I lost two pounds in a day and a half. I only weighed 149.5 to start! I know all water loss.

Okay. I tried my husbands low carb diet for a day. Very werid.

My knee stopped hurting. It has been hurting for about a week and a half. My knee felt better as soon as I stopped eatting the carbs.

I got very friendly and talked to people in the park for two hours. I have been so exhausted that I can't even have the energy to be friendly. I think I was eatting too many carbs and it was exhausting me. Spiking my blood suger.

Went to the health food store and just had the wheat grass and no vegetable juice (carrots and apples made it too many carbs.) Had brocelli and tofu.

I ran around cleaning the house. I had tons of energy.

I wasn't doing no carbs just eatting food with no carbs and food with under 5 carbs a serving. Expept for breakfast where I had about 18 carbs.

No bread - no potatos - no beans - no rice - no grapes - no carrots - no mangos

The fruit section of the supermarket has the fruit carb listed. Bought a bunch of fruit with low carbs or low glycemic index (They absorb slowly into the blood stream) such as cherries -
apples - oranges - peaches - any berries (very good) Fruit should be eaten with protein or fat to decrease the spike in your insulin level.

All the vegetables you can eat with olive oil or canola oil or butter.

I ate tons all day. Cheese - brocelli - tofu - chicken - spinach - macodami nuts kept in the car for snacks - 3 gram carb fiber crackers - half a cup of whole fat milk - cream in coffee. I wasn't hungry at all. If I was hungry I ate something right away.


Totally going to add more carbs today. Just some fiber crackers at 3 grams of carbs a few times a day.

By Jazzermom on Tuesday, July 15, 2003 - 08:16 am:

I've been doing a low carb diet, as well, and it is WAY easier to stick to, and I've lost weight much more quickly.

I know all about the virtues/cons of these diets, believe me -- I have researched them ad infinitum. This was kind of a "lark" on my part -- just to see what would happened.

I'm totally surprised, as well.

By Jenn on Tuesday, July 15, 2003 - 09:32 am:

I am suprised that when I read the foods you can eat, it doesn't sound that bad. My step dad keeps saying that he wants to do the adtkins diet, but you aren't allowed to eat anything, but after reading your post I see that you can eat. I will show him the links that your husband put on here and this post. I just have one question, with all the butter and eggs and greasy things, doesn't your cholesterol go up?

By Angellew on Tuesday, July 15, 2003 - 10:14 am:

Hi Jenn!

I have been on (and off and on again!) Atkins since mid-September (with about 100 lbs to lose!!! ouch to admit that!). When I started, my cholesterol was 255! At my last dr's appointment in May, I was down 40 lbs and my cholesterol was down to 157!!! Even I couldn't believe it, considering I was eating bacon, eggs, sausages, steak! I was amazed! I still get fast food cravings. So, I will go to Burger King and immediately throw the bun away and just eat the burger and all the fixin (no fries )!

The first month was really difficult! It's almost like going through carb withdrawal! You can't imagine how dependent on bread I was! But, after that first month, the energy level is great, and, most of the time, I really don't miss the carbs and sugar! I still have a VERY long way to go, but, I feel like I can really do it this way! Check out the Atkins website! They have their own carb counter in there and some very inspiring stories!

Angela

By Feona on Tuesday, July 15, 2003 - 11:02 am:

Feona's DH here:
As I understand it, a low carb diet switches the body from burning primarily sugar and starches for fuel to burning fat.

Normally, just about all the extra carbs that you eat are stored directly as fat within hours of eating because the body usually has an excess.

By restricting carbs, you're forcing the body to use stored fat as fuel. Because the process of converting fat to fuel is so inefficient the body has to use A LOT of body fat for fuel.

One of the sources of fat utilized is triglicerides and chlolesterol in the blood (a good thing!).

When you eat fat and cholesterol it will only cause blood fat and cholesterol levels to rise IF your body already has large stores of carbs (in the liver) to burn. IF the carb levels are low, the body will burn the fat directly and not store it:

http://www.metabolicdiet.com/start_phys.htm

I saw a quote from a doctor saying that the more fat you eat on this diet the MORE you lose because the body thinks that it has fuel to spare.

If you don't eat enough fat, the body will slow down fat burning since it thinks that supplies are low.

It's also important to eat meat and other high protein things on this diet to increase lean muscle.

Their are several variations on this diet as described here:

http://www.metabolicdiet.com/lowcarb101.htm

The common thing is reducing or eliminating your intake of things containing starch : common bread, flour, potatoes, corn
and eliminating ANYTHING containing pure sugar: pop or soda, sweets, candy, cakes, cookies.

They vary in restrictions placed on fruit and vegetables, with a common emphasis placed on eating things high in fiber.

Most place very few restrictions on the consumption of fat, meats and eggs. On Atkins and others you can freely eat bacon, ham, pork even spare ribs as long (as you don't use a starchy or sugar filled BBQ sauce).

I found the initial Atkins "break-in" diet (called induction) a little too restrictive on carbs (mostly the fruits). So I increased my consumption to about 50g effective carb (subtracting fiber) a day.

And lastly one of the great things is NO CALORIE COUNTING.
The only thing you need to keep track of is the amount of carbs in the food. For meat and fats that's zero but for fruits, vegetables and starches you need to count it.