Many people are under the false assumption that calorie counting works well for losing weight. While it is true that it can help, it can also do a lot more harm than good.
This is because, over time, restricting calories will actually start to slow down your metabolic rate. This can damage natural hormone levels, and after a while, no more weight loss is seen, and it can lead to some serious issues, including hair loss.
When one is using a keto diet, things are much different, and there is no calorie counting to worry about.
Why Calorie Counting Doesn’t Help
At first, cutting back on calories will help you to lose weight. But, after a while, you may start to find that this method of weight loss is no longer working for you. This is due to the slowdown in your metabolism.
Some people find that they actually start to gain weight instead of losing, even though they are sticking to their daily caloric intake. Metabolism slows faster when calories are restricted, and it doesn’t rise as quickly when one starts eating normally again. The damage has already been done.
This is one of the main reasons why the ketogenic diet is so popular. It is not a typical quick-fix diet fad. Rather, it is a lifestyle, and not only will you be able to lose more weight than you ever could with other diets, but you will also lose more body fat, without having to resort to a low-fat diet.
This type of diet gives you about 5 percent of carbs, 15 percent protein, and 80 percent fats. You feel fuller without eating a lot, and your body burns the stored fat for energy because there is no need for more fat in the diet.
The keto diet lets you eat fat and burn fat, even though fat actually is higher in calories than proteins and carbohydrates. But, the foods you are eating on the keto diet let you burn fat by double the rate of other diets, particularly the high-carb diets.
You will experience lower insulin levels, which also helps in fat burning, reduce the amount of fat stored by the body, and gain lean mass. Your body will begin to self-regulate because you will be concerned about what you are eating, not how much you are eating.
How Keto Helps with Weight Loss
Did you know that you can eat foods with fat, but also burn that fat, even though fat has far more calories than carbohydrates or proteins? The trick is to burn calories, and different foods affect the body in different ways.
So, even though a food may be high in fat, it may be that your body is able to burn those calories faster than it could burn the calories of other foods, due to differences in metabolism and hormones. What you eat, and how you burn calories can have a huge effect on weight loss.
Studies show that most people who use the ketogenic diet tend to lose much more weight than those who are using other diet programs, including low-fat diets, and they keep the weight off longer. Another great thing about this type of diet is that you won’t go hungry.
You can enjoy a wide range of foods that are high in fat, and that gives you plenty of energy to burn off that fat so your body doesn’t store it.
Don’t Go Overboard
One thing you do need to keep in mind is that even though you are supposed to eat calories on a keto diet if you go overboard, you aren’t going to do yourself any good. In fact, you will end up gaining weight instead of losing.
The keto diet isn’t your “get out of jail free” card for miraculous weight loss. No, it is not as restrictive as other types of diets.
Yes, you do have to limit yourself as to how much you eat. So, you may find some benefits to counting calories, but you don’t have to make it the main focus in your life as many other dieters do.
For instance, if you find that you are following the keto diet and not getting the results you expected, it may help to start counting calories to see where you might be going wrong with the diet. Chances are that you are just eating too much of certain things, and your body is storing fat calories instead of expending them.
On the other hand, if you cut back on calories too much, you end up slowing down your metabolism. Again, you will end up gaining weight instead of losing.
In this case, you would need to add more calories to your diet. Counting calories can help with this as well so you can get to where you need to be in order to start losing weight. It will also help you to get a better idea of what a typical portion size should look like.
Balance is the Key
The trick is to be able to control a balance in calories, so you are getting the proper amounts of macronutrients. Our bodies are designed to eat certain types of foods, and these are the foods you will be eating on the keto diet.
These foods are low in carbs and high in proteins and fats to help control blood sugar levels and cravings. This type of diet also requires you to eat foods that are high in vegetables, which have always been important in human diets.
Conclusion
The keto diet works as long as you do it right. Unless you are having issues with not losing enough weight on this type of diet, calorie counting is not something you need to be obsessed with.
It can help if you are off track, but it still shouldn’t be the main focus.
Once you start the diet and begin to lose weight, you will be able to see where your calories go, and then you can get an accurate count of the caloric intake you need for weight loss.