Diet 2020 Wk 1 - week ending 05.JAN.2020

Last week went quite well - I stuck to my standard meal plan on Mon and Wed, and did a semi-fast on Tue and Thu. Then I got started with my 'keto' diet from Friday onwards - sticking to around 5%-6% cals from carbs out of a total daily calorie intake of around 1200 cals, mostly by increasing my protein consumption to around 150-175g/day. I also did more than 10K steps/day on the weekdays, and managed to do about 7K steps/day (plus some swimming) on the weekend. My average daily cals for the week was the lowest its been for the past 18 weeks, which helped shed the extra kilos I'd put on during the Christmas break. My average morning weight over the past four days has been 93.0 kg, so I'm happy to be back on track and making good progress with my new 'keto' regime. According to my scales my body fat over the past week has averaged 17%, so I seem to be making progress with shedding fat without losing too much lean mass.

I won't bother doing a daily 'keto' post from now on, as the novelty has worn off already. I'll keep track of my morning ketone levels just so I have some data to compare to the breathalyzer readings (when it arrives), but its been 1.5-4.0 mmol/L for the past  three days and I'll stay in ketosis as long as I'm only consuming about 10 g/day of carbs with my current meal plan. Yesterday afternoon I did notice feeling a bit tired and low energy in the afternoon ('keto flu') and felt a bit light headed (probably due to my BP now being around 100/60) so I'll make an appointment with my GP this week to check if I should lower the dosage of my blood pressure medication. I've enjoyed the lack of hunger while doing 'keto', and I enjoy eating lots of ham, grilled fillet steak and chicken breast, and a few poached eggs. Not too keen on only having broccoli, cauliflower, and green beans with my dinner though. And having eggs and ham for breakfast still seems a bit weird (and takes longer to prepare than porridge or cereal). I tried having some frozen strawberries and avocado for breakfast this morning, but found that I don't really like avocado and the defrosted frozen strawberries were unappetizing. I think I'll just stick with having some ham for breakfast (and maybe a low carb chocolate flavoured protein shake) on the weekdays.

This week's goals are to stick to my high protein 'keto' diet plan (some 'keto' articles suggest that having too much protein can kick you out of ketosis via the conversion of protein to glucose, but other research papers have suggested that protein>glucose production is limited to meet the body's basic requirement for about 120 g of glucose/day, and excess protein intake is NOT converted into glucose. The fact that I've had no trouble getting into ketosis while having about 170 g/day of protein indicates that a high protein 'keto' diet is indeed possible) and to do all three planned gym workouts (Mon/Wed/Fri) this week, as there are no more public holidays (when the gym is closed). I also need to make sure I do my daily walking and 5BX, and will also try to swim some laps every evening.

I'm visiting my parents next weekend and mum will be cooking some non-keto meals, so although I'll keep track of what I eat (and try to not overeat too much) I won't bother trying to stick to a 'keto' diet next weekend.

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