I know there are a ton of fad diets out there these days, and that’s exactly what I thought about keto for the longest time. Being trained as an Ayurvedic practitioner, staples like rice and lentils played a huge part of my diet for quite a while.
It wasn’t until I started researching nutrition for optimum brain function that I finally decided to give keto a try. You see, after having a child and trying to raise him while working full time and going back to school, it wasn’t easy for me to pull those straight A’s with no effort….let alone with effort.
While I can’t say I turned into a female Einstein from eating low-carb, I definitely experienced some unexpected, yet pleasant benefits from eating this way.
Energy
After doing a 30-day metabolic reset by following a strict keto diet for this time, my energy levels improved substantially. I realized how unstable my blood sugar had been from eating so many starchy carbs. Keep in mind, I was a clean eater before doing this, I didn’t eat a lot of processed foods, but I was eating simple sugars like sprouted grain bread, dates and other dried fruits, lentils and items made from lentils and legumes such as pasta, etc.
Cravings
I had always had a craving for carbs. Even after cutting out most sugary foods such as ice cream and baked goods and limiting my fruit intake, I would crave things like bread all the time. In fact, I was eating sourdough bread on a regular basis, as I found it the easiest to digest due to the fermentation process it underwent. However, by eating this way, I didn’t realize that it was still perpetuating my craving for carb-heavy foods, and I’d often have small amounts of dark chocolate in an effort to satisfy these sweet cravings. And yes, I was under a lot of stress at the time, which leads to more cravings.
Interestingly enough, after removing high-carb foods from my diet, including all breads, starchy vegetables, and fruits except berries, I no longer craved carbs or sugar! This was simply life-changing to say the least.
Digestive Symptoms
As a result of cutting out these starchy and sugary foods, I no longer experienced symptoms of gas and bloating that I would so often get. I had tried for years with Ayurvedic techniques to get rid of these issues, but never had such profound results as I now experienced. Ayurveda teaches us to eat sweet foods such as fruit first so that our system can better process, but by eliminating them all together, the results were incredible.
Fat loss
Although I wasn’t overweight by any means, I felt that my body had softened and put on more fat after not having opportunities to lift weights like I used to after having a child. Child care always seemed to be an issue, and then once I started school, not to mention the pandemic lockdowns, there was hardly time to workout. Yes, I took my son for hikes, walks and in the jogging stroller, but he was too clingy for me to get in any type of real weight training. Once I switched to low-carb however, the combination of less gas and bloating and decreased inflammation allowed my body to release an enormous amount of water weight it had been holding onto, and I finally felt confident in my own skin again.
Although this way of eating came relatively easy to me and I had much success with it, there were some pitfalls that I experienced after a while. Luckily, I discovered how to overcome them. If you’d like to skip the trial and error and hear exactly what worked for me and what didn’t, please consider joining me for my upcoming workshop on how to create a customized diet for increased energy, weight loss and confidence, where I’ll review several popular diet trends and dispel fact from fiction, while advising on things to watch out for and tips for success.
