Newbie here.

Now, it seems like the Atkins book says that eggs are a "free food" and yet Fitday seems to be adding one carb per. What's up with that? 'Cause if that's the case I haven't been doing as well as I thought I was. Oh dear.

It's day 4 and I'm in deep purple on the little strippy things. That's good right?

I have a really tough time getting to my water. I'm horribly busy chasing all my kids around I usually have to drink about 40 ounces all at once at the end of the day. Does it still work if I do it that way?

Thanks!!

Hello hetoame: Welcome to the board. Yes, it is true that eggs have 1 carb each. But that isn't much for the punch of protein, fat and other nutrients that are packed in that neat little package. So count them.

The colour change on the stix indicates that you are in ketosis but purple isn't necessarily better than light pink. Many people lose well without ever seeing even a dark pink. I think that drinking the water all at once is probably causing that.

If you can spread it out over the day, that will be good in a couple of ways. It will keep your urine diluted so you may show smaller ketone level. It will help your body flush out the waste products from the cells on a regular basis. It will help you kidneys and liver function efficiently. It will help keep you full and not hungry. (Thirst is often misinterpreted as hunger by a 'carb lover')

Try some of these strategies for getting the water in.
Use a 500 millilitre or 1 litre bottle - buy a bottle of mineral water - instead of a glass.
Drink one of them right away when you get up, so you are ahead of the game.
Keep a bottle or container in the frig to see if you prefer cold water.
Try drinking warm or even hot water to see which you like best.
Drink water with meals instead of anything else - I add ice to this one.
Drink 1 glass or small bottle of water with every cup of coffee or tea.
Measure how much is in your glass or bottle so you know how much you are getting.
Get the kids to drink a glass of water while you drink your bigger one. It's good for them to get into that habit too.

The more you drink water, the more you will find yourself craving it. It's only the first few days that are REALLY hard. After a while you may even prefer it.

I see you have lost 33 pounds already = a great accomplishmnet. Which plan were you following to do that?

Thanks for the good suggestions. I usually find room temp water the easiest to get down. I've tried all kinds of methods to try and remember to drink more often but my life is just so compicated and busy that sometimes it just doesn't happen. I'll will just have to try harder.

I have been on and off (and when I say off I mean REALLY REALLY off) of a low fat diet for two years. I lost about 40 pounds in about 4 months but then proceed to yo-yo in and out of binge/self destruct/despair eating patterns and finally had gotten to the point where I was ready to just give up altogether when I read the article about the recent Atkins study. I have poo-poo-ed the Low Carb thing for years but was pretty desperate and so I got the book. It made more sense to me than I expected it would so I decided to give it a try. So here I am... It feels VERY strange to be eating 100+ grams of fat per day. It can't be any worse than what I was doing in "deep binge" mode. I'm just not used to actually counting my grams and eating bacon all on the same day!

I am glad to hear that pink can be just as good as purple. I've been stressing about the color too much, I think.


I think this forum will really help me. Thanks for replying!
Heather

You may want to re-read the induction part of the book to understand what the 'free' foods are..no where does it say they have zero carbs Veggies..cheese..eggs..all have carbs...following the directions of induction and keeping to the 'acceptable' foods list will keep you under 20 carbs which is the point

I guess what confused me was in the Carb counter part of the Atkins book (page 389 to be exact) it states:

"Fish, Poultry, meat or EGGS...........0 or trace amts."

Doesn't that sound like he's saying there no need to count the carbs in eggs? It sure does to me!

What am I missing?

Heather

hmmm...I dunno..do you have an old book? Because my Atkins carb counter off of his site lists eggs as having carbs..i'm not too sure what he means by that...try poking around the site www.atkinscenter.com Look at the carb counter and look at the induction section..everything on there is totally up to date...it could be just 'bad wording' you know what i mean? During induction you can have as many eggs as you want..they are considered a 'free' food per say..as long as you don't go over 20 carbs..which would be very hard to do unless you were eating 20 eggs a day plus veggies

Dr. Atkins specifically says that, yes, some of the items on his "free" food list have carbs, BUT their health advantages are so great that you shouldn't worry about them - just count them as free. I'll try to look up the page number if you need it.