All you need to know about Keto - Keto Q&A | Keto Mom
Keto Mom here!
And here are the questions that I often get asked, and I have my little cheat sheet right here. It's often around "What is the difference between a Keto diet and a low carb lifestyle or lazy Keto", "How do you track your food, what are some good fats that I can eat", "What are net carbs and total carbs", "Tell me about kids in Keto, how much water should I drink, do I have to work out and intermittent fasting?". Those are the questions and if you have questions as we are chatting, ask the questions down below.
Points to Ponder:
00:42 How long have I been Keto
00:59 Most common Questions
01:34 Difference between Keto diet & Low carb
02:47 Power of Ketones
04:07 Strict Keto
04:45 Lazy Keto
05:49 Lifestyle approach is more sustainable
07:54 There is no one size fits all
08:26 Ownership
08:47 You did not get here Overnight
09:03 Tracking food
09:19 Overeating Good food
13:03 Fats
14:13 Net carbs and Total Carbs
15:21 Helpful Tips
15:59 The trick is to Flip
16:09 Calculating Net carbs
17:16 Kids in Keto
18:10 My kids are not on a diet
19:01 Snacking
19:25 Measure your snacks
19:50 Portions
20:19 Water intake
20:58 Working out
23:10 Intermittent Fasting
23:53 Eating out
24:11 Control your food
24:53 Choose a better option
26:36 Effects of stress and sleep
27:09 Keto Snacks
29:07 Pay attention to what you are eating
29:51 Power of reading, mindset
31:35 Learn and grow
Full Episode Transcript
Good morning! Welcome to the Keto Mom page, my name is Stephanie and today I'm going to go over as many Q&A, well the most common Keto questions that I get asked. So as you're tuning in, where are you tuning in from... I'm going to give you a rapid fire, Question and Answer around the Keto, low carb
lifestyle. So just so you know, I just got done working out this morning, done showering... Sunday, you will see me all put together, probably not very often. So I am a mom, we have four daughters, we homeschool and we've been on this Keto, low carb journey... me six years, It'll be six years in June and my husband, about eight or nine years.
And here are the questions that I often get asked, and I have my little cheat sheet right here. It's often around "What is the difference between a Keto diet and a low carb lifestyle or lazy Keto", "How do you track your food, what are some good fats that I can eat", "What are net carbs and total carbs", "Tell me about kids in Keto, how much water should I drink, do I have to work out and intermittent fasting?". Those are the questions and if you have questions as we are chatting, ask the questions down below.
Whatever it is, it doesn't matter what it is, if I see it, I'll write it down. If not, I'll come back and answer it in the thread when we are done. So number one, "What is the difference between a Keto diet", and often I will say, low carb, lazy Keto, some people like to say dirty Keto.
So, I'm going to tell you to the best I understand... I am not a doctor, I am not a scientist, I am a mom, who has watched and learned and "implemented", taking action on what I have learned into our family, our home, my lifestyle and my husband's.
And so a Keto diet, just so you understand is about approximately eighty percent (80%) fat, fifteen percent (15%) protein and five percent (5%) carbs. That's approximately under twenty carbs a day, that's the actual Keto diet. And did you know that the Keto diet was initially created and used for medical reasons for kids with epilepsy, so the Keto diet wasn't initially started for somebody to lose fat loss. Now, when studied and when looked at, scientists and doctors realize the power of ketones. If you don't even know what that means, and you're here, because you read, I love to read by the way... Your body can run off of glucose or ketones, glucose meaning carbs, and sugar, donuts, bagels, cereal, bread, pasta, potatoes. Like you get that spike, you eat something and then you crash and you get the UP and then you get the DOWN. So your body can run off of glucose or Ketones, but what they found is when your body's running off of Ketones, your brain prefers Ketones, your body operates better off Ketones, you feel incredible.
Ketones are a long, sustained energy, so if your body is making ketones, then you've got a natural form of energy, and focus, it helps with your appetite control and so many other things.
So a Keto diet is under twenty carbs a day, if you eat under 20 carbs a day, then you have the ability to eat the eighty percent (80%) fat, and that's a lot of fat.
