Keto Diet for PCOS - The Keto Diet Isn't Magical For PCOS

The keto diet is incredibly popular amongst the PCOS community currently. Many are sprouting its magical results but, there isn't anything magical about the ketogenic diet.

🤔 WHAT IS THE KETO DIET? 🤔

The ketogenic diet is a very low-carb, high-fat diet that involves drastically reducing carbohydrate intake (5% of overall calorie intake) and replacing it with fat (75% of your diet to come from fats). This reduction in carbs puts your body into a metabolic state called ketosis.

To ensure you're in ketosis, it's best to buy a ketone meter. This measures blood ketone levels by pricking your finger and taking a small sample of your blood. It usually takes 2-4 days to enter ketosis and so you shouldn't be jumping in and out of the diet otherwise, you aren't actually following it.

When this happens, your body becomes

incredibly efficient at burning fat for energy - this is where everyone believes its magic, that one sentence. But, you need to realize the fat you are burning is coming from the dietary fat you are eating and not necessarily stored body fat!

You must still ensure you are in a net caloric deficit in order for your body to be able to lose stored body fat. Reading facts like "the diet is so filling that you can lose weight without counting calories or tracking your food intake" is ludicrous. You can do this with literally any diet so long as you are in a caloric deficit.

😀 KETO BENEFITS TO PCOS 😀

Keto can definitely benefit someone who has PCOS if they also have insulin resistance. Certain studies have shown that the keto diet may improve insulin sensitivity due to your body no longer being constantly fed carbohydrates. This can also help to lower your risk of prediabetes or type II diabetes.

😚 WHY DO SOME PEOPLE SWEAR BY IT 😚

Although there are health benefits of the keto diet for PCOS (as is with nearly any healthy diet) the main benefit will come from how strict you need to be. The keto diet forces you to be extremely conscious of everything you put in your mouth.

Most people love black and white, yes or no, good and bad, and the keto diet really allows you to see foods as OK or off-limits. This means it becomes very clear what you are, and aren't allowed to put in your mouth.

For people who love this, love eating lots of dietary fats, the keto diet for PCOS could work absolutely amazing for you. My point of this post isn't to bash the keto diet, as I haven't done.

It is to point out to everyone out there that the keto diet isn't the only diet approach for PCOS. You do not have to go to such extremes, you may want to, that's absolutely fine but, you don't have to.

Let me know your experiences with the keto diet!