Hello fellow "little women". I am impressed by all the success you have and I was wondering if you would't mind posting a typical day's menu?? If you could include rough amounts as well that would be great.

As a fellow "vertically challenged" woman, I'd like to see what has worked for you.

Thank you kindly!
Kristen

Hi, Kristen!

Just wanted to check in with some support for my fellow member of the "vertically challenged club"

I'm not sure my current maintenance menu would be a lot of help, but I'll try to go find my notebook from OWL and maybe, by the time the weekend is over, I can give you some idea of what I ate to lose weight at the astounding rate of less than a half a pound a week.

(Having dual membership in the >>>fast as a glacier>>> brigade. )

Maggie
5'1" ~~ Atkins since '98 (160+)
Maintaining nicely (110 +/-)
~~ Redhead until further notice!

As long as the scale is going down, Maggie! That's all that matters.

Connie

[img]//www.lowcarbeating.com/lcesupporter.gif[/img]

LOL, Little Women. I thought it was going to be something to do with the novel. Hmmmmm let's see, there was Meg, (oh phooey that's all I can remember, )

Anyhoo.......Um let's see......

Typically I eat Mock Danish or Flaxomeal or bacon/sausage and eggs for breakfast.

Lately I have been having Kefir smoothies for lunch.

Dinner consists of a meat and 2 veggies or 1 veggie and a salad (with lots of salad veggies), baby spinach, romaine, some iceberg, and a creamy dressing like blue cheese, ranch or green goddess.

Snacks usually consist of nuts, or veggies and dip or pork rinds and dip or a sweet treat I've concocted like a chocolate mock danish (tastes like chocolate cake, in which I add a TBS. of flaxmeal and chocolate s/f syrup, 2 TBS. cocoa powder and stevia.)

Tonight for dinner we had Emeril Lagassi's Sun dried Tomato Sausages (Sam's club-oh YUMMMM) cooked in a red sauce with some sauted onion, garlic and oregano and basil. To which I added slices of zucchini, yellow squash and red bell pepper, just to heat through. I also had a BIG salad of various greens and green goddess dressing. YUMMERS. I had double helpings of both.

Barb - 30 lbs gone FOREVER!
www.iwsgroupinc.com - website design and development


Atkins-3/14/03
174/144/135 5'2"
"A little knowledge is a dangerous thing."
Knowledge is POWER

OK, Kristen, that's a fair question. I'll try to describe a typical day. Since I do a Zone variation, this is typical of what I've eaten since I began in 1998, but also represents my own particular eccentricities.

Wake-up
latte with 1/2 c. 1 or2% milk

Late Breakfast/Early Lunch
omlette with 1 egg , crumbled FF Feta, and lots of veggies, usually leftovers, cooked in bit of coconut oil, or
chef salad with lean protein (maybe 3 oz.) and homemade dressing, or
tuna salad


Afternoon Snack
Small salad with Protein 1-3 oz), or
kefir (1/2-1 cup), or
2 or 3 Akmak crackers with protein & mayo or almond butter, or
boiled egg (1 or 2) and raw veggies with nut butter,


Supper
Veggie Stir Fry--lots of veggies, protein enough for me and DH--I have 3-4 oz, rice maybe for DH, or
Chicken or Beef Tacos/Burritos--LC products for me, or
Chicken, Beef, or Pork, with 2 veggies, sm. salad, or occasional fruit (1/3 c berries, 1/2 apple, 1 tangerine, etc), or
Chicken or beef stews or soups with various veggies, or
Chili, or
Big Chef's salads in summer.

Evening Snack
Scrambled egg with lc toast or Ak-mak crackers, or
Kefir, or
Small 1-2 oz protein with Akmak and mayo

On heavy workout days, I'll have a small snack about an hour before, and right after.

For me, staying on track means thinking ahead enough to keep cooked (crock pot or pressure cooked) lean chicken or beef, (or deli meats when all else fails) raw veggies, cooked veggies, and lc appropriate fruits and grain products always on hand. I don't use bars, or many lc products other than splenda, stevia, DaVinci syrups, some LC compantible breads/taco/tortilla products.

For soups, stews, chili's, I know how much protein I put in, and judge my portions accordingly. I don't measure veggies, but use mostly low GI ones, and take small portions of higher GI veggies. I occasionally enjoy beans, small portion of sweet potato, Ezekial bread, fruit. Grains, not more than one a day, usually less. Fruits maybe a couple of times a week.

I don't make sweets or deserts, LC or otherwise.

I don't drink, other than occasionally cooking with wine, or special occasion toasts.

I prefer to use low/lower fat dairy products and meats, so that I can use the fats of my choice in cooking and salad dressings. I mainly use olive and coconut oil.

