I hate the term “carb,” in and of itself. Which is completely independent of the current fad, but I hate that too.
Firstly, welcome aboard. Enjoy your stay. And it is really really addictive here! Oh, and I didn’t think your post was too snarky, at least not for the pit. A bit too snarky for other fora, but for here it was nice and kind and didn’t contain a single swear word so probably miles above many posts here! 
On to the OP -
My conclusions:
4. 1. Atkins, done right, is really just healthy eating.
-
The crap (low-carb alchohol? Alchohol is **all ** carbs, idiots!) being marketed in the US (thankfully, it doesn’t really exist here in the UK yet) is really just marketers trying to make money off it and doing it wrong
-
Lots and lots of people have had success with Atkins, but lots more haven’t
-
Atkins, like any other diet, is really hard to help you loose weight without increasing your exercise
-
Exercise + Diet change is the magic bullet for weight loss. Exercise does not mean going to the gym and beasting yourself, but does mean increasing your daily activities as much as you can.
Ok, fine. But I would like to add one more:
The vast majority of people are confusing weight loss and BMI and other bullshit metrics with changing their bodies to be more fit and look better (as well as have more energy, feel better, etc…).
To whit: I lost a bit of weight in the last couple of years, but to be honest I didn’t give a shit about that. What I cared about was that I had shoulders again, and biceps again, and could see the definition in my legs, arms, and chest again, which I haven’t been able to do since I was 18. The weight lost was nice, but really I don’t weigh a hell of a lot less - it’s just that it’s all turned into muscle.
OK, this might just be my goals, but damn it - I don’t care how much you weigh, male or female. I really don’t. I care how you look. Or I should say, how I look.
I hate diets, weights tables which are never based on hispanic females or take age into account, etc. There is a difference between racism and stating that “certain populations have more melamine than others”. And I hate it when some woman who actually should get some weight on badgers me to go on whatever diet she’s having.
Years ago I was in grad school at U of Miami; computational chemistry, 5 computers for 9 users so basically you had to sit at the computer or lose it. After a while I decided I had to do something to keep my thighs from spreading out (I weighed the same as I’d weighed for the last 10 years, but I could tell that I was losing muscle tone). I go to the gym, ask one of the monitors for assistance with the shiny machines. Guy stares me up and down, gets this supercilious look, weighs me (160lb, 5’5"), says “well, looks like you do need some exercise, yes, he he”, brings me to one of the machines. Makes me lie down face up, and there are some weighs I have to lift by folding my legs. No prob. CHUNK! Up go the weights. He stares, open mouthed. Loads it more. CHUNK! Loads more. CHUNK! Loads all the weights. CHUNK! Says “ohmyGAWD, that’s 300 pounds!” I say “sit there”, pointing to the bank next to where I am. Him and his friend sit. Right led, CHUNK, left leg, CHUNK. Oh, and yes I could do it both fast and slow.
I’M NOT FAT DAMMIT. Even now that I’m at 170lb, if I lose weight I also lose my periods, so I’M NOT FAT I SAID!
And
I
WANT
MY
PASTA.
Al dente. If it’s not al dente it ain’t done right.
Thank you.
One reason I think Atkins has been a lot more popular in the US than other places: Americans are more likely to snack on sugar-and-complex-carbs stuff. I’ve met many Americans who had dinner at 5pm (that’s merienda time, in Spain; time for a piece of fruit, or a sandwich, or a handful of nuts) and went to bed at 10pm-midnight, but who had spent the whole time in between chugging fries. Get that person off fries and insert a real meal one hour before bed and voila, it does wonders. 
It’s damn hard to change your life, especially to get rid of the habits that your body thinks is sustaining it (eating) and what initially hurts to do (exercise).
But “it” really boils down to two things - regulating your caloric intake in some fashion to balance it with your level of physical activity and eating well to fuel your body (diet) and increasing your daily physical activity in some fashion to a larger amount of caloric burn than you take in (exercise).
