Atkins not healthy for me!

[debmarjs]

I am sad that I had to come to this conclusion. I was hoping that this could be a life long diet for me. I went through all phases of the diet induction,owl,pre-maintence and maintence. When the 5th month arrived on the diet I started to not feel to well. I felt very depressed,foggy and tired. My blood pressure dropped to 85/58 I started to feel faint. I stayed on the diet hoping that this would pass but it did not. I really felt bad so I did some more research and came across some articles on serotonin and low carbing. Without the right amount of carbs serotonin will become depleted and you will start to feel depressed. So I went ahead and started to eat higher carb I felt better within the day. I have started a well balanced diet that isnt lacking anything that your body needs and I feel 100% better. I have continued with my excersise and I havent gained back an once I even lost 4 more pounds. My blood pressure also returned to normal which for me is 100/70 which is low to begin with but is normal for me. I dont think is very wise to be on a diet that lowers blood pressure if your blood pressure is all ready low and in the safe range. I took all the vitamins that are recommended and that didnt help matters. This is another thing that bugs me how come you have to take the vitamins if this was the diet humans are supposed to be eating and its all that healthy why do you have to take supplements???? I think I will save my ketones for a real emergency and not put my body through this again. I have to say the weight lose was great and it did benefit my cholesteral levels by lowering them but thats great but sadly this is not a long term healthy program for me anyways! Good luck all!

[LilaCotton]

I am not sure here, but I'm thinking that once a person is on maintenance they should be able to eat enough food they shouldn't need supplements. Everything I've read has pointed in that direction.

Please, don't get me wrong; I'm not arguing about your symptoms. I think you most likely did the right thing. :)

[ysabella]

How many grams of carbs were you eating per day when you had this problem? If you were on maintenance you could be eating all kinds of carbs and plenty of them. It sounds perhaps like you were just being too restrictive.

I'm glad you're feeling better!

[jaykay]

Hi Deb,
I used to keep my serotonin levels up by eating carbs too - til it caught up with me and I became insulin resistant (not saying this will happen to you, it just did for me).
I now find my serotonin levels are especially affected by light (ie I have SAD) and i either take St John's Wort or 5 -HTP to help during the fall and winter.

I know what you mean about the supplements, I think that as I'm popping pills. I think if we were eating well-farmed food, we wouldn't need them. But what with depleted soils, grain-fed beef etc. even our food doesn't contain everything we need, thought the wider variety we eat the better.

Hope you find a good, long-term way.

Take care, Jay

[Samuel]

You are doing great, but why do you blame Dr Atkins diet? You are actually still on Atkins diet. You have merely put yourself on the maintenance phase of the diet.

Dr. Atkins said that during the maintenance phase of the diet you should eat the maximum amount of carbohydrate which allows you to keep your weight. Isn't that what you did?

[debmarjs]

I am going to give maintence a try again. I am just going to go a little higher with my carb count by adding more fruits and veggies. I think I may have been a little restrictive with my carbs for my activity level. I was kind of scared of carbs but now that I was off the wol for a month and didnt gain any weight I wont be that restrictive. I dont really enjoy the high carb foods anymore I perfer low carb dishes now. So I will give it a shot again. I hope I dont feel bad again.

[Quest]

Good luck, Deb, let us know what happens.

As far as supplements go, I never took them when I was younger, except for a multivitamin, but now that I am middle aged I take the view that the body is not producing what I need in the same way as it does for a younger person--esp the many vitamins and minerals that are relative for healthy skin, hair and bones, all areas where people tend to go downhill as we age.

[Kristine]

Just about everyone needs supplements - the soil is seriously depleted and food grown now doesn't have nearly the nutritional content it had years ago. Also, transportation and storage causes nutrients to be lost.

As Ysabella said, if you've bumped up your carbs to where you're feeling good, you're still doing maintenance. Some people can handle a lot of carbs, 150 g or more per day, especially active people like you.

Good luck!