low carbing and ww
 

Not posting this to start anything.

just want to give my opinion on something that i've been tring. I remember reading in the atkins book that people without a weight problem can eat anything that they wanted and they don't gain weight. Why because they had a balanced matabolism. Remember the picture of the scales?? Dr. Atkins explained that unless you did his induction portion of the diet you will never get it to balance out right.

Well, see we all have our certain weakness to a special food. I got heavy because I liked the taste and didn't have the willpower to stop at just one serving. Like the skinny people can. They don't deprive themselves, if the want it they eat it.

Wasn't Dr. Atkins plan to teach us how to eat correctly? Without having a weight problem. Itsn't it true that once you get your matabolism back in balance you can have fruit ,bread ,pasta ect? I don't mean gourge on it but have some if you want some, just make sure it's balanced with your other foods.

Like a low carb weight watchers. Add the points for the day of what you eat choose whole wheat bread if bread is what you want or a high fiber bread, Baked potato, corn ect. (ADD THE POINTS AND THE CARBS and remember you can subtract fiber from carb count) Have your eggs with butter and some beacon. ADD THE POINTS. If you want the fruit ADD THE Carbs and the POINTS. By the end of the day and by choosing wisely your carbs and points come out in range. Thus you still are losing weight your eating right and feeling full Plus Your getting your complex carbs, but within range of both carb count and point counts.

Remember Dr. Atkins got your matabolism back in order so your body should know to burn and not store. Well this is something that I am tring. I'll let you all know if it has positive results

The issue with this has to do with the fats and the feeling satisfied eating.

Also with Atkins you are allowed to eat whenever you are hungry which I found you run out of food with WW. At least that was my experience.

I think the hardest thing to wrap yourself around is the low carb truth - that fats with the absence of carbs - does not make you fat. They just fill you up and burn away...

Anyway... it took me a while to believe it but I spent 10 years low fat/low calorie dieting and kept yo yo ing while always being hungry and deprived and now i'm a couple pounds from a goal I once would have never dreamed possible.

All the best to you.

I think once you reach your goal you can begin to eat more carbs and more varieties of carbs in moderation, but to think you could ever eat anything anytime and not gain I don't see it. Unfortunately our bodies aren't the types that can do that and not gain.

I look at it like this -- I'm diabetic, I may be able to control it with diet, but it is something I will need to watch for the rest of my life. My symptoms may go away, I may have excellent control over my diabetes, but I know if I don't watch it and monitor it it can get out of control again. I will always have to watch carb intake and be sure I get adequate protein, that is what keeps my body in balance.

In learning to eat correctly and getting your body balanced out again I don't think you will ever want to live on those high carb food again, maybe have some once in a while (a birthday or special occasion) but not a daily indulgence.

I do think this way teaches you a lot about yourself and how your body acts and reacts to certain foods and now you are learning just how good you feel when you eat to fuel your body and not eat out of emotions (well, that is what I'm learning anyway).

I have to watch and will probably always have to watch how sweet effects me, even if it is a legal sweet it can set off the craving in me to want to eat it until it is gone, so from that I have learned that I do better without the temptation. For me it's an addiction that will always be with me, but I can learn to live with it and I can learn to control it and be healthier for it.

I'm glad you are thinking about these things, it shows just how much you are learning through this process, made me think of what I've learned and that is never a bad thing.

Debi

During the maintanance phase some people can have whole grain breads and so on. It all depends on what your individual carb tolerence is. When you know that, you try to have good carbs such as veggies, fruits and whole grains but stay within that amount so as not to gain weight. Some peoples can be as high as 80-100. That means as little as 2 bagles, or a ton of veggies, fruit, and LC bread.

I'm not tring to stay away from fats. Oh I do love them and I believe the choices are great. I talking about when I feel the need for that potatoe with my steak. Or the toast with my eggs. If I add up the points for the steak and the eggs and add up the carbs because I wanted that potatoe or the toast by the end of the day it equals out. I didn't over do it but yet I still stayed in control and in range of both Atkins and ww and oh I have not wanted any of those mentioned above today. May not want it for tomorrow . It just something I needed to experiment with.

