Having (hopefully) successfully cooked meat for the first time in my life yesterday, I’m ready to once again start earnestly considering a low carb diet.
Anyone who’s interested, I’d love to hear what plan you followed and how successful/unsuccessful it was. Also, if you lost or gained weight, and if anyone has serum numbers how those changed. Also the effect on your energy level would be helpful.
Thanks!
I did Atkins about five years ago and lost about 60 lbs. I really liked it but of course, didn’t stick to it for more than a couple of years. I watch too much Top Chef and Food Network Star now to give up my rice and bread but I have toyed with doing the Induction diet just to kick start things before switching to a more calorie-oriented diet plan.
Pluses of low carb:
Never hungry after the first week. You get to the point where food seeems overwhelmingly rich and you just don’t care for it.
Fast weight loss and I did feel much better during that process than I do when doing low calorie or low fat diets.
Wings!
Negatives:
Can be hard to keep things interesting.
Low-carb products sneak up on you. The last time I did low-carb, I used way too many products and didn’t lose more than a few pounds. If you do it, leave out the bars, low-carb bread and tortillas and just go straight.
I think it’s an excellent way to get weight off when you have a lot to lose and if you are like me and have more than your share of appetite. However, unless you are willing to give up bread, rice,pasta, etc forever, be prepared to figure out how to switch to a more low-calorie diet so you can have more variety.
I didn’t plan to do low carb - my plan was to eat more whole foods/lots of vegetables. After a couple of years, I realized the foods I ate had naturally gravitated to low carb. I found that carbs made me hungry and that protein/healthy fat foods kept me more full. I don’t eat a ton of “low carb products” - my emphasis is on healthy whole foods (although I do love La Tortilla Factory 50 calorie tortillas!). I like to cook and make healthy dinners almost every night, I also pack my lunch for work everyday. I avoid fast food and junk food.
I didn’t give up rice or pasta forever, I still eat them. I eat measured portions of the whole grain stuff.
Here’s what I ate yesterday, it’s a very typical day for me (I am maintaining a 75lb weight loss, but up a few lbs since the holidays, so trying to lose right now).
B - 2 scrambled eggs, broccoli, tons of salsa wrapped in a 50 calorie low carb wheat tortilla
L - big salad - romaine, grape tomatoes, red cabbage, carrots shreddies, leftover steak, low fat Caesar, a little bit of crunchy jalepeno
S - tangelo
D - maple glazed salmon over brown rice, steamed broccoli
I did adkins several times in college to lose the weight I put on during track season before the start of football. Typically I’d lose about 20 lbs a month but I stayed at virtually 0 carbs the whole time rather then moving on to maintenance phase. I was never hungry but you do have to find creative things to keep in interesting one of my favorites was ordering a large pizza and eating off the toppings and cheese then tossing the crust.
A year and a half ago I went on a calorie reduction diet, 1300/day, and I lost 80 lbs in 6 months then kind of plateaued. After spending the summer holding flat despite drinking and not worrying about food I went back and in October started doing a mixture of low calorie and Adkins. Basically I was eat 3000 calories/day but of only protein and I lost 27 lbs in 2 months.
Right now I’m going back on the diet after partying too hard for three months after blowing out my knee. I’ve lost 11 lbs in two weeks and I’m doing the combo low calorie/low carb. I’m hungry a fair bit of the time but it’s an easy way to get 60-100g of protein, to help with my lifting, while still eating around 1300 calories a day.
I’m running about 300 lbs and 6’6" to put the numbers in prospective.
IANAD but I have to say, 1300 calories a day for a big man who’s 6’6" and 300 lbs sounds dangerously low, especially if you’re lifting weights (exercising regularly).
Even if you were seriously overweight with a 33% body fat, you’d still have a lean mass of 200 lbs. Using a worksheet for a fairly standard “Katch-McArdle” formula for computing the energy needs of a normal person based on their lean mass and level of physical activity:
Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR) = 370 + (21.6 X lean mass in kg)
= 370 + (21.6 x 200 lbs / 2.2 (lbs/kg))
= 2,334 kcal
Even if you consider yourself only “lightly active” (exercising 1-3 days a week), your average Total Daily Energy Expenditure (TDEE) would be
2,334 x 1.375 = 3,209 kcal
The generally recommended slow-and-safe caloric intake (to lose only fat, and not shed a lot of lean mass along with the fat in a rapid weight loss program) would be to consume about 85% of your TDEE, or around 2,700 calories.
