Hellobee Boards

This is a great overview, if you haven’t already seen it:

https://www.perfectketo.com/keto-while-breastfeeding/

I haven’t tried it yet, but I’m doing keto now and plan to pick it back up when I’m breastfeeding in the future.

In theory, your milk supply shouldn’t go down. But the important steps to take to ensure that are:

1. Start at 50-75 carbs and slowly reduce it over time, taking note if your supply goes down (so if it does go down at 35 carbs, maybe try sticking to 40). You don’t have to be at 15 - 20 carbs to go into ketosis. For most people, anything less than 50 will do. The reason it’s usually advised to go to 20 is that a) there are so many hidden carbs in food we might not know about, it acts like a safety net; and b) going down to around 20 will ensure you enter keto super fast (within two or three days). But again, that’s not necessary, so easing into it will give you a chance to make sure your supply is okay.

2. Take a magnesium supplement (one 400g pill will give you all you need), and try to eat foods with a lot of potassium, like avocado and spinach. Your kidneys will suffer if you don't get magnesium—you could end up with a UTI or kidney stones. And you’ll feel tired and fatigued without potassium. I don’t advise potassium pills because they only come in 100g when you need like 3000g daily, so it’s a joke—stick with real food high in potassium. Lastly, you need to eat a lot of salt. More than the average person who isn’t on keto. Put salt on your salads, your guacamole, your eggs, your steaks and hamburgers. Some people drink a cup of beef broth everyday to make sure they’re getting enough.

3. Don’t limit calories. At least not at first. Eat to fullness! You can’t make milk without a lot of calories. And when you become fat adapted, your body will start to burn your fat stores even if you don’t have a big calorie deficit.

4. Drink enough water! Seriously! I use a camelbak to know exactly how much I’ve been getting (and I add a sugar free flavoring because honestly I’m not a fan of plain water).

Like the article says, milk is mostly fat, so a diet high in fat should only make it that much easier to breastfeed. Good luck!

I'm keto but not breastfeeding. But I had to go dairy-free when I was breastfeeding, so I've done both just not together. Personally, given my dietary preferences, I would not want to do keto dairy-free, but I know that people do it....

I find heavy cream, cheese, and butter to be important to my keto diet, and would struggle without them. My husband prefers almond milk/coconut milk, but we still cook with a lot of butter and eat cheese. So I guess it could depend on how sensitive your LO's dairy intolerance is. (I couldn't have ANY dairy with my son, even cooked/processed dairy)

Oh, and we eat a TON of eggs. DH doesn't like to eat a lot of red meat, so we find ourselves eating eggs basically every day. Not a problem if you're dairy free, but just a heads up.