Here's the kicker, sometimes people want to do more low carb or like a lazy keto, what that means is you're not tracking all of your food. A truly strict Keto diet will most likely have to be tracked in My Fitness Pal, or a carb counter, because you're going to want to make sure that you are eating under twenty carbs a day. You've got your moderate protein and your really high fats, if you just eyeball it, you're probably not going to get it right.
Do you have to do strict Keto? No. So here's where people just get frustrated, they might track their food for a certain period of time. We did that years ago, and my husband did it, he was like "Oh, I know what I should eat, I know what I can eat, I know how my body feels". So most people would say "I eat lazy Keto, or I eat low carb" and what that means is, you get rid of the buns off the burgers, the croutons off the salad, you'll grab a lettuce wrap. You'll just eat more veggies and protein for dinner, get rid of the pasta, the bread and the potatoes. So for those of you on here, do you consider yourself strict Keto, or more of a low carb lazy Keto. I really hate the word lazy, so I would just say strict Keto or more low carb, and either one is fine. Because I feel like ninety percent (90%) of people that do a low carb, lazy Keto, feel like a lifestyle approach to a Keto diet, like long term is more sustainable. I can go for breakfast, I'm either going to intermittent fast, or I'm gonna have bacon, eggs or sausage. For lunch, I'm going to have a salad with no croutons, I'll put less dressing on it. Or if I'm ordering my food at a restaurant, I'll get the dressing on the side. For dinner, I'm going to eat a protein and veggie.
That type of lifestyle, I personally feel like is easy to walk yourself through for the rest of your life. Because you don't have to get stuck to your phone, stuck to tracking everything. People get overwhelmed, and they get frustrated and they quit. Most people do a strict Keto diet for a certain period of time, because they want to get to the vacation, they want to get to the wedding, they've got an end destination. And then they throw up their hands and they go, "I did it, I lost the twenty pounds, I feel great", and then they go back to the way they were eating, and then they gain it all back and then have to start over. If you can implement making better choices forever, it doesn't mean you can't have a treat, or you can't have a cheat day. But a majority of the times when you're eating, "Are you eating better?".
The longer you implement this into your life, you will find that things taste better without the bun, the other day I had a bite of the bun and it taste like a sponge. Why do people not enjoy their burger and everything on top of it without the bun, the bun takes away the flavor. You will just naturally learn to love food and even the way it tastes without the bun and the bread because it just wrecks it. So whether you're strict Keto, or low carb, however you can choose to stay on this lifestyle and what works for you. "There is not a one size fits all".
So if somebody says "Yep, pay me $28.50. And I will give you your Keto diet", don't you dare do that because your body processes food differently than somebody else's. You might be able to handle more Keto snacks and somebody else can't process Keto snacks, or maybe you can have the low carb wraps that still have gluten in them, but somebody else can't.
There's not a one size fits all, you have to know why you're here, why do you want to feel better, and then you're going to have to take a little bit of time. You're going to have some ownership on your lifestyle, and on this way of eating, "I'm going to do this, I'm going to push through it".
Might be a hard couple weeks to get it, even a month, it took me a year. It took our family a year to truly understand what we were doing, how we were feeling and implementing this to where I didn't have to think about it. And so give yourself some time you did not get where to where you are today overnight, you're not going to get to where you want to go overnight. So that comes to tracking your food, you don't have to track your food if you're not strict Keto. I want you to understand something and hear me very clear on this, super important. The question is "Do I have to track my food and can I overeat calories?". You don't have to track your food and yes you can overeat good food.
Here's what people's mindset is "Oh my goodness, I'm eating Keto. I can eat as much bacon, butter, fat bombs and keto treats as I want because it's Keto". So maybe you get up in the morning and you're like, "Of course I can eat that pound of bacon, it's Keto. I'm at my friend's afternoon party on Saturday, and I already ate lunch. But it's fine, I'll eat the cheese and the meat that's made out of cream cheese, I can eat that". Mind you, I'm not hungry, but it's keto, I can eat it. For supper, you're eating food and you feel great, and then all of a sudden, you're full. You sit down to watch a movie, and then you eat those nuts cause it's Keto. "I need something to snack on, I'm kind of bored, it's Keto".
