It's been a rough ride for me the last few years and what with life stress and stopping smoking I've piled on the pounds. Last year I tried the 5:2 and lost a little bit of weight then gained it after stopping smoking.

A number of years ago I tried Atkins and I lost a huge amount of weight after being in a long term relationship - I'm also now newly married and very much in love and the same thing has happened again and I am back at my heaviest 205pounds. I'm only 5'6 tall so the weight really shows on me, while people say it suits me I'm just not happy not being able to fit into my wardrobe and I'm fed up of having to buy lots of larger sizes.

Now Atkins was great - I released I was sensitive to wheat so I don't eat pasta that much and the same goes for rice. Bread I only have very rarely and I never eat cereals.

I have recently found out that I am sensitive to mozzarella, so I have been avoiding dairy. I'm not resistant to going back on Atkins again but I just don't feel I could back on the dairy.

I was considering doing Dukan but it looks seriously restrictive - it's not something I'm super enthusiastic about but if it's something that will get the job done for me to then keep the weight off by slowly adding in the foods I am eliminating then I'm happy to do it.

So my question is .... What are you guys doing and what would you recommend if I'm low dairy ? I have hemp milk in my coffee at the moment, cheese I avoid and cream isn't something I want to start having in my diet.

Any thoughts my fellow low carbers ?

Being in love was tremendously fattening for me! Best wishes anyway.

The simplest and best LC diet is found in the back of Taubes's book "Why We Get Fat and What to Do About It"--a good read for anyone wanting some background on the reasons why LC seems to work pretty well for a lot of people. It's Dr. Westman's simple plan based on his work with Dr. Atkins.

I don't eat much cheese, and I don't think it's essential for a palatable diet. I do enjoy heavy whipping cream in coffee, but I keep it to a couple TBS per day. If you like a "creamy" coffee, you might look up recipes for so-called Bullet Proof coffee. This involves adding coconut oil and butter to hot coffee and whizzing up the brew in some kind of blender. Clearly, that gives you a lot of fat energy.

Fat is what you need. You can get good fats from avocados, mayonnaise (especially if you care to make your own from light olive oil), and, of course, various meat fats like bacon. And coconut oil for cooking.

You might consider experimenting with various other kinds of dairy. For example, full-fat Greek yogurt (I make my own from regular full-fat yogurt drained of the whey). Cream cheese is another form of dairy that's easy to eat and useful for recipes. Maybe it's just something about mozzarella that isn't universal to all dairy.

Let us know what you find out.
P. S. A handy one-stop-shop for LC info is DietDoctor.com The basics are free on the front page. Membership brings you the whole world of LC media.

Welcome, Paullondon! What Barb has outlined is sound advice. I go dairy free a good amount of time, and still can consume Greek Yogurt (Plain, full fat) and use some heavy whipping cream in coffee.

I cannot have most dairy but I can have those high in fat such as butter, heavy cream, and some cream cheese, occasionally a tablespoon of Parmesan cheese. I am also gluten intolerant and have been able to work around that with finding creative recipes.

Once you get in the habit of low carb eating it becomes very enjoyable.

There are many old threads on this forum about No Dairy. http://forum.lowcarber.org/showthread.php?p=8707730

Dropping dairy is a common LC tip for anyone stalled, and it is the basis of a strict paleo diet and elimination diets like Whole30.
I would suggest you do a dairy free Atkins, still high fat (Dukan is low fat) just no dairy. You can even use ghee for a few weeks, then add back butter to see how you do.