Extended Induction?

[yogilove]

Hi Everyone...

I'm new to the ADBB and I don't quite understand the term Extended Induction. How is it extended? What are the reason's for extending? My version of the ANA doesn't seem to cover this.

Can anyone also suggest the best 'version' of Atkins to purchase?
I currently have the All-New Atkins Advantage: The 12-Week Low-Carb Program to Lose Weight

Thank you for any help/info you can provide!

Namaste,

B

[Jodes]

Hi yogilove and welcome.
I am relatively new here too and have been on induction for nearly 3 weeks now. My first week was great but the second week was harder and I want to get this WOE right for life, so I decided to stay on induction (extending induction) for a bit longer. It seems a good idea for some people and others seem to do better when they start OWL.

Everyone is different and I think you just need to decide what you want to do. If induction is hard for you because of the limitations, then to make sure you stick with it, it might be better to go to OWL as soon as the two weeks are up. But if it was easy, then why not extend it a bit longer if it is working.

The book that I use and I think is the one most followed here is the one written by Dr. Atkins in Dr. Atkins New Diet Revolution, 2002 ed.

Hopefully someone with a bit more experience will come and answer your question too

[Elizellen]

Staying longer than the first 2 weeks on induction was suggested by Dr Atkins for those with messed-up metabolisms and those with large amount of weight to lose (50 plus pounds).

However . . .

1. Many people who do extend their induction find their losses slow down or even stop but once they move to OWL their body starts to allow the pounds to drop once more.

2. Dr Atkins did say we should be through OWL and ready to move to the third phase (premaintenance) when we have between 5 and 10 pounds to lose. So you need to have done OWL by then.

3. Once your losses slow to less than a pound a week it is very hard to tell if you have stopped losing, and most people's losses slow as they approach a healthy weight. So climbing the OWL carbohydrate ladder is easier to do if you still have plenty of excess weight to lose, as it is much easier to tell if adding the extra carbs or different foods are affecting your losses.

4. Some people who stay on induction for a long time start to feel restricted by the limited food choices and get fed up with constantly having to make sure they don't exceed the 20 net carbs most of which are vegetables from the induction list.

So they start 'tweaking' the rules and allow themselves the odd 'cheat' of nuts/berries/ice creamn/alcohol etc (which would be 'legal' at the relevant rung of OWL) and then feel guilty andr fall into the 'well I have blown it for today so might as well eat that pizza and start again tomorrow' trap.

And as we all know - tomorrow never comes

If they had moved to OWL earlier they could have reached the OWL level where that food was 'allowed' and have eaten the 'cheat' food without guilt and maybe stayed on plan instead.


So I suggest that once you are down to about 50 pounds left to lose you should move to OWL even if you are happy on induction choices of food and no more than 20 net carbs (most from your veg).

This will allow you the time to conduct the great experiment with you as both the scientist and the subject to discover your CCLL and any foods that affect you adversely so that you are prepared to eat a maintenance 'diet' for the rest of your life once you reach your goal weight.

[phil h]

Just finished my 6th week of induction.Down 30 lbs with 42 left to goal.My experience with Atkins in past is impressive weight loss but when I began to add carbs back into my diet, the weight came back quickly.This seems to be a major flaw in the diet.Kind of like allowing an alcoholic to start taking sips of beverages.In theory it sounds reasonable but in reality many losers put all the weight back on plus, this wonder what the heck happened.This time I will keep my carbs low and maintain that never really being hungry feeling.With the quanity of the low carb food I do eat and moderate exercise ,I should continue to lose 1-3 lbs a week until my goal is achieved.Might go against the grain of some but I won't repeat my prior mistake.

[liv]

Originally Posted by phil h

Just finished my 6th week of induction.Down 30 lbs with 42 left to goal.My experience with Atkins in past is impressive weight loss but when I began to add carbs back into my diet, the weight came back quickly.This seems to be a major flaw in the diet.Kind of like allowing an alcoholic to start taking sips of beverages.In theory it sounds reasonable but in reality many losers put all the weight back on plus, this wonder what the heck happened.This time I will keep my carbs low and maintain that never really being hungry feeling.With the quanity of the low carb food I do eat and moderate exercise ,I should continue to lose 1-3 lbs a week until my goal is achieved.Might go against the grain of some but I won't repeat my prior mistake.

