Fatigue early into Primal routine? page

[Redline]

Hey all -


Heard a podcast from Mark, got intrigued, and picked up his book. Good stuff. I've eaten similarly in the past, but the PB way seems more sound--and I appreciate that it allows generous portions of fruits and vegetables.


Question to all of you PB'ers, though: Did you find you got tired when you first started going Primal? I've been eating totally Primal for five days now--like the routine, and generally I feel MUCH better--but today I tried to lift weights and just felt too tired to do it.


Could it be that my body hasn't yet grown accustomed to burning fat efficiently? Will this fatigue issue go away?


Appreciate any insight you long-timers might share!


Thanks.

[john_e_turner_ii]

I am right there with you Redline. I started about 5-6 days ago as well. I had a great workout this morning, but this afternoon I feel a little tired. I tried to eat more PB carbs today, such as bananas this morning. I am getting between 60-100 carbs per day. It could be just the adjustment to the change in eating and few carbs. I was getting up to 250 per day in my normal diet.

[Vick]

Give it time. Many experience this. Part of the body's adjustment.

[Kryz]

It seems to happen to everyone in varying degrees and lengths. I'm lucky in that my 'flu' doesn't last very long...the previous time I transitioned into primal (by 'transition' I mean 'went headfirst cold-turkey&#39 I only felt bad for the first day, but man did I feel BAD. This past weekend I vowed to fully revive my primal efforts, and I felt pretty awful that whole weekend - poor energy, crummy self-esteem - but Monday morning came around and the skies parted and angels sang from the heavens yada yada. I've been high-energy and happy joy joy since then.


I wonder what makes the 'flu' different for each person?

[Prowler]

This is common; it takes the body a couple of weeks to adjust to a more fat-burning metabolism. I didn't have much of a problem with it, but some people experience fatigue or light-headedness for a while.

[animalcule]

I was eating quite a bit of carbs before, so I felt crappy for exactly one week (not too bad- just 'under the weather', achey, tired, light-headed). 7 days, then back to normal BUT with no more low energy, drowsiness during the day, or oversleeping.


So, patience, and in a few days your body will start burning fat and making any necessary glucose you're not eating. Cheating with large amounts of carbs will make the process slower, but I did find it helpful to eat small amounts of carbs (from primal foods of course) during the day when I was feeling out of it, rather than starting out beign strict with my grams or trying to go into ketosis.

[Agatsu]

I felt this too for the first week. I decided to change over to primal eating cold turkey, but left things like my diet soda habit in place (soon to go). Now that I'm used to the energy level that PB is giving me, I'm reducinge caffeine and increasing exercise. I've thrown myself head first in to thing too fast in past life-change attempts, and only resulted in burning myself out. This time I feel much more in control and am 10 pounds lighter in less than 2 weeks.

[Sterling]

I posted an answer to a similar question on my blog today. It might help.

[bcrank]

i was the one asking this question last week lol i'm starting week 4 and last week i was extremely weak and tired all the time. some wise people on this forum told me it would pass and it has. i feel energized and alert. my advice is work through it as best you can and eat more fat. another key is too exercise and keep active even if you're tired, something as simple as a brisk walk will increase ur energy level immensly

[ny2001miata]

I thought it was just me! I bought Mark's book and started the PB diet a few days ago pretty much cold turkey, threw out all the bad stuff in the kitchen. Last night I slept bad and woke up tired, run down, light headed and just plain crappy feeling. I've been thru other detoxes before and it felt similar but not nearly as bad. I'm glad I found this thread. Good info.