Why am I not losing weight on Keto? If you find yourself asking this question, congratulations you’re at the right place. In this article, I’m going to discuss all the possible reasons which might be hampering your ketosis journey and what you should do instead to come out of it.
Simple Answer
You’re not on calorie deficit anymore that’s assuming you once were. But things aren’t as simple when we talk about human bodies, they are complex.
So you might want to actually understand what’s happening inside your body when you’re on the keto diet or any diet as a matter of fact.
Chances of you being successful increase manifold if you actually understand what you’re trying to do instead of just doing things.
I know it’s boring but it’s crucial that you understand how things change inside your body when you go on any diet, being a coach and having trained many people, in my experience the number 1 reason why people fail most times is because they don’t know what they are doing.
So, with this blog, one of my primary focus would be to educate people on how and why things happen the way they happen.
What are the basics of the keto diet?
I get it, you want to lose weight and you want to lose it fast.
You might have already tried several other diets like the GM diet which is the worst possible experiment one could do with their body or you might have tried a fruit diet, a low carb diet, or a gazillion other diets floating around and now you’re on the keto diet.
So, to understand what could have gone wrong you’d have to understand what exactly is ketosis and how it affects everything in your body.
What is keto? Well, I’d tell you what it’s not first, it’s not a miracle. You heard me, so what exactly is the fad about it?
Why are people especially newbies with very little knowledge or experience with dieting always going gaga over it? It’s simple, you tell someone all you have to do to lose fat is eat more fat, and they’ll be hooked right in.
Definition
Keto diet or ketogenic diet is a diet where the body produces ketones in the liver to be used as energy instead of glucose from carbohydrates. In keto, one follows more or less the macro range of 5:30:65(Carbohydrates:Protein: Fat), now one may wonder what’s so special about this macro split. The answer is in science.
The Science Behind Ketosis Diet
In keto diet, one has to consume very low carbohydrates i.e ideally less than 20 gm (5% of total calories), and when that happens your body’s glycogen stores are depleted within 5-10 days. After this, ketones are used as the primary source of energy instead of glycogen.
An average person holds up to 400 gm to 800 gm of glycogen in the body, precisely in the liver & muscle.
Normally 1 gm of glycogen can hold up to 2-4 gm of water in itself.
So here’s what happens in the initial days of keto, let’s assume you have 600 gm of glycogen stored in your body which is normal for an average adult who’s overweight.
When you begin your keto journey, in the first week of the keto itself you might have an average weight loss of 2-4 kgs and when I say weight what I really mean is that most of it would be water weight and NOT fat, sorry but you had it coming.
Now, if you could do the math, add 600 gm glycogen and ~1800 gm water associated with it, that’s a whopping 2.4 kgs.
This number could be a couple of pounds less or more but generally, it’s between 2 to 5 kgs depending on the current body composition of the individual, typically the heavier you are more you’d lose.
Congratulations, You have basically lost water, and your body is dehydrated. But it’s certainly a good ego boost, can’t deny that.
But, here’s the interesting part, your body is in ketosis now and any further weight loss from hereon would, in fact, be fat as well if you continue to do it right.
After the initial phase, one would lose fat slowly just as in any other deficit diet. So, now you know how keto works but the job’s not done yet, to understand why it’s now working anymore you need to go through one last science lecture.
Please bear with me, the good part is just around the corner.
Science Behind Weight Loss
It’s as simple as counting up to 10. When you consume fewer calories than you burn, you lose weight. Period.
Doesn’t matter whether you’re on a 500-calorie deficit following the keto diet or low carb diet or any other diet for the matter, you’ll end up with the same fat loss, it’s as simple as that.
Now that we know the science as well as the math behind Keto and weight loss, I think we’re in a good position to explore “why am I not losing weight on keto question?” and hopefully find an answer for it.
I’ll go over each reason one by one and you should be able to relate to one or more of them. So, here we go.
Top reasons for “why am I not losing weight on keto?”
1. Following Cyclic Ketogenic Diet(CKD) instead of Standard ketogenic Diet.
A lot of people are going to be pissed at me about this but I’m talking from experience and if you apply a little logic you’d see where I’m coming from.
A prominent reason for people not losing weight on keto is because they follow CKD which in itself isn’t superior or inferior but understanding whether it is for you or not is of utmost importance.
First things first, newbies who have little to no experience of proper dieting, don’t do cyclic keto, you’re better off with a standard keto diet.
Cyclic Ketogenic Diet
This is a form of the keto diet where you load carbs on a cyclic basis, it could be weekly or every 10 days.
It is suited for the people who have the primary goal of switching out of ketosis to refill their muscle glycogen levels, in order to sustain their training performance as glycogen is the primary fuel that one needs while doing any form of heavy exercise.
