Does the Ketogenic diet work?
Have you ever wished you knew the secret to dieting? I like to think of diets like high school cliques. There’s the vegan clique, the Whole30 clique, the Paleo clique, the low-fat clique, the ketogenic clique, the Atkins clique, and so many more. They all have their own devoted followers but they rotate in popularity. Today, one of the most popular “cliques” is the Ketogenic diet. But why is it so popular? And is it the secret to weight loss? Let’s dive a little deeper and take a look at this popular diet.
The Ketogenic diet emphasizes on eating high fat foods while restricting carbohydrate intake. On this diet, you can eat whenever you want and however much you want, as long as you stick to the required macronutrient ratio. In fact, if you want to follow this diet exactly, only 5% of your calories should come from carbohydrates, 70% should come from fat, and the other 25% should come from protein. This means followers of the ketogenic diet eat a lot of butter, meat, cheese, high fat salad dressings, cream cheese, eggs, nuts, and oils, while cutting out bread, rice, pasta, some fruits and starchy vegetables, and other sources of carbohydrates.
At this point, you may be thinking “wow this diet allows you to eat a lot of fat while losing fat!? Sign me up!” But wait a second; before you start filling your grocery cart with cream cheese and meat, consider a few things. First, this diet is incredibly hard to stick to because it is so restrictive. To actually get the body into ketosis, you have to be really conscious of how many grams of carbohydrates you consume. The recommendation is 20-50 grams depending on your body- to put that into perspective, one medium apple is 25 grams of carbohydrates. Second, though this diet has helped many people lose weight fast, when people are no longer in ketosis, the pounds just come right back on or their weight loss stops in its tracks. Third, long-term effects of the ketogenic diet are unknown, probably because it is so hard for people to stick with for longer than a few months. Fourth, some people experience some not-so-fun side effects on this diet, such as lethargy, bad breath, nausea, constipation, and sleep problems.
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