Good point Lisa. I'm going to put that post in my journal so I can remember its a choice (not to have a glucose hangover), not a diet.

You might want to check out Lyle McDonald's book called Flexible Dieting. I haven't read it but I hear it helps one deal with that all-or-nothing mentality one gets about dieting.

Excellent!
I was going to write a post dealing with this very issue in the PSMF thread actually.

Learning this lesson while you are losing weight makes maintenance a non-issue, so despite it's extreme nature, I think PSMFers are ahead of the game already. Let me tell you, that is the trouble with maintenance in a nutshell, speaking as someone who's maintained weight for awhile now (I haven't lost/gained more than a pound in a couple of months and have maintained my weight within a 5 pound range for several more). It's all about learning how to make the right choices to achieve what you want to achieve... how to balance desire & living with your goal. You can eat out, you can eat whatever you want... you just can't do it without being conscious of the consequences. Meaning, you have to do the responsible thing later and/or before, and eat less.

All roads eventually lead to maintenance. Unless you plan on living your life in ketosis (some people actually do choose this), it is unnecessary. You're going to eat the way you're going to eat eventually... if ketosis and complete abstinence from carbs was requisite in order to curb excessive desire for them, this means the latter phases of the diet are not effective and nothing but book filler .

Atkins is so strict early on because the early phases are designed to induce rapid and marked weight loss. It does this to make the diet more popular, effective, and motivating to compensate for the difficult sudden and radical changes being asked of dieters. Atkins induction is a perfect weight loss plan. When you're eliminating almost all food choices - combined with fixing metabolic problems - it's really hard stay fat. I mean most people would have to really try to mess it up in order to lose NO weight by doing something silly like eating lots of 2 "net carb" protein bars, or tons of nuts and cheese, thinking calories didn't count at all. Lots of people eventually stall out (and there they must make a choice to reduce fat more or stay heavier) but it's really hard to follow induction to the letter and drop nothing (assuming the person is in reasonable health and some kind of endorcine/metabolic problem isn't behind it).

So no I don't think cold turkey is necessary, even for carb sensitive people. The real question is cold turkey effective short term... and even if short term effective, is it effective long term?

Cold turkey might work better for some people, but others don't do well with it. I did well with cold turkey in the short term, but that's because I was extremely motivated and wanted to lose weight as fast as possible. I also think I was very sensitive to carbohydrate, so the fact there was such a marked change in me made it very easy for me to understand WHY I was abstaining from carbs. I remember back then I thought low carb was like a miracle, it was so amazing to me how I was living my life a slave to food and hunger all because of carbohydrate. Back then I had just been introduced to the concept of "insulin" and stuff like that, from a background of total and complete nutritional ignorance, so all this education combined with observing such a dramatic change felt a lot like a one. If the improvement/difference is not as severe, it's probably easier to justify bad choices. But for me, I thought the minute I ate cake and sugar, I was back to hypoglycemic episodes, starving constantly, PCOS, weight gain, etc... so I was really not ever seriously tempted. The benefits outweighed the restriction.

Later on when I figured out that reality wasn't that extreme... that I could have SOME carbs (even "bad" ones) without going back to that way of living - when I figured out it wasn't as simple as carbs = bad... things got tricker. I now had to make choices. But the thing is, it was like I was trapped because I had drilled it into my brain this extreme way of looking at food, weight, and eating.

For one, it made me unusually fearful of anything "unsafe" or "vague" in food and weight. Whenever my food and weight was not clear and simple - the nutritional info of my food to the letter, my weight steadily going down - I didn't know what to do. I had this extreme point of view that if I messed up it at all in any way, it was all over and I was basically resigned to obesity. For awhile I had trouble stopping weight loss because of these fears.

The sudden extreme black & white nature of a diet like atkins made my transition from "weight loss" into "weight maintenance" far more difficult than it had to be. If I had figured out during weight loss that it was OK to be human, I think this wouldn't have been an issue. It's normal to gain some weight (1 pound does not mean you have slipped, it just means you have to cut back). No one stays the exact same weight every single day, yes people even gain fat for awhile. It's normal to eat like a piggy and let loose occasionally (EVERYONE over eats sometimes). It's irrational to think even the most insignificiant amount of dietary sugar will trigger you back to what you were. I honestly thought, until I TRIED it, that if I had a small portion of cake I would helplessly be at the mercy of my body and be magically be "forced" to eat gluttonously and gain weight. Talk about crazy. The sad thing is a lot of people are getting that black or white message from rigid diets and they are BELIEVING it!

