“NEW YEAR, NEW ME”: Will every year’s motto be like that? 

Justine Mae A. Membrido, RND 

Every New Year, you must have heard the statement “I am going to eat healthy and start going to the gym more” from your friends or even yourself. You’ve wanted to change your lifestyle for a long time but you don’t know where to start.

You must have been looking and trying all possible home workouts to lose weight. Even considered enrolling to a gym nearby, maybe? You must also been looking for a shortcut to shed those pounds and unwanted fats (especially in your belly area :))

You’ve searched tons and tons of pages in the internet, looking for diets that can help you improve your health and well-being. At some point in time, you must have come across to certain diets called Paleo Diet and the Ketogenic Diet. You must have been asking, “What’s the difference?” “Is it really effective?” “Will this improve my well-being?” 

Today, we will take a closer look at these meal plans, discuss their differences and similarities, which may help you decide on what is best for you and your needs. 

  

THE PALEO DIET  

Also known as Caveman Diet, the Paleo Diet, has been a very popular diet in the United States and some European countries over the years. It is a dietary plan based on foods similar to what might the people in the Paleolithic Era (about 2.5 million years ago) have been consuming.  

This Paleo Diet usually includes lean meat, fish, and eggs as protein sources; fruits and vegetables such as sweet potatoes as carbohydrate, vitamins and minerals sources; nuts and seeds as fat and other nutrient sources. These food items are obtained by hunting and gathering during the era. Dairy products, legumes, and grains are usually avoided in the diet because these are food items that became common when farming, a method of food production, emerged about 10,000 years ago.  

The Paleo Diet aims to bring people to eat the way nature intended, the way our hunter-gatherer ancestors used to eat. It conditions your body to crave and choose foods high in several nutrients and void processed sugars and other items that can cause inflammation in the body. It isn’t about shedding pounds to look better naked. It also isn’t about just calorie counting BUT calorie counting and regarding the sources of the calories. The whole diet is about a full life, holistic approach that can help you get rid of unwanted fat, and cleanses the body of built up toxins.  

 

THE KETOGENIC DIET 

Quite contrary to the modern perception of Ketogenic Diet for weight loss, Ketogenic Diet has been used for quite a long time in Medical Nutrition Therapy for epileptic patients specifically for patients unresponsive to medication. The Ketogenic Diet, also known as Keto Diet, is a high fat, low carbohydrate diet requiring careful measurements of calories, fluids, and protein. 

The Ketogenic Diet usually contains high fat meat such as pork and fatty fishes as protein and fat sources, avocadoes, nuts, oils as fat sources, and green leafy vegetables as vitamins, minerals, and carbohydrate sources. Its main goal is to enter ketosis – a metabolic state in which the body relies on fat for energy, once adapted. In ketosis, ketones are produced in the liver which is used as fuel for energy production by muscle and brain cells.  

Keto diet promises instant weight loss because at the start of the diet, the glycogen (glucose stores) in your liver together with water weight are the first things that gets lost. Moreover, since about 75% of the diet is mostly fat, you will feel less hungry, thus eating less. Fat promotes the feeling of satiety meaning, it makes you feel full immediately. Careful calorie counting is important in the diet as you should be able to reach the ketosis state and to become really fat adapted for continuous weight loss. The importance of calorie counting is highlighted in a sense that your intake is equal to the calories your body actually burns so you wouldn’t gain weight.  

 

PALEO AND KETO, CAN THEY GO TOGETHER? 

Is it possible to go Paleo and Keto at the same time? YES. Paleo and Keto can go together! Following the principles of the Paleo Diet – all natural, dairy, legume, and grain free, it is another way to go keto. With healthy oils such as olive, coconut, and sesame oil used in Paleo-Keto Diet, it is ensured that there is no spike in LDL or bad cholesterol in the blood. Also, since chemically processed foods are a big NO-NO in a Paleo diet, intake of added and hidden sugars and salt are avoided in a Paleo-Keto Diet. Intake of a lot of sugars can disrupt the mechanism in a fat adopted body. In a Paleo-Keto Diet, inflammatory foods and processed foods are eliminated, thus hormones are stabilized and balanced. A person in Paleo-Keto diet can experience the anti-inflammatory effects of all natural Paleo Diet while shedding pounds through controlled calorie intake via the Keto Diet.  

If you got through this point, you must be asking yourself now, “How am I gonna get both keto and paleo? How can I have it all? Is this the key to a new me?” I am not saying that these two diets or even the combination of the two discussed above are appropriate and recommended to ALL because not all bodies are the same. Your body is different from mine. I have a different need and you have your own too. It is always best to consult a medical professional before jumping into a new diet. 

Before I end this article, I’ve got a quote from one of my favourite TV Series, Grey’s Anatomy, as stated by Dr. Meredith Grey. “Sometimes, the key to making progress is to recognize how to take that very first step. Then you start your journey. You hope for the best. And you stick with it, day in, day out. Even if you’re tired, even if you wanna walk away, you don’t; because you are a pioneer. But nobody ever said it’d be easy.” 

Stick to your New Year’s Resolution. Determine where you will start. Determine what your body needs and what it deserves. Stick to your plans and ALWAYS work hard to get your goals. What always matters is that you work harder each day and you will feel good about the results. 

 

Sources 

Keto-Paleo. (n.d.). Retrieved from Paleo Leap: https://keto.paleoleap.com/#i3 

Kosokoff, E. (2017, October). Ketogenic Diet. Retrieved from Epilepsy Foundation: https://www.epilepsy.com/learn/treating-seizures-and-epilepsy/dietary-therapies/ketogenic-diet 

Krans, B. (2016, March). The Caveman Diet (Paleo Diet). Retrieved from Healthline: https://www.healthline.com/health/caveman-diet#1