It’s a no-brainer that you won’t be able to perform as well as you use to in your lifts if your glycogen stores are depleted.
That being said, let’s be realistic, Keto in itself is very complex when you see what changes your body goes through when you’re on keto, gulping down carbs every weekend and again waiting for ketosis to start does not sound very intelligent especially if your primary goal is just to lose weight?
Stick to the standard keto and if you crave sweet, there are numerous keto recipes that you can enjoy using stevia as a sweetener but don’t go after cyclic keto just because it sounds easier and lets you have some carbs.
2. You’re simply not in Ketosis and this can easily happen when you’re not tracking calories.
Two things I always make sure of with my clients is that they weigh their food and use keto test strips to check for the presence of ketones in the urine.
You have to make sure you’re in ketosis after the first four to six days into the plan if you haven’t lost any weight or don’t have the keto flu-like symptoms at least. You don’t want to be shooting blanks, pun intended.
3. You’re having too many carbs .
To understand better let’s introduce Sally. Sally weighs 110 kgs and she decides to try Ketone diet, she uses an online calculator and figures out that she needs to eat 1400 calories and she splits them into 10:30:60(Carbohydrates:Protein: Fat) using the same calculator.
Notice that the carbohydrates intake here is over 5% of your total macros, which in my experience isn’t low enough sometimes to induce ketosis.
Moreover, if you aim for 10% it’s a lot more likely to land around 12-13%, that’s just too many carbohydrates for keto.
Make sure you strictly adhere to 5% of carbs or lesser than 30 gm of carbs, pick whichever is lower.
Don’t be like Sally or should I call her silly? Don’t blindly rely on calculators, adjust their values, and make sure the fat is set to 60% or higher, and carbohydrates to 5%, and nothing more if you want to lose weight on keto.
4. You’re having too much protein .
As explained in the previous point, macros are important, the reason why you’re not supposed to have more than 5% carbohydrates is directly related to why you can’t be having too much protein either.
Carbohydrates are stored as glycogen in our bodies and ultimately glycogen is broken down into glucose for energy.
Similarly, when you’re consuming protein in excess of 35% of your macros, the excess protein is broken down into amino acids and must be either stored or oxidized.
And more often than not one of the amino acids ‘glutamine’ is converted into glucose by the process of gluconeogenesis which would defeat the purpose of the keto diet.
Now, this process of gluconeogenesis is a lot more complex and I’d have to give you a complete lecture on the chemical reactions involved but let’s just stick to the topic for the sake of relevance.
Remember, we don’t want glucose? That’s the whole point of the keto diet. The source of energy has to be ketone bodies and not blood glucose. The takeaway is to keep your protein intake between 25-35% of your total macros.
5. Your snacks are not helping you.
So you think it’s just salad and you can have as much of it as you please. WRONG !!
To give you an idea, understand this, 1 medium-sized onion has up to 15 gm of carbohydrates and 7 gm of sugar, yes sugar.
I’m not saying you should completely give up on onions but this was just to show you how these things add up when you’re on a deficit.
According to me, the key to staying in ketosis is limiting your carbs to not more than 30 gm, I’d say go for 20 gm if you possibly can.
Now, that we’ve gone through the top 5 reasons you’d have a fair idea of where you went wrong. But if you’re one of those unlucky folks who followed all these basics and yet the scale refuses to budge, read on, it could be one of the following reasons :
6. You might be suffering from Hypothyroidism
The thyroid gland, a gland that produces thyroid hormone becomes underactive and doesn’t produce as much thyroid as it should this condition is called Hypothyroidism and it’s not good news.
Thyroid hormone controls various bodily functions and one of the most crucial ones is the regulation of bodily metabolism, when the gland is underactive it secretes lesser thyroid hormones(T3 & T4) and as a result, the overall metabolism of the body slows down.
Slow metabolism means a slow rate of energy expenditure of the body, hence your diet might not induce enough deficit for your body to start losing weight.
This does not mean you should drop calories further, that would be really stupid. What you should do instead is get your thyroid test done which requires a simple blood test, it can even be done in the comfort of your home these days.
7. Using artificial sweeteners.
Usage of artificial sweeteners has always been debatable and there have been many studies conducted on how they affect our bodies.
Although it’s still not clear, some evidence still suggests that artificial sweeteners over prolonged use can spike insulin levels which is a big no-no if you’re on keto.
Artificial sweeteners like Aspartame and Sucralose are completely cooked up in labs and if you must use a sweetener I’d recommend using Stevia, It’s 100% natural and comes from a plant called Candyleaf. I’ve had the best results with it.
