How I Did Keto On A Budget
The Ketogenic Diet on a Budget
When I launched into months of research it was to find a natural way of healing or dealing with rheumatoid arthritis. I was already on a low carbohydrate diet; one that I composed myself, where any carbs that I took in were vegetable carbs in potatoes and its cousin's sweet potato, and cassava. Any others were extremely small amounts of whole wheat and rice.
Pushed into a Keto diet as a recourse to a life with less pain and symptoms of Rheumatoid Arthritis, I was quite skeptical, as I am of all diets, because they start out as the newest, best thing and then fall flat of the predicted results; some, with their powders, pills, and shakes causing irreparable damage to one's health.
Well, little did I know that the Ketogenic diet in a place called Ceylon (Sri Lanka) would be a rather interesting experience.
How I Came Across the Keto Diet
I decided that research was the first step and that’s what I did. I found that there wasn’t much that could be done clinically for Rheumatoid Arthritis and in Ceylon, even less. I then switched to researching natural forms of pain and inflammation relief and found Naturopathy… the practice of an alternative form of medicine that uses natural remedies to treat the cause of illness. Having no Naturopath in Ceylon; I did what I could on my own and received some relief for a few years. But I knew, the time was coming when my form of “Naturopathy” would not work.
So, I continued to search and stumbled on the Ketogenic diet for RA. Little by little I began to understand the idea behind it and the scientific research being conducted on it as a cure for cancer, autoimmune diseases, diabetes, and others. It was too staggering to ignore. Being a strong believer in a creator, I could also see how perfect the design of the creator was.
I did eight months of research before I came to the conclusion that I wanted to try it. It took another month for me to decide to get started. Keto was definitely for me!
What is Keto?
The Ketogenic diet is a diet that causes the body to run on ketones instead of sugar from carbohydrates and sugary food. It requires consuming a very low amount of carbohydrates (20% of the diet for rheumatoid arthritis) and replacing the rest with High-fat foods. This reduction in carbs puts the body into a metabolic state known as Ketosis; in which the body burns fat for fuel instead of carbs and by turning fat into Ketones the liver supplies energy for the brain.
Many important studies have shown that this type of diet helps you lose weight and has health benefits against cancer, diabetes, Alzheimer’s disease, epilepsy, and auto-immune disease; to name only a few. It can also significantly reduce cholesterol, blood sugar, and insulin levels.
The standard Keto diet is a very low carbohydrate, moderate protein, and high-fat diet. It typically contains 70% fat, 20% protein (3-6 oz), and only 10% clean and other carbs (carbs from vegetables).
What Can You Eat on Keto?
Good question. Quite a bit as it turns out.
Healthy fat which includes olive oil, coconut oil, bacon, butter, full cream milk, cheese, and avocado.
Healthy protein includes salmon and pretty much any fatty fish, lobsters, prawns, shrimp, calamari, and crabs that are not farmed, beef with the fat, eggs, lamb, pork with the fat, and nuts.
Healthy carbs are the carbs of green and leafy green vegetables, cruciferous vegetables, and berries (60-70g).
The healthy drinks are lemon water, herbal tea, bone broth, apple cider vinegar in water, almond milk, and coffee (1 cup a day)
Things to avoid on Keto
Avoid all pasta, whole and refined wheat flour and grains, rice, tubers, and yams like potatoes, artificial sweeteners, agave syrup, refined sugar, corn, and corn flour and flakes.
Avoid alcohol, coconut water, fruit juice from a carton, and any percentage of fat-free or skimmed milk.
My First Keto Shopping Trip.
The first thing I learned on my first Keto shopping trip was that the Keto diet in Ceylon was something almost no one had heard of. Those who have, laugh at it because the people of Ceylon still believe that fat is bad for your health and almost everything ‘healthy” is fat-free.
I likewise learned that “Organic” was only a word for; what Sri Lankans call organic is farmed with something called “nature identical” fertilizer… so, not organic; and incredibly expensive.
I soon realized that most foods in Ceylon were not up to real Keto standards and a lot of the food, supplements, and condiments were not available in the country. Then too, the fruit and vegetables are not harvested at the right time for them but often before they are ready for harvest rendering some toxic, and others flavorless and just plain disappointing.
My first week on Keto
As it turned out that was pretty limited. My plate consisted of a combination of cabbage, carrots, tomato, and cucumber for veg; pork, chicken, or wild-caught fish and its cousins for protein and fat; and peanuts and seeds made up the deficient rest.
There was zero sugar or refined or whole grains. There was no nutritional yeast, or fancy formulas that seem to be the “must buy” recommendations of the experts. None of these things were available and the “experts” don’t ship to Sri Lanka.
How on earth was I going to keep this up for the four months it took to effect RA.
Four Months Later…
It took a lot of willpower; however, keep it up I did; and I enjoyed it too! I even reaped the rewards.
Today I am pain-free 95% of the time and inflammation is down by 80%- 90% percent.
Would I Continue?
Limited though it is, yes I would. I would rather enjoy my food than pop any pills. and the occasional cheat day doesn't matter as long as I exercise self-control and don't overload.
So, friends, I invite questions, if you have any. I will answer them in a future post. In my next article, I will talk about why; even though I chose Keto for myself and it worked well, the average Keto diet is not as user-friendly as all the experts say; with a few tips on how I made it work for me.
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