In which Mr. Athena and I try the Atkins diet

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Mr. Athena and I recently spent a week in our old digs of Boulder, CO, eating and drinking like the proverbial fish. As typically happens when we’re on vacation, when we’re heading home we both look at each other and say “We have GOT to stop this! We’re FAT! We need to LOSE WEIGHT!” Then we both spend the next 30 minutes telling each other “well, I need to lose weight, but YOU are the sexiest thing imaginable! You look GREAT!” We do that because we like each other.

Regardless, we come home with the idea that I need to lose 10-15 pounds, and Mr. Athena thinks he needs to lose 30 (but he doesn’t really, he’s the sexiest thing imaginable.) We know many people, including a good friend in Colorado and Mr. Athena’s sister, who have lost a lot of weight with the Atkins diet. I’ve previously looked into it, and despite thinking “hmmm… ketosis… icky!” and “… but I like bread! I like beer!”, I decide “What the heck! I’ll give it a try. 2 weeks eating cheese and butter and more cheese and losing weight?!? Sounds good to me!”

I buy the Atkins book. Two of 'em, in fact. I look with happiness at recipes that include cream sauces, red meat, and cheese. I think “Hmm… beurre blanc is atkins-happy! I can eat beurre blanc EVERY DAY!” Tuesday morning, I spend a huge amount of money at the grocery store buying meat, cheese, more meat, more cheese, eggs, and more eggs. We start The Diet. In the meantime, both of us come down with colds. Mr. Athena is so bad that he goes to the doctor, who informs him he has an ear infection. I only have a miserable cold.

Tuesday goes well. We have scrambled eggs & cheese for breakfast, a big chef’s salad for dinner. I snack on meat, more meat, some cheese. I note with dismay that I can’t, in fact, eat as much cheese as I want every day - I’m limited to 3-4 ounces per day.

Wednesday goes OK. Eggs for breakfast again. I can’t remember what lunch was, but I’m guessing it involved cheese, eggs, and meat. Mid-day, my mother sends me e-mail offering to make me my favorite comfort food - chicken soup with dumplings. Dumplings! My kingdom for a dumpling! Shit, no dumplings. Maybe meat dumplings? Cheese dumplings? Goddamn it, no chicken soup, no dumplings. I tell her no. Lamb chops for dinner, with a wilted spinach salad with warm bacon dressing.

Thursday. More eggs for breakfast - an omelette this time. I halfheartedly snack on string cheese, meat sticks, and a hard boiled egg for lunch. I’m hungry. I’m tired. I have a freakin’ cold, and no energy. I lie listless on the couch most of the afternoon, dreaming of warm buttered toast and orange juice. Late afternoon I manage to crawl upstairs to my office, and spend a couple hours on the computer. Now it’s dinner time. Mr. Athena and I consult. We’re both hungry, sick, and in bad moods.

“Well, we could have eggs… or meat.” I say.

“Let’s do something easy since neither of us wants to cook. I could run over to <local takeout place> and pick up some chef’s salads.” Mr. Athena offers.

“No, I had one of those last spring right before I got that horrible stomach flu… I can’t bear the thought of them.” I counter. “We could have steaks, I bought some nice rib-eyes. They’re in the freezer.”

“We’d have to grill the steaks. How about I grill them and you make a Caesar salad.” Mr. Athena tries to look optimistic.

“A Caesar salad is more work than grilling! I’d have to make the dressing and that’s a hassle.”

“That’s the problem with you! Food just can’t be simple, can it? If it were just me, this diet would be EASY! I can just demphasize food and eat whatever’s around and I’d be happy. Why can’t we just use NORMAL dressing?!? The kind that comes in a bottle?” Mr. Athena is starting to get testy. He opens the fridge and holds up a bottle of Newman’s Own Italian Dressing. “See! Dressing! Just use this!”

“It’s not a bloodly Caesar salad if you use Italian dressing.” I counter. “We can use that, but don’t yell at me about making dressing when you say ‘Caesar salad.’ Caesar salad implies Caesar dressing. if you just want a normal salad, that’s fine, but say so!”

“Food is JUST FOOD. It’s FUEL. Quit making such a big deal about it!” He puts the dressing back in the fridge and stares at the steaks. “I’ll cook these.”

