My annual checkup revealed that my blood sugar, already borderline previously, is now higher than ever (not surprising given the weight I’ve gained). So my doctor read me the riot act: start losing weight, or I will be a full-blown diabetic in five years.
The only diet regimen that I have ever had any success with is cutting back carbs. As long as I am eating bread or pasta I gorge uncontrollably. Apparently I am a gluten addict, along with the proteins in milk. So I’ve grasped the nettle and cut out refined sugar, wheat and milk from my diet. I have no restrictions on rice, corn, oatmeal, cream or butter. So I’m not starving myself for carbs or trying to go ketonic.
Well apparently addict was the right word, because after a week I am as sick and miserable as can be. All I want to do is stay in bed (which I can’t), either until I feel better or I die. The only thing I want to eat is a pound of bread, and since I can’t nothing else seems worth it, until sheer hunger forces me to eat something.
I’m going to tough it out, but tonight I screamed at my wife and smashed a glass against the wall. I am not a happy camper right now. :(:mad:
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Good luck with this, and I hope it works out for you. Diabetes is something well worth avoiding if you have the chance.
For the longer-term, take a look at the Mediterranean diet. You’ll need to do a bit of exchanging (rice pasta instead of wheat), but most of it is vegetables, meat and not a lot of carbs.
It’s weird, I went full Atkins, with as few carbs as possible, and it was the easiest diet in the world. Never hungry. Bacon. Steaks. Salads with rich blue cheese dressing.
Now- it’s hard to stay on for years, true.
Also, instead of a snack at nite, drink a large glass of water with two teaspoons of that fiber stuff. I am not a real Doctor.
Reducing your carbs is probably playing with your blood sugar right now. I know that it’s common with low carb diets to have this sort of reaction at first, and then everything evens out. I went through this on Atkins during the first week or so.
Not advocating this particular diet, I just googled “low carb flu” and this wast the first good hit: All About the “Low-carb flu”
My husband is celiac. Once a week, I make us a gluten-free one-pot fettuccine alfredo. I don’t think you’d lose weight eating this, and I don’t know whether it’s low carb. The process to make it reminds me of hamburger helper, but with real ingredients (and chicken, not beef). I’ll share the recipe, in case it’s something you can have. You WILL NOT feel deprived after eating this. The yield would comfortably feed a normal family of 4-5. It’s just my husband and me… we have very healthy appetites, but always get leftovers from this recipe. Fortunately, it reheats very well. Honestly, I’d eat it 7 nights a week if it didn’t take so long to make. It’s really not super effort-intensive, especially if you like to cook, but it does take awhile. Lots of setting the timer and coming back in 5-10 minutes.
Gluten-free one-pot fettuccine alfredo quasi-casserole thingy:
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[li]Slice up or cube 2-ish pounds of chicken breast. We buy frozen chicken breasts in bulk and defrost them in the microwave first. This works great, but fresh would be good/better.[/li][li]Put a dollop of olive oil and a generous sprinkling of salt in a deep frying pan. Fry up those suckers on medium-high until golden brown, between 5-10 minutes.[/li][li]Add 14 ounces of chicken stock, 8 ounces of cream, and 8 ounces of gluten-free pasta in the shape of your choice. I like elbow noodles, they hold the sauce better, but they aren’t as cute or traditional as penne. I use corn pasta, because it more closely resembles the flavor and texture of traditional wheat pasta. Rice pasta would probably suffice, but it also leaves a weird flaky residue in pans that I don’t care for.[/li][li]Cook on high heat until the liquid begins to boil, then reduce to low, cover, and simmer.[/li][li]After 10 minutes, add half a package-about 7 ounces-of frozen broccoli florets (optional). [/li][li]Keep simmering until the liquid is absorbed. This is usually about 10 minutes after adding the broccoli, but you may need an extra 5 depending on your pasta.[/li][li]Add shredded cheese, possibly more salt (to taste), stir, and eat. I like Kraft’s parmesan/asiago/romano mix in the purple container, half the container for one pot (so 3.5 ounces).[/li][/ul]
This meal is THE SHIT. It’s so full of flavor (and yeah, calories).
Lumpy can get carbs if he wants them. He seems to specifically be missing wheat. And that surprises me. Low carb flu is old news; missing wheat specifically is something I’ve never heard of.
Because I’ve never heard of it, I don’t know how to help, only to say … do go for some rice and oatmeal right now, buddy. Not a ton, but some. See if it helps.
Just a quick addition here, “losing weight” by changing your diet is very good advice. I’m wondering though if exercise might be helpful. Obviously, this is more complicated than what I’m inferring, but it seems to me one way to lower your blood sugar is to just burn the stuff off.
Check with your doctor and if he agrees, work up slowly, build your muscles.
Yes, it seems really odd, and that’s putting it nicely.