Did you add them back in the OWL way?
I think the OWL way works well for most people because you are only adding 5 extra carbs in a week and you start with the low glycemic ones. So if you meat a food that make you gain you know you cannot deal with it and leave it out of your future menu. I think this is a very good system when done right.

[phil h]

Liv ,it should be but when the hunger and cravings rear their ugly head,the horse is already out of the barn.I didn't get obese by having great will power and self control.I have to keep my appetite curbed and never get hungry.So for me to be successful, I have to remain in a appetite suppressed state.That means around 10 carbs or less of low GI food and avoiding all artificial sweetners.Example, a broiled pork chop,bite each of sauteed spinach and mushrooms tonight will safely carry me to breakfast.

[Georgiana]

Phil, the efficiency of something designed for a large number of people is usually based on statistics. If you look at statistics, Atkins does work and your statement

This seems to be a major flaw in the diet. [...] In theory it sounds reasonable but in reality many losers put all the weight back on plus, this wonder what the heck happened.

is nothing but speculation. In the time I spent on this board, I have never seen anyone who "put all the weight back on plus" by following Atkins correctly. The people who "put all the weight back on plus" are those who believe induction is the single phase of Atkins -- they get bored with foods or discouraged for whatever reason, return to their old eating habits and, indeed, most gain the weight back. However, this is not how Atkins was designed in the first place -- it's a way of eating for life, not "until you lose the weight".

Anyway, these are just statistics. By definition it is obvious that not everyone will fit them, so one should do what works for him/her. That being said, there is however some major flaws in your rationale.

Let's start from this:

This seems to be a major flaw in the diet.Kind of like allowing an alcoholic to start taking sips of beverages.

On the line of your analogy (alcoholic = carb addict and beverages = carbs), one is actually allowed to "take sips" even during induction. Atkins is not a zero-carbs diet and, even in its first phase, it asks for a maximum of 20g net carbs, most of them coming from approximately three cups of veggetables per day. Which brings me to my second point...

That means around 10 carbs or less of low GI food and avoiding all artificial sweetners.Example, a broiled pork chop,bite each of sauteed spinach and mushrooms tonight will safely carry me to breakfast.

As I've said above, during induction you should be eating three cups of veggies per day -- two cups from the list of "salad veggies" and one cup from the list of "other veggies" OR three cups from the former. Unless you have a big bite, I'm not sure you are actually following this rule by eating "bite each of sauteed spinach and mushrooms". But I might be wrong since that's just one meal. So I have a question for you. If you are eating three cups of veggies, do any of these veggies make you "hungry"? Do they give you cravings? Since you only had "bite each of [...]" for dinner, I assume you must have had at least a cup or two of veggies for lunch. Did they give you cravings?

If we were to correlate one's cravings with the amount of net carbohydrates eaten (assuming induction levels or baseline+5g for OWL, not a jump from 15g to 150g of carbs) and with the incidence of "stalling foods" in one's menu, the correlation between cravings and foods will be much higher than the one between cravings and carbohydrates. The reason behind it is quite simple. Let's see...

Assume you are eating (on average) 13 g of net carbohydrates during induction. After the two weeks are gone, you decide to move on to OWL, so you add 5 more grams. Now, during induction, let's say your veggies (measured raw) were distributed like this:

Breakfast: 1 cup jicama (5.1 net carbs)
Lunch: 1 cup red peppers (5.9 net carbs)
Dinner: 1 cup cauliflower (1.8 net carbs)

The first 5g of carbohydrates you should be adding on OWL are from veggies, so you decide to eat cherry tomatoes for example. We distribute them like this:

Breakfast: 5.9 net carbs from jicama
Lunch: 5.9 net carbs from red peppers
Dinner: 6.0 net carbs from cauliflower

All good. Now you see, blood sugar levels don't spike before you go to bed from eating 17.8 net carbs instead of 12.8. If you were to get cravings, you would get them between meals. But since you ate 5.9 net carbs in one meal during induction as well, OWL Rung 1 should not give you any problems as long as you are eating enough fat with your meals. You could also eat more meals during the day, in which case things should get even easier.