“If you want to make it easier, there’s cooked chicken breast in the fridge. We could put those on the salads and not have to cook the steaks.”

“Dry cooked chicken breasts? Yuk. What the hell am I supposed to do with those? Dry, tasteless chicken.” says Mr. “Food is just fuel.”

“You could put them ON THE SALAD (like I said) and drench them in dressing.”

“Could I have them on the side and dip them in mayo?” he asks.

“I guess so, mayo is OK I think.” I try to remember… mayo… it’s eggs and oil. That works, right?

“Ok then, let’s do that.” He looks relieved.

I pull the romaine lettuce out of the fridge and carefully measure out 2.5 cups of it - our daily allowance according to Lord Atkins. I put it into a bowl. Mr. Athena looks despondantly at the bowl. “Is that it? I want more.”

“Well, we get 3 cups of ‘approved’ greens a day, 2 cups if we add 1 cup of other veggies.”

“And that’s 2 cups?”

“No, that’s 2.5 cups. We had onions and tomatoes in our omelettes this morning, remember?”

“That’s it?!? That’s ALL the salad I get?”

“Yup.”

“Lettuce is WATER! How the HELL can it be fattening? Why in the world can’t I eat AS MUCH F#$#@% LETTUCE as I want? This diet sucks.”

“I kind of agree with you. I never knew how much I liked vegetables until I started this idiotic diet.” I gaze longingly at the taboo tomatoes in the fridge.

“To hell with this, it’s not worth it. Let’s get a pizza.” At this moment, Mr. Athena seems handsomer, sexier and more intelligent than I’ve ever seen him before.

“Really? You want to quit this thing?”

“Goddamn it, I want a beer, I want a bloody BIG salad if it’s the main course, and I think this whole Atkins thing blows. Let’s just work out more and eat a bit less of the normal food. Order the pizza! I’m going to get a beer!”

We split the beer and order the pizza. It was the best food I’ve ever eaten. We’re happy now. Fat, maybe… but not too fat. At least Mr. Athena isn’t, but I could stand to lose 10-15 pounds. I’ll go to the gym more. I’ll eat small portions of normal food. I will NOT be eating eggs, cheese, or meat for the next week. Atkins sucks! Long live Carbs!

2

I was considering going Atkin’s with the spouse to offset the expect holiday binge; now I see we will not talk be able to each other for two weeks if we do.

3

What, you had no Reddi Whip and sugar free Jello? What in ogs name were you thinking?

4

Bahaha! Multiply your experience with Atkins by about 8 months and that was exactly my experience with the diet. I have no idea how I lasted that long. Maybe because I was the only one on it? Mr. Greywolf never tried it.

5

Is that to wrestle in when Mr. Athena and I get into fights over what to have for dinner? Or to throw at each other? Cuz God knows, I’m sure as hell not going to EAT Reddi Whip when I’m allowed to have REAL WHIPPED CREAM!!!

Athena, who is drinking a beer RIGHT NOW because SHE CAN

6

I never measure out how much salad I eat, even on Induction. I’ve lost nearly 40 lbs. this year. The meal I’m fixing tonight has stew meat, yellow, orange and red peppers, and mushrooms in a beef broth gravy. If I have time (I’m running a D&D game in a few hours), I’ll cut up salad vegetables, too, and have a huge salad with it.

If you need to lose weight, maybe you’ll be able to find the diet that works for you. Best of luck to you and the mister.

7

You guys aren’t motivated enough. If you’re not motivated enough to stick to the diet, I doubt you’ll stick to your “go to the gym more” plan.

You gotta find something to keep you going. Anything. Because once you get going, it actually gets easier. Then the motivation isn’t so much a factor anymore, because it becomes habit, or second nature.

After awhile, you just start gravitating towards foods that are conducive to the diet, and you “forget” about the foods that aren’t.

8

You want beer? Fine, Michlobe Ultra only has 3 grams of carbs / bottle. Pizza? no problem. There are plenty of low-carb pizza crusts available, if not at your local health food store then the internet.

I feel your pain, and have done it myself a few times. However, I’ve learned that being bored with the food is a sure sign you are about to fail so I try at least one new recipe a week. This week it was chicken wings, coated with fresh parmesian cheese/garlic/other good stuff, and baked until cripsy. A few of those with some greens is a fine meal.

