Keto Flu Symptoms Prevention – Practical Guide

Keto flu treatment or preventing keto flu symptoms simply require basic knowledge and awareness. But if they are not taken seriously they can make you feel miserable. The quick and simple way to remedy the keto flu symptoms is electrolyte supplementation. Continue reading to know more about how to prevent keto flu symptoms in this practical guide.

<img src="https://healthmonastery.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/4f9c7-15d2df47-2e2c-4527-951e-2a0ab8681f3b.png?w=1024&h=576&quot; alt="

Important Steps On How to Prevent Keto Flu Symptoms:

1. Drink Plenty Of Water

Staying hydrated is the key to keep keto flu symptoms at bay. Adequate water intake is crucial, especially when you are restricting carbs. If you don’t drink enough water, keto diet can make you dehydrated quickly.

It just take 2% water loss of your body weight to hamper normal physiological functions and only 2.8% of your body weight to impair cognitive function. Your body is more susceptible to this sort of water loss during the initial five days of commencement of the keto diet.

Recommendation On Daily Water Intake (Females)

• Drink 2 – 3 liters of water per day

Recommendation For Daily Water Intake (Males)

• Drink 2.5 – 3.5 liters of water per day

During the first five days of the keto diet, monitor your weight everyday to see how much weight you lost. For each pound you lose, add an extra 15 ounces of water to your baseline of water intake for the day. This additional water intake is required just during the first five days on the ketogenic diet.

2. Supplement Your Diet With Electrolytes

With ketogenic diet there is a decrease in insulin hormone levels. This decline in insulin results in depletion of sodium and potassium from the body at a much faster rate. This results in headache, lightheadedness, fatigue, constipation, and muscle cramps.

To make sure adequate intake of potassium, include coconut water, green leafy vegetables like spinach and avocados in your daily diet as your body adapts to ketosis. Also sprinkle some salt on every meal and in your water to replenish your sodium levels as well.

Some certified dietitians even recommend up to 5 to 7 grams of salt per day during first few days of starting keto diet.

Another important mineral is magnesium which can make transition through ketosis a bit comfortable. Although magnesium loss is not significant like sodium and potassium, while you are on strict keto diet, but it’s replenishment is vital to prevent and treat cramps, improve sleep quality, and increase insulin sensitivity.

To ensure adequate intake of magnesium, make sure you add some almonds, spinach and pumpkin seeds to your keto diet. However it’s advisable to use supplements for adequate replacement. Magnesium citrate is the best pick as it gets absorbed well. Some of you might experience it’s mild laxative effect.

Nutshell is to make sure that you have at least a teaspoon of salt per day and supplement your diet with potassium and magnesium to minimize the effects of keto flu symptoms.

Recommended Doses of Minerals:

Sodium

• 5 to 7 grams of unrefined salt per day

Potassium

• 3,500 mg per day for people ages 16 and up

Magnesium

• For men: ~400 mg per day
• For women: ~310 mg per day

Is Bone Broth Useful in Keto Flu Symptoms Prevention ?

Nutritional comparison among vegetable broth and bone broth showed the content of potassium to be 3 times higher and of magnesium to be 5 times higher than bone broth.

But instead of spending several hours making the broth, it’s advisable to prepare a fresh salad containing spinach, pumpkin seeds and avocado. Don not forget to use nutritional supplements to meet your nutritional requirements.

3. Ensure Adequate Fat Intake

Giving ample amount of fat is the right way to help your body adapt to keto diet. Fat provides the liver cells with acetyl-CoA which is metabolized and ketone synthesis occur.

Fat bombs (Delicious ketogenic ingredient combination which can be consumed as a snack or as a substitute to proper meal) are the easiest way of adding more fat to your diet.

Most fats are not utilized as fuel directly, especially during the first few days of carbohydrate restriction. In fact, animal fats from meat and dairy have to go all the way through your lymphatic system to your heart, muscle cells, and fat cells before they reach the liver.

Only once they get to the liver can they be used to produce ketones. By that time, the protein from your meal may be providing your body with the energy substrates it needs, making ketosis unnecessary.

PS: THIS IS ONE OF THE IMPORTANT HACK FOR ADAPTING TO KETO DIET: Supplement your diet with medium chain triglycerides (MCT) oil. MCT oil is medium chain triglycerides, these are a type of saturated fat that go straight to the liver after digestion. Once in the liver, they replace proteins to be used as fuel and can be converted into ketones there by initiating the process of ketosis.

MCT oil can help you become keto-adapted more quickly and efficiently than any other type of fat. MCT oil addition has seen to alleviate the keto flu significantly in majority of the ketoers along with right type of exercise.

4. Start You Day With Low Intensity Workout

Once you wake up, grab a water bottle and add a pinch of salt, and go for a long walk. Target to walk for about an hour at a conversational pace at which you can talk comfortably without feeling out of breath.

As you continue walking you should feel better and better and more and more awake. This is a form of low-intensity exercise that will help increase fat burning and kickstart ketosis. This process minimizes the chances of developing keto flu symptoms.

While walking make sure you stay hydrated properly all the time. You may feel worse if you are dehydrated or low on electrolytes.

5. Stay Stress Free

When you first start the ketogenic, you may be more stressed and irritable than usual. This is might be because your cortisol levels are a bit higher than normal.

To help reduce your cortisol levels and improve your sense of well-being, it is may be helpful to implement a daily meditation practice.

For 15 minutes every day, simply sit in silence and take long, slow, and deep breaths. If you have a thought or urge to do something, then shift your focus back to your breath. That’s meditation in its simplest form.

The goal of meditation is not to be thoughtless, it is to come back to your breath when you have a thought. This is how you train your mind to be less reactive, so that life is less stressful.

You can also use meditation apps to help you develop the habit of meditation.

6. Sound Sleep Is Vital

Good sleep is the best stress buster. Adequate and sound sleep is essential for ketoers. Lack of sleep causes cortisol levels to increase, making the keto flu worse and adapting to keto diet more difficult.

Try to get atleast 8 hours of sleep daily, and if you feel drained during the day, a quick 30 min nap is the solution. Avoid consumption of caffeine in the afternoon as it will make it more difficult to fall asleep at a reasonable time.

Stay away from your mobile while in bed and turn off all the lights. Use that 30 minutes to relax and meditate. This will help turn the switch from work mode to sleep mode.

You can also try magnesium supplements to help improve sleep quality, to increase sleep time, sleep efficiency, and melatonin levels in older adults with insomnia.

Thanks For Reading!!!

Some Must Reads:

1. 10 Symptoms And Signs Of Ketosis
2. Ketogenic Diet: An Introduction
3. Health Benefits Of Ketogenic Diet
4. Ketogenic Diet Chart: What To Eat And What Not To Eat