Unless you’re cheating left and right with off-balance-sheet snacking, I can’t see how 1,300 calories is sustaining you without dizzy spells…
More on the subject of the OP - I have never been able to follow a low-carb regime, it worked out much better for me to eventually follow the more traditional “make smarter food choices, learn portion control and get more exercise” approach to lose 50 lbs. almost 5 years ago, and have kept most of it off.
My wife however has successfully done the Atkins/low-carb thing to lose up to 30 lbs. in a few months. The problem is that she never stays on it and has always gained the weight back, sometimes ending up heavier than before. She’s done this at least 3 times already and is about to “go Atkins” again.
When I point out that this constitutes a “yo-yo diet” that is probably damaging her metabolism, she counters that it’s surely better to be up to 30 lbs. lighter for periods of time than to never have lost the weight at all. I suppose she has a point.
I would be very interested to hear from anyone who’s successfully used Atkins as a bridge to a long term maintenance diet.
I had some dizzy spells the first time out, I even feinted once and looking back at my numbers including Christmas and Thanksgiving I was averaging about 2300 a day With out those feasts I averaged 1740 a day. I only had 6 weeks where I was able to stay at the goal.
I back calculate my calories on my weigh in day and compare to my tracked calories in case there are some I’m missing, in non boxed food the estimates for calories and how much I’ve eaten are much tougher. So that’s why there is a difference
My goal has been 2% weight loss per week which is about the top end of what is considered healthy and it’s worked pretty well so far. I was able to run a half marathon last summer and am training to run my second one right now. I’ve got another 40 lbs to lose to reach my goal of a BMI 30 at around 10% body fat.
I followed Atkins after reading the latest version of Dr. Atkins’ book, maybe 5 or 6 years ago. I lost 90 lbs, felt great, looked great.
When I stopped was when I bought my house. When I was on the diet I was making good money and living with my parents. I had a nice kitchen and plenty of money to spend on food as well as time to cook, shop and eat. When I bought my house I didn’t even have a fridge, and was living like a miser, so I basically gave up eating well in exchange for Easy Mac.
I did put all the weight back on, plus about 10 lbs (that was over 5 years or so).
I totally agree with Dr. Atkins and I know his plan works for me. I’ve actually gotten to the point where I can afford to eat well again. HOWEVER…something has happened to me where I do not like meat anymore. I can enjoy a good steak or burger, occasional lunch meat/sausage and pork loin here and there…but I detest chicken and turkey, have never liked fish, don’t quite like ham, and never ever buy any meat to cook at home.
Not sure what the fuck my problem is, but that’s my bane. I know I do best with high protein low carb, but i cannot make myself eat like that right now. In fact I have been having trouble getting myself to eat at all which is why I often have cereal for dinner. It’s a real pain for me to get enough protein as it is, and most of it comes from dairy and/or protein bars (with sugar).
Of course this new issue has NOTHING to do with my previous foray into low-carb eating. That was lifetimes ago. I did not over-indulge on meat and I did not miss carbs so much that I gorge on them now. Let me make that clear.
Anyway, if you can do it I think it’s great, if it works for you. The first few weeks you feel crummy but after that it’s smooth sailing. Lots of people like to chime in and talk about how low-carb is soooo bad but they are assuming 1) No carb 2) High fat 3) not a lifestyle change. Those people are wrong. In a recent thread, every “diet book” someone recommended was a different version of low-carb. Every “diet plan” I see on tv and in magazines is some version of low-carb.
Don’t tell people you are eating “Low carb” or use the word “Atkins” (but if you do please spell it right). Just tell people you’re eating healthier and it’s working well.
Drink plenty of water and exercise.
7 or 8 years ago, I started eating a Paleo diet type of eating. It’s basically low-carb, not much processed food, lots of green leafy vegetables. My inspiration was Ray Audette’s Neanderthin. I lost 30 pounds, my cholesterol numbers got better, and I felt fine.
Then I got lazy. I went back to eating the SAD (Standard American Diet), gained back most of the weight, yada yada.
Fast forward to 2010. My husband had some bad cholesterol/triglyceride numbers and they were threatening to put him on statins. He wanted to try to fix it by diet first if he could. He remembered my paleo diet stuff, and did his own research and decided he wanted to do that.
Long story short, he’s lost 20 lbs, his cholesterol/triglyceride numbers are also better, he feels like he has more endurance. I’ve also lost about 25 lbs. I’m almost back down to the lowest I got to the first time I did Paleo.
There’s no counting calories or (what I call) bookkeeping involved. You eat meat and vegetables and fruit, preferable fresh, not processed. Keep dairy and sugar intake low. Avoid grains.