Most people who jump from one “give up one thing completely” diet to the next are never going to lose weight in the long run, and it also is rarely as healthy as they think. Give up carbs, give up fat, give up refined sugar, give up whatever, that’s not what actually makes you lose weight. The only way those diets work is by tricking you into eating fewer calories.
If you give up carbs and they are 70% of your calories, of course you’ll lose weight. You can’t eat enough meat to make up for that.
If you give up fat, of course you’ll lose weight. You can’t eat enough sugar (without fat) to make up for that. (Many low fat foods add sugar to make up for the lost taste).
Most people just can’t sustainably give up the one thing permanently and keep the weight off. It takes real lifestyle change and it doesn’t usually have to be so draconian as giving up something completely.
Hell, even people with celiac, IBS, IBD, or whatever will occasionally cheat by eating foods that make them literally sick. It’s much harder to eliminate something completely if it doesn’t make you literally sick.
Agreed. I’m a bread addict, but giving it up entirely is a knee jerk, IMO. I follow the WW point system and have a piece of toast with butter every morning as part of my breakfast, and usually a half-sandwich at lunch. As a diabetic, I usually avoid white rice, as it has a high glycemic index.
Draconian diets seldom work in the long term. The Weight Watchers program takes off pounds gradually (two per week is normal); your hunger is satisfied, and, as they say: you can eat anything, just not everything. In other words, portion control. I’m in my fourth month of eating this way and am down over 30 pounds.
My idea, simply because I know I binge on bread, pizza and pasta- and then I’m so bloated I’m tempted to eat sugar for the boost. When I’m eating wheat I don’t even bother eating oatmeal, rice or corn so I know it’s a “trigger” food for me. Or to put it another way, if I can’t give up just wheat, I can’t even consider a low-carb diet.
I never do, now. Sometimes, I’ll know that I’m eating something that might make me sick, but that’s more because sometimes you’ve taken all the reasonable precautions and now it’s just time to bite the bullet. (So, essentially every time I eat in a restaurant.)
I’m a little baffle by the idea of being addicted to wheat or suffering from withdrawal. Of course, when I stopped eating gluten, I felt so much better that it would be hard for any other signals to make it through.
Suffering withdrawal from wheat seems a bit strange to me (unless it really is due to a coincident carbohydrate withdrawal), but addiction of some kind I can see. First week I gave up soda – not for weight loss but for GI reasons – I was … let’s not say miserable, that’d be overstating it. But since I’ve spent almost all of my 34 years hydrating myself almost entirely through diet soda, my cravings were constant and fairly significant.
I could see that with bread, too. Gluten is something else I may try to give up to see if that helps me … ugh, that’ll be difficult. Not smashing glasses difficult, but very highly annoying. I don’t need butter or jam, just give me plain bread or crackers and I’m a happy man.
But, as someone else said in the thread, that’s not inherently true. Sometimes it’s easier to go all the way.
Still, I will give you the advice that helped me–don’t concentrate on what you can’t eat, but on what you can.
Oh, and, if you can, get the trigger stuff out of the house, at least, initially. I know I got irrationally angry when I couldn’t eat things when I first started.
I’ve recently started calorie counting and found it to be surprisingly easy. I eat what I want - just not as much. Sure, I’ve done the low carb thing - but it’s not a long term solution. It doesn’t teach you how to eat a healthy long term diet. More than that - it doesn’t teach you how much of what is really a good idea! My epiphany in the last two months is that no wonder low carb diets work, because I’ve found bread, pasta, and sugar to be the biggest calorie bombs. The next one after that is fat - butter, olive oil, coconut oil - 100 calories a tablespoon. But fats are also good in moderation, so I’ve learned to moderate.
My Fitness Pal has an entire online community of bloggers, you can find lots of support there. Make friends or not. Keep a blog/diary that’s private or shared. And the best calorie counting database that’s very easy to use.
I seriously had no idea how much I was eating in calories daily until I started logging. I logged for three months - no accountability as far as limiting, just to see what I was doing daily. It turned out to be a LOT of calories and after three months I decided it was time to do something about it. It was as simple as adding my weight to my profile, along with how much I want to lose and how fast I want to lose it. Turns out a pound a week is damn easy, so that’s what I’m sticking with. And still having some pasta, going out and drinking/eating socially, and even a cookie or two when I want.
As a person with a binging issue, this has been huge. Knowing I’ll need to log what I’m sticking in my mouth, makes it much easier to pull up the reins and have two Oreos and not the whole sleeve, yanno? I’ll make a pasta/chicken/lots of veggie dish and portion out two cups to eat rather than shoveling it in. Another benefit of this is I have more leftovers that last longer and I actually don’t have to cook as often. Better ingredients that cost a little more (like imported Italian pasta and family farmed local chicken), but last longer has been a very good thing.
I’m posting this in hopes the OP is actively looking for other real ways to lose weight, especially if the total cutting of a food out isn’t working. Learning by my own accountability to make better choices is the best way to make a long term change that will stick for life. That’s MHO after doing other “diets” that don’t really teach you how to eat better forever.
