Ajusting to SPP after a low carb/low calorie diet
 

Hi All

I was hoping to get some feedback from those who have been doing SP for a while. I just finished my first week of SPP and I'm loving it.

My situation is that I reached goal about a week and a half ago and have chosen to do SPP (starting with the healing plan) for maintenance. I prepared myself for a weight gain in the beginning because of several factors - Dr. S. warns about this in her book; I was coming off of a low carb (20 gr/day0 and low calorie (1200/day) diet along with heavy exercising (1 hour strenuous, 7 days/week); I took 3 days in between goal and SPP to eat "regular" (ie., high carbs and bad carbs) due to a grad school orientation I attended all day those three days; Major stress because I started grad school and not only had to worry about my classes and my master's thesis which I'll be doing this year, but also starting to teach freshman composition classes (I'm shy and have never been in front of a classroom in my life - didn't even consider it until I went for this degree and figured out it would pay for school :lol: )

Anyway, I weighed myself this morning and I'm up 4 pounds. As I said, I expected it and I'm fine with it for now.

So I guess I'd like to know for those who did switch to SPP from a low carb or low calorie diet (or both) - how long did it take for your weight/body to ajust?

I've been adding carbs slowly and I'm not even up to what Dr. S. recommends for the healing plan in her book. I checked my food stats today in fitday and I'm at 1450 calories, 80 gr carbs, 67 protein, and 58% fat. I know the fat might be a little high but Dr. S. recommends in her book to be at around 50-60% a day. I'm also using mainly coconut oil, for health reasons (I need the energy right now).

As I said, I'm feeling fabulous - no carb hangovers, good energy, uplifted mood, no bloating or heaviness. I did some ab exercises this morning and I felt I could do them a lot better than a few weeks ago. I've also been doing 40 minutes of calming yoga every evening and adding migraine-preventing suppliments (since I have a tendancy to them a lot when I'm stressed). I've also moved to mostly organic food and most of what she has on her chemical toxins list I've cut out (except for the occasional Excedrine Migraine, which I had to take a few days because of stress - but now I think the suppliments are beginning to kick in). I've decreased my exercise a little - moved to more moderate exercise 4x a week for 50-60 minutes (still higher than what she recommends for the healing plan).

Sorry for such a long post! But I really love this plan and right now, I'm trying to focus on health rather than weight. However, I don't want to regain back most or all of my weight. I'm at 127 right now - I'm willing to stick with it until I reach 130. But I don't want to gain beyond that.

Any insights as to what I can expect in the next few weeks?

Tam

The weight gain you're experiencing now is most likely from the replenishment of glycogen stores in your liver and muscles. And also some water weight from the increased carb intake.

I can't help you with any of the other stuff, but you can expect up to 5 pounds from those things above. Anything more than that can't be explained by those things.

Best of luck!

Thanks, Elle - as usual, you're a wonderful resource for the SP plan :D. I guess I just needed reassurance of what I already knew I would be experiencing when switching to SPP.

Tam

I started losing right away. 6 lbs in two weeks. However, the total amount of food for me is so much less than I used to eat (lots of bad, hi calorie food) that Im not surprised.

Im doing 20 carbs/meal, 5-10 for snacks. LOTS OF FIBER!!!

I havn't started exercising yet; maybe that's the catch. But don't stop, I'm sure the weight will come off of you soon, its just a matter of when your body gets ready to shed it. Good luck!

Here's a receipe to jump start you at breakfast:

Flaxmeal Cinnamon Muffins

3 Eggs
1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons oil
1/4 cup sugar free syrup, such as DaVinci--I use Vanilla
2 tablespoons water
1 tablespoon of vanilla
1 cup flax meal
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
2 tablespoons cinnamon

In a medium bowl, beat the eggs with a fork. With a fork or spoon,
beat in oil, syrup, water and vanilla.

In a small bowl, combine the remaining dry ingredients, then stir into
egg mixture.

Let stand 5 minutes.

Spoon into 12 well-greased muffin cups (without papers).

Bake at 350 degrees 12 - 15 minutes or until they are lightly browned

I have been taking the time to devour the archives and there are a couple of things that Wanda said repeatedly,

that Schwartzbein said to up the carbs slowly and Wanda often suggested 5 gms a meal up for a bit and then to raise them every week or so, (I don't know how you chose to do it, it's just a comment from having so recently read about the very subject that you are asking about.) I see that you are already increasing them slowly, just giving you another (stolen :lol:) viewpoint.

and that Schwartzbein really was a moderate fat diet. It's one of the things that I have had to try to readjust my thinking to. Once I have/had realized that I really needed to address it, it was pretty easy.

There's a lot of good stuff in the archives. I would say that some of the posts pertaining to this subject are in pages 10-15.

Marty

Thank you, Leela and Marty. Marty, I'll check out the pages you suggested. I am reajusting my fat and carbs a little this week. I agree with you that the fat is the hardest. I don't think I could get lower than 50% fat but I consider that moderate (especially since I was doing around 75% before!) If I have to, though I will cut down more on the fat.

Tam

I wouldn't try to go below the 50-60% like DS says. There is not need to restrict high quality fat beyond that. As you know, it's the presence of the excess carbs that causes the dietary fat (AND excess carbs) to be stored as body fat, and if you find yourself gaining weight, I would stop increasing carbs and not restrict fats. If you restrict fats and not the carbs then the extra carbs will still be stored as fat. But that's definitely a point where I agree with the Drs. Eades and disagree with Dr. S.

I guess I wonder what about the PPLP maintenance plan you don't like that leads you to SPP? They're actually very similar. The PPLP purist plan seems to me to almost identical to SPP, just that the carbs are lower, but no lower than a person needs to maintain weight and health, I don't believe.

Your calories were really low which certainly has an effect on metabolic rate. I had lots of problems coming off a low cal diet. If I were you, I would make my changes very gradually, bringing up calories slowly, and monitoring how you do. The scale is not the best measure for body fat unfortunately. Also, heavy weight lifting is the best thing you can do for your body composition. This will increase your metabolic rate and eventually allow you to eat more.

It's great that you are feeling good. Hopefully you will be able to bring up your intake without too much more weight gain.