A significant number of people who start out on a ketogenic diet fall short along the way. Failing to follow through with a diet or fitness regime, or just about anything that you decide to do, but that requires self-discipline is not alien (recall those New Year resolutions?). If you think that you will just start to eat a different variety of food and all will be well, you will quickly realize that It is not easy. It requires self-discipline and patience to see it through.
Let us explore the reasons why you are finding it harder to keep up with than you anticipated:
1. You are not making your keto food delicious
We associate the word “diet” with drab, tasteless food. Just because you are on a diet doesn’t mean that your food must feel like you are chewing on bits of rubber each time you eat. You probably love the high-carb foods you used to eat because you know how to prepare them well – they are finger-licking good and you looked forward to meals.
If you are going to abandon your trusty, unhealthy recipes for good, you would be lying to yourself if you think you are going to survive on a diet that makes you dread the whole concept of food. Especially when the tasty meal is within touching distance.
Sheer will can only take you so far, but it is human nature to go for something pleasant over something that isn’t. We are wired that way and the only way to short circuit your brain is to make your new diet as pleasant if not better. With a bit of research, you can find amazing recipes that will make you want to cheat on your high-carb diet with the new, sexier ketogenic diet.
2. You encounter keto flu
People don’t talk about it enough, but your body will inevitably feel different as you adjust your diet. When you go to the gym for the very first time in your life, your body will ache. But you will accept that because it is common knowledge – you have already read about it or heard about it.
What about keto flu? Did you learn about it as you researched this new, exotic-sounding diet? Probably not. Because where you read about it, all they gave you were the instructions on how you should shed the carbs, embrace the fats, and, of course, the amazing health benefits that come with this new way of eating (if you were not thorough enough with your research).
In reality, after you eat a ketogenic diet for a week or so, you start having:
- Headaches
- Exhaustion
- Nausea
- Mood swings
These are things you associate with something that your body is rejecting. “I must be allergic to the new diet,” you think. But all you encountered was what specialists call keto flu. It is a perfectly natural process of transition as your body changes its base energy sources. During the transition, your body also changes the way it operates and that comes in the form of those symptoms. An easy way to combat it and lessen its impact is to ease yourself into your new diet. Eliminate carbs slowly and as you taper them off, replace them with low-carb alternatives.
3. You have not done your research
This is one of the most glaring pitfalls that you will fall into if you are not keen enough. They do not take the time to find out:
- Which foods are low on carbs and high in fat
- Which foods are natural but not necessarily appropriate for your dietary purpose
- That you need salt and water
You need to do a bit of research before you commit to a keto diet. You will learn about what works and what doesn’t instead of finding it out yourself and wasting time while at it. Costly mistakes are the main reason why people fail at the keto diet. If you do not learn them soon enough, they will render your efforts less effective. And when your efforts don’t bear fruits, you are more likely to give up.
4. An irregular food supply
This is one of the common reasons why people don’t follow through on new diets. It follows the same trend:
- Your supply of food runs out, you start feeling hungry, but finding healthy food requires that you travel some distance. Since you cannot wait much longer, you go for a quick fix of the “wrong” food and you stray.
- You want to eat out, but the restaurants that have legit healthy food are too far or are already booked up. So you opt for the wrong food that is easier to order and you get into an unhealthy habit every time you eat out.
Finding restaurants that serve ketogenic foods on their menus can be tough, especially if you are in a smaller city or town. It can also be frustrating if you do not restock before your supply runs out; high-carb foods are more common in grocery stores than low-carb, high-fat ones.
5. Setting unrealistic goals
This one has to come up when we talk about giving up on something. You will see it in all spheres of life and even in dieting: You will sometimes mistakenly want quick and tangible results irrespective of your underlying conditions and how your body responds to your new diet.
If you go into dieting with that mentality, you are in for a rude awakening. Here is how it will play out:
- You will gain weight sometimes instead of losing it.
- Your weight loss will plateau at some stage.
- Binge eating on low-carb foods will not fast-track your weight loss plan
Do not expect to lose weight overnight because you are human. You will make mistakes. You need to be patient because the gains will inevitably come if you do things right.
When it comes to something as beneficial as a ketogenic diet, you want to follow through with it because the benefits are tremendous. These are just a few of the many reasons why people give up on it. Some people do not realize this and they throw their hands up after a few bad experiences or slow progress and think “This whole thing is probably not as effective as they keep making it out to be.” Meanwhile, there are other people successfully losing weight and enjoying the process.