Have you ever found yourself saying "It's Keto, I can eat it. It's bacon, I can eat as much as I want". No. A Keto diet is not living off of bacon and butter, and if you're not doing it right, meaning if you're making the excuse of eating any type of Keto snacks that you want, as much as you want, and you aren't thinking to yourself "Am I hungry?"... then you can overeat good food. So oftentimes I feel people reach this plateau, or they go "Oh my goodness, I've been eating this way for weeks, and I have not seen this scale move". I have to say, how much food are you eating? I only eat keto food. Well, how much are you eating?
It is great to eat some good high fats, but you can only eat the eighty percent (80%) fat, if you were eating under 20 carbs a day.
So avocados, good healthy organic butter, nuts, fish, olive oil, or all of those things are great. But you're not going to eat them whenever you want, as much as you want, if you were eating low carb, if you're eating, seventy, sixty, fifty carbs a day, which is considered low carb. So if you're eating low carb, that's awesome, but if you're eating low carb and then eating as much fat as you want, you're going to get to a point where you're eating too much. I'll give you an example... I think there's about four or five calories per carb, it's approximately nine calories per fat gram. That means if you were eating as much fat as you want, but you're still not under twenty carbs a day, you just could overeat some good food. If you reached a stall, then all I would say is "Ask yourself, how much food are you eating, and are you hungry?". That's it, are you eating because you're bored, because it's Keto, you don't have to just snack to snack.
And that is one of the hardest things for people to get into their mindset, "I really shouldn't be eating if I'm not hungry". So track your food if you want to, I think it's great in the beginning because it helps you visibly see what to eat. But after a long term, then you don't have to. So we talked about Fats... We've got the yolk in the eggs, if you were eating lean, we used to do that for a while, chicken, broccoli and rice, egg whites, not yolks. So there's some really good fats that you can implement into eating, the reason you want to eat Fat is "Fat keeps you fuller longer". Fat helps with satiety. If you're asking questions, I'll come back and answer those, I love it when you guys answer questions or you share your thoughts because people can read through and read those. And so it's not just me, it's also you.
So some good fats, the yolks and the eggs, nuts. There are some nuts that are better, like almonds are better, macadamia nuts. Some people would say "I can't eat peanuts, they cause inflammation". Peanuts are, but peanut almond butter, avocados are great, I love Kerry gold butter. So there's things that you can eat, I love fish, I love salmon, we like to eat sardines. there are things that are good fats.
Okay, net carbs and total carbs. Everybody's different, some people go "Do I have to do it? Can all of us eat net carbs?". It depends, my goal is not fat loss anymore, my goal is actually to build muscle.
If my goal is to build muscle, and I'm not working on fat loss, I could probably eat net carbs and eat more like a low carb wrap, because my goal isn't fat loss.
If you came to me, or somebody else who's helping you on your Keto low carb lifestyle and you have to lose or want to lose a hundred pounds, or even fifty or sixty or seventy, you might be a little bit more strict in the beginning. Because if you are counting net carbs, most of the time it just allows people to eat more Keto treats, so oftentimes, it's that excuse of it's Keto, I can eat it. But if you find yourself eating a whole bunch of Keto processed snacks, it might do the same thing and create this stall. You don't have to have them because you're hungry or just because you're craving something, doesn't mean you have to go eat a fat bomb.
It can help, but try go brushing your teeth, try removing yourself from that situation in the environment, you might find it you don't have that snack anymore. Drink some more water, drink some electrolytes, change your palate. Brushing your teeth is quite incredible, bring your toothbrush to your office or grab some mouthwash, and you might find that if you're craving something, it immediately changes.
