This is what I am currently on. It's a low calorie (800-900) and semi-low carb (I average about 80 grams a day) plan that you are supposed to get medical supervision for. It causes very rapid weight loss, and consists of 5 meal replacements a day along with one real meal that you make yourself, which can be a lean protein and a certain amount of low-carb veggies.

Despite eating that many carbs, I have still gone into ketosis. I check daily with those Keto-stick things. I lost about 6 pounds in the past 10 days. The things I DON'T like about it are how low calorie it is (I feel weak/sickly a lot of the time) and how costly it is, but I am too afraid to switch to just an Atkins type thing out of fear that I would gain weight.

When it comes to keeping it off, I think I might keep on with the low-carb thing thought obviously with more calories.

You wrote "supposed to get medical supervision for" Did you do that or are on your own?
IMO, for your height and weight, Medifast is not an appropriate option for you.
If you haven't yet, read the Atkins book and do this eating real, whole and fresh food.

Good Luck!

I noticed your mention of calories......
have you ever heard the story about Dean from The Magic Bus who did an experiment for 3 months, eating 5,000 calories a day to see if it's true that calories cause you to gain weight?

Look at Dean's Mam experiment and look for Jeff's experiment too..
both men did 4,000 and 5,000 calories a day respectively and journaled about it. it's pretty profound. Neither of them gained ONE ounce on 4,000-5,000 calories per day..

good luck to you!

Yeah, the doctor is supervising me. I have to go in monthly and get blood work done to make sure nothing is wrong. I will probably switch to a low-carb "real food" plan eventually, but for now I am going to stick with Medifast because I like that all the work is done for me, it doesn't "feel" low carb (much of what you eat are chocolate shakes/bars/etc) and cuz I already paid for it

BTW, the bars would be great for someone who's in OWL or something for Atkins. They only have 10 grams of carbs, and are really high in soy proteins. And they taste great.

RJLupin, I do know someone who successfully was losing weight on the Medifast plan. She then disappeared from our group so I don't know what happened after she was nearing her goal. What concerns me most about the plan is that you are dependent mostly on (with the exception of your one lean and green meal) their prepackaged products. You obviously cannot stay on their prepackaged products forever, so how do you sustain the weight loss. Are you truly learning how to properly eat? Once you reach your goal, do you know how to prepare your daily foods, do you know which foods are okay to buy?

When you are done, you VERY slowly (over a period of 8-16 weeks) start to add back "real" foods, subtracting one or so Medifast meals a week as you do so. I always knew what I "should" be eating, but like most people I wasn't always good at it. I did Medifast because it's got lots of good reviews, and works very quickly (most people lose 3-5 pounds a week.) So, yeah, I've known forever what will keep me thin, this is just a jump-start to getting me back there.

I was on Medifast for quite a while, I lost a good bit of weight then fell off around the holidays. I found it a very hard diet to stay on but I did love some of the foods like the hot chocolate & cappucino, kind of miss them ;-) Then as I tried to get back on program I found it harder and harder and the results were not there for me anymore. I think for me it was just too many carbs. I have just switched to Atkins myself. Will see how that one goes. Liking it so far.
There are a lot of people who lost a lot of weight on your plan, I hope it works for you. Just don't fall off during the holidays like I did ;-)

Good luck. I did Medifast too many years ago. For me it was huge mistake. I did lose some weight but no more and no faster than I did later on while on low carb and eating delicious foods. Plus I developed gallstones, which I was told is a very common side effect to diets like Medifast. I've had gallbladder problems on and off ever since (though I still actually have my gallbladder). Plus I gained all the weight back as the nutrition advice the stick-skinny nurse who had never had a weight problem in her life gave us was total cr*p - like "if you really have a craving for a bologna sandwich just get yourself some really good thick bread and but only one slice of meat on it".

I hope the plan is better now.

you won't. but with crash dieting you could overshoot your natural weight and then when you go on any other plan you could gain a little back ... and then you will blame the plan!

LC is great, but if you keep the fat low too then you will be ravenously hungry, besides being malnourished. And you can scan this forum for all the people who have lost their gall bladders doing very low fat diets just like yours.

I'm not specifically on an Atkins plan, but it is similar enough to mine that I have a good attitude about it. And you will not gain weight on it.