OWL Rung 1 is the least "dangerous". As you go up on the "carbohydrate ladder", you will come across foods that give you cravings. This is the reason why one should only add maximum 5 g of carbohydrates at once (at least a week apart) and these carbohydrates should come from only one food, not from everything in that rung. With one food, it's easy to say, for e.g. "almonds make me want to eat my neighbor, I must take them out of my meals". Of course, you still don't want to eat your neighbor when the urge arises, so you need to have a good strategy handy. Foods high in fat and protein are very helpful here -- make sure you always have a fatty snack in the house, "just in case". Some would swear on L-Carnitine, but I have never tried it myself.

This is getting long, so one last question for thought. Are you sure eating "10 carbs or less" every day is realistic? Sure, you could do it for months maybe, but could you do it for life?

[liv]

Originally Posted by phil h

Liv ,it should be but when the hunger and cravings rear their ugly head,the horse is already out of the barn.I didn't get obese by having great will power and self control.I have to keep my appetite curbed and never get hungry.So for me to be successful, I have to remain in a appetite suppressed state.That means around 10 carbs or less of low GI food and avoiding all artificial sweetners.Example, a broiled pork chop,bite each of sauteed spinach and mushrooms tonight will safely carry me to breakfast.

It is certainly true that we all became fat and obese by losing control and I think it is not necessarily wrong to extend induction while trying to work up enough self awareness and self control.

I think you are not giving yourself much credit here. You can do it. It is the whole point with Atkins. Because I think it is unrealistic to believe that that you can stay in ketosis for ever. For some that effect will even wear off. Others will suddenly just stop eating like that or will start adding back items willy nilly without going trough the process of researching the effect of those items on their bodies. The end result is that they are back where they started after a few months. I have met plenty of people who say Atkins does not work because that is how they tried to work it.

So we all will have to develop strategies for long term eating. I do not believe in diets - if a person does not intend of changing his or her lifestyle for ever he or she is moving into a yo-yo situation. OWLing properly helps low carbers get a new relationship with food. Helps us eat healthy and we learn to use control of what foods we eat and what portion we eat. It is sustainable because it becomes natural and ingrained and for ever. But not necessarily always easy.
And I think some of us need to take it slow because yes we are addicts and yes it is very easy to get side tracked. And there may be trigger foods out there that are incredible powerful and that we have to stay away from for ever, But there are also many healthy foods that we should be eating and enjoying that are not on the induction menu and most of those foods will work albeit in smaller portions that we may have eaten them before.

Keep on going Phil. You are doing so well.

[phil h]

Thanks Georgianna and others for your insight.I just have to disagree with how my body responds to carbs.There is not a threshold where I can get to and then safely backtrack.Been there, done that.When the appetite increases ,I will start binging,get frustrated,weight comes back very fast.I'm glad the the ladder climbing works for you and others, but my body responds differently.As far as ketosis.I should soon be adapting to it where I will I will use fat as preferred fuel.Early in low carb dieting we use fat as an alternative to carbs.Hopefully the adaption will still keep me saited where I can continue to eat only till I am full and not beyond.It is starnge for this big ole guy not to be able to clean my plate.I usually cleaned mine and my wifes as well as what is left in the serving dishes. I had baseline levels drawn when I began (was in metabolic syndrome which is a precurser to type 11 diabetes) and will compare them six months in regards to insulin levels.I suspect I will see a significant drop if I continue on my path.Thanks,Phil

[ceemarie]

Please keep in mind that each of our bodies reacts differently to adding carbs back in and therefore you will need to experiment a bit to see how your body reacts when you start adding carbs back in. The same goes for cheese and diet soda, for some of us, it will slow weight loss for others it will not.