I don’t think anybody (and I am not for sure!) is suggesting it is easy or simple to implement, and I think that is part of what defeats a lot of people from trying - the “it can’t be that simple! it must be some complex reason that I am fat and the methodology for loosing and keeping fat away must be very complex too”) and the fact that it’s damn hard to exert the day-in day-out willpower battle to change them.
What does work is that it gets easier. I get edgy when I haven’t exercised, and really have come to enjoy the burn I get. I also don’t feel good when I eat crap food - I just don’t eat much fast food or pre-packaged food anymore, and when I do I feel loaded down and bloated and unhealthy and don’t like it. But it took me two years of phasing these things in / out of my life, and it was never easy. I still binge from time to time, but these times are getting fewer and farther in between.
I do feel that I will stay this healthy (if I could ever quit smoking! That’s the one stone still around my f^&*% neck! :mad: ) but I will never ever be so condescending to those just starting out that it’s an easy fix.
Well said.
I want to make it extremely clear that by “the hated phrase” I never ever meant to express any sense of it being “easy” or that overweight people are “just” lazy and lacking in moral fibre or anything similar to that.
I’m just saying that IF (and it’s taken for granted waaaaaay too much that we do. As I said, I do not.) overweight people like my good self want to lose weight, then fooling ourselves with low carb pasta et all is not going to help and it’s masochism from a taste point of view not to mention hurtful to the bank account. As well as edging the good stuff off the shelf. Which is what caused my bad mood.
I have doubts about this; certainly avoiding highly-processed foods seems to be sage advice, but the whole ketones thing is a bit alarming IMO; As I understand it (and I’m sure this could spark a whole debate on its own) Atkins makes you lose weight because protein tends to satisfy your hunger before you’ve ingested your calorie requirement (i.e. you end up eating less than your body needs, so like any other reduced-calorie diet, you lose weight); the amount of energy your body expends producing ketones is a tiny tiny insignificant drop in the ocean.
Normally, ketones in the indicate some sort of metabolic or dietary problem, now of course it would be completely fallacious to argue that they cause any such problem, but at the same time, they aren’t particularly nice chemicals to have floating about your body and I won’t be the slightest bit surprised to discover that there’s some kind of long-term elevation of risk with Atkins-style diets.
I probably should butt out now, because my experience has not exactly set me up to have an easy time mustering empathy for people who struggle with dieting - for me (like it was with smoking), there was an easy, conscious choice - keep pushing too many pies into my face and keep gaining weight, or choose to push fewer pies into my face and perhaps lose weight.
The Low Carb craze has definitely jumped the famous shark, failed to make it over the shark, fell into the brine and was eaten by the shark, who spat it out because it tasted like something made of old phone books, which it probably was.
People initially had some success because they had to eat less, what with everything being crammed full of carbohydrates and other potentially caloric nutrients. With the current craze, though, they can now continue to overeat, with the mental error of believing that more expensive and foul-tasting foods actually make you LOSE weight, and the low-carb craze will go the way of The Knack and leg warmers.
I would be excited, but there will be something equally dumb right behind it. Since we’ve now rejected and rediscovered sugar, fat, and carbohydrates, one suspects that the next big thing will be rejecting protein. That diet craze will do particularly well, since protein deprived people will lack the will or strength to shake of the mind-forg’d manicals of faddish self-deprivation. I should write that book now before someone else does.
Well said right back atcha… this is quite true. If you’re a bit over your ‘target’ weight, but you eat right, exercise enough, have low cholesterol, etc… they you are at a far lower health risk than someone who is underweight but never exercises and eats crap.
This is true of me and my brother - I eat well and exercise regularly, but weigh more than he does (significantly) although I am only 1 inch taller. He, on the other hand, seldom does cardio exercise anymore and eats whatever he likes - as a result he has cholesterol through the roof, higher blood pressure, and is far more likely to die younger than I will of a host of ailments including stroke and heart attack. He’s two years older than I am, so it’s not a middle-age metabolic slowdown, either.
Here, here! I’m a 5’9" female, weighing in at 180. I’ve run three marathons, can lift more than my body weight on my legs, and have a resting heart rate of under 60 beats per minute. I still fit into a size 10-12, and look pretty decent in those pants, and I don’t consider myself fat.
