re not feeling that gray area.
What is the Gray Area of Keto?
If you don’t keep your fats high enough you could fall into what I like to call the gray area of keto. That’s going to make you feel like you have flu-like symptoms going on, but it’s just not the case.
So, keep the fats high and keep the electrolytes high.
Add Pink Salt to Your Water
Add sodium to your water. Yes, you are reading this right. You’re going to think that you’re absolutely losing your mind because you’re going to add salt to your water. I literally mean go get some good quality sea salt or pink Himalayan salt, not table salt, and add it to your water as you drink it throughout the day.
I promise you it makes sense and don’t worry about the blood pressure situation, studies have shown that it’s sugar that has a stronger link with blood pressure over salt, so add good quality salt to your water and you’ll feel a lot better.
Keto Pro Tip: Drop a bouillon cube into boiling water and drink. This should also help alleviate the symptoms.
Recap
The keto flu is not fun, but you may be causing it to yourself. Stay out of the gray area, load up with good fats, drink lots of electrolytes, and you should be on your way without feeling the effects of the keto flu.
As always let us know if you have any questions.
