I am two months new to this WOE . I THINK I have done fairly well so far.I started in at 205 and am now at 183.{ I am 5'9 } Unfortunately i lost most of that weight in the first month,and have been struggling ever since. I get so discouraged after eating a straight week of salmon/fish and a salad and still see the scale unchanged,4 times this month I've said 'well I'm not losing anyway,one chocolate bar or a piece of bread wont kill me'.Does anyone know if its these little binges that are keeping me the same size? I do however feel absolutely fantastic,my energy levels are much higher and I haven't weighed in under 200 pounds in 13 years.{highest 240}. I'm also 33 years old and for the first time in a very long time feel I'm not going to sit on a chair and break it!!!I do come on this site quite often just to see everyones success to boost myself up. It's just discouraging to think that I still want to lose 23 more pounds. Thanks to all you guys!

What are you eating? Provide a sample menu of what you are eating each day. Perhaps we can help. Also, I've found that keeping track of my calories as well as carbs at this juncture helped me to finally have that breakthrough I was looking for, and I am consistently losing weight now, towards my goal of 180. I began at 352. I keep my calories right around 1600 each day, and carbs of 40, and haven't had starch or sugar in 25 days now.

Again......please post a sample menu.

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April

The face of a child can say a lot -- especially the mouth part of the face.

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I haven't counted calories on this diet.....maybe that's it! I really wasn't a big eater even before I started this woe but meatloaf and mashed potatoes were my downfall. ok bread too.I usually don't eat breakfast but have been eating usually a piece of fish and a small salad with about 2 ounces of cheddar cheese and 2 tablespoons of dressing for lunch and supper. I also always drink more than enough water as well as being addicted to eating ice cubes all day! Sometimes I will substitute a cheeseburger for the fish. More often then not I seem to usually eat once a day. Also believe it or not I have developed a love for pork rinds,and thankfully my kids all hate them so they seem to stick around.Once and a while i will also have a pepperoni stick.Oh and I also have about a half a cup of cottage cheese about 4 times a week.Hope this helps .thanks

Oops. Gotta rethink that eating pattern. Skipping breakfast--let alone two meals--puts your body at a big disadvantage. This is one of the things you're aiming to relearn as you get into the LC groove for life.

Fix yourself a quickie breakfast the night before. Celery with cream cheese. Hardboiled eggs or deviled eggs. Leftover chicken or fish. Grab as you go.

Pork rinds are an okay snack, but they don't add much nutritional value. You'd be better off with a handful of almonds--but be sure and measure a portion, and don't just eat them out of the jar.

You don't mention veggies--and I hope you're getting your full measure of allowed veggies every day. Salad greens (lots!), plus others.

Even little sugar/starch binges can affect the chemistry of low-carb and set you back. Try to find a low-carb snack that satisfies that sweet tooth. Sugar-free Jell-O with real whipped cream is pretty good.

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Barb L.
Atkins since Jan 2003
Maintenance as of 4/05


My Fitday Journal

i could be wrong--someone back me up here--but i think you need to eat more than one actual meal a day, and absolutely starting with breakfast.

breakfast does just that--it breaks the fast that you're on when you're sleeping and your body is in dormant mode. breakfast jumpstarts your metabolism, and then throughtout the day (or so i've been advised) you should eat several smaller meals and/or snacks rather than one big one.

i could be wrong here but it could be worth a shot! kudos to all the water, though, that's what i'm working on right now... i forget to drink a lot of water sometimes.

also, i don't recall you saying anything about exercise? give that a shot, believe me it works wonders!

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proud member of the HOME STRETCH CHALLENGE... kicking those last 13 pounds in the teeth by 12/31/05!! ^_^

Ooops I did forget to mention about the salad.My salads everyday consist of about 2 cups of lettuce,4chunks of cucumber,1 green onion ,2 ounces of cheese,2-3 slices of thinly sliced gypsy salami,and two tablespoons of dressing.once in a while I enjoy fried up broccolli with butter and garlic. I am a very picky eater and absolutely hated salad before this but have come to look forward to them. It's very hard to force myself to eat breakfast however. Usually if I do have something in the morning, I find I,m starving all day!

Lets see, you lost 22 lbs in two months, congrats....thats an average of 2.75 lbs per week (granted none in the last 4 weeks)... but your body could be adjusting to the new way of eating, to having let go of 22 lbs, some people having that one candy bar or bread could be the sabotage that is hold them from losing any more....
I would make sure you are eating enough food, you should be eating between 30-40 grm of carbs per day....
that means you need to be eating breakfast, lunch and dinner, and maybe some snacks during the day....
You are basically starving your body when you only eat one meal a day... take that salad and break it up between two meals....are you exercising????
remember if you just started exercising you are building muscle and muscle weighs more than fat....
its is those thoughts ... just one won't hurt.... becomes more than just one...
usually that means two or more, and other things start looking ok to eat....
i have been there, and know that just one won't do it for me....so I just don't eat those things any longer
hope some of this makes sense....
carolyn

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carolyn in texas
started 8/11/03 327/268/177
5/20/08/ - 348
onward thru the fog

Hey, I think losing that much weight is a huge success and I congratulate you! :great:

It's normal for weight loss to go faster or slower at different times, but it's good that you are stopping to think about it and ask questions. Our bodies and our needs are constantly changing, so most of us find we have to tweak our practices from time to time.

I really agree with all the good advice you've gotton already - especially about eating breakfast. It doesn't have to be big or fancy, but you would probably do so much better eating some form of protein in the morning.

