If that is the question then I hope this post will help you choose what is better for your health.
Firstly: The Keto diet is a low-carb, high-fat diet that aims to push your body into the state of ketosis by limiting the amount of carbohydrates in your nutrition to under 5%. This means that out of all the macronutrients ( carbohydrates, proteins and fats ) and micronutrients you should eat, carbohydrates have to be under 5% of the total. Fruits and vegetables are carbohydrates so they are basically excluded and the idea behind this is that your body will start burning fat as fuel instead of carbohydrates.
In medicine, it is used to control unmanageable epilepsy in children.
Now here is what you usually don’t hear: Ketosis is a form of acidosis and can, if sustained over a long period of time, reduce the bodyʼs ability to manage the acidity of the blood; in extreme cases, it can result in blood poisoning!
If the high acidity in the blood and the exclusion of fruits and vegetables didn’t convince you that the Keto diet is bad for your health, here are some more reasons: if your Personal Trainer or Health Coach is encouraging you to do a Keto diet, they are in direct breach of the European Register of Exercise Professionals code of Ethics and Conduct, as this clearly states “Pts should avoid giving advice which calls for the omission of food groups”. It also demonstrates that they know nothing about basic human nutrition requirements and/or they donʼt care about your overall health and long-term well-being.
Carbohydrates are the primary source of energy for the human body and are perhaps the most important nutrients in our diet as they need to account for 50% of our nutrition. Blood glucose, which is a partially digested form of carbohydrates, is the only source of energy the brain and central nervous system can use, except during prolonged starvation. “In starvation, ketone bodies generated by the liver partly replace glucose as fuel for the brain” – Biochemistry, 5th edition by Jeremy M Berg, John L Tymoczko, and Lubert Stryer.
When blood glucose levels are too low, tasks requiring concentration and moderate to complex motor skills become increasingly more difficult and this is just the tip of the iceberg. Like all low-carb diets ( Atkins or Dukan – Keto is not an original diet and now it is being reinvented and called The Carnivor Diet ), most of the initial weight loss is based on glycogen depletion and water loss, which explains why weight loss on the scale is rapid in the early stages and people think itʼs working.
Carbohydrates are also important for muscle building alongside proteins and when they are removed from the diet, the body will turn to muscle tissue and use it to generate energy. This simply means your body starts eating itʼs own muscles to get energy, so you might lose weight on the scale but a lot of that is loss of muscle mass.
Due to the excessive consumption of animal products and fats, you significantly increase the risk of kidney stone formation.
The “keto breath” is another common issue and it indicates the body is trying to avoid blood poisoning by exhaling ketones. This diet is also deficient in fibre and promotes dehydration which can increase the potential for constipation and other digestive tract issues. It is soooo deficient in many vitamins and minerals, especially antioxidants and phytochemicals that are found in greens and fruits – so your skin will be affected too.
And last but definitely not least because lots of people experience this: hormonal imbalance which can translate into being angry, irritated, confused, and not think straight plus the reproductive system will suffer – women lose their menstruation and men get erectile dysfunction in as little as 1 month on the diet.
High cholesterol and high triglycerides, constipation, being tired and lethargic, not being able to think properly, short term memory loss, vitamins and minerals deficiency, loss of muscle mass, feeling and looking older, risk of heart disease, risk of kidney stones formation, bad breath, infertility, loss of menstruation and erectile dysfunction – these are the real risks of the Keto diet.
But no one is telling you about the stinky breath, feeling like you are on 5% battery all the time, risk of heart disease or not being able to have an erection are they? They are just showing you the before and after photos so you buy the book, the meal plan, the program, the supplement or whatever they are selling. And to make it worse, a lot of them have no certification that can allow them to sell a meal plan for example.
The keto diet is actually based on the older Atkins diet and like any restrictive diet they all have some success but that is short term and there are a lot of downsides and health risks that people who love the keto diet never talk about. So it might help in the beginning but you always gain the weight back plus new health problems.
Add to everything the sustainability, environamental and ethical factors and you have yourself a huge NO-NO: the planet is suffering because of the pollution and the “meat production is one of the leading causes of greenhouse gas emissions and other particulate matter pollution in the atmosphere.[] Furthermore, elevated greenhouse gas emissions have been associated with respiratory diseases like asthma, bronchitis, and COPD, as well as increased chances of acquiring pneumonia from bacterial infections” – Wikipedia.org .
Plus the increasing demand for excessive amounts of cheap meat and animal products encouraged the food industry to rear these animals with a cruelty that is beyond the worst nightmare – we just like to remain in the dark and believe that the cute happy cow on the milk bottle or the playfull chicken on the egg carton are real and they have nice lives, free to roam in the sun and see the green grass. But the reality is a systemised cruelty that has become possible when humans decided to believe the lies in advertising.
So to answer the initial question is no because the Keto diet is dangerous and I will not endorse it. I can help you with your weight loss and understanding of nutrition but keto is not the answer! Neither is the new Carnivore Diet, which is just Atkins/ Dukan/ Keto remixed.
I wish you good health!
Ada Florea
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