8. Stress due to Cortisol and Insulin imbalance.
If you take a microscopic view, hormones essentially control every function of the body, if they’re not in tandem, things can go south pretty quick.
Cortisol which is also called the stress hormone is directly related to insulin which is your biggest friend as well as your biggest enemy when you’re trying to lose weight whether on keto or LCD or any other fancy diet you might want to try.
So if you’re not losing weight on keto, your hormones could be the culprit.
If you were under stress over a prolonged time, then there is a good chance that your cortisol secretion has turned chronic and this, in turn, leads to insulin resistance which we already know by now is the single most important factor which decides if you’re going to lose weight or not. Consult a doctor and get your full body check-up done.
9. You think a calorie is a calorie, Nope, not even close. Satiety matters.
If you’re trying to gain weight, it’s still somewhat true but definitely not If your goal is to lose weight, especially in a diet like keto where macros reign supreme.
Sources of protein, carbohydrates, and Fats during your keto journey need to be carefully handpicked, or else you’re heading to a disaster.
Choosing the right sources is important because the chances of you succeeding are directly dependent on the fact whether the diet is sustainable or not.
If you pick something that isn’t going to keep you full for longer you’re 10 times more likely to cheat. And if you’re cheating I guess you shouldn’t even be wondering why am I not losing weight on keto, you will not lose weight on any diet.
10. Other possible Reasons.
- Sleep- Insufficient sleep contributes to stress and I have already discussed how stress can impact your results with keto.
- Alcohol- Its empty calories, alcohol is metabolized very differently inside our bodies and does not provide any nutritional value what so ever, while beer and wine are strict No-no on the ketone diet, gin and vodka won’t kick you out of ketosis but they’d nevertheless add up those empty calories which you could have had instead with something which provides more satiety.
- Any type of food allergies such as lactose intolerance, gluten sensitivity, casein allergies, or more particular allergies like with eggs, some nuts, or any other food, well you might not even know this and the only way to find out is to book an appointment with your doctor and let the professionals deal with it.
Allergies are common and cause an imbalance in your gut activity which leads to inflammation and ultimately results in vomiting, rashes, breathing difficulty, swelling, diarrhea, etc depending on the food and your body’s reaction.
Is Keto For You?
Generally speaking, Keto Diet is easier to begin and hard to sustain for the long run, which makes it very important to understand whether you should follow the Keto diet or you’re better off with a typical low-carb diet which is much easier to follow and has similar effects if not better.
Keto has added advantage for you if you fall in any of the below categories :
- Carb tolerance– Some people are more tolerant of carbs than others if you are one of those people, why bother with keto at all? You’ll get excellent results with Low Carb Diet(LCD )or even with a High carb Diet(HCD) as well. But on the contrary, if you’re someone who is carb intolerant go with keto by all means.
- Resources– If you are someone who lives in a hostel or has very little time and resources to do your grocery shopping, cooking, and cleaning the whole mess left after a feast, keto could be a good option as you can survive on solely chicken, eggs and Indian cottage cheese.
- Epilepsy– some doctors recommend the keto diet for children who suffer from epilepsy as the low carbohydrate diet is found to be helpful in controlling seizures but it still needs to be prescribed by a physician and careful moderation by a nutritionist is a given.
- Try it when nothing else has worked for you, it wouldn’t hurt trying the keto diet, who knows you might find it a lot more sustainable for the long run.
Still here? I have some bonus tips for you.
Try these along with your Ketosis Diet and you should see a positive change
- This is probably the most important tip, I want you to strictly follow (5:30:65 | C:P:F) macro split and make sure those 5% carbohydrates are coming from complex carb sources which are high in fiber. You can do this by simply having some green vegetables in your keto diet and you’d get 20-30 gm of high fiber carbs easily.
- Incorporate weight training: When you’re on a deficit you don’t just lose fat, you lose those hard-earned muscles as well and I’m positive that it’s not your goal. By adding weights to your training regime, you’re preserving most of your muscle mass while still losing fat.
- Too much cardio: Cardio does help increase your activity and burn more energy but after a while, your body gets accustomed to it and you can utilize the same time doing weight training which would burn calories even after you’re done with your workout due to EPOS. ( Non-exercises activity thermogenesis (NEAT)) .
- If you must do cardio, try incorporating High-Intensity Interval Training (HIIT) variations to keep your body guessing.
- Always weigh your food, unless you can tell me the difference between 35 gm and 30 gm by just looking at it.
Final words
To conclude I'd say Keto diet is not a miracle but it certainly works, and if you are not losing weight on keto, it's time you start monitoring everything a little more closely and you should be able to figure out why. Choose keto diet if it aligns with your lifestyle and doesn’t make you puke your guts out, a good diet is a sustainable diet !!