I don't think I am. I think I'm on a moderate-carb diet, and the entire Western World is on a high-carb diet. The normal American diet, with its preponderance of breads, sugars, and potatoes is not a moderate carb diet, it's a high carb diet. An Atkins induction, with 20 carbs a day is definitely low carb, but I think an ongoing weightloss diet of 30-75 carbs a day isn't terribly low carb. A maintenance diet that goes higher than that could easily be argued as moderate and balanced by nearly anyone's standards.

But a diet that derives hundreds and hundreds of carb based food a day? That isn't a moderate diet. Especially a low fat diet should be called out for being dangerously high in carbohydrates. Yet these diets seem to get a free ride in the media and nutritional establishments; they aren't called fads or extreme.

I wonder if there will ever be a paradigm shift as time goes on and the proof piles up that the processed grains and sugars are far more dangerous than saturated fats.

I think part of the issue has been the way DANDR was written. It did sound hoky and salesman-like. It did make bold promises that sound less credible (although most of them turn out to be correct). The book did sell itself, and it may not have caught on the way it did if Atkins had written a dry, more academic book. But it may have caused a backlash just based on its tone.

Anyway, I'm not eating low carb. I'm eating moderate carb. You there, with the French bread and baked potato -- you're eating an extreme high carb fad diet!

YES, you never realize how bad it was, or how many carbs you ate, until you go off of this WOE, and you get to the bottom of a box of wheat thins, and realize how many people eat that way......

it's sickening and makes you so tired........I have never felt worse since going off............. hugs, Gina

I agree. I don't feel like I am on a low carb diet. I eat 30-40 grams of carbs 4-5 times a day, instead of 30 grams for the day. I'm still losing weight and feel great. Sure I don't eat as many carbs as I used to, so I am at a lower carb level, but nothing extreme. I'm glad that you have learned out to balance and moderate. That's great!

Arctic Cat you missed the point, LC is not extreme in any way shape or form. Not even induction levels. Your 200g of carbs a day, IS moderately extreme by most LC standards.

KD, everything is relative. LC is low only compared to SAD, it is normal when you consider what man ate during the tens and hundreds of thousands of years of his development.

I don't consider my plan low carb either...but I do consider it controlled carb!!

I'm guessing that I consume about 60-80 carbs grams per day and rarely from bread and never potatoes!!

I agree.
I think "extremism" of diet can be determined based on relative ease and realistic practicality of maintaining said diet in a natural unstructured environment. It's very easy to stay "moderate carb", in fact, it's probably what most primitive people's diets look like (save for a few in extreme climates). It is impossible to eat a low fat / vegan diet, which is why the low fat diet depends on so many unnatural man made foods and products to maintain health.

The Food Guide Pyramidiots say we should be eating a "low-fat, high-carb" diet. They actively promote this type of eating, pushing grains and more grains as the ONLY way to be healthy! Low, Moderate, High. It's all relative. At least these modern "nutritionists" call it "high-carb". Because if you compare the amount of carbs they say you should eat to what humans evolved on (for eons!), then it is EXTREMELY high! We don't even need carbs in our diet to survive. They are a non-essential macro nutrient! By eating them, we get some glycogen stores (and FAT stores... which was the ORIGINAL purpose in eating carbs!, back when we needed to prepare for the scarcity of winter!). BUT, if we eat over so many (like over 70g a day) we are increasing the amount of insulin in our system to dangerous levels. Just the excess glucose alone running through our blood is NOT good! You want clogged arteries, bad lipid profile scores?... eat lots of sugar! And, we NEED animal fat in our bodies! Period! It is super good for us! But, if we have too many carbs along with that fat, it is BAD! We also should NOT be eating grains! But, that is another thread I suppose...

Standard 'Australian' Diet ?

this is interesting.
One way to look at it is that we may not have evolved at all if early humans had been eating the same amount of carbs most people eat today. They would have had to search for food continuously to satisfy constant hunger. Eating meat and fats gave them the feeling of fullness so they had time to do other things besides constantly search for food, thus, using thier brains more and developing intelligence. Thanks for figuring it out early humans!! Now if we could just get some of our modern "experts" to see the light.........do you think all of these carbs are making our society slide backwards in the realm of intelligence? j/k

Valid point, really. I feel mentally sharper than I have in years since low carbing. No way to measure that, of course. It could come from weighing 100 pounds less. It could come from better overall food (whole vs. processed). It's accepted that the physical and the mental are inexorably tied together.

Am I smarter due to eating low (moderate) carb? Probably not. I doubt I would score any better on an IQ test before & after, although that would be an interesting study. I believe I'm sharper and more energetic. My brain isn't lagged by poor nutrition. My body isn't expending resources servicing a hundred pounds of fat it did before. There is a correlation between the weightloss and sharper thinking, in my mind. But is there one between the low carb and high carb eating?

Tom,
I'm sorry that we don't seem to communicate well so far. I said that I believe am on a low carb diet, but have not cut them out as much as some. If that is what helps you become healthier than great. I'm sorry that my posts seem to push your buttons. I don't like arguments or confrontations, but please respect my opnion and view even if they are not your own.

I hope you weren't offended, his remarks seemed to only clarify, not insult to me.

Your diet is very high carb. Not by the standards of modern nutritionists, of course. But the point I was trying to make is that today's standards, especially the Food Pyramid's, are outrageously high carb. A "low carb" way of eating that puts, say, 30-100 carbs total on your plate a day, is probably a moderate carb diet by the standards of our human ancestors before we developed agriculture (at least in many cases). It's impossible to say what "high" and "low" carb really are, because there isn't any objectivity on either side. However, I think calling 200+ carbs a day anything but "high" carb isn't accurate.

I am on a moderate carb diet, and think that if you exceed 100 grams a day, you're on a high carb diet.

Thank you for your reply. I know that it is hard to get tone from posts and are often taken the wrong way. What this has really shown me is that it is really up the dieter. Whether you choose Low, moderate or high. As long as you are feeling healthy and seeing progress and it is working for you that you can't really critcize or say someone else is doing it wrong. I have seen to many people succeed in so many ways that I know lots of things work. But I am happy to stick around and give advice on how I have suceeded if people still want it, since it worked for me. Thanks again.

I don't think that the induction level of carbs ( 20 grams ) is excessive if your diet is balanced. Many who begin induction have a hard time eating enough food to equal 20 grams. The more I read about primitive cultures whose diet consists of protein, fats and very little carbohydrates the more I believe that carbs are overrated. These people are stronger, taller, leaner ( not thinner ). They have exemplary immune systems and denser bone mass.

This has been the most impressive among a study of African tribes and Europoeans. The tribes that ate the highest amount of protein were healthier and had very little caries. On top of that they had very straight teeth ( hmmmm, orthodontia may not be such a lucrative business ).Scurvy is unheard of. The tribes that ate higher amounts of flora were not as healthy but they still had exemplary health. They had more cavities but it was still a low occurance. The Europeans who did not eat whole foods in comparison shorter and had more health worries.

Note that cultures who thrived on a high ( adequate ) protein diet consumed the whole animal-guts and all.

I don't believe that there are low carb diets, just high carb ones. I ate way more carbs before I began Atkins. Even when I cheat, I eat way fewer carbs than I did in the past.

Our 'modern' medical research is all based on a diet that appeared only a short time ago. Eating many carbs was not possible until agriculture came into being about 10,000 years ago. Refined carbs have been around for a few hundred years. What the medical researchers consider to be normal amounts of carbs are extremely high based on what humans developed on. Anything more than 70 to 100 grams of carbs per day should be considered high carbs.