And you'll be like, "I don't need that piece of chocolate because I'm actually not hungry, and I brushed my teeth, now I feel fine". So, what a net carb is... For example, let's say you have a Keto cookie, flip over the Keto cookie and on the back, it would say total carbs. Let's say the total carbs in your keto cookie that you want to eat is ten, but right underneath the carbs, it says fiber five, and then it has sugar alcohol, which does not spike your insulin. You can take the total carbs of ten, subtract the fiber, which is five, and let's say there was four sugar alcohols, you could subtract nine, which gives you a one net carb. So you take the total carbs and subtract fiber and sugar alcohols, which should not spike your insulin. Some people would say it does, you know everybody's body is different, right? So in general, a net carb is subtracting fiber and sugar alcohol and you could count that for your carbs that day.
Everybody's a little different, I usually have a pretty good visual, I'll share it on my stories today about net carbs and total carbs if you are curious. Okay, kids in Keto... "Why are your kids eating your foods?". I want you to think of this real quick, my kids are not on a diet but they eat the meals that I eat.
Because if we can help our kids understand the power of food and how their body feels and processes food, you're gonna set them up for success.
So if you are saying in your home, or you are saying, as a mom or a dad "I'm fat, I'm on a diet. I have to eat these vegetables. No, I cannot eat that". You're creating this negative view around food, your children are going to grow up and probably have to do the same thing that you're doing today, as their adults. If you can teach your kids that you are eating better, we are going to eat healthier as a family, it's important to fuel our body the best that we can. Then your kids are not going to have a diet mentality, but they're going to have a healthy mentality. My kids are not on a diet, I don't track their macros. I just buy better foods. So if they want to snack, they will eat a pickle or a hard boiled egg or a cheese stick or a beef stick. They'll eat some of the bars that I eat, I'm not a snacky person so they don't see me in the kitchen snacking all day. If I'm really hungry, I might grab some macadamia nuts.
But I even asked my kids, if I see them in the kitchen, and I know they just ate lunch an hour ago, I'll say, "Are you hungry?" I want them to understand what that means, and they'll go, "No, I'm not hungry".
I'll say why don't you drink some water real quick and then come back in a little bit. I'll say "Hey, go grab a handful of almonds", because almonds to me are, an incredible source to get you to that next meal. When you're snacking, it is important that you don't grab the entire bag of almonds or or mixed nuts or macadamia nuts, whatever that is or all those Keto treats. Measure them when you come home from the store.
Take out your fourth a cup, because that is about the approximate summation of all of the measurements of any Keto snack is about a fourth a cup. Measure it, put it in snack baggies and grab one.
Your kids can do the same thing, my girls they just grab the little scooper, throw in their hands. Not to measure because they can't eat more, it's to measure because they don't need to overeat. You don't have to eat until you're full. Not everybody on here is probably from the United States, but let's just be real... In the United States, our portions are huge. If you go to a restaurant, you probably have enough for two meals, but we feel like we have to eat all of it. Eat when you're full but when you're stuffed, you most likely over ate. And so I hope that's helpful, the kids are not on a diet, my goal is to teach them how to have a good relationship with food. So that they can grow up and choose better foods, they don't have to start when they're an adult and try to figure it out.
Water intake, water is super important. I often get lashed back of why I hate drinking water... Add some lemon, lime, some electrolytes, but your water is super important. If you sneak a peek after you pee and your pee is yellow, you need some more water. Just carry it around with you, I always have water bottles with me. Set an alarm clock on your phone every forty five minutes to an hour that says drink your water, go take a big gulp. So it'll help you I promise.
Working out... I often get people say "I just can't lose the weight because I'm eating great, but I can't work out".
You have to give it time, we live in a fast paced instant society. Again you didn't get here overnight, you're not going to get to where you go if you get frustrated after two weeks, the next diet isn't going to work.
I have to remind people, if you are drinking more water, you don't have to work out... I mean, if you love to work out awesome, but working out is not going to ultimately get you your results. You have to choose better foods, and so I often have to remind people, it's not overnight.