I don't want to come across as rude, so if I do, I apologize.

It seems to me a little bit like your trying to justify eating some foods that you miss, by using another diet plan on top of a low carb plan..

I guess you could always try it, but I'd be scared to death to gain back what I've already lost.

When you reach maintainance, you CAN have spagetti, or a piece of bread or whatever it is that you desire as long as you are staying within your CCL. But you should still keep in mind that this is a WOL and you have to limit yourself accordingly.

Honestly, I dont know WHAT I'll do when I reach maintanance. I think that I intend to have that occasional donut, but It's going to be a VERY rare treat for me.

~Angi~

Brandon

No apology needed. I understand where your coming from :) . I just know me. I have been on and off Atkins many times. It works but.......I can't do without for the rest of my life so I am tring to learn a way to control my eating by following Atkins and a low carb version of ww. I even read somewhere that ww is finally coming around to it. It's just my way of controlling my weight without going off the wagon again and that's because i deprived myself. so I hope it works. I'm within range of carbs and points since I started. I don't alway look up the points because i follow Atkins mostly.

WW is based on low calorie/low fat.
Low carb is based on higher calorie, high fat, adequate protein.
The two are really not compatable as they have nearly opposite premises; WW says cut the calories and the fat and you'll lose weight, low carb says cut the carbs and stop worrying so much about the fat and calories and the weight will come off.
If you're following WW points combined with low carb, I can practically gurantee that you aren't getting enough fat in your diet and probably eating too many high glycemic carbs. You literally can't have your cake and eat it too in this case. I'd encourage you to pick one or the other, but don't try to do both at the same time.
I'd also like to point out that if you're eating baked potatoes and toast, you're not following OWL. Those are foods that would be added back in during pre-maintainance or maintainance if they are ever added back in at all.

Thin people aren't thin because they allow themselves whatever they want. They're thin for many reasons, one of which is that they happen to have bodies that don't have a problem with carbohydrate metabolism. If you've developed insulin resistance, you can reverse it and get it under control with low carb, but if you go back to eating the way that gave it to you in the first place, it will come back. It does't just go away forever and let you go back to eating like those "skinny" people. It's a hard fact to live with, but that's the truth of the matter.



It's not just a matter of "rebalancing" your metabolism. Yes, low carb will help you get insulin resistance under control, but if you go back to eating high glycemic carbs that insulin resistance will soon come back with a vengeance along with the pounds.
Dr. Atkins' plan is a plan to teach us how to eat correctly. That means low glycemic foods in the right proportions for our bodies based on what they (not some skinny person) can handle. Fruits are not off limits during OWL, pre-maintainance or maintainance, but you should choose the lower glycemic fruits, not the higher ones. Breads might be workable during pre-maintainance or maintainance as long as they are whole grain and don't cause weight gain or carb cravings. Even pasta, if it's whole wheat, might be okay for some once they reach maintainance, but not a steady diet of it and if it causes cravings for more, it's something your body can't handle.
Don't kid yourself that you'll be able to just go back to the way you used to eat before you began low carb once the weight is off. The old adage is true: if you always do what you've always done, you'll always get what you always got. If you go back to eating the way that got you overweight in the first place, going back to it will only cause you to become overweight again.

