"The symptoms you report – dizziness and leg cramps – are probably the two most common symptoms people experience when they switch from high-carb to low-carb diets. Insulin drives the kidneys to retain fluid – when insulin levels drop quickly, as they do on low-carb diets, the kidney releases fluid. This is a good thing because most people on higher carb diets tend to retain fluids; but it can also be an annoying thing because the fluid that goes out takes potassium with it. Lowered levels of potassium often cause leg cramps and feelings of fatigue. Plus, losing a lot of fluid quickly can lead to a lowered blood pressure, especially when going from sitting to standing, and feelings of dizziness. I ALWAYS put my own patients on a potassium supplement when they start the program to replace the potassium I’m sure they are going to lose. I give them a prescription supplement that contains about five times more potassium than they can get from over-the-counter potassium supplements, which max out at 99 mg. Five of these OTC potassium supplements will work as well as the prescription dose. Also, I recommend that my patients starting low-carb diets increase their salt intake so that they don’t lose so much fluid and don’t experience the dizziness. They can do this by eating a dill pickle a couple of times per day, consuming some bouillon a time or two a day or even by drinking some pickle juice. The potassium supplementation and increasing salt intake eliminate probably 90 percent of symptoms people experience when starting low-carb diets."
http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/ketones-and-ketosis/metabolism-and-ketosis/ (Note - look for this comment on 11 Dec 2010)
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