Also, those strict limitations are only for the first 2 weeks. After that I pretty much stop counting “allowed” veggies and just avoid the bad ones such as corn and potatoes.

Try again when you are both better. Plan your meals ahead of time with recipes from the internet so you don’t get bored with your food. Also get some Ketosticks from the drug store. They are a great motivator at first because you can clearly see that your body is in “fat burning mode” (aka Ketosis), and weight loss is inevitable.

9

Diets, shmiets.

Eat what you like, hon. Burn off the excess calories via sex.

10

Ketostix are a godsend. You get to run around saying “I’m in ketooooooosis! I’m burning faaaaaaaaaat! It’s melting ooooooooooff of my aaaaaaaaaass!”
Well, that’s what I did!

11

There’s no law that says you have to use Atkins’ “induction” plan if it doesn’t suit you. Atkins himself talks about “carbohydrate sensitivity”, by which he means that some people HAVE to cut out all carbs to lose weight, while others do not.

As I recall, Atkins invented the induction plan for his extremely fat or diabetic patients, whose systems had gotten so screwed-up that the slightest trace of carbohydrate in their bodies gave them drastic insulin surges that turned practically everything they ate right into fat.

It probably works for marketing, too: fast initial weight loss helps win converts.

Anyway, if you feel up to it, try the diet from the other direction: gradually reduce your intake of heavily-processed carbs (candy, cake, pasta, chips, ice cream, bread, etc.) and see what happens. Veggies can probably stay in your diet in whatever quantity you wish.

This worked quite well for me. Granted, someone could argue that you’re not really USING Atkins if you do that, but if it works, who cares what you call it?

12

My darling wife Marcie has embraced the South Beach diet, which I understand is a modified Atkins. She has shed “about” thirty five pounds over the last six weeks or so. I am so sick of hearing “I can’t eat that” and “That’s not on my diet” or “You can have that if you want it, but I can’t” and “Why can’t we have steak for dinner?” (For the fifth night in a row) that I want to scream. I’m pleased she has lost weight, mostly because her blood pressure is much better, but that damn diet is a pain.

13

Good luck! I had great success with it, but couldn’t stay on it. Hope it works out for you.

14

I feel for you. Sometimes you must eat pizza and drink beer. If you can’t do this you will surely go mad and explode.

At risk of boring everyone senseless, here’s my diet: low carb but not no carb. Low fat but not no fat. No white bread, pasta, potatoes, rice. No sugar. Wholemeal bread and high fibre cereal in limited amounts. Daily 2 serves low fat dairy, 2 serves fruit, lots of meat. It’s the CSIRO plan

In 6 weeks I have lost a whole 3kg, which may seem like very little. But I had about 2 weeks off in total, with large numbers of birthday parties, dinners out, pizza nights, Oktoberfest beers etc. And mr cajela and I have modified it to add daily extras. More beer, more chocolate, and simply do not count the allowed veggie portions but eat as much as you damn well please.

So, there you go. I preach it. Lose weight slowly but consistently without pain. Yes, indeed, it goes faster with pain. But then you feel pain and you stop so you don’t lose any weight anyway.

Beer is good. Mmmm, Oktoberfest. The Bitburg was nice.

15

I’m trying to do it myself. Do you have any idea just how many meals are stacked with carbohydrates at a college mess hall?

16

This is not medical advice! I’m reporting my experience, not making a recommendation (I have to say that)

I found the Atkins diet super-easy. I’d never been on a diet before. I’ve heard so many people complain since I was a kid that I guess I was secretly afraid of them) but I painlessly lost almost twice the 25lbs I set out to lose. I’d accepted that I’d never be my college weight again - boy was I wrong!

I’m quite healthy, so I knew a couple of months of weird diet wouldn’t hurt me (med school is a nutritional nightmare: eat what you can, when you can, if you can - with a lot of drug seminar pizza when possible, since you’re busy when the cafeterias are open, and asleep when you’re home)

The secret was, IMHO, the Foreman Grill. I have quite a reputation as a darn good cook (the stories I could tell!) but let me tell you, my Foreman Grill cranks out a consistently tasty, juicy lines-and-all, medium or medium-rare grilled New York sirloin that matches (okay, exceeds) my average when I grill manually indoors – and does it in 4-7 min instead of 10-15. YMMV.