so, you want to lose about 25 lbs... same here. i've stayed between 135 and 145 for just about my whole life til i quit smoking 6 years ago. from that point on, the pounds began to pile on,
first 5, then 10, then 20 and finally, close to 30.
i have always adored eating and never really had a weight problem as i spent lots of time substituting cigarettes for food. of course that all changed when i quit.
anyway, this plan seems to work well for alot of folks as far as losing unwanted fat is concerned. for me, it took years to put on 30 lbs and i have a feeling that it won't take near that long to take it off thanks to this way of eating.
i do believe 100 % in what you say concerning the incorporation of fruits (since when are they bad for you???), root vegetables (full of nutrients for your healthy body), grains, etc. when you get to the weight you're comfortable with.
what NOT to do is pig out like we probably did before gaining the weight in the first place!
i love pasta... i can have 2 to 3 full plates of fettucini alfredo along with a caesar salad and loaf of hot french bread dipped in olive oild and balsamic vinegar. if i eat that much every day, not counting my other meals and snacks, i'm going to gain.
that's a no brainer! but, if i have such a meal once or twice a week and keep watch on my portions (weighing, measuring), i'm going to maintain my weight. unless you have some metabolic or physical problem that causes you to pile on fat like there's no tomorrow, eating just about anything you want (whole, natural, unprocessed foods) in strict moderation should keep you where you want to stay.
of course, i'm speaking for myself and not for those that have had serious weight problems for reasons OTHER than constantly eating & stuffing themselves like i did.... if it tasted good, i'd go for quantity!
for those folks, the low carb/high fat way of eating is probably their only way to a healthier body and they may just have to stay true to this diet for the rest of their lives to keep things in check.
in a nutshell, we're all different and there's nothing wrong with trying different options to find what suits you best. if you want to incorporate the weight watchers mentality with the atkins way, more power to you... makes perfect sense to me ;)

sounds to me like you should check out CAD because it sounds exactly like it to me.

Hi Cherinfo,

If you are more comfortable eating complex carbs, that's fine for you and I wish you well.

But this is a low carb site, where we only support the low carb way of life, not WW which as LisaN says is low cal, low fat and high carb.
What you are doing is not low carb, so I think you'd be better to find a WW bulletin board.

:rose:Rosebud:rose:

Not from what the poster said. From what I gather, it's eat whatever you're craving whenever you're craving it and count the points.
CAD allows a reward meal with carbs, but it has to be balanced with proteins and veggies (equal portions of each), ONLY once a day and it has to be eaten within a one hour time span. The rest of the day is strictly very low carb.
Not being able to stick with low carb because of cravings and feeling deprived is a pretty good indication of carb addiction and that's a hard one to kick if you keep feeding the addiction.

WW and low carb have one thing in common. If you go back to old eating habits and forget your carbs or points the weight will come back. Alot of lifetime members of WW end up gaining and going back on and off the plan. No temperary diet will keep weight off. To maintain a healthy weight takes a lifetime commitment to healthy eating.

I guess you must of misunderstood me. I didn't mean to imply eat whatever you crave and count the points. I mean if i want the bread with my eggs OCCASIONALLY then have it. same with the fruit. I'm not about to feel quilty because i had a piece of fruit or bread it's within my ccl. I was just looking through the points book which has to do with choices I do not choose low fat high carbs foods and then add the points. I choose to low carb :) what I am experimenting with is this: I CANNOT do without bread for the rest of my life or fruit or a baked potatoe (occasionally). So I looked through the points book that I had when I did ww and if you incorporate healthy choices, by that I mean no low fat no sugar but some complex carbs it falls within range of both. I'm not saying it's for everyone. But it's for me. It's better then feeling guilty because you had something you consider bad for you. You can honestly tell me you will NEVER eat bread or fruit or cave into a potatoe some time in the FUTHER. All I am doing is tryng to learn how to control my eating habits. Since when is fruit bad? As long as I learn how to eat right by choices and I do mean good choices what's the harm? and why bash it? I did my induction.

I believe i'm back in balance and I will not throw myself out again because I want healthy carbs. I will not choose refined carbs and count the points and say it's okay. I know better then that but I am truely being honest with myself and I'm learning how to handle those times when you want to go off the wagon. Isn't it better to eat the bread or the fruit? You still end up being within your ccl. As for points because I choose Atkins way to eat I was just seeing side by side what the two came up to. to my surprise they were both within range and I choose high fat foods from the points book. not high fat and carbs together either.