Macro is short for macronutrient which are Protein, Fat and Carbohydrates and when you’re following this lifestyle, you will often keep track of these, especially the carbohydrates which must be kept very low (less than 20-30 grams/day for most of us) in order to stay in ketosis.
Calories of course are a measure of how much food energy our body requires throughout the day, which honestly, is different for everyone and can vary for each of us day to day so I encourage you to become in tune with your body, eat when you’re hungry (there are days when I just can’t get enough food) and don’t eat when you’re not (I also have days that I can go all day without wanting a thing).
If you haven’t calculated your own macros before, than try out this Macro Calculator by Ketogains. I also use My Fitness Pal on my phone for tracking my daily food intake.
After doing this, you may find that you’re eating way too much during the day, or way too little, as can be the problem for women when dieting. Their body adapts to such a low calorie diet that they have no room to drop them anymore. You may actually need to begin to increase your calories in order for your body to begin burning fat again. Check out this article on Reverse Dieting at Bodybuilding.com to find out more!
Protein
Protein is important during weight loss and in general. You want to try and follow the Macro calculator’s recommendations for protein pretty closely. If you’re a guy who is bodybuilding, you are going to need more protein than a woman who has a desk job and doesn’t exercise much, but both need that protein equally as much, as it helps to build and repair our body. I love steak and fatty cuts of meat, so I find it quite easy to get the protein that I need in my diet but if you’re having a hard time, try adding in some eggs or even a low carb protein powder mixed in water.
So, if you find that you are not getting enough protein in your diet, make a conscious effort to increase it for a week to your recommended amount and see if that makes a difference. On the flip side, if you’re over doing it on the protein, that also may be an issue for some people and you can try to cut back on your protein a bit, adding in more low glycemic vegetables like cabbage, broccoli and cauliflower to see if that makes a difference.
Fat
If you’re part of any of the low carb chat groups online than you will understand that ‘fat is your lever’. What is meant by this, is that this is the Macro that you can ‘play around with’ to see what works for you.Generally, when you first start out eating low carb, I would encourage you to enjoy all the fat you want, in order to keep you full and satisfied and ditch those initials carb cravings. Once you’ve gotten the hang of things though (2-4 weeks in) and if you have quite a bit of body fat, then you may want to decrease the amount of fat that you’re eating to a moderate amount.
If you’ve found yourself falling into the trap of adding lots of fat to your coffee, eating fat bombs all day and slathering everything on your plate in butter then you may want to start tracking that to see whether the amount of fat in your diet is causing your stall but don’t eliminate fat all together, fat is important in keeping our metabolic hormones running so we still need some. Try to get your fat from fatty meats, avocados and eggs. If you’re eating too much fat, cut out the extra fat coming from dairy and salad dressings.
Carbohydrates
Carbohydrate is the one macronutrient that our bodies can produce on its own so we don’t need to worry about consuming enough. What we do need to worry about is consuming too much, or more than we can burn through physical exercise. If you’re on a ketogenic diet than you already are keeping track of this macro but if not, you may want to start tracking, just to see how many carbs you’re actually consuming because they are in almost everything processed and can easily sneak up on you. Try cutting out all processed foods if you find this to be the case.And remember, when eating vegetables which contain carbohydrates, you can subtract the amount of fiber grams from the total carbohydrates to give you the net carbs which is what you want to track.
If you haven’t calculated your own macros before, than try out this Macro Calculator by Ketogains. I also use My Fitness Pal on my phone for tracking my daily food intake.
After doing this, you may find that you’re eating way too much during the day, or way too little, as can be the problem for women when dieting. Their body adapts to such a low calorie diet that they have no room to drop them anymore. You may actually need to begin to increase your calories in order for your body to begin burning fat again. Check out this article on Reverse Dieting at Bodybuilding.com to find out more!
Protein
Protein is important during weight loss and in general. You want to try and follow the Macro calculator’s recommendations for protein pretty closely. If you’re a guy who is bodybuilding, you are going to need more protein than a woman who has a desk job and doesn’t exercise much, but both need that protein equally as much, as it helps to build and repair our body. I love steak and fatty cuts of meat, so I find it quite easy to get the protein that I need in my diet but if you’re having a hard time, try adding in some eggs or even a low carb protein powder mixed in water.
So, if you find that you are not getting enough protein in your diet, make a conscious effort to increase it for a week to your recommended amount and see if that makes a difference. On the flip side, if you’re over doing it on the protein, that also may be an issue for some people and you can try to cut back on your protein a bit, adding in more low glycemic vegetables like cabbage, broccoli and cauliflower to see if that makes a difference.
Fat
If you’re part of any of the low carb chat groups online than you will understand that ‘fat is your lever’. What is meant by this, is that this is the Macro that you can ‘play around with’ to see what works for you.Generally, when you first start out eating low carb, I would encourage you to enjoy all the fat you want, in order to keep you full and satisfied and ditch those initials carb cravings. Once you’ve gotten the hang of things though (2-4 weeks in) and if you have quite a bit of body fat, then you may want to decrease the amount of fat that you’re eating to a moderate amount.
If you’ve found yourself falling into the trap of adding lots of fat to your coffee, eating fat bombs all day and slathering everything on your plate in butter then you may want to start tracking that to see whether the amount of fat in your diet is causing your stall but don’t eliminate fat all together, fat is important in keeping our metabolic hormones running so we still need some. Try to get your fat from fatty meats, avocados and eggs. If you’re eating too much fat, cut out the extra fat coming from dairy and salad dressings.
Carbohydrates
Carbohydrate is the one macronutrient that our bodies can produce on its own so we don’t need to worry about consuming enough. What we do need to worry about is consuming too much, or more than we can burn through physical exercise. If you’re on a ketogenic diet than you already are keeping track of this macro but if not, you may want to start tracking, just to see how many carbs you’re actually consuming because they are in almost everything processed and can easily sneak up on you. Try cutting out all processed foods if you find this to be the case.And remember, when eating vegetables which contain carbohydrates, you can subtract the amount of fiber grams from the total carbohydrates to give you the net carbs which is what you want to track.
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