And, if you feel hungry a couple of hours after eating breakfast, that's okay - eat something Think of it as normalizing your appetite. Just don't go hungry... eat again. Have some veggies and cheese, peanutbutter and celery, a ham and cheese roll-up, cucumbers and dip, some nuts, even pork rinds. You don't need to go hungry with this way of eating. Your body will burn fat faster with several small meals a day than with 1 big meal.

BTW, pork rinds are fine in moderation, but they are very high in sodium and fat. Sodium may cause you to retain water and the fat adds a lot of calories. Though counting calories isn't as highly emphasized on low carb diets, eating too many calorie-dense foods can stall weight loss.

As for the occasional candy bar or piece of bread... yes, that burst of sugars can switch off the fat-burning metabolism for a couple of days. I'm not sure what plan you are following, but most good LC diet books have a section on the body chemistry of low carb diets. They usually explain how insulin and excess glucose affect metabolism and weight loss.

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~~~Teelbee
Back to GOAL!!!
start weight: 176/goal range: 137-134/now: 138
Reached goal in Aug. 2003 - 4rd year of maintenance.

When I first started, I went down from 240ish to about 200 from September to the end of November. After that, I stopped loosing. On January I began to loose again.

Sometimes your body does need to stop loosing for some reason. Later on, I started to loose and gain the same 5-15 pounds over and over again. That lasted until just a few months ago when I began to count calories in addition to carbs. As you get closer to your goal, some people need to do that too.

As for the chocolate, I have at times bent the woe with low carb chocolates, but I never allowed myself to eat regular candy - sugar is just way too destructive to your body. It helps if you change your way of looking at it: you are not depriving yourself of something, you are cutting out the poisons that you used to eat. Begin to feel sorry for all the people out there that actually eat that junk and continuously poison themselves. That is something that has helped me overcome that problem.

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Started Atkins on 9/20/03
235-->190; 150 goal

Regarding chocolate.....Here in NZ we have a Cadbury Lite choc I buy one a week and I sometimes manage to save it to last all week but more often than not I eat it all in the one/two days...But it is only about 6 carbs per bar so i find it a great solution to the chocolate cravings i feel happy and i lose/keep weight
off and get to still eat chocolate....YeeHAAA love this woe (way of eating)

if you're phsycially feeling good, you're probably doing at least a lot of things right. usually, though, small, frequent eating is better than once-a-day bigger eating times. actually, each time you eat something, your body uses up some energy to digest it, so it's a little bonus.

and yeah, little things do add up. a little here and there won't stop you from losing, but a little is easily turned into more than a little. you can do if if you decide to, but you have to realize it does slow you down...it's a choice you make. you have to find a way of eating forever that you can live and be happy with, whatever that takes.

also remember, the last 20 lbs or so is notoriously difficult to lose. it just takes longer. if the scale depresses you, put in the the closet for a while! it's about what helps you, after all.

personally, i think the mindset is about a hundred times more important than anything else. if you can get the mindset, you can make the eating changes that you need to make. if you don't get the mindset, you lose your way. try a few days focusing EXCLUSIVELY on signs of progress, what you've done right, and things you feel good about, dismissing any negative thoughts. i'll bet by the end of your small trial run of positive thinking, not only will you feel better emotionally, you're weight issues will probably start to improve as well. really...

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I'm following Atkins. I did great for 1 1/2 months and then stalled. I found moving to OWL and upping my carbs to 25g per day has enabled me to start losing weight again.

Colleen

Ditto all above. But one comment you made struck me. You mentioned if you do eat breakfast, you are starving all day. Before I began LC, I was the same way. But that was because my breakfast was usually loaded with CARBS! Too many carbs = too much appetite! My blood sugar skyrocketed ane then plummeted . . . making me hungry and tired. But once I started this WOE and ate a LC breakfast, it made all the difference in the world. I had energy. I was not tired. Plus having breakfast and a good lunch made me less likely to grab something at 3PM because I was STARVING.

Please give a light breakfast a try . . . keep it low carb . . . you should feel a difference and not be hungry . . . until lunch!

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Alida
5'1" ~ 59 years old
Highest weight: 165
Atkins 7/10/2004
160/126/125
RE-DO, January 2008:
167/162/135

Canadasdee, ditto to all of the above.

Let's look at the positives here:
1) You HAVE lost weight!!
2) You feel a LOT better
3) You are drinking more water
4) You are improving your health daily

Weight loss is a battle, no matter what method you use, plain and simple. But your body is fighting you because you are, in essence, starving yourself. Breakfast gets the metabolism going. I used to not be able to eat breakfast until after I had been up for a couple of hours. I have learned to eat first thing in the morning, especially now that I am working full-time. I find that if I eat a high protein breakfast, it sticks with me until lunchtime. I pack my lunch EVERYDAY and pass up going to fast-food places with my coworkers. I eat eggs usually or mock danish and a protein shake with strawberries or something like that. I eat BIG breakfasts usually and get it made the night before most times.

Weight loss can be a bit of a rollercoaster. The body doesn't lose weight in a constant, fluid fashion. It does it in fits and starts. You have to accept that or you will drive yourself nuts. Just keep doing what you are doing, tweek it here and there (with suggestions posted above) and keep the faith. Adding some sort of exercise whether it's going to Curves or walking, whatever you find you WILL do, get your body moving.

And above all, keep coming here for support. We've all been in that boat with you. We know exactly how you feel.

Hang in there, you will get there and you have to accept this as a WAY OF LIFE now. (and if you have a little cheat and you are exercising, you can work it off much more easily!!!!)

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