Thread: Third day in pandemoniuim

time--a long walk and you vitamins--I take Atkins Essential Oils, a good mulitvitamin and a calcium supplement! Occcasionally I take the accel!

folks say that l-cartenine sometimes helps cravings. people have lots of different and often strong feelings about supps. i take everything i can find personally!

you're probably riding out the end of the withdrawl now. almost everybody i've seen talk about it say 3-4 days. it was 4 for me 1st atkins trip. (i'm on #2 and forever lc, thank you very much!)

hang in, honey...most of us have been there before and you're almost home!

There are a couple of good threads about supplements and vitamins. Do a search at the top of the page. Not "search this thread", but higher up: search. Type in supplements and you should find an opinion poll type thread or two about what stuff we are all taking. Have fun!

Hi-
I've been taking 500 mg of L-Glutamine to help with sugar cravings, I do notice a difference when I don't take it. Other than that, I take Multi Oil formula by GNC and One a day Carb Smart vitamins along with Atkin's Accel and drink lots of water all day.
Good luck...I had a hard time the first few days of Induction and things got better around day 4.

cre8tive,
First of all, welcome to LCE! Many of us know the feelings you are having right now.
They are sometimes very difficult to deal with. Personally, I take minimal supplements for *cravings* because I believe once you rid yourself of the toxins in your body by following Atkiins induction, your cravings should become more manageable.
That being said, Atkins LC WOL is not for everyone. Maybe you would be more pleased with another lower carb plan such as South Beach Diet or CALP. There are forums here for those plans as well. Also, if you haven't done so already, read the book for the plan you are following. I always get re-inspired when I re visit my book(probably a mental psych-up thing)...LOL.
Anyway, as most have said above, you are most likely at the *end* of feeling bad, and should start to see more energy, decreased cravings, and just a general all over sense of feeling better if you are sticking to induction the way it was intended to be.
Hang in there!
Post often and let us know how it is going; also you might post a few days menus for us to look at; sometimes there are *hidden* carbs we are unaware of that can trigger cravings also.
Good Luck on your LC journey
HTH

Shelley

Cre8tive, everytime you eat something with sugar, you set yourself back. I made the mindset switch from "I can't have that" to " I don't eat that." Pure and simple...........I DON'T eat sugar anymore. None, nade, zip, zilch. I know what sugar does to my body and just won't go there anymore. Sugar is the most evil food in the world (if you can call it food.) Hang in there, get bottled water if you have to and flavor it with a dash of sugar-free syrups if you have to. I love sweetened stuff and make sweet goodies all the time, but they never contain sugar. I am so used to stevia and splenda now, they taste normal to me.

creative--i would really encourage you not to focus on what you "can't" have. first of all, you _can_ have anything you want. but those things have consequences. i could eat brownies and poptarts all day like i did before, but then i'd still be a porker. LOL

when i was in induction, i did eat some sugar-free jello to help with my drive for something sweet. i also stopped worrying about what was "breakfast food" at breakfast and ate whatever appealed to me that was within guidelines. i found those things helpful.

you can't let yourself sit there whimsically thinking of all the off-plan stuff you want to eat, and can you do this forever? you don't have to deal with the rest of your life. you have to deal with TODAY. this afternoon, this hour, this 5-minute stretch. live in the present.

if you choose to stick it out--which i hope you do!--you'll find the stuff you want to eat changes. you won't have the same drives and compulsions for food as before. you'll rule your eating, not the other way around. maybe you don't feel like food ran your life. it sure the heck ran mine!

and the milk duds...? well, he's your husband and loves you, right? he can stand a few days of crankiness for your health and happiness.

people emphasis how this woe is a permanent thing, and of course they're right. but you have to experience the phsycial changes to your body and the changes in your eating drives before you can feel that long-term is possible. if everyone continued to feel like you can feel during the first few sugar-crashing days of induction, how many people do you thing would stay with it? it's getting past that and moving to a place where your body is happier that keeps us going.

creative--focus ont eh things you do eat now--if you need a sweet soemthing--find some sf jello--or some splenda sweetened something--cream cheese or whipped cream--but for the most part have some steak, a deviled egg, some cauliflower or broccoli with dip, I went 6 days before I really felt like this was making a difference! I had headaches, body aches, cravings, muscle cramps and I was a bear to live with--BUT I got through it with sf jello and whipped cream and cream cheese with splenda. . .mostly however I ate meat and veggies!