Also, the American habit of eating dinner at 5 p.m. drives me nuts. I lived in South America for quite a while in college and became used to eating my primary meal around 8 or 9, with onces, or tea with a couple biscuits or crackers and some fruit, around 5 or 6. I still keep this habit and haven’t noticed nearly as much of a “spread” as most of my friends who eat dinner no later than 6:30, then continue with dessert, then start snacking. Of course, this does often cause a scheduling problem for meals out with them - we usually compromise by meeting at 7:00 or 7:30, so it’s not too late for them, and not ridiculously early for me. It gives me time to unwind from work, and go to the gym before I eat my evening meal. It also prevents me from snacking all night.
As I understand it (IANA nutritionist or Atkins expert) only the first couple of weeks of Atkins are carbohydrate-free, ramping up to limited numbers of carbs as the timeframes progress - not such a bad thing if one is basically sedentary as they would not require a large number of carbohydrates for quick-release energy sources. Atkins as far as I know also has a strong component of not eating any pre-packaged or processed foods, which does agree with what a nutritionist told me once - if it’s not in the same package nature put it in, don’t put it in your body.
That said, the popular vision of Atkins is eating whatever meats, fats, etc is fine as long as you eat no carbs is not only incorrect but damn unhealthy as well!
There are a not insignificant number of people out there who will tell you that carbohydrates are POISON! - that’s right, POISON! - in big letters. Fucking idiots.
Same people who say ‘FAT is killing you’ and cut all of it out of their diet. Guess what - complex fatty acids are fundamental to the support of life. You don’t have them, you die. It’s too many of them that are killing us.
To be honest - it’s the same thing with carbs. Yes, we need them, but let’s face it - the days of human beings needing a huge store of ready quick energy to escape predators are long time gone. Just like (unless you live on a farm) a farm breakfast is pretty stupid if you’re going off to sit in an office for 8 hours.
W.T.F?
:rolleyes:
First off I would think that 275lbs stuffed onto a 5’7" frame would by itself be proof positive that I love food. If that isn’t enough I could talk about my cooking skills, and a being wizard in the kitchen.
I won’t instead I will talk about a few of the low carb dishes I have made over the last month or so. Off the top of my head I have prepared
Maple glazed, cedar planked Cajun salmon
Smoked a brined heritage turkey (started with Alton Brown’s recipie)
Pork tenderloin with a chipotle wine reduction sauce
Halibut pan fried and crusted with nuts
Redneck rumacki (Jalapeno peppers stuffed with cream cheese, shrimp, and wrapped in bacon then grilled)
Roast chicken
Want me to go on? And yes, each of those meals had veggies, lots of veggies to accompany the main course.
The only things I can for sure state are NOT in my diet are bread, potatoes, cake, and other sugary deserts. I was unaware of the rule that one has to eat bread if one loves food.
As of this morning I am 202 lbs. My waist has gone from 48 to 36. My body fat percentage has gone from about 50% to 24.8%. My resting pulse is 57. I have gone from not being able to run 100 yards to being able to run 2 miles. Not bad for a guy that is going to be 53 next week.
How did I do it? Atkins. Look I have said this before, and I will say it again here. The most effective (best) diet is the one you can stay on. I travel a lot on business. So for me staying on a diet has always been a challenge. I like Atkins for several reasons
[ol]
[li]I can stay on it while on the road[/li][li]It contains food that I like[/li][li]I do not get hungry between meals[/li][li]I am losing weight (duh!)[/li][/ol]
All of last year, I was trying to lose weight, and I was not succeeding. Hell let’s be blunt, I was failing big time. If anything I was getting fatter. In January of this year, two things happened. First I scheduled a vacation for Hawaii, and second I had to buy some size 48 pants. I made a decision that I was not going to show up in the vacation photos as a fat bastard. So I had to do something about my weight. At the same time, a doctor friend of mine (from another board) mentioned that some of her patients had great success with Atkins. I read the book and started on Jan 17 of this year. I am now 73 lbs lighter, and I will reach my goal of going to Hawaii at under 200 lbs.
