After my own personal struggles with maintaining my weight and yo-yo dieting, I was recommended the keto way of eating by a friend. After spending two years researching products that were low-carb and keto and the benefits of eating this way, I understood the impact sugar and gluten was having on my mental and gut-health. I knew this was the right lifestyle choice to get my body and mind back to optimum health.
After embarking on this new lifestyle with my husband-to-be, we both noticed the positive changes on both a physical and mental level and since then. In fact, I am so passionate about the benefits of a low carb and keto lifestyle that in 2021, I launched HEYLO, to help make this lifestyle choice easily accessible for all.
What Is A Low Carb, Keto Lifestyle?
A ketogenic (keto) diet is a low-carb, moderate protein, higher-fat diet that can help you burn fat more effectively. Unlike other low-carb diets, which focus on protein, a true ketogenic diet centres on fat, which supplies as much as 90% of the daily calories.
What Are The Benefits?
One of the main reasons people, including myself, embark of a low carb, keto lifestyle is because of the initial weight loss and the ability to maintain your ideal weight. Once starting, people begin to experience the other benefits and it is often those benefits that influence the decision to follow the lifestyle.
Eating a low-carb, keto diet helps to maintain your weight without restricting you to a ‘diet’. It helped me break the yo-yo dieting pattern and has helped thousands of others break this habit too. In addition to the weight management benefit, embracing a low carb, keto lifestyle comes with loads of other health benefits too including:
- Reduce your hunger
- Control your sugar addiction
- Improve your clarity of thought and get rid of daily brain fog
- Better sleep
The Top Tips:
My top tip for anybody trying to maintain, or lose, weight is to not become too focused on the scales. Many of us have a habit of weighing ourselves weekly, or sometimes even daily, and this can be damaging to our journey. We can become obsessed with the number on the scale and if we don’t like the numbers staring back at us, we can quickly fall into old yoyo habits and stop the cycle of a positive lifestyle change.
It’s equally as important for us to celebrate the non-scale victories as these will help us focus on the long-term benefit and goals rather than just the immediate ones. Whilst you may not have shifted an extra pound this week, you may have dropped a dress size, or you may have had the best night’s sleep you’ve had in months.
Before making the change to a keto lifestyle, try and promise yourself that you will make a 12-week commitment. This gives you the best chance at getting your body into tip-top, fat-burning condition. Then it’s up to you if you decide to stay “keto” or move into more of a low-carb lifestyle. For your first keto week, start things off nice and simply. To enter a keto state, try to consume no more than 20g net carbs each day.
UK food labels already show net carbs and whilst following keto, you can eat anything containing 5g or less of carbohydrate per 100g total weight. If it says “polyols”, you can subtract these as they are sugar alcohols and the body doesn’t use them. Keep your fats nice and clean which means no seed oils such as rapeseed and sunflower and yes to olive oil, coconut oil, mct oil, avocado oil and even nut oils.
Whilst transitioning, you can still drink sugar free fizzy drinks but as time goes on try to use these as a treat rather than an everyday occurrence as they don’t have the best effect on your gut. Instead, make the swap to fizzy water with sugar-free cordial or a slice of lemon and/or lime. In the beginning, you may experience constipation as your body adjusts. Apple cider vinegar in the morning and some chai or flaxseeds in a smoothie or Greek yogurt will help to get things moving again. If you are hungry, eat and when you feel full, just stop. It’s equally important to not starve yourself as it is to not overeat.
Now I’ve shared my top tips what changes are you going to make today?
Love to hear how you get on leave me a comment and together we’ll make that healthy difference…
About The Author
Heidi Normanton is the Founder of HEYLO and is on a mission to help transform the lives of thousands of women by helping to make low carb and keto food and drink products easily accessible for all.
Heidi launched HEYLO in March 2021 after discovering the physical and mental health benefits of following a low carb and keto lifestyle.
Heidi is passionate about only offering the best products, and advice, to her customers and is dedicated to always delivering excellence whether this be through food and drink products or outstanding customer service.
To find out more visit: http://www.weareheylo.com
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