Anyway, if I learned I had the power to make choices and to balance my choices to achieve ALL my goals, things would have been a lot easier and I could have avoided a lot of unnecessary problems. So, because of who I am, I don't think a diet like Atkins was a good choice. Even though cold turkey was extremely effective weight loss diet, in the long term, cold turkey did not work as well as a low carbohydrate plan that emphasized behavior and the power to make choices.

This is what I was going to mention. For people with the patience of a saint, dieting backward might work. It would work for people who are not feeling totally fed up, helpless, and hopeless.

The one issue I'd have with the backward concept is how wishy-washy it is. Unless you're going to be very regimented with yourself, it just seems kind of half-arsed. Half-arsed effort gets you half-arsed results.

For the record, I eased myself into LCing by first eliminating sugar, then grains and starchy foods. It was PP intervention after that (30-40 g carbs). So I guess I was cold turkey enough that I took it seriously, but not so cold turkey that I had withdrawls. I had some buffer time. The advantage of a cold-turkey approach is that it forces you to put your eating on "project status", as Dr Phil would say. If you don't take the time to really learn how to do it, how are you supposed to be successful long term?

Atkins is also designed to supress your appetite early on. If you don't go all-out, would you not be giving up the appetite supression that so many people experience?

I think not being hungry early on is why you see rapid weight loss on Atkins. Why is it more rational to "slip" into it when the thing is designed to change your metabolism and reduce your hunger by being strict in the early phases? Absent that, I'm not sure I'd be where I am.

There's also the psychological advantage of seeing that early weight loss (lots of it water, but still). When Atkins came out it was widely ridiculed, and people said it would never work, it would kill you, blah blah blah. Quickly losing 5 or 10 pounds can be a big psychological boost to a dieter, and get someone to buy in to a plan they were skeptical about. People here have confidence in low carbing; not everyone does. Edging your way into a program you don't really believe in and not seeing immediate results isn't the best way to overcome doubts.

The purpose of induction is not to lose weight, in fact most weight lost during induction is water. Induction is designed to shift the body to fat-burning metabolism. This is more likely to fail for both physiological and psychological reasons if attempted in a half-fast fashion.

On the other hand, I went from a low-carb diet with lots of restaurant and processed food choices (no real lifestyle change required) to a paleo-style diet which IS a major lifestyle change - but doesn't involve a physical addiction - by making incremental changes ("dieting backward"). Every few weeks I'd select an undesireable food to eliminate, spend whatever time needed to figure out alternatives or otherwise adapt to the change, and then move on to the next.

Wyv

Wyvrn you're kinda forcing me to take a position I don't really support. Just because I feel induction is structured the way it is to primarily lose weight fast, doesn't mean I don't ALSO think it's also designed to get the body burning fat. I just think induction takes that template of getting blood sugar under control, and adds in a whole bunch of other rules on top of it to produce rapid weight loss. These rules make no sense, if induction was exclusively about detoxing from sugar. I'll list a couple of those rules now.

1) No nuts. (Nuts are extremely high fat and extremely low carb, percentage wise they are the ideal food for induction (all nuts are at least 65% fat, mac nuts I think are 95). They are more than conducive to fat metabolism. Unfortunately, nuts are notoriously hard to portion control. On induction they are forbidden explicitly so people lose weight).
2) Limited amounts of cheese, avocado (half per day), cream. (You are allowed these foods, but asked to watch portion size, again to control calories. These foods are all perfect percentages for induction, if not BETTER than some foods that are free (avocados are over 70% fat). These foods are not forbidden because they aren't as hard to portion control, but they are limited because people still tend to eat too much of them.)
3) The fact that induction is optional. Would be Atkinsers are told if they don't have much weight to lose, or don't want to lose weight at all, they can skip this step or cut it really short and move directly to finding their ideal carb tolerance levels. On the other hand, very obese dieters are told they may prolong induction to lose weight faster if they wish.
4) The emphasis on ketosis. Atkins does say not to worry about strips, but ideally he would like you to be in measurable ketosis while on induction. Ketosis is not necessary to have your blood sugar under control. Ketosis is necessary to make you adverse to food and your appetite suppressed, though.

There's lots and lots of other rules which are more vague and can be argued (lack of berries, limited AS)... but those are the most obvious and it's really hard to argue that those rules exist for any reason other than calorie control and weight loss.

I'd have to brush up on the science behind this, so I'm not going to comment on that part. However, I'll avidly read what other have to say.

