Why YOU Should Try a Ketogenic Diet

Why YOU should Try a ketogenic diet

Have you been hearing the word keto or ketogenic lately? Are you considering trying a ketogenic diet? or wonder if a ketogenic diet is healthy?

The lean human body is 74% fat and 26% protein (broken down by calories). Fats are a structural part of every human cell and are the preferred fuel source of the mitochondria, the energy-burning units of each cell. A fetus naturally uses ketones before and immediately after birth.  This post will give you the information you need as to why you should consider a ketogenic diet.

Inflammation is the stem of all diseases. One question or complaint is why can’t I eat “normal?” Sure, there are people who can eat potatoes and rice and pasta and not be overweight, BUT this doesn’t mean they are healthy. I have had a handful of clients who were female, 115 pounds and had very high blood sugar levels and had to be put on insulin. Not only should diabetics and people who want to lose weight limit carbohydrate intake, everyone should.

We are all, in an evolutionary sense, predisposed to becoming diabetic. So I want to step you through how fat is stored, but more importantly this is how we become at risk for diabetes and heart disease:

1. After you eat excess carbohydrates, blood glucose stays higher longer because the glucose can’t make it into the cells of the muscles. This toxic level of glucose is like tar in the bloodstream clogging arteries, binding with proteins to form damaging AGEs (Advanced Glycated End-products) and causing inflammation. This high level of glucose causes triglycerides to go up, increasing your risk for heart disease.

2. Starch and sugar gets stored as fat (remember starch is just glucose molecules hooked together in a long chain; the digestive track breaks it down into glucose… so a sugary and a starch diet are the same thing!). Since the muscle cells aren’t getting glycogen (because they basically have a crust over the cells and are considered “resistant”), and since insulin stops the production of the fat-burning enzyme lipase, now you can’t even burn STORED fat! So workout all you want, if you continue to eat oatmeal before your workouts, you will never be a fat-burner, you will remain a sugar-burner and you continue to get fatter until eventually those fat cells become resistant too.

3. If that isn’t bad enough, I have more bad news…Insulin levels continue to stay high longer because the pancreas mistakenly believes “if a little is not working, more is better.” NOT GOOD. Insulin is very toxic at high levels, causing cellular damage, cancers, plaque build-up in the arteries (which is why diabetics have so much heart disease) as well as many other inflammation issues such as nerve damage and pain in the extremities. Starch and sugar destroys nerve tissue, causing tingling and retinopathy, which causes you to lose your eyesight.

4. Sorry, but I have more bad news…Our cells become so damaged after a life of cereal and skim milk for breakfast that not only does insulin resistance block glucose from entering muscle cells; the crust we have formed over our cells also blocks amino acids from entering. Amino acids are the building blocks for our muscles that are found in protein. So now you can’t even maintain your muscles. And if that isn’t bad enough, our muscles become cannibals because your body think there’s not enough stored sugar in the cells, so they send signals to start to consume valuable muscles to make more glucose (sugar)! You get fatter and you lose muscle.

5. Instead of feeling energetic after you eat, you are tired, and you crave more carbohydrates and since you have less muscle, exercise is getting too darn difficult, and the sad cycle continues.

6. But there is even more bad news… thyroid disorders also happen too. When your liver becomes insulin resistant, it can’t convert thyroid hormone T4 into the T3, so you get those unexplained “thyroid problems”, which continue to lower your energy and metabolism.

Start your path to healthy healing today!