Carnivore

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Very low ketones after 2 months strict carnivore (self.carnivore)

submitted 4 months ago by rowinxavier to c/carnivore

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My partner (36 XX) is two months in to very strict carnivore, eating exclusively beef mince and grass fed butter. Total intake is 1-1.5kg been mince and 200-300g butter per day. The only beverage is water or Powerade (sugar free, acesulfame K, sucralose).

Her ketones on a blood meter are consistently low, maxing out at 0.2 mmol/L today. She feels tired, fatigued, and has burning in muscles suggesting lactic acid being elevated.

Just looking to see if anyone has seen something similar and if so what the solution was? Thanks

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[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

When do you measure? If in the morning, low ketone levels can be part of the dawn effect (morning cortisol spike)

Stress can increase blood sugar (our friend cortisol again), if the glucose levels are low, a continuous glucose monitor for two weeks can be helpful in debugging. There are pituitary issues which can keep stress levels high and thus glucose.

Sucralose can trigger a insulation response in some people

If it's important to get the ketone levels up go heavy on the fats, cream cheese, olive oil, bullet proof coffee etc until you get the gki where you need it to be

If it can be tolerated a small water/electrolyte fast will increase ketones, maybe 24-48 hours

From your example diet, some questions:

Are you getting electrolytes in (salt/potassium)?

It isn't nutritionally complete, with just meat and bone broth. Needs fat, and organ meat such as liver, or eggs. Coronometer is a good app that takes your food diary and tells you about your micronutrient coverage.