What I will say is that I'd find this tough to do on a personal level. Going from six (okay, sixteen ) chocolate chip cookies to two would require more of an exercise of willpower for me than simply saying "no" to chocolate chip cookies in the first place. Being able to eat sour cream & onion potato chips without being able to wash them down with soda is the sort of thing that will have me back drinking soda in very short order. It's not so much an issue of cravings, I don't think I get those. It's just that I have a tendency to well, finish what I start, whether it is a package of cookies, a bottle of soda, what have you. I almost turn into a automaton.

In fact, I'm thinking it was something similar to the above that made me fail at an LC diet the last time I tried one. (Nobody's fault but mine, of course. But this time 'round I'm trying to be sensitive to any traps. And I'm fairly sure that sort of thinking is one of my biggest.) I'd start thinking that "just one [whatever] won't hurt me" and before to long I'd have chowed down on fifty of them.

I've never bought the analogy of carbohydrates as being like tobacco, but perhaps there's something to be said for it, at least in a limited way.




It sounds like a very complicated plan to follow. Could I knock out Ring Dings one month and Suzy Qs the next? Sorry.

Seriously, I guess it boils down to personal preferences and your own abilities to handle this sort of thing. I really doubt I could, but that's me. I'm also the sort who throws himself off the dock rather than wades into the lake. I find it far easier to get into the water that way.

In a strange way this sort of dieting reminds me of my old company, which used to lay people off in small numbers, and cut our benefits just a little bit, but never seemed to stop doing it. Everybody was always on edge, wondering what the next thing taken away was going to be. In consequence, morale was horrible, performance suffered, etc.

At least on a plan like Atkins you can look forward to some things coming back once you take the plunge.

My $.02, and doubtless worth every penny.

Yes, indeed! I was asking my SIL, a psychologist, whether its possible to change bingeing behavior. She said its extremely difficult. She said it is far better to practice avoidance. I think she said something like 100% is much, much easier than 97%.

I actually totally agree with this, because the nut and cheese restriction seems to be in there ONLY for the sake of keeping calories low

As to the point about dieting backwards being complicated, I actually don't understand that. You make one healthful change, and then move forward.

Actually, someone just posted something about it taking 2-3 weeks for your body to convert from running on glucose fuel to running off of glycogen from protein and fat. The process is a pretty uncomfortable one for a lot of people.

I'm not forcing you to do anything - how you respond to my post is completely up to you. I'm just telling you what Dr. Atkins said about induction. Regardless of whether you agree with his rules for how to accomplish the switch fat burning, that's what he said. The initial weight loss is just a side effect that demonstrates the success of the method - not at burning excess fat, not in 14 days - but for reducing excess sugar in the body. The dieter is encouraged to find this process motivational, but the stated purpose of induction is the metabolic switch.

These foods are limited because even though they are low in carbs, they are high enough that it's easy to go over the 20 grams per day if allowed or not limited. Notice eggs, butter, meat are even potentially higher in calories than the limited foods... but they are not limited! It's possible that some people can have some of the limited foods on induction without trouble - but Atkins developed his diet for people who are more, rather than less insulin resistant.
People who don't need to lose weight are less likely to be very insulin resistant... they don't need induction to get into fat-burning mode because they're already there. In their case moderating their carb intake would be preventative. Whereas people who are very insulin resistant (thus obese) may need to keep carbs at induction levels to remain in fat burning mode. Makes perfect sense to me.
Measurable ketosis is a useful indicator for people starting the diet. As for appetite, I've been in ketosis for months and it hasn't made me "adverse to food". It doesn't suppress my appetite, unless you call getting rid of addictive carb cravings "appetite suppression". I just call it normal. I still get good and hungry when it's time to eat.
How do you figure? I know I was eating huge amounts on induction. 3000+ calories a day, trying to drown my carb cravings in prime rib and butter. I lost about 10 pounds anyway. It's not about the calories.

Wyv

In my experience, it's not a particular food item that's the problem, it's a whole class of foods. Anything with high sugar (carbohydrates) from potatoes to Hershey bars causes the same problem, any amount causes the same problem. For my body, it is strict low carb or nothing.
Atkins induction worked for me and his advice was the result of years of experience with thousands of patients, so I trust what he had to say n the subject. What you have to remember is that Atkins considered the ketosis strips to be pretty unreliable and use a machine that measured all the types of excreted ketones in the exhaled breath. Also the strips only measure the unburned ketone bodies, post vigorous exercise there may be none excreted because the body has used them all. Nyah Levi