Has anyone here previously been on atkins, and if so have you kept any of the atkins ideas and merged them with the Neanderthin diet?

What prompted you to start the Neander thin diet?

What advantages/disadvantages have you seen with this diet over other Low Carb diets?

Kevin

Paleo, in theory, allows only natural foods. That's what the main difference is. Of course, it's an approximation, as it is nearly impossible to be a neolith in the modern world but eat like a Paleolith.

Give it a try. You won't miss that salad dressing at all once you begin to taste all the vegetables!

I started Paleo because of the following:

1) I got tired of weighing everything
2) I missed fruit
3) I didn't care for the marketing of Atkins products
4) the rules are a lot simpler

I find eating Paleo incredibly freeing. I don't have to worry about carbs because for the most part, I'm not eating food (apart from the fruit, natch) that's going to contain a lot of carbs unless I decide to eat something breaded like a chicken wing. I still occasionally eat a bit of cake or something, but it's rare and I never fear craving more of it.

Hth.

M

I'm slowly making my way to the dark side of the force Atkins was the greatest thing to happen to me at the time in came into my life. I was basically a fruit and bread eating vegetarian and it brought veggies, fish and chicken back into my life. (So funny since the general public thinks people eat meat only on the diet). After years of following it though (and a bit of time off the wagon) it just seemed to me like a good time to take the next step towards healthy living by trying to eliminate all the "fake" foods I have used as a crutch.

I really see no disadvantage to eating more real foods. The advantage is that I don't worry if those fake sweeteners are someday gonna give me a tumor or something.

Jenn

I second all of the above - cleaner, fresher, nothing artificial, no weighing, counting, worry about ingredients. I'm starting tomorrow (shopping day) to challenge myself to eat a different Neander veggie at every meal. When I get to the end of what I have available around here, I'll start over. Lots of variety so I won't get sick of meat. With that too, lots of choices out there. I bought some chicken livers, and some chicken hearts and gizzards. Freaks some people out but fried up with some coconut oil til crispy with a salad and man oh man!! Adding berries and low sugar fruit is also a bonus. Really makes a difference - so refreshing and cleans the taste buds after eating meat and fat. So bottom line: Neandering is way better than Atkins - IMHO

You know growing up my mom always used to cook up the turkey hearts and gizzards at thanksgiving and me and my brothers would fight over it. I thought it was normal, but have been informed by others that it is weird. Still... I love turkey hearts and gizzards. I'm sure the weird chemicals in most of those so called "normal" people's food is far more bizare and unatural.

Kevin

Yes, I did Atkins for awhile. I have definitely kept the low-carb idea from Atkins, although I'm not as rigid with counting carbs and I don't stay quite as low.



It really appealed to my inner scientist.



It really forces you to eat whole, natural foods as opposed to processed chemical stuff. Whereas before I would eat peanut butter and splenda-sweetened jelly on a slice of weird high-gluten low-carb toast, now I eat a handful of almonds and an apple. The only real downside to it is the difficulty presented when eating out or at friends'/families'.

This is an interesting thread. I follow Atkins but only eat local, pasture-fed meat, eggs and salad from a couple of farms nearby. We don't eat fruit yet and I eat dairy. My husband essentially eats Paleo food, but follows Atkins. We are grain-free and have kind of agreed to only eat berries that we actually forage ourselves, in season, in a very limited way. Our food choices center around meat. In my opinion, eating the Atkins way can be done with lots of different food choices. It doesn't have to involve Splenda and frankenbars. We are somewhat extreme in our food choices, eating locally and the whole animal that we have slaughtered for our deep freezer - we have not been to a supermarket except for paper goods in about 6 months.

Janine

I used to do Atkins but my body forced me to give that up. I was having a lot of health issues especially with my gut. I think the high-gluten breads and wheat flour replacements really made my underlying gluten intolerance show up. That coupled with my history of autoimmune diseases made me realize that gluten and dairy were doing a number on me.

So I was tested for, and found, dairy and gluten intolerances and discovered that I was subsequently on a very close to paleo diet. So I decided to come over here and see what people eat and I stayed! They tolerate my not 100% paleoness with grace.

I'm not 100% paleo, there are modern things I won't give up like coffee, chocolate, olives, Splenda and such. Although I will give up all but coffee for the APE week.

Since then I've changed my way of eating even more when I decided that SE asians have the most delicious and compatible way of eating, except for the rice which I don't eat, and I have taken up Thai cooking. Most of my meals nowadays are Thai.

I don't see any disadvantages really. I *must* be gluten free for my health and dairy free seems to help my health a lot too. This goes well beyond weight loss.

I think several of use are sort of Paleo by default. Once you've given up dairy for personal intolerance reasons, and either soy or gluten as several of us have had to, the rest of the journey to practically-Paleo isn't very far. I started out plain Atkins, but when soy nearly killed me and I found out that my sinus allergies went away when I kicked dairy, well, since casein, gluten, and soy are all 3 the same kind of trouble, it just seemed sensible to throw gluten out too.

I definitely keep it low carb. Berries, and a few days of indulgence with the new fresh fruit of the month. A bag of cherries last month, 1-2 peaches a week this month. Nice seasonal treats. Otherwise meat, nuts, veggies, berries.

I still eat a little peanut butter and use small amount of splenda, and I like things that use vinegar like prepared mustard and olives. I still use the odd tablespoon of butter, especially when out. My meat is the best I can afford, but not all grass all the time. I don't think I'll ever make it to what I think is 100% paleo, but I'm pretty happy here at 95%.

"My meat is the best I can afford, but not all grass all the time. "

We were able to buy directly from a farmer. It's much cheaper.

I'm same as Nancy and Batspit, basically here by default. But I prefer eating natural stuff anyway, at least 90% of the time I'm not strict but I try to keep it to natural foods. I do use artificial sweeteners like Splenda and I am not ever giving up dark chocolate or cured meats like bacon. But to me, paleo presents the best model for eating and it's what I use to guide (most of) my choices.

I had good luck with Atkins in the past, then tried the Type O diet, which allowed my sinuses to clear up (I guess because I cut out wheat and most dairy). I gained a little weight by eating too many treats, so I went back to Atkins ... and I got TERRIBLY stopped up, post nasal drip, throat sore. and so on. So I found this forum and found out about Neanderthin. I've been on it just a short time, but my sinuses are clear, I'm not hungry, and I feel really good. I love this way of eating.

I haven't read either Atkins or Neanderthin although I've read everything I could find on the Internet about Low Carb in general. The only reason I consider myself Atkins is because I eat dairy products - cheese, butter (a lot!), heavy cream, sour cream and I also eat natural peanut butter. Other than that I eat almost exclusively natural food as in the Paleo diet so the mindset of Paleo eaters agrees with me.

I only did natural food on Atkins and felt pretty good but then I discovered all my food sensitivities-most grains, gluten, dairy, eggs....and found I felt great and lost weight almost effortlessly on meat, fat, nuts/seeds and produce. By great I mean that I feel emotionally stable, have more energy and have only occassional pain from chronic Lyme disease. I do feel better on lowish carb (like Atkins) rather than having lots of fruits for example. I don't count carbs though.