Tell Dh that teh milk duds have to go--send them to his car--make him eat them--whatever it takes to get them out of the house--or simply stick them in the garbage can and forget about them! Don't focus on can't haves--focus on the future and NOW--get through this craving--get through the next one thinking obut how nicely a new outfit will feel, look. Focus on you--take a hot shower, sit in a tub of hot water with bubbles, do what ya gotta do for you! If eggs don't sound good--eat steak, have steamed broccoli with cheese. I eat chicken salad for breakfast about 3 days a week--cottage cheese one or two days, yogurt with fruit a couple of days , you name it--if it looks good, sounds good, I eat it for breakfast or lunch or whatever.

How do I feel? Like s#@t.

Then, you're doing everything right.

Day three, and you feel like crap. You probably have a huge headache. Get used to it. When I de-toxed, it took 5 days for the headaches to subside. My energy was nil, I was cranky, whiny, irritable, and when someone replied to my whining post about me feeling like crap and told me to just suck it up and by day 6 I'd feel better, I felt like punching her freakin' lights out.

But, I stayed the course and proved her right. Change takes time. Give it time. Quit dwelling on the "cannots" and think about what you CAN have. Reexamine your reasons for wanting to lose weight and becoming healthy. Dwell on THAT.

If you are very vulnerable just now to sweets in the house, get rid of them. There are sweets all over my dang house. I hate it, but I cannot change it. The only thing I can change is my attitude and determination.

You can, too. This is doable. Trust me. You'll feel better in a few days. We're here for you. Please keep posting so that we can get you through this.

My two cents….

Instead of dwelling on what you can't have, try to remember all the kinds of food you can have. Like: steak or chicken fried in butter, shrimp with buttery/creamy alfredo sauce, broccoli & cauliflower with cheese, caesar salad w/ full fat dressing, etc.

Also, if somebody leaves candy laying around in my house, it may get tossed by me if I'm in that frame of mind. If they want candy, they better find a drawer, bag, or shelf to keep it where it's not out in the open to tempt me. That's only fair. I don't go around leaving my peppers & cukes out to tempt them (ha ha).

Like everyone has said though, it WILL get better. Just stick with your plan and pick yourself back up if you fall.

Hey....yuo just gave me a great idea! My 10-year-old just got a snowcone maker for her birthday. She keeps telling me we can use pop instead of the syrup to flavor them.

I'm gonna make one with diet orange soda!

Thanks for the idea.

PS: It was sugar cubes with me as a kid. I'd put three cubes in each side of my mouth -- that's 6 cubes -- and suck 'em until the were gone, and then start all over again. No WONDER the tooth decay was rampant as a kid.....

DD loves snowcones too and has been begging for a snowcone maker--she may actually get a real one for her birthday--and yeah--diet pop would be awesome over shaved ice!!! HMMMMM even maybe a grape or strawberry when it can be found! I lvoe my diet Dr. Pepper--have had 3 or maybe 4 since school let out and that is a huge change for me--I usually have 1-2 a day! I am starting lists of things to do before I go--cooking supper tonight is one of those things I amg oing to ahve to do, though I relaly don't want to! It is smoked pork chops and a veggie--can't decide which one. I am going to make the last package of jello too--I love SF Jello and am out right now--will get that out of the cabinet while I am gone too! trying to start over after vacation! hmmmmmmmm!