The True Role of Ketosis in a Low-Carb Diet

Do you have the purpose for a low-carb diet fixed firmly in your mind?

Maybe not.

If you are thinking that you have to be in ketosis to lose weight, then you still don't understand that getting into the state of ketosis is not about unlocking your fat stores. That's an old theory that didn't hold up when recent scientific studies put it to the test.

The purpose of a low carb diet is to lower your basal insulin levels, but lowering insulin doesn't affect the amount of body fat your body uses for energy. Instead, it reduces your hunger level and makes it easier to eat at a calorie deficit.

That's the true role of ketosis in a low-carb diet.

The state of dietary ketosis isn't magic. It isn't a state that fixes your metabolic defects. Nor does it guarantee that you will always lose that excess body fat. Instead, ketosis is a byproduct of the fat burning process.

When you are in ketosis, you are burning fat for energy, but that fat can come from your diet as well as your fat stores.

Most of the Fat Your Body Burns
Will Come From Your Diet

Obviously, we want it come off our bodies, but it takes time to break down adipose tissue and convert it into a form that the body can use. 

The body can't do that quick enough to supply all of the calories you need to function, so a large number of the calories you need daily must come from your diet in the form of fat.

How much dietary fat you need on a daily basis depends on how well your body can convert its fat stores into energy efficiently. Everyone is not efficient at burning fat. For that reason, there is a maximum amount of body fat that can be processed and burned on any given day.

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