I’ve been doing keto for a while now. Not for myself, but for my 6-year-old daughter who was having 28 tonic-clonic seizures a day. We tried a bunch of medicines and even a surgery but nothing worked. They gradually got worse. In April we started her on keto with the help of a nutrition team. 4 days after starting keto she stopped having seizures. Since then he has been seizure free.
It has been a life changing journey for my little girl. He is non-verbal and has had seizures since 6 months of age. There are other things wrong with him, but epilepsy has been the hardest. I will try to put it in the best possible words. He has PMG – Polymicrogeria. He has only damaged more than 80 percent of his brain. We were told that she would not be able to walk, talk or feed herself. She will be in a wheelchair and will be blind and deaf by the age of 2.
I will tell you that this little girl has overcome these difficulties. Doctors put him on various medications to control his seizures, even CBD and nothing else ever stopped them. His surgery was to have a VNS implanted in his chest. It never had any real effect on controlling his seizures. Since we started keto, and kept on track (her 100%, me about 70%) she has gotten much better.
She talks, (nonsense but there are words we understand). She is learning to read, can count to 30 and loves to color. She dances and sings and runs everywhere. She sometimes names things from the past that we had no clue that she still has a damaged mind, it’s amazing. She has almost finished all her medications.
I can’t wait to see what she’s like when we can hold off on the last one. This little girl loves all her keto foods. He has no idea what he is missing. Ruled.me has helped me make sweet treats so that she can partake in the sweets and include them when she’s at birthday parties or things like that.
Below is a picture. The red dress was pre-halloween cato she was staring out of the side of her face the whole time. She was shaking all the time and was a zombie most of the time. Only her second photo is from Halloween this year. It was about 7 months on Keto. She knew what she was doing and knew she had a beautiful dress.
1. What tactics did you use to help you reach your goal? What helped you best achieve your goals?
I researched what keto was and how I could implement it into my daily life. I needed to know “how” it worked. When we were ready to clean out the house of food we wouldn’t use again and replaced it with things I needed to make good keto food. Baby steps and a sense of readiness helped the most.
2. What is the most impactful change you have made to your diet and why do you feel it is the most important?
The biggest impact for my daughter has been her 9 months of being seizure free, all because of the diet. Doctors are amazed at how well her body responded to the diet and how well she is doing. Keto is not boring or simple. There are many options for foods that are keto.
3. What is the best advice you can give to someone just starting out?
research. Know what you need and make a plan you can stick to. Plan ahead and be prepared before you jump in. Don’t say you’re going to start without doing the leg work.
4. How do you feel your life is now that you are on your goal?
For me I am not at my goal weight. I have lost 50 pounds so far and need to lose 100 more. I can say I’m happier with Keto. I don’t feel lazy. I want to do things. I love to cook so I enjoy learning new recipes.
Our goal for my daughter was to prevent epilepsy. We did and I couldn’t be happier. For 6 years it was difficult to wonder if this visit was going to end his life. I love that we no longer live with that fear.
5. What do you consider the biggest change in your daily life?
Living life is the biggest change. We couldn’t live before. We ate our emotions. Now I’ll eat steak with butter if I’m emotional. We are taking our lives to where we always knew we could be.
6. What did you do to get help throughout your journey?
People around us, when we talked about Keto, blew it off as a craze. It would go away so it wasn’t supported. We had to learn to support each other through action. We also learned not to be offended by the reactions of others but to share in our own lives and what Cato has done for Betty. Other than support from the nutritional teams for my daughter we only had emails from each other that I would get from Ruled.me.
7. What do you currently do to manage your daily diet?
Everyday we just plan for the next day. It’s hard for us adults to stay on track 100% of the time because there are holiday traditions I still can’t let go of. For my daughter I always plan ahead. I send him to school with food every day. If we have to leave town or know we can’t eat at home, we prepare in advance what we can take out or order.
8. What is your favorite keto recipe from www.ruled.me that has become a staple?
There are so many that it would be difficult to name just one. Enchiladas, peanut butter/chocolate fudge, chocolate breakfast smoothie, Chick-fil-A style chicken. So much fun.
9. If you could do one thing differently during your trip, what would it be and why?
For myself I will be more disciplined which is my goal this year. The only thing I would change for my daughter would be to start Keto first.
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