When you’re on the keto diet, you often want to know how many ketones your body is producing. Using keto strips is a common way to measure this output and get an understand of how deeply you are in ketosis. Since the goal of keto is to stay in ketosis for as long as possible, it makes sense to measure the ketone levels in urine.
The keto diet is highly popular among women. Because of this, many women may wonder how their cycle can impact the reading on ketone strips. Does your period affect keto strips?
In this post we’ll look at the impact of your period on the readings that you see on keto strips.
Table of Contents
What are Keto Strips?
Keto strips are small paper or plastic based strips that are used to measure the output of ketones in urine. There is a special chemical on the strips that changes color based on the level of ketones that are being output.
Keto strips are commonly used by people on the keto diet to ensure that they are in ketosis, which is a state where the body is using ketones for energy instead of fat. They are also used by diabetics to ensure that they don’t enter a state of diabetic ketoacidosis.
To use a keto strip, you will need to follow these steps:
- Remove a strip from the bottle without touching the test pad.
- Dip the strip into a urine sample for a few seconds.
- Shake off any excess urine and wait for the strip’s color to change.
- Compare the color of the strip to the chart provided with the test kit.
- Match the color of the strip to the corresponding level of ketones in your urine.
For a state of nutritional ketosis, you’re looking for a reading between 0.5-3.0 mmol/L. If you are in this range, it is a good indication that your body is in ketosis.
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How Does Your Period Affect Keto Strips?
As many women know, a lot of changes occur in the body during the menstruation cycle. These include hormone changes, fluctuation in body temperature, and changes in cervical mucus.
Many people assume that this cycle can change the composition of urine. However, the shedding of the uterine lining doesn’t really impact urine because urine is create in the kidneys and stored in the bladder. So this aspect of your period shouldn’t impact keto strip readings.
However, your period does cause hormonal changes that can cause certain hormones to be more present in urine output. This includes the hormones estrogen, progesterone, follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH), and luteinizing hormone (LH). This does slightly change the urine composition.
Because of the hormonal changes keto strips may be less accurate when on your period. Often these changes result in lower readings on keto strips. Another cause of this is water retention and bloating that can dilute ketones in urine.
It’s also not uncommon to experience carb cravings, which could lead to you consuming additional carbs, but that is a separate issue.
In general, keto strips are not as accurate during your period and you should not take the results as if they were as accurate as other readings. You shouldn’t feel discourages if the readings are off. Keep doing what you have been doing and take additional readings once your period is over.
Conclusion
Your period can effect the reading of ketone strips. This is caused by changes in hormone levels in the body, additional water retention, and bloating that can cause the composition of urine to change.
Testing during this time may not be as accurate and can often lead to lower ketone readings. You shouldn’t get discouraged if your readings are lower during your period. This is pretty common. In fact, many people have success on the keto diet without even measuring ketone levels.
Keep doing what was working for you off-cycle and you should be fine. Continue to track your progress over the month, but don’t rely too heavily on ketone strip readings.