I cook genrally simple but well-seasoned foods, use only "real" foods for the most part, and try to use organic fruits and veggies, and naturally raised eggs, chicken, and beef and milk when the budget allows.

I take my supplements regularly, and take my workouts seriously.

I do fall off the wagon occasionally, sometimes with both feet, sometimes on my butt. Maintenance is not about being perfect, but about being able to pick yourself up again quickly. I make the occasional planned exception, too.

HTH, and will be glad to answer any questions.



BC
172/108/108
Zone since 4/98

[This message was edited by BC on 01-24-04 at 09:23 AM.]

I am currently reading one of Suzanne Somer's books. I like her approach with modified LC and proper food combining. When I think about it, LC is really about proper food combining. I am going to give it a shot. She conferred with Dr. Diana Schwarzbein for one of her books, which gives me confidence in her Somersize approach. So I may give it a try. She says you can eat fruit on an empty stomach and then you have to wait a 1/2 hour before eating anything else to give the fruit time to leave the gut. It digests very rapidly if not eaten with other foods. If you eat a protein, fat or carb with fruit, it will slow down the digestive process and cause a horrendous fermentation process to begin. Having given up MOST fruit for this WOL, I may try it and see what it does to my weight. I am going to stick with the low glycemic fruits to start with. I am also going to add some whole grains back in small amounts and not eat ANY fat with it. So I have made some whole wheat bread and just made some Bruschetta without any olive oil. I will use that on my whole wheat toast instead of butter. Fat + Carbs is a very BAD combination, even according to the Eades, authors of Protein Power. So a lot of this makes sense to me. So What the hay.......if it starts causing a weight gain, I will back off and go back to Strictly LC. It is kinda hard to switch my thinking, I've found. But I adjusted quickly to LC, I'm sure I can adjust to this pretty quickly too. It forces you to think hard about what you are putting in your mouth. I am also going to switch back, gradually, to completely decaf coffee. I have been using 1/2 caf for awhile now, which may coincide with my stall. I think my body has adjusted to such a low caffeine level, that completely cutting it out won't make my head explode.

Barb - 30 lbs gone FOREVER!
www.iwsgroupinc.com - website design and development


Atkins-3/14/03
174/144/135 5'2"
"A little knowledge is a dangerous thing."
Knowledge is POWER

Barb,
I tried Somercizing about 2 yrs ago. I really liked it at first, and lost about 10 lbs in a month.Then I stalled, stalled, stalled.I follwed it to the letter. I did feel really good. Her WOE does make sense,but so does Atkins.
I'm so happy with my success on Atkins, I would never switch to a different plan.

deb t
5'1(another vertically challenged lo-carber)
Atkins since 08-08-03
153(highest weight Mar 03)
146/124/118?

Hi Deb,

Ya know, I've been doing Atkins for 10 months and have come to a screeching halt. I'm doing everything right, but can't seem to jog it lose. So I figure I'll change it up a bit. I'm still doing LC for sure. We'll see what happens. Now if I lose 10 pounds doing it, I'll pass my goal weight, wouldn't that be something? Hey and if Atkins is working for you, more power to ya!!!! We'll see how it goes. The hard part is getting that pro/fats and no carbos thing down. I'm so used to using fats so liberally. It really makes you think, "okay, is this a good combo?"

Barb - 30 lbs gone FOREVER!
www.iwsgroupinc.com - website design and development


Atkins-3/14/03
174/144/135 5'2"
"A little knowledge is a dangerous thing."
Knowledge is POWER

Are we Little Women destined to be glacial movers or what?

Barb - 30 lbs gone FOREVER!
www.iwsgroupinc.com - website design and development


Atkins-3/14/03
174/144/135 5'2"
"A little knowledge is a dangerous thing."
Knowledge is POWER

OK, Kristen.

Browsing though my old journals, these are the things which come up most often:

Breakfast(around 6) :

- Usually: eggs, usually scrambled - sometimes fried or soft boiled with a slice of lc toast
- Often: leftover meat or fish
- Rarely: 1/2 atkins shake (from powder) w/extra cocoa & heavy cream.
- Sometimes: piece of fruit with one of the above (section of grapefruit, piece of melon, a strawberry)

- Always: couple of cups of tea - fore & aft ( I drink orange pekoe or green & I don't put anything in it.)
- Vitamins (multi & C)



At work (around 9):

- Always: Coffee, couple of cups w/ heavy cream (I haven't liked sweet coffee since I was a kid.)
- Exception: Sometimes, I'd put some cocoa, splenda & vanilla in the second cup, if I needed a chocolate fix



Morning snack (around 10):

- Usually: cheese of some kind. Often cream cheese.
- Often: raw veggies cut up.
- Sometimes: maybe 1/2 oz almonds. (that's about a dozen)
(any or all of the above - depending on how hungry I felt)



Lunch (around 12:30)

- leftover meat
- salad or leftover veggie (always some kind of veggie - either separate or part of the deal)
- fritatta (like an omelette but with the veggies incorporated, cheese on top, and put the pan
under the broiler when the underside is done.)
- soup (I always make big batches & freeze it in portion size bags)
- BLT w/mayo (wrapped up in the "L" instead of toast, LOL!)
- tuna salad (wrapped in a piece of romaine instead of bread or eaten as a dip w/ celery)
- ham & cheese roll-ups w/mayo
- lox rolled up around cream cheese, few slivers of onion, few capers.
- Rarely: an Atkins shake, but only if I was really pressed for time.

