Detox? I Am Going Keto – Trialling A Ketogenic Diet

Happy New Year and welcome to 2015! It is that time of the year when all the adverts on television are for diet plans and workout gear. When the hoards of ‘new year, new you!’ resolutions flood our social media accounts and people vow to be a different person.

I have to admit I have always been a resolution’s type of person. I love a challenge and there is no better time to think about things you want to improve about yourself than a new year. That hasn’t changed but what has changed is my outlook. They aren’t new year’s resolutions for me this time around, they are small steps to me being the best version of me that I can be. And you know what? If I ‘fail’ at any point, I’ll jump back up and start again. Because that is the problem with making new year’s resolutions for me. Once I fail that’s it, I fail entirely. This time I’ll be working on achieving my goals throughout 2015 and beyond.

The first of my goals is to get to a healthy weight. This has been a challenge of mine for as long as I can remember but I finally got the motivation when I started working out with John Preston last year. I well and truly fell off the wagon when I returned from my road trip but I’m back training and was considering a detox. You know the one, where you eat nothing and drink juices every day in a bid to cleanse your liver of all the alcohol you have abused it with over the festive period. The various companies selling these detox plans promise you can lose an obscene amount of weight within a few weeks and this where the cracks start to show. If you reduce your calorie intake so drastically, surely the minute you start eating real food again the ‘weight’ you have lost will go back on? And that in itself can only have a negative impact on your metabolism, energy levels and body functions.

Your body was designed to detox itself, that’s what your liver and kidneys do. It is a pretty clever thing really which is why we need to look after it and you can do that without going on some fad diet. I can tell I’ve not been eating the best. I’m tired, sluggish, can’t lift anywhere near as heavy as I used to in the gym and my skin is really sensitive.  That changes now and I’m going Keto.

By cutting the majority of carbohydrates from your diet the body is forced to go into ketosis, therefore, using fat for energy instead. You could say this is a form of Atkins diet and in many ways it is, the difference is I won’t be eliminating all fruit and vegetables from my diet nor will I be guzzling on endless amounts of high fat food. In fact there are lots of research studies to suggest a ketogenic diet can also help people who suffer from epilepsy and diabetes.

For me my detox will be sticking to a ketogenic diet for 10 days and that means eating the following foods:

Meat, poultry and seafood
Healthy fats such as coconut oil and olive oil
Oily fish
Nut butters such as cashew and almond
Green leafy vegetables
Berries (not too many due to the natural sugar content)
Eggs
Avocado
Feta and goats cheese
Cottage cheese
Nuts such as cashew and pistachio

After my 10 day ketogenic detox I’ll be introducing some sweet potato, none-dairy milk and more vegetables adding more of a paleo style to my diet. I can’t wait to get stuck into my new paleo recipe books and will share these with you on Twitter and Instagram. Make sure you follow if you want some inspiration and make yourself known so I can be inspired too.

What are you doing to get in shape in 2015? I’d love to hear your resolutions.

This post is completely my own thoughts and opinions. Please make sure you seek medical advice before embarking on a diet or detox programme.