I largely agree with your post, because I have seen so very many people on this forum who are kidding themselves on about what they are eating, then after cleaning up their act for about two days, coming on and insisting that they have been eating clean for two months... However, I do think there is the odd exceptional person who cannot lose weight on Atkins - possibly due to hormonal, medical or metabolic issues.

I do want to pick up one point you made though:



Now .. this may well be true.. but it is kinda misleading, because people who consume fewer calories will burn less of them over time. Their energy will nose-dive, and their body will start to cling to every last calorie it can get hold of, and in some cases that includes water. That might involve losing weight in the short-term, but they keep having to cut calories further in order to continue to lose, which is unsustainable. More to the point, however, I don't think that it is as simple as you think. Recently, my weight had gone up marginally, in spite of very low calories, and being quite active (for me), so I increased my calories by quite a large amount (I know I lose better on higher calories).. In spite of my energy being low, I have lost those few pounds again, to bring my weight back to 168. I don't really understand this whole issue of eating / burning calories, but my own experience has proven to me that it is not as simple as we are led to believe. I think in my case, my blood sugar is quite wonky, and if the calories are too low, I might get a surge of insulin, which is packing everything I eat into the fat cells. Being unwell, my body doesn't always work properly, so rather than using the glycogen stores, it simply shuts down my energy output and waits for the next meal. Over time, this leads to weight-gain.. in spite of very low calories. I have observed this happening with the low-carb diet, but it was far, far worse before I started Atkins.. I could honestly gain about 8lbs in the course of several days of eating about 80 calories (yes - 80 and not 800). I don't understand it, but it happened, several times, and it didn't come back off until I discovered Atkins. I suspect that inflammation was responsible for those gains, and I was very impressed by Hutchison's post early in this thread, which dealt with that issue.