I bought 8-10lbs of thick cut NY Sirloin at a time ($2.69-3.69/lb at a major local chain supermarket, but probably cheaper in most other parts of the country), cut it into 4oz (precooked) portions, wrapped them in plastic wrap and froze them. I used an accurate electronic scale to weigh each one, and by the 2nd week I could consistently cut even the tricky corners +/- .4oz by eye. Consistent weight let me easily eyeball the the right grill time for the shape/thickness.

Even though these steaks have been maybe 1/4 of my meals for the past year (and 2/3 of my meals when I was actively on the diet) I haven’t gotten tired of them. I just vary my homemade seasoning salt, adding one ingredient at a time to my perpetual shaker to change the mix enough to keep it from being boring. Right now, I’d say it has powdered celery seed, onion powder, salt, MSG (hey, I love it, and it doesn’t bother me), Hungarian paprika, and some cayenne and cumin from October.

I also found a good brand of pre-packaged boat-frozen fish (not as good as carefully picked fresh fish from the fish market, but at least as good as ‘average’ fresh fish from the supermarket, and better than most unfrozen fish that’s been in your fridge a couple of days) Mostly I ate their salmon (individually vacuum sealed 4oz packets at $3.69/lb, which is pretty cheap for this area) but they have six varieties (if I could just convince them to carry catfish and trout!) These can be cooked nicely on the Foreman grill, but I prefer doing it manually - I like to cook, and I have to get my fix somewhere.

I also have an irrational love for a good salad [allowed in unlimited quantities on Atkins] with blue cheese dressing. Usually I’d eat a 4oz serviing of steak, fillet, salad or vegetable [chosen with an eye to make sure I didn’t get hungry by the next meal] every 2.5 hours - but soon a steak PLUS salad left me with a wonderful, sated, after-steakhouse feeling.

The funny part? I never really went into ketosis. I cruised at an ambiguous urine ketone level that was probably (-) but which I liked to kid myself was '0-5" on the urine sticks. I was in Induction for 3 mos, and only broke 15 twice - both times after unusually heavy physical exertion (a few hours of hauling and chopping wood) I monitored several lab values in addition to urine ketones.( As a doc, I have the analysis gear because getting results from the hospital is too slow, and I don’t mind drawing my own blood), Every value I monitored either improved or become more stable.

Overall, I ws very impressed with the effects, but I’m a bit skeptical of the biochemical mechanisms to which Atkins attributes his results. They seem plausible (I also have a degree in molecular biology) but I was at best only slightly ketotic.

Probably the most important change in those three months was my outlook on food. I’ve always weighed “what’s the biggest” among my top criteria when ordering at a restaurant. I was never fat, IMHO, but I never thought I could live on 4 oz portions. Now I do, without a quibble or second thought

It does help that I’ve cooked most of my own meals since I ws 10, but I think that most women, many men, or anyone with a partner who is also on the diet should be able to exercise similar control over their intake.

I’ll concede that I’ve always been an avid carnivore at hear. I missed bread and pasta, but not impossibly so. (When I went into maintenance I was amazed how many types of custom sandwiches and pasta I’d missed) I did experience occassional cravings, but I was always able to defer them with a steak or filet (Another benefit of the Foreman grill is that you can bring one with you, and do a quick grill in a break room, wherever you are)

I have many other tips, but I’m sure you’ve read many tips/tricks/pitfalls. I just wanted to share my experience.

17

KP, IIRC, what Atkins said about ketones is that if you’re over a certain amount of carbs, they won’t show in your urine even though you still could be burning fat. And actually, during induction (the first phase), you’re limited to two cups of salad per day. Sooo … if you exceeded that by quite a bit, you could have just put yourself over the limit where the ketones would show in your urine. (I’ve been on Atkins for almost four weeks now, and I read the book a few times before I started, so I probably remember most of it.)

I haven’t gotten the KetoStix, but I know I’m in ketosis because my husband (who is a nurse and thus is familiar with the smell) can smell them on me as well as on the sheets after I first get up in the morning. Yukky, I know. (I hope no one else can; apparently they don’t smell good. I’m probably okay, though, since he has the keenest sense of smell of anyone I know.)

Side note: blue cheese dressing is about the best thing on the planet, isn’t it?