(During my second year of OWL, my doggie was a baby and I went home every day at lunch time to walk him.)



Afternoon snack (around 3)

- cheese
- nuts
- olives
- fruit (never alone - always with cheese or nuts or cream or sr. cream)
- raw veggies (sometimes alone, sometimes with dip, sometimes stuffed - like celery)
- sometimes I'd put some cocoa, splenda & vanilla in a bowl and mix in an ounce or so of cream
cheese if I needed a chocolate fix.



Dinner (around 6)

This varied a LOT, but always had a
- meat: chicken, steak, pork chops, fish, (can of sardines if I hadn't planned better.)
- veggie: name a lc veggie, they were all there. Special emphasis on baby artichokes.
- salad: lots of greens, w/ cukes, radishes, onion slivers and a variety of dressings.



After Dinner Noshing (NOT something I did every day)

- nuts
- Raw spinach (full grown, I like the stems, they're sweet)
- pork rinds & dip
- few lc tortilla chips (after I discovered them) with salsa
- baby artichoke or two
- half an avocado


Right before bed (around 9:30-10)

- little bit of cheese, or meat, or HB egg - to help have a good AM blood glucose reading.

******

That was from the weekdays. On weekends, I'd "stretch" for one meal, usually on Sunday. (like have 1/4 of an english muffin w/ breakfast, or a baked potato skin w/dinner or whatever had been on my mind during the week.) This was more common in the earlier days.

I would also sometimes, not every week by any means, make some kind of lc treat on the weekend, like a cheesecake or jello or "fudge" or something. Then save or freeze what was leftover & get to have some more as part of a meal or snack during the week.

*******


What's different now (since most of it is still true):

- kefir (a few ounces a couple of times a day)
- Maggie's cereal (few times a week - still love my eggs!)
- more nuts in a nut snack
- more fruit (but still very small portions and ALWAYS w/something else to slow down the assault
on my BS)
- mock danish every so often
- shakes almost never (I'm a better planner)
- more likely to make a treat on the weekend.
- If I do a "Sunday stretch" it's like a half an ear of corn during corn season, or some cherries
during cherry season, a whole piece of lc toast w/ breakfast or some lc pasta as part of a
meal and like that.


I hope this helps, and (like Bren) I'd be glad to answer any questions you might have.

Maggie
5'1" ~~ Atkins since '98 (160+)
Maintaining nicely (110 +/-)
~~ Redhead until further notice!

Thank you all SOOO much!

I just wanted to get an idea of what types of things I *might* eventually be able to eat...

Kristen

Barb,
I wish you luck on Somercizing!Perhaps a change
will jump-start the weight loss. I think after a while our bodies become resistant to one plan. Maybe switching plans & strategically combining foods will trick your body into giving up those last few pounds. You sure are an inspiration to me! Good luck!

deb t
5'1 Atkins since 08-08-03
153(highest weight Mar 03)
146/124/118?

Well, there's been a change in plans, LOL I talked to Sharron about cutting out dairy for 1 week and seeing what will happen. Oh man is this hard!!!! I miss my cheese, kefir, whipped cream, kefir cheese, cream in my coffee. I made almond milk for my coffee. I don't know if I can do this a whole week. My mind is so set in being able to have dairy. So I am going to give this a try and see what happens. If I drop some pounds, that might be the key. If I don't, then I'm gonna quit torturing myself. After that I may still give the Somersizing a try. So........we'll see



Barb - 30 lbs gone FOREVER!
www.iwsgroupinc.com - website design and development


Atkins-3/14/03
174/144/135 5'2"
"A little knowledge is a dangerous thing."
Knowledge is POWER

Brenda... I loved reading through your 'typical' menu. In large part because it is so ON target in terms of healthy, real, whole foods. People who are worried about the garbage and chemicals and processed 'stuff' they're eating would do very well to read through your WOE. I was so impressed!

Hugs,
Rachel
165/144/128
Haec trutina errat. (Latin for,"There is something wrong with this scale".)

This is a great thread. Thanks BC Maggie and Barb, (not that a want to become a little woman or anything)

gregg

196/189/165