So whine all you want about carbs, and how Atkins doesn’t work. I will be over in the fresh veggie aisle of the supermarket picking out something to yummy to make for dinner, before I make a stop at the butchers to buy some lean meat. When I overhear you whining how Atkins doesn’t work, you will know it’s me by the big smile on my face.
People, you are way too smart to misspell a simple word like ‘lose’. Say it with me now.
“lose”
“losing”
“lost”
“will lose”
“will have lost”
“I bet there are other ways to conjugate lose and I’m sure some smartass will point them out, but I don’t care as my basic point has been made.”
Sorry for the spelling nazi rant, it was driving me crazy.
but but but… that’s not fun and effortless, and life is supposed to be fun and effortless, just like on all the commercials and sit coms. :smack: :smack:
I have no objection to those people who’ve used Atkins to make a sudden change, when combined with exercise and proper diet afterwards, but the twits who think there’s no problem with doing Atkins all the time are fooling themselves. You could just as easily have a low protien or low fat diet, too, that would cause weight loss: You lose weight when you starve your body of essential nutrients. :smack:
- veteran of the fat wars… in enemy hands.
Yes, Atkins has obviously worked for you. However, wouldn’t you say that most doctors would advise anyone to cut out refined foods and sugar, and would encourage grocery shoppers to stay in the produce and leans meats area of their supermarket?
I don’t necessarily see that as Atkins helping someone - it’s just healthier eating.
Ooh. I almost forgot.
Congratulations, Rick, on your success!
Thanks, it means a lot to me when someone notices.
As far as what people should eat, yes I agree with your statement up to a point. Over the last couple of years my body started handling carbs differently. I became insulin resistant.* I ate, my blood sugar went up, and then crashed, and I got hungry, very hungry again. Very soon, too soon for good heatlh. For example I would eat a sandwich at 11:30. By 3:00 I stomach would be growling and wondering if my neck had been cut. I would eat again, and by 6 be straving. Needless to say 4 or 5 meals a day is not the path to weight loss.
Now I eat 3 times a day. Eating protein my blood sugar rises slower, and does not crash as fast. I don’t get hungry between meals.
YMMV of course, but I have found what works for me.
*Dr. Atkins has a good description of this in his book. Here is what is said on the Atkins website
There are many out there who fully comprehend that a low carb diest has to be included with an excercise regimine.
Fot the first two weeks you’re on induction, your sugar intake is NILL - meaning no peas - they have sugar, no lots of innocusous things because, dammit, they have a sugar content. What an education. Otherwise i would not have known.
I’m no idiot that I don;'t recognize that ANY diet doesn’t do significant good without a healthy regimine of exercise. But lord on a turntable, to lump all of us in that "we’re taking the easy road out cause they said we could eat meat: is simply offensive.
Yes, you can eat meat. Yes, you can eat cheese. Did you know there is a carbohydrate intake daily that you must stick to? It doesn’t mean “I can eat that cow because Atkins said I could”. Did you know on indiction you could eat one CUP of greens - that didn’t contacin sugar - with oil and vinegar or lemon for dressing. No dieet soda, because no caffeine. No coffee, cause…well, no caffeine.
Think THAT’S easy?
You try induction for two weeks, and tell me how mindless and easy it is. I struggled. And I am not your typical trailier inhabitant either eho has no idea what the foog groups are other than doritoes, cheetos and the carbonated beverage f your choice.
I apologize again if this sounds snarky - it’s not my ntention, I swear. I just am tired of peopl esaying it’s taking the eady road out when - FROM PERSOSNAL EXPERIENCE - it’s NOT the easy road.
I now retr5un you to your Ron Popeil commercials for the hamburger thing that takes away the fat…
Ink
Look, I write for a living, but i can’t type for a damn, and I hurt my arm so coherency with a keyboard is laughable. My apologies.
No grammer corrections. If I warrant them, I LOVE learning, but…this is injury related.
Ink