Prepare for cravings when you drop carbs down low. They’ll go away. Don’t buy into the low-carb processed food stuff.
This kind of diet suits me very well, I think. I do think that there are some who DON’T do well on it. But I’m glad my husband’s on board with me this time around (though actually this time I’m on board with HIM.)
Neither fried bacon rind nor whipped cream have any carbs.
Just sayin’.
I’d be surprised if you could find such a person. Atkins is only a diet in the sense of the first two definitions on this site. If you eat the way you used to eat, you’re going to weigh what you used to weigh. There’s no way around it.
Atkins has been very successful for me, but I’m still on it and expect to always be. The person who advised you to avoid all the low-carb “frankenfoods” is absolutely right. The best way is whole foods, minimally processed. Meat, fish, eggs, green vegetables, and healthy fats.
Remember it’s not a high protein diet, it’s a high fat diet. I do best with 65% or more of my calories coming from fat.
I saw a recipe one for a fat free, carb free cheesecake once. Any diet theory that could spawn this kind of an abomination is something in which I don’t want to get myself involved.
I can guarantee it was not Atkins. Fat free is an abomination.
Atkins doesn’t promote low fat/ low carb, in fact they believe that fat is a required part of the diet.
I was once an Atkins success story. I used Atkins to change my way of eating and after losing the weight successfully maintained with a maintenance version of Atkins for several years. Due to some health issues I fell off the wagon hard. I was on seriously restricted movement and constant pain killers for almost 2 years and the resulting depression caused me to turn to sugar to nurse me through it.
I’ve tried to return to Atkins but I’m having a really hard time motivating myself to go back. I know logically I’ll feel better once I do but man that first step is a tough one.
One thing I will say - each person seems to have a diet that suits their metabolism better than others. It might take some experimenting to find what works for you. The sad part is I know it’s Atkins for me, it works and I’m happy eating that diet but for me to get back to a healthy weight is going to take some real work and I haven’t quite made the mental leap that will enable me to get there.
Atkins is very big on going carb free (or nearly carb free at least). A carb free “cheesecake” is going to have no dairy and no sugar at all. Yummy!
Many of the high protein, low carb foods are expensive, but there are cheap choices, too. Eggs can be prepared many ways, and are filling and cheap: scrambled, omelettes, souffles, egg salad, deviled, sliced hard-boiled with hollandaise, etc.
Ground beef is also cheap, and there are often meats at the grocery store on sale for under $2/lb. A supermarket rotisserie chicken is good for a few meals. A chicken-broccoli divan-type casserole is a good use of all Atkins-approved ingredients.
I mostly eat low carb, but had to be very strict about itfor a while about 2 years ago while the docs figured out what turned out to be diabetes. (they weren’t sure what type I had, kept screwing around with meds, I finally just quit eating carbs to control it for several months while I waited to get in to a specialist)
I rarely ate more than about 20 carbs in one sitting, and daily carb intake was less that 50 or 60. Like I said, I was very, very strict about it, mainly because I was scared out of my mind.
Result? I couldn’t eat enough to maintain my weight. I wasn’t trying to restrict anything but carbs - I gorged on fatty meats and cheeses and butters. What it comes down to is those things fill you up pretty fast, and even eating as much as I wanted, it was hard to get enough calories in a day.
I wasn’t losing really quickly or anything like that - maybe a pound or two a month - but the weight was definitely going down.
Now that I can eat carbs again (they figured out a good med plan for me), I gotta watch it, or I start gaining. But if there’s one thing I know for sure, restricting carbs definitely makes me (and a lot of people) lose weight.
I ate a lot of homemade cheesecakes when I was following the Atkins plan. “No dairy” is not true - there are a lot of cheese with little or no carbs. Cream cheese, eggs, Splenda. Cheesecakey enough for me.
It is. It’s dangerous to focus on protein for your energy needs, too much can cause serious problems. Fat is where it’s at.
The problem is always the sweetener. Because I don’t care for the “crust” of creme brulee and lower the sugar in the custard to start with, and aside from the sweetener creme brulee is cream and eggs, perfectly low carb. But I need to find a sweetener that isn’t so vile it just ruins it. Since I only need a dash of sweet in it to begin with I’m wondering if I can get away with actual sugar… hmmm…
I follow the Primal Blueprint, which is a paleo-type diet. I’ve lost about 25 pounds from my highest documented weight. I generally feel better on it–my skin is clearer and I have more energy. On the very rare occasions when I eat white carbs, I feel like absolute shit afterwards.