Success with going into ketosis

Dear fellow Cranks, Deadbeats, and Nutjobs. Thank for your advice about ketosis test strips. I got some from a local pharmacy after a day's waiting time. First test gave me a light purple reading, which I interpret as showing that I am in ketosis. Don't know how to compare the color with the scale of 0.5 to 3 that is spoken of in the ketosis books, but I understand that any color change is a positive sign.
Expect that I can use the test strips to discover if I can try to eat some of my favorite foods again, like bean soup.
I have an appointment with my specialist doctor in a few days and I'll try to get a free blood-drop meter from him that can measue ketons.
However there's one thing. I have read that being in ketosis generally gives a feeling of well being. For myself though, for the last couple of weeks I've had a general feeling of malaise. I'm 73 years old and am in very good physical condition. Ususally go to the fitness centre 5 times a week and do weight lifting and running and fast walking. Have been feeling like being half my age for a long time. Now though, I feel poorly, my heart is beating harshly, instead of softly as itusually does, and am finding my self clenching my teeth, and feeling often faint. Very much like the feeling from over-training.
I'm wondering if this is connected to ketosis. I've tried eating more salt, which seemed to help a little. Can it be I'm not eating enough fats? My weight is good, wouldn't mind loosing a bit more belly fat, but I haven't had any weight change since starting my very low carb diet a couple months ago.
Has anyone else had a feeling of malaise since going into ketosis? If so what did you do?

Douglas V wrote:Dear fellow Cranks, Deadbeats, and Nutjobs.  Thank for your advice about ketosis test strips. I got some from a local pharmacy after a day's waiting time. First test gave me a light purple reading,  which I interpret as showing that I am in ketosis. Don't know how to compare the color with the scale of 0.5 to 3 that is spoken of in the ketosis books, but I understand that any color change is a positive sign.
Expect that I can use the test strips to discover if I can try to eat some of my favorite foods again, like bean soup.
I have an appointment with my specialist doctor in a few days and I'll try to get a free blood-drop meter from him that can measue ketons.
However there's one thing. I have read that being in ketosis generally gives a feeling of well being. For myself though, for the last couple of weeks I've had a general feeling of malaise. I'm 73 years old and am in very good physical condition. Ususally go to the fitness centre 5 times a week and do weight lifting and running and fast walking. Have been feeling like being half my age for a long time. Now though, I feel poorly, my heart is beating harshly, instead of softly as itusually does, and am finding my self clenching my teeth, and feeling often faint. Very much like the feeling from over-training.
I'm wondering if this is connected to ketosis. I've tried eating more salt, which seemed to help a little. Can it be I'm not eating enough fats? My weight is good, wouldn't mind loosing a bit more belly fat, but I haven't had any weight change since starting my very low carb diet a couple months ago.
Has anyone else had a feeling of malaise since going into ketosis? If so what did you do?

Yes,I felt like this for over a week when I dropped my carb intake to below 30 grams,felt cold and shaky too but I wasn't taking on enough fluid and sodium to replenish what I was losing...I upped my fluid intake to just over 2 litres a day and as well as making sure I added to salt to my cooking I also made a hot drink from a Boullion cube mixed with boiling water and drank it as a broth once a day which added more sodium to my diet and things improved over the following days but it's worth persevering with as when all the symptoms subsided I felt energised in a way I hadn't felt in years.

If I'm remembering right, Dr Phinney addresses the salt issue in this video:

Some words from Dr. Jay Wortman a lowcarb expert and type two diabetic on lowcarb and salt.

“When you cut the carbs your kidneys will release sodium. This is why people lose some water initially and why blood pressure also tends to get better on low-carb. If you are not careful to replace the lost sodium sufficiently by adding salt to your food, you will experience the effects of mild hypo-natremia. These are: headache, constipation, weakness, fatigue, low-blood pressure, othostatic hypotension and possibly leg cramps. If you get a blood test you may find that your potassium is low, too. Unfortunately, there is no reliable blood test for magnesium but it may also be low. Supplementing with salt should correct these problems. You don't need to take a potassium supplement, it will correct if you eat enough salt. Some people will have a persistent magnesium deficiency that will require supplements. This would be manifested by leg cramps and hyper-reflexia (something your doctor can check). To correct this you should take a slow-release Mg++ supplement daily.

Many people make the mistake of restricting salt and drinking lots of water when on a low carb diet. This is virtually guaranteed to cause problems. When you look carefully at the studies that report equivocal results with a low-carb diet, this is invariably one of the reasons.”

...but it MUST be full range sea salt, preferably Celtic, NOT cheap mineral-devoid table salt.

It really bugs me that sodium-chloride-and-nothing-else is called 'salt'. It isn't salt, it is just sodium chloride. Perhaps table 'salt' ought to be renamed 'NaCl' and then there would be less confusion.

Because salt is made up of 97.5% sodium chloride and only 2.5% other elements, the other elements are deemed insignificant.

But that would be like building a bridge and saying that although 2.5% of the bolts are missing, it's still perfectly safe to drive across......