Trendy ketones supplement

There is a magic fix. It's called keto and it's free.

So, my (probably flawed) understanding is that a low carb intake triggers the body to start breaking down fat into ketones to fuel metabolic processes, rather than using glucose, and giving us all the assorted benefits of that from low blood sugar to weight loss etc etc.

Logically then, adding in ketones would mean that your body wouldn’t need to do as much fat breakdown and the benefits would not accrue. Surely it’s counterproductive and entirely unnecessary?

Sprocket 2 said:

But they have "celebrities" endorsing it so it must be true! Will admit part of me wanted to believe the hype even though I knew it was rubbish. Perils of being trapped in a plastic apron staring at yourself in a mirror for an hour

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What is it?
The infamous "raspberry ketones" scam or something else?

People often refer to the side effects of the keto diet as the “keto flu.” Those beginning this diet may experience: headaches, fatigue, trouble sleeping, problems with concentration, nausea, dizziness, stomach cramps or aches.
Certain supplements, such as electrolytes -magnesium, potassium, chloride, phosphorus, and sodium, digestive enzymes, and L-theanine, may help minimize these symptoms. Maybe that's what she was talking about.

Sprocket 2 said:

She was adamant she was drinking keytones..and had added water and extra salt to her diet to counteract the flu side effects

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The water and salt help with the keto flu. Exogenous Ketones appear to be a keto diet supplement also. Item number 6. Not that I've heard of it before.

https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/best-keto-supplements#section6

Sprocket 2 said:

I wasn't sure I should mention what it was on here. Begins with P and callum best promotes it

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Luckily I'd never heard of him although the name of the product now sounds familiar.
As most who indulge in ketogenic eating know exogenous ketones lead to very expensive wee.
If you aren't in ketosis then your body won't use them and they'll be excreted. Except in very specific cases (like treating people with dementia and Alzheimers) they aren't recommended and at that price! I'll just carry on making my own for free.

Edit to add if she's already in ketosis by eating fewer than 20g of carbs per day then it becomes even more expensive wee.. still her pee sticks will be a lovely purple colour!

isnt Callum Best son of the more famous George?
(Sorry for off track .

TeddyTottie said:

So, my (probably flawed) understanding is that a low carb intake triggers the body to start breaking down fat into ketones to fuel metabolic processes, rather than using glucose, and giving us all the assorted benefits of that from low blood sugar to weight loss etc etc.

Logically then, adding in ketones would mean that your body wouldn’t need to do as much fat breakdown and the benefits would not accrue. Surely it’s counterproductive and entirely unnecessary?

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Could the same be said with MCT oil? Or an obese person eating fat in general? I’ve considered trying MCT, just haven’t

Keto only costs me what it costs in food at the supermarket.... I wouldn't waste money on a ketone supplement. It makes no sense to me.

Sprocket 2 said:

Who wouldnt love a magic fix!

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My magic fix was simply cutting right down on carbs for a while - it works a treat, and as @Tophat1900 says didn't cost me a penny extra...

When I first starting aiming for ketosis I wondered why my Ketostix weren't that lovely purple, until I understood I was actually using those ketones instead of wastefully weeing them out.

Robbity said:

My magic fix was simply cutting right down on carbs for a while - it works a treat, and as @Tophat1900 says didn't cost me a penny extra...

When I first starting aiming for ketosis I wondered why my Ketostix weren't that lovely purple, until I understood I was actually using those ketones instead of wastefully weeing them out.

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Wee-stix are not as useful to show diet effectiveness. A bgl meter that reads ketones is a better indication of a ketotic state since it monitors what is in the bloodstream rather than being in excess wee. Also the stix are not very sensitive, and a purple colour may just be excess diet ketones, but could also be an indication of other health problems such as approaching DKA. You would not be able to tell from stix alone, but with a meter they suggest any reading above 4 mmol is possible cause for concern, although DKA is usually much higher (10+).. But I note that the NHS advice is that any reading above 3.0 should be treated as DKA and requires immediate medical assistance. I think this difference is to allow for those taking an SGLT-2 inhibitor drug can also register as DKA at the lower bgl levels that can happen.

This may help (or confuse):
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5734222/

LaoDan said:

Could the same be said with MCT oil? Or an obese person eating fat in general? I’ve considered trying MCT, just haven’t

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You know, I do believe in energy input vs. energy consumption as an overall mechanism affecting body weight, but crucially, within the context of a very low carb diet. Of course, if a person’s metabolic processes are dysfunctional and they have insulin resistance , for example, then there are other factors affecting the normal storage and release of energy which muddies the water.

So provided one has addressed the carb issue and is dealing with insulin resistance on a daily basis, what else is there to dictate as to whether ones loses/gains/maintains weight? Surely it has to be an excess of fuel. So the net effect would be the delta between the energy I consume as food and the energy my body need to function; if I eat less energy than is required then presumably my body utilises stored fat to make up the deficit.

However I don’t know the detail of that mechanism and this is just my impression from my research so far. Please let me know if anyone knows that different mechanisms are at play, I would like to understand this, when so many of our friends on this forum are adamant that ‘calories in, calories out’ is a total fallacy. I find it confusing, especially when still others advise to ‘eat more fat’ when a person doesn’t wish to lose weight on LCHF.

As for supplements, I think you do have to consider them within the framework of your overall diet. Most of them are consumed in very small amounts as compared to the whole of the diet so I expect their impact is fairly negligible.

The point I was trying to make about ketones is that they are end product, not an ingredient. So by supplying them to the body I would think that one is hijacking the very process that one is trying to enhance. Much like trying to support job creation in a luxury cake factory by buying in the Mr Kipling’s to sell instead ...

And there was I thinking Raspberry Pi was a computer. Silly Billy, moi.

To my mind it is quite clear that external ketones do not trigger dietary ketosis since it is blood glucose levels and adrenaline that control it. As pointed out it is the burning of lipid fatty acids that generate ketones as a waste product, and we do not actually burn ketones as fuel. So yes, expensive wee and harder working kidneys to boot.