After years of being used for strictly medical purposes, a keto diet, or the ketogenic diet, has become a trend in recent years. From losing weight to helping in getting sleep, a keto diet has a whole lot of benefits, which are not known to us.
The keto diet is a diet that involves a high intake of fat, a low intake of carbohydrates, and an adequate intake of proteins. This diet forces one’s body to stop burning carbohydrates and start burning fats instead. While this diet was primarily used to treat epilepsy, it has recently gained a lot of traction among people for having various health benefits. For people who can’t process ketones internally, there are several best exogenous ketones, which have been developed by scientists. Some health benefits of the keto diet are:
1. Keto Diet Helps You in Losing Weight
Several studies and subsequent analyses have backed the claims that a good keto diet plan can help you lose weight. Keto diet foods are known to boost a person’s metabolism and even help them reduce their appetite. This happens in a few ways. The foods filled with proteins and fats fill you up faster, and several studies have suggested that they also help in reducing certain hormones that stimulate hunger.
2. It Improves Your Energy
When you start taking a keto meal plan, it is very common to feel the “keto flu”. This is a brief 1-2-day period, where you experience one or more symptoms like nausea, fatigue, headaches, and confusion. This is because your body is switching from burnings carbs to burning fats. However, once you go through it and start burning fat readily, you become energized and gain more endurance. This is primarily because fats are a better source of energy.
3. You Start Sleeping Better
With all the stress an average person has, it’s often difficult to sleep properly. Well, people who eat keto-friendly foods have reported sleeping better and deeper. During the aforementioned keto flu, you may have bouts of insomnia, or you may not be able to sleep for long hours. However, once you adjust to the change, you will start sleeping deeper and longer. Your relaxation levels will also increase. So what are you waiting for? Get a keto diet for beginners now.
4. Beneficial for PCOS and Type 2 Diabetes
PCOS is a very common hormonal disorder among women, which leads to dysfunction of the ovaries, high levels of male hormones, and polycystic ovaries. A diet that has a high content of carbs can be extremely harmful to such people by causing weight gain as well as certain skin problems.
While not many studies have been conducted on this aspect, in the few studies that have been conducted, it was found that keto foods help in improving a lot of the symptoms of PCOS like the imbalance of hormones, insulin levels while fasting, and weight loss.
Other studies have found the keto diet to be helpful for people with type 2 diabetes as well. This is because lowering the amount of carb intake lowers the blood sugar level of patients. While a keto diet has been helpful, not enough studies have been done to recommend this diet as a treatment for any of them.
Conclusion
While it is trending these days, we recommend you not to blindly start a keto diet. Instead, you should go to a dietician and see if you need it or not. Then you can start working on it. Did you ever try a keto diet? What was your experience like? Do you still follow it? Tell us in the comments section.
Author’s bio: Catherine Wiley is a healthy food enthusiast and fitness instructor from Dorking, UK. She’s been a lifelong student of health and enjoys staying active with her husband, 2 young children, and dog Bentley in the beautiful Surrey Hills countryside.