If you just back up for a second when you get frustrated if you go, "Okay, I've been drinking more water, I've been eating less processed junk", just think about what you've been eating over this last time period. I have to remind people "How did you use to eat?"... I often have people say, "I can't believe that you are eating that way it's going to kill you". So if I'm eating more meat, and more salads and more veggies and avocados and good things, and I feel great. I hear what you're saying. What I hear you saying is, you want me to go back to eating the way I used to be eating, which is frozen pizzas, Debbie snacks corndogs, mac and cheese, I ate out a lot of Burger King. So what you're telling me is, my Keto low carb lifestyle, which is not bacon and butter, what you're telling me is I should go back to eating that way. And when I phrase that to people they would say "Yeah, that's not it's not right". This lifestyle is eating better foods... You can even think of it as a whole food and not overeating. And so working out is great, more importantly it's what you put in your mouth. If you can go for a walk and move your body, that's awesome.
Okay, intermittent fasting... Are you an intermittent faster? You don't have to be, but a lot of people feel it helps them on their journey, especially for fat loss.
All that means is you stop eating after supper time, and you go about fourteen to sixteen hours the next day, which usually takes you till lunchtime, and then you eat your lunch and your dinner.
It's going to help you not overeat, you're not going to consume everything that you felt like you missed during that morning. You're going to eat when you're hungry, drink more water, it is going to help your body rest, it's going to give you a good healthy mindset of food.
Eating out... I'm going to be real I love to go out to eat, but people go it's so hard. You've got to get the mindset of this, there's a good, a better, and a best way to do this lifestyle. The absolute best way to do the lifestyle is for you to control your food. So you know what you're making, you're in the kitchen, maybe you have your own cows. Maybe you are growing your own vegetables, of course there's always a best way. A better way is to choose, which one is better this or that. You're not going to have the best meat at a restaurant, I understand that. You're not going to be able to control the best dressing, but what you can control when you go out to eat is, you can take the buns off the burgers, the croutons off the salad with the dressing on the side, grab a ranch or something that would be a better option, grab some chicken and veggies. Don't get stressed out when you go out to eat, just choose a better option in the situation that you're in. If you can take five seconds before you eat the food that's in front of you, whether you're at your office, at home, at a restaurant, or you're at a birthday party. Just take five seconds and go in this environment in this very second, what is my best option, what is the best option that I can do.
I'll give you an example, years ago, we were at a Christmas party. And we were at somebody else's house, it was lasagna, there was a salad, bread and corn. My husband was really strict back then, so this is what he did, he loaded his plate up with lettuce, he cut a huge piece of lasagna, he picked up each lasagna noodle, and he scraped off the meat and the cheese and the sauce onto his bed of lettuce. And he did it for the whole lasagna, so that's pretty extreme. But he did it, and he's like, "I'm not going to eat the noodles, but I'll eat everything on it".
He just made a lasagna lettuce bowl, it was so funny. That's a little extreme, but he just went "Okay, what am I going to eat?". If I go to a party, or if I go somewhere, I'm usually in control, I always bring something and I'm in control of going at least we have a salad or at least we have this and I'll bring something better to eat.
So don't get overwhelmed, don't get stressed out, in the moment what is the best option that you can eat. Just don't overeat, you don't have to eat until you're full, eat until you're satisfied.
Somebody brought up a good point. Don't overestimate the power of stress and sleep in your diet or lifestyle. If you are stressed to the max, your body knows it, and no matter what you're going to do, it's probably going to hold on to some excess fat. If you're not sleeping well, if you're not resting, same thing. So if you message me and you're doing all of the things right, the question I'm going to say is "Are you overeating, are you super stressed?". And usually people go "Yes, and I'm not sleeping well". Lastly, "Can I have the Keto snacks?" Yes, you can have the Keto snacks most of the time. For instance, most of the time the Keto packaged snacks, or those skinny syrups, or the low carb wraps, all of those things meet within a macro content. Which means you can subtract things, you can get it low carb, but they might have super low wheat in it. Are they the best option? Probably not, but are they a better option instead of a snicker bar? One hundred percent.
When people get mad at me, about eating the low carb wraps, I always have to say "Here's the deal, don't you dare ever judge somebody else and on their low carb journey".
