I think that entire post was the best thing I have ever read!

Yeah...Thats my Husband for ya...see what I have to put up with daily! lol He's def. a character! Love him dearly!

Wow you got your hubby doing LC that's great. I don't know why more men don't try it they usually do really good on LC.

Michelle's profile shows that she has not read a single low carb type book. Perhaps reading a few would help her understand how the whole process works and dispel some of the common misconceptions attributed to a low-carb way of eating. Nah, that would be too much work.

I see this all the time in my life. Everyone I work with or know is horrified that I am doing a low-carb diet, yet none of them has read any low-carb book or investigated this lifestyle.

Next time anyone starts on me again, I'll ask them what Dr. Atkins said about exercise. If they can't answer with "Exercise is non-negotiable" then I'll tell them they haven't read the book and they can stuff it. And, I'm not actually doing Atkins.

It seems that every so often, I find something that I want to learn as much as I possibly can about by researching and experimenting every chance I get. I have a thirst for knowledge of all kinds, it was just a matter of time before I applied that to something dietary. I'm a tad obsessive about it at times, but in this case it's never a bad thing.

I find that the general population will continually resist anything that isn't the cookie cutter solution. It might have something to do with the fact that it has been punched and drilled into peoples heads for years that "FAT IS BAD".

It just takes an open mind, and a little research to realize that there is something to be gained (or lost in this case, lol) from this way of eating.

One of the problems is that it seems so intuitive -- eat fat, get fat. It's an easy thing to teach because there is already a relationship between dietary fat and body fat in most people's minds. Add to that years of medical and nutritional dogma, and it's a longterm battle to get people to think that fats are not killing them. I guess at the end of the day, I don't suffer either way on it -- I know better now -- but I hate to see people suffering when they may not have to.

And of course there are vested interests that make sure dietary fat stays on top of the food pyramid rather than near the base. Those interests can't mark fats up enough to really profit. My wife is doing college business analysis, and one of them was on Tyson foods. Tyson is struggling because an enormous share of its business is based on selling of meats that aren't packaged, processed, and marked up. It has diversified into other, distinctly more profitable areas that can be sold for higher margins, but it can't escape the fact that most of its revenues come from selling chickens and pork under plastic in such a way that is hard to mark up very much. It makes a lot more on fajita kits or mexican foods it processes and uses to create a meat + something. The + something is a lot more profitable than the meat. With external factors controlling the price of food on the market (Do the Japanese continue to refuse U.S. beef exports? Will bird flu drive up costs and drive down demand?) Tyson can ensure itself more money by depending less on straight meat sales.

We like to pick on PCRM and Ornish, and they are certainly suitable for picking on, but they aren't the real problem. They make outlandish claims based more on religion of a kind than nutrition, but the processed food industry and its much higher profit margins is what keeps the USDA placing that grain on the base of the pyramid. Millions of dieters, nutritionists, and doctors then process that out as "balanced."

Along the same lines, I sure don't want to be dogmatic. I don't want to ignore facts when they're presented to me even if they contradict my preferred way of eating or thinking. I do take studies seriously when they point out pitfalls in the amount of fat I consume. I haven't seen anything yet that would sway me off this path, but I've seen some relatively convincing stuff that I don't discount out of hand. Even if there are negtative factors, I don't think they can possibly outweigh the positives.