I started dieting, working out with weights and walking back in December to get my newly diagnosed diabetes under control. I lost about 12 pounds and stalled for three weeks. I read DANDR and decided to give it a try about a month ago. I started Induction and on the second day I was in ketosis but I started having severe neck and shoulder pain like sore pulled muscles. It continued to get worse and by the end of the first week I couldn't stand it anymore so I got out of ketosis and the pain went away within 2 days. I did manage to lose 10 more pounds.

After a couple weeks I decided to try induction again. last week I started induction on Thursday morning and was in ketosis by lunchtime Friday but thistime the muscle pain started in my legs and groin. By Sunday afternoon the pains was unbearable. It fealt like a bruise but there was no sign of bruising. I stopped induction and this morning the pain began to subside.

The only thing I can think of is I briskly walked 3 miles on the treadmill Thursday morning when starting induction. The time before I had lifted weights the day I started induction.

Does going into ketosis with exerted muscles cause problems like this?

I think I will try one more time after I recover from this last try but this next time I will not do any excercising several days before starting induction.

Bill, sounds like you're experiencing a magnesium deficiency. When you hit ketosis your body flushes out excess water - along with the water you lose electrolytes and minerals. Replacing potassium, magnesium and calcium will generally alleviate your problem. I know I had night cramping when I began this WOL and w/in one day of supplementing with cal/mag the symptoms disappeared.

You can get info on supplement doses and times here:

Cal/Mag and K

and you can find out about the effects of their lack here:

Cramping
Fatigue / Headaches

Be sure that you are drinking sufficient water as well (2 litres minimum) - it will help with the symptoms and it will help with the fat loss.

Hope you're feeling better soon
Nat

P.S. It's advisable that you wait a good 2 weeks before starting any exercise program while LCing. Your body will need time to adjust to a new fuel - once Induction is over try adding exercise back slowly to your day. It will take some time to get back to a pre LC intensity, but you'll get there.

Thanks Natrushka,

I am drinking 6 - 24oz bottles of water per day so that should be plenty. I am also taking Dr. Whitaker's daily regime vitamin supplement but I don't think it has Magnesium Calcium or Potasium in the amounts recommended in the link you gave.

I will try an additional supplement to boost the dosage.

I also didn't take into account being on an exercise program before trying induction. I should have stopped temporarily until after induction.

What is strange is that I alternate days lifting weights and walking and the only muscle group that seems to have been affected each time was the one exercised the day before ketosis begins. The first time I walked every other day and didn't have a problem with my legs for the whole week. The second time just my legs were affected not my shoulders.

I guess those tired muscles don't like switching fuels in mid stream. lol.


Thanks again.

I think you'll find the potassium/ cal and mag will make a difference. I had been working out prior to LC (a lot!) and I had well developed calf muscles that never cramped - I thought I would be immune to this - but it hit me just the same. It makes sense to me that if you'd been working a particular muscle group and it was in a recovery phase then it would be more suseptible to the cramping - it would already be torn and suffering from the workout.

Good job on the water
Nat

The extra Magnesium/Calcium/Potassium did the trick. All my muscle pain has gone away.

I started induction again yesterday and i got dark purple on the ketone test strip this morning so I am back to this WOE.

My Blood sugar was 94 this morning. I have never been able to get it below 100 with my oral diabetic medications.

Thanks again Nat for the info. Your a life saver.

Bill

Glad you're feeling better, Bill. I've been there - those cramps hurt!

Be sure you're drinking enough water - dark ketosis is often a sign of dehydration not better fat burning. Whether you're pink or dark pink you're burning fat - it's far more important to be well hydrated. It's the water that flushes out the burned fat and nasty toxins.

Nat

My first morning test is usually dark. The readings get light to moderate during the day because I drink plenty of water all day long.

Bill

The cramps were almost unbearable. My doctor has given me quinine pills but has also ordered blood work to check on my levels of electrolytes etc. Is there a good combination of mag and pottasium supplements?

Are you on statins by any chance? They can cause muscle problems, not infrequently from what I hear.

I am also new and wanted to take the multi vitamin I have in the cubbard, how bad is it to finish taking the multi vitamin that has iron?

I had upper thigh tightness on the yesterday after i ran, i dont know if it was lack of stretching or that it was cold, or that i'm on induction. Just some food for thought

Bill,

I realized the with working out with free weights and using apartame products, I would get sharp muscle aches like you are describing. Specifically, I was drinking 3 or 4 glasses of Crystal Lite, which contains apartame, and I stopped by accident ( my wife forgot to pick it up several shopping visits in a row ) The aches were in my left shoulder, in my left hip, and thighs. After stopping the Crystal Lite, the pain went away. I would stretch on a 6 inch noodle to relieve the leg pain, it would take like 20 minutes to get the kinks out. Now I go to the gym and my muscles are ready to go after 5 minutes of stretching. Any similarities?

Rick

Uh... the OP posted this 5 years ago...

sorry, is there some protocol about not responding to a thread after so much time has gone by?

Well, it's just somewhat poor nettiquette. The OP hasn't even visited since 2003, and now, other people would be more likely to waste their time posting to him, because a reply sends a thread to the top of a forum. It's a bit of a pain to write a long, thoughtful reply to someone, then realize they're never going to read it.