This update is being made a little earlier than planned, but I have some stuff to update - so may as well!
Diet progress update:
Diet progress
As you can clearly see, I’ve made some changes to the graph since last time… I’ll go through the changes one by one:
End date – There is now an end-date, the end of Christmas. The intention is to transition away from the keto diet at this time and onto a long-term sustainable diet. This may change depending on progress, but for now it’s a pretty good end-date to aim for.
Larger graph – Things were starting to get quite squished over on the X-axis, so I increased the size of the graph. It’s still a little squished but much better.
Logarithmic – I made the Y-axis logarithmic to better display values of interest, especially the smaller values that were much harder to see previously.
Goal tracking – As I now have a goal date and goal weight (more on this later), I can now plot my progress against it. This way I can track whether I am on target to achieve my goal or not.
Now to actually discuss the data in the graph… It’s only been a week since the last update, so don’t expect massive changes!
I have been gradually curving off my calorie and carbohydrate intake, and as a result you can see the moving average beginning to come down as a result. My goal is generally to get this back down to about the 750 - 1000 kcal range.
After adding the goal weight and adjusting my diet progress based on the latest medical scales and the doctor’s - it looks like unless I make some changes I will miss my goal. I have set a series of intermediate goals in order to try and meet my target weight in time:
16/08/2021 – 115kg (I may just about miss this goal, but I am not so concerned as long as I get close.)
01/09/2021 – 110kg
16/09/2021 – 105kg
01/10/2021 – 100kg
16/10/2021 – 95kg
01/11/2021 – 90kg
As you can see, I plan to reach my goal early, as I would really like to eat a proper Christmas dinner this year, rather than some keto substitute. If I do end up going home for Christmas and my Grandmother is cooking a Christmas dinner - there in no hope in hell that I don’t end up eating it. I also want some buffer time to allow for some mishaps along the way, perhaps things don’t go exactly how I hope.
Recap
Now to address some previous points:
Illness – I am mostly over the ear infection now (I hope) and am feeling a lot better, I even have most of my hearing back now! The biggest annoyance for sure was the leaking coming from my ear.
Cramps – The muscle cramps are not really any better, I just got better at avoiding them. Nobody seems to really have any ideas, I’m just a weird case I guess.
Dietitian – I will discuss this briefly shortly…
Keto chocolate – I have been mostly successful in reducing my need for this slowly but surely, especially now that I have managed to reintroduce the protein powder.
Come down plan – After speaking with the Dietitian, I have a better idea of a viable way off this diet now. Again I will discuss this shortly.
Running – I have not made any progress with this. Ironically I wanted to speak to a semi-professional runner today, but due to weather issues we were not bale to meet-up.
And now for the next part!
Social
So again the posts on dead social from the tag #keto…
I have not since purchased the GuyLian chocolate - it tastes seriously good and is much higher in carbs than I am willing to introduce into the diet. But generally, the no/zero sugar chocolate is generally a bad idea anyway.
As for the almonds, they are now finished and I do not plan to buy any more. They were insanely high in fat and offered little protein. Their biggest sin was the “fullness” they offered per calorie - one 40g serving simply wasn’t sufficient.
One of the many benefits of the keto diet has been my cognitive function gain - I haven’t been able to think this clearly in years. I am very happy to keep getting sharper and sharper. It’s not yet consistent, but I suspect this is partially the result of how much energy I happen to have at the time due to intake and exertion.
So I had the crazy idea of creating a keto icecream from scratch… I have been buying the ISO tubs for a while, but they are at least $10 a tub and it was getting expensive.
Meanwhile I had vanilla protein shake just sitting there, that I really should have been consuming. What if there was a way to solve both problems?
After some practice, I think I have a reasonably good keto icecream solution. Current it consists of:
4x ice cubes (start crystal structures)
4x stevia sweetener sachets (lower freezing temperature to better form smooth crystals)
2x scoops diet vanilla whey protein (main body of keto icecream)
250ml unsweetened almond milk (add some fat and protein)
I then blend the mixture to within an inch of its life and throw in the freezer for 8-10 hours.
I would normally create a section for medical updates, but there really isn’t so much to this. The session was for an entire hour and not too much came from it.
Going in I though they would spend the entire time telling me I was doing everything wrong, when in actual fact it ended up being the opposite. I spent the first 30 minutes or so explaining the keto diet to the two dietitians, after which they essentially said: “We don’t normally recommend the keto diet for people to do, but as it’s working for you, we recommend you stay on it”.
One decent aspect did come out of it though - I did like the goal they suggested. 90kg means that based on my height, my BMI will be 30, which goes from morbidly obese to obese. The joke is, I don’t consider myself to currently be morbidly obese, i.e. at risk of death in the near future. My health records from the last update suggest that I’m perfectly healthy.
Anyway, by the time I’m down to 90kg, I think I will be in very good shape.
Next Steps
And now for the next steps:
Running – I really need to start running soon if I plan to reach my goal. 10kg a month is no easy feat, especially as I have already deviated from my goal. To achieve this, I need to increase the amount of calories my body consumes.
Calorie reduction – As I said in the beginning, I need to get my calories down from approximately 1250 kcal down to about 750 kcal again. I will need to go back to one main meal plus a small snack. This will be much easier now that I have created a lightweight protein snack icecream.
Coffee Space 
Social
So again the posts on dead social from the tag
#keto…I have not since purchased the GuyLian chocolate - it tastes seriously good and is much higher in carbs than I am willing to introduce into the diet. But generally, the no/zero sugar chocolate is generally a bad idea anyway.
As for the almonds, they are now finished and I do not plan to buy any more. They were insanely high in fat and offered little protein. Their biggest sin was the “fullness” they offered per calorie - one 40g serving simply wasn’t sufficient.
One of the many benefits of the keto diet has been my cognitive function gain - I haven’t been able to think this clearly in years. I am very happy to keep getting sharper and sharper. It’s not yet consistent, but I suspect this is partially the result of how much energy I happen to have at the time due to intake and exertion.
So I had the crazy idea of creating a keto icecream from scratch… I have been buying the ISO tubs for a while, but they are at least $10 a tub and it was getting expensive.
Meanwhile I had vanilla protein shake just sitting there, that I really should have been consuming. What if there was a way to solve both problems?
After some practice, I think I have a reasonably good keto icecream solution. Current it consists of:
I then blend the mixture to within an inch of its life and throw in the freezer for 8-10 hours.
I would normally create a section for medical updates, but there really isn’t so much to this. The session was for an entire hour and not too much came from it.
Going in I though they would spend the entire time telling me I was doing everything wrong, when in actual fact it ended up being the opposite. I spent the first 30 minutes or so explaining the keto diet to the two dietitians, after which they essentially said: “We don’t normally recommend the keto diet for people to do, but as it’s working for you, we recommend you stay on it”.
One decent aspect did come out of it though - I did like the goal they suggested. 90kg means that based on my height, my BMI will be 30, which goes from morbidly obese to obese. The joke is, I don’t consider myself to currently be morbidly obese, i.e. at risk of death in the near future. My health records from the last update suggest that I’m perfectly healthy.
Anyway, by the time I’m down to 90kg, I think I will be in very good shape.