Meal Planning is a Must!

DISCLAIMER: I am not a doctor, trainer, or any other kind of professional in regards to a ketogenic diet. Everything you read below is based on my personal research and opinions.

One of the biggest parts of my success has been meal planning.  When I first began this journey I didn’t really meal plan very well.  I just tried to choose things low in carbs.  But my weight loss wasn’t going quite like I wanted.  So I started planning ahead.  What worked for me was to go ahead and fill out the tracker in My Fitness Pal at least a day ahead.  Then I could easily see how many carbs I was going to consume and adjust as needed.  When I started doing this, my weight loss improved.

In addition to planning meals, I started exploring new recipes as well.  At first it was a lot of fun but soon I realized I couldn’t keep that up.  I spent way too much money on new ingredients way too quickly.  Plus I couldn’t realistically make a new recipe every day due to my schedule and having leftovers from previous recipes I needed to eat.  So my biggest advice would be pick one recipe to try once a week.  At least that’s what worked for me.

A word of advice on those new recipes though.  Just because it’s low carb does not mean it’s good for your keto diet.  If you’re following keto, you want low carb/high fat but I found that some of those recipes could be very calorie dense.  Even though you can still lose weight without doing so, I watched my calories as closely as my carbs.  So just beware of some of the high calorie foods out there.  

And finally, be careful of all the low carb dessert recipes you’ll find out there.  They all require some sort of artificial sweeteners.  I’ve discovered that these artificial sweeteners can interfere with my weight loss so I stay away from them.  But that doesn’t stop me from saving them for later when I’m focused on maintenance rather than losing weight.  But even then, they will only be an occasional treat.