Because if you were pointing your fingers at somebody, and saying you are not doing it right, and that's not Keto... You're making somebody feel bad for doing the best that they can, you're going to get them down and they're just going to go right through the drive thru and grab that burger, because you just told them that the low carb wrap was bad. Don't judge somebody else's journey, you're on your own, they'll figure it out. And so why is wheat bad? It just depends, it's just the way your body processes gluten, oftentimes it just holds on to it. So not everybody's like that, I can eat completely different, or the same foods or the amount of food as my husband, and my husband's body will hold on to it and mine won't. So it just depends, it's not that you can't, it's just figuring out how you feel. Pay attention to what you're eating, and if you don't feel good after you eat that low carb wrap or if you don't feel good after eating that Keto snack, then maybe don't eat it again. Drink plenty of water... Ezekiel Bread? Yes, there's a difference between the gluten that sits in the bread on a shelf, or the grains that has to be frozen that sprouts if it doesn't. So in any area of this low carb or Keto lifestyle that you're working on, take it one day at a time, one meal at a time. Focus on the next meal, what am I going to eat, before my next meal I need to drink some water.
And I talk about reading all the time on here, it is super powerful. Because if you are thinking negative thoughts about yourself, or you can't do this, or I'll never get to that weight, I am doomed to be doomed, then you are. Because what you think is what you're going to get, what you think is what you're going to speak. Words are power, your words have the power of life and death.
And if you are not going to get this (mind) right, then I can tell you, all of these things that I'm telling you right now, if you don't put into action one thing... So here's my question, I just talked to you about the diet versus the lifestyle, we talked about tracking foods, good fats, net carbs, kids, water, working out intermittent fasting. What is the one thing that you took away from this LIVE? I would love to know, one thing, and what is one thing you can put into action today. "Hey, I'm going to give myself five seconds before I eat to go, what is my better option?", "Hey, I'm going to remove the buns off my burgers next time I go to the restaurant", "I'm going to focus on whatever it is, making sure I have an alarm clock set every hour that tells me to drink water", or "I'm going to pick up a book and read, to get my mindset right so that I truly believe in myself, because I know I can do this. I have to believe in myself".
What are you going to do? What is your one action step you're going to work on towards your goals. We've got one more day left to this month, do you have goals for next month? I will preach that all day long, "Ask yourself, am I hungry? ". Then don't eat if you're not hungry, it's really understanding the power of asking yourself questions and giving yourself permission to learn and grow.
Not overnight, but a process... If I were to say, "You might not see or feel how great you're going to feel, for an entire year, would you stick with it?' I hope so. Because if you can give this a year of learning and growing and implementing and taking action, then you'll have the rest of your years to feel incredible. Because you've learned the process of making this a lifestyle and not diving into just a diet and then giving up after you reach the results, and then coming back next year to start over. Don't do it.
So I hope that was helpful. I will come back on and answer all the questions that were asked, I'll come back on and answer those next time. So let me know any questions that you have, ask those for sure. I am going to come on later tonight and do "Thirsty Thursday". I think every Thursday I'm going to talk about my Mom fuel, I drink Ketones every day. And I'm going to start doing some fun contests on tuning in the LIVES and different things like that. So I'm going to do just learning about ketones tonight, that's it. So it'll be "Why I drink ketones, when I started drinking them over six years ago and what they do". If you want to know more about my mom fuel right now, just post a three in the comments, and I'll send you some videos to watch, I'd love to share more.
Otherwise, follow me on my stories... I share, not just Keto tips, but you're gonna see homeschooling, I love to read, anything about our girls, we've got four daughters. I just share tips throughout the entire day. So if you ever have questions, private message me, I'd love to help you on your goals, and I'm here to I'm here to help. So reach out, if you private message me, I will message you back before the end of the day, I promise. Whether you want to foods list, whether you want to know where to start, whether you just have a question. Reach out and ask, follow me on Instagram, it's ketomomsecrets all one word. Otherwise the stories should go right here on the page. I'm here to help, I hope that was helpful. I would love it if you'd press the share button, because sharing is caring. And I hope you have an incredible day. I need to go homeschool my kids so we'll talk to you soon. And I will do this again very soon.
Have a good day everybody.
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