I know that there are tons of threads out there about fat fasts...but I couldn't find my answers directly...so I made another thread

Alright, I've been on Atkins for 3 months and I've lost 29 lbs (I feel like I start every thread that way...I know it's probably not necessary, but it's easier to explain myself - I have started to think I in denial or something and I'm reassuring myself...lol, anyway). I'm starting to slip. I'm not falling off the wagon or anything, but I'm having more nibbles or bites of things and I know now it must be what is affecting my weight loss. However...it's has not been nearly as easy to stop these "nibbles" b/s I don't even notice them. Also, I really don't think I can do induction again - the food journal, etc. So I was thinking about doing a fast to get me in gear again. For some reason I'm movtivated for it. I know, I know, I stumbled into a bunch of threads that asked "why put yourself through that," but whatever, I'll be fine. I wrote a thread about this a while ago, but I still have some questions....

1. Is this only flushing my fat cells of water...b/c I want to lose fat, not excess water?

2. There's a diet that's only meats right (or a combo alternating meat days w/ other things)? Because I think that's the one I'd want to do, but I can eat as much as I want. If there are one thing I have lost my appetite to during Atkins - Macadamia nuts (and eggs too).

3. How long do you do the fast?

4. Typically, does the scale go up first rather down? How long does it take to go down?

Thanks for any answers,
Erin

Hi Erin - (me again )

I've done the fat fast on 3 occasions. My recommendation? Go ahead and do it. Does it work? No. But it helps the psyche.

So long as you feel in control, things go well. As soon as you stop losing you start feeling out of control. So go ahead and do it. It'll make you feel better.

It doesn't matter HOW you do it or which angle you try, it doesn't work, so try them all.

Once I made cheesecake and ate that for 3 days. Fun (I like cheesecake), but I put back on the weight I lost.

Then I tried to "reintroduce" foods gradually after a fat fast. Little better - it took me longer to GAIN it all back.

You won't lose any water, you are not retaining water anymore.

The one thing I discovered, is that patience and perseverence - the occasional change in food types or exercise regime, adding or removing certain supplements (like L-Carnitine) were all the keys to success.

Good luck out there - I'm pullin' for ya'.

So your saying that they don't work? If they don't, I'd rather just try induction again...

E

I'm of a different opinion than Sponge. Fat Fast will lose you weight. But, what's going to stop you from the bites and nibbles afterwards?

If you want to get a grip on bad habits, going back to induction, or modified induction will put you back on the 'straight and narrow'. It's like an LC refresher course.

Atkins has a description on the fat fast in Diet Revolution.

THe modified plan you are looking for is The Low Carb Project, v.1. It's in the Journal Forum under Group Projects.

Karen

I'm going to just "get it together" and go on induction again. Bye, bye new expresso maker (atleast for the next to weeks); bye, bye Fiber One...ahhhh, I can't give up my Fiber One.
Do you guys have any suggestions for "regularity" during induction...especially during the breakfast hours? I had horrible consequences with Milk of Mag...do you guys have any others?

Thanks for your help everyone,
Erin

CheeseCake is not permitted on the fat-fast. Thats like doing the induction diet eating 150 grams of carb a day. Fat-Fast is the most effective form of the Atkins diet. For the 1% that are very metabolically resistent... its heaven. Everytime I get stuck... eating 0 carbs... cutting down to 1000.... and fail to break the plateau. I begin running on top of that... 1 hour per day... still not breaking it.... I do a fat-fast... and I'm down 6lbs in 3 days. Try it first.

If so, you're doing it for three days?
Thanks for the info,
Erin

Sure it is. A low-carb cheesecake can be made that would fall into the fat-fast protein/fat/carb guidelines.

Karen

Cheese was supposed to be eliminated long before one resorted to the fat-fast. Along with a extended attempt at as low of a carb level as one feels ok at. The best way is straight nuts... the macadamias.

Fat fast permits macadamia nuts and cream cheese. LC cheesecake is made with cream cheese and a nut base (almonds are used typically but it can be made with macadamia nuts - or a crust can be omited). A LC cheesecake would be legal for Fat Fast.

I'm of two camps - you will lose weight but you wont keep it off. Fat fasts typically force the water your fat cells have been clinging to out; but once you start eating a reasonable amount of food again your weight will start to creep back up. And of course there is the fact that you've not changed the nibbling behaviour that got you here in the first place.

Stillman (lean meats) tends to be easier to do - but you end up with the same results - the weight will slowly creep back up.

These two techniques are intended to be used to break through plateaus when nothing else has worked - if your "problem" is nibbling and being unable to give up Fiber One then they're not going to help you (in the long run).

My 2 cents.
Nat

Nat is right! Atkins does wax on poetically about "luxurious cream cheese and macadamia nuts" in the section on Fat-Fast.

Karen

Ok, I hear you on the cheesecake. I just did stillmans at 1000cals this week, and am now doing a fat-fast. It really is for the metabolically resistent. If your not, I'm not sure what the response by the body would be. For me, it is the only way for me to break a plateau. 800calorie stillman and I actually gained weight. I am freezing, craving carbs like mad (drempt about donuts), and the only thing that does work is a fat-fast.

I think the problem with cheese cake is neither the cheese nor the nuts, it's the sweetner.

As fat fasts are meant to break stalls, it may be better done with none-processed foods, and none-stallers. Many of us get a sugar "buzz" from artificially sweetened foods.

Wa'il

There is such a thing as a savory cheesecake.

I agree completely on the sweetener, but to each his own!

Karen

Sorry, this may be a really dumb question, but instead of the focus being on diet to break a stall, couldn't one add an extra level of exercise to help boost the metabolism? i.e. added mile in walking or upping the intensity?