New w/ Atkins, Please help in Menu

[hugomartin]

Hi,

I just started atkins diet yesterday. My current weight is 209, Heigt 5'7", my goal is 170 in 2 or 3 months, is it possible?I am doing the intruducion phase for 14 days, what should I do after? help please!

This is my menu:

Breakfast:
*1 hour before L-Glutamine (500mg)
3 Egg omelette w/ 1 tp Olive oil, 1 stick Mozzarella, 3 Slice Bacon. 1 Small Tomato, 1 avocado, 8 ounce water

Lunch:
*Vitamin, l-carnitine, essential oils
1 Large chicken breast, 1 celery stalk 8", 3 tp Mayonnaise, 1 tp parsley & 1tp Olive oil, 8 ounce water
*CoQ after food

Dinner:
Pork Loin (large), broccoli 1/2 cup, 8 ounce water
*CoQ after food

68% fat, 30% protein, 3% carbs

How much total cals should I eat? can eat one day 1678 cals and next 2150? should I be only concern about not eating more than 20g of carb? Help please, thanks

Martin

[LookingForward]

Hi and WELCOME!

First I want to say your food choices look very good! You're choosing whole, real foods and the right foods, so you're definitely off to a very good start. Along those lines, the only problem I can see with those choices are that you don't have quite enough veggies in your day. 2 cups of salad veggies plus 1 cup of "other veggies" is required (not just allowed) to do Atkins correctly. Your body really needs them, both for the nutrition and for the fiber. You did really well at eating veggies, just add a salad in there and you'll be good to go.

Going from 209 to 170 in 2 or 3 months is definitely possible. That said, I would recommend focusing on how you feel and let your body adjust to your new lifestyle and way of eating at its own pace. I mainly say that because I don't want you to get discouraged and possibly jump ship if you don't see the results on the SCALE that you want to see in the time you want to see it. Before anything else, choose this way of eating because it's healthy and because you know it's the best thing for you long-term. You'll definitely drop the weight. But if it isn't fast enough for your goals, don't let it derail you. I'd also recommend taking your measurements, because it's entirely possible that you'll lose INCHES even if you don't lose pounds, especially if you are sedentary and begin an exercise routine. Since muscle weighs more than fat, you could be shrinking in size but gaining weight or holding steady, and measurements are the way to keep yourself motivated if that happens.

Some recommendations: Drink more water. A rule of thumb is to take your body weight (in pounds), divide it in half, and drink that number of fl.oz. of water each day. For you that'd be roughly 105. Add more when you exercise. 64 fl.oz. is considered the bare minimum you should have in any given day. If you aren't exercising, that's definitely something you should do to ensure success.

Calories are nothing to be alarmed about, yes they'll vary from day to day. So long as you are only eating what you need to feel satisfied (not stuffed), don't worry about how much you have. Yes, 20g carbs per day, but that's NET carbs, meaning total carbs MINUS fiber, meaning you can have 35g carbs and 15g fiber in a day and still be within the limits.

You're doing induction for 14 days, and after that you can choose to either stay on induction (we call that Extended Induction, that's what I'm doing), or you can move on to the OWL (ongoing weight loss) phase. That's up to you. Either choice will enable you to continue to lose the weight, just do what works for you. Check out the forums for each of these phases for more info:
Atkins Diet (Extended) Induction
Atkins Diet Ongoing Weight Loss (OWL) and Pre-Maintenance

Your ratios look good, you probably know the goal is 65fat/30protein/5carbs.

You're doing great so far, keep up the good work and good luck! If you have any more questions or need help with anything in the future, don't hesitate to ask here or PM me anytime!

[Elizellen]

Hello Martin
Welcome to our ADBB family

On induction we are not really supposed to worry about calories but just stick ot the allowed foods list and count carbs.

So make sure you are eating under 20 net grams of carbs.

Also we should be eating over half of our carbs from our 3 cups of veggies - of which I think you only listed about one-two cups in total!

Oh- the avocado is fairly high in carbs and so only one half of an avocado is allowed on the 'special foods category'.

The rest of your menu looks fine to me. You had a good breakfast to get you started and made sure you have some vegetables with each meal - well done!!

You are having more water than the 8 ounces with each meal I hope!?!? We need to drink at least 64 ounces plus another 8 ounces for every 25 pounds we want to lose.

So for you that would make about 80 ounces (a bit over 2 litres).

As for finding you are eating more food some days than others - this is normal.

If you see what a small child eats (without being made to clear the plate) he/she will have very little some days and huge portions another day, depending on what the body needs. It will even out on average, as long as you eat till you are no longer hungry and not to bursting point!!

[hugomartin]

Thank you for the reply! Lookingforward you said salad, what type? any recommendation? give me a few samples. I will start drinking more water for sure!

[LookingForward]

Well, are there salads you enjoy? I'm talking about leafy green veggie salads, not seafood "salad" or chicken "salad". And it technically doesn't have to be salad per se, that's just the easiest and tastiest way I've found to fit in the required veggies each day. Just pick 2 cups from the salad veggies on the acceptable foods list and be creative and enjoy! Just curious, have you read the book? If not, you definitely MUST. But in the meantime, read these to get you started on the right road on induction:
Acceptable Foods
Rules of Induction

I generally eat a salad each day using baby spinach leaves instead of lettuce. I mix it up from day to day and put on any combination of cheese (usually parmesan), green olives, tomatoes, cucumber, mushrooms, avocado, meat (chicken, turkey, salmon, etc.). I have a few favorite dressings Newman's Own Family Recipe Italian is my VERY favorite. Brianna's Asiago Cheese Ceasar is great. "Goddess" dressing is very nice, I buy Organics brand and Trader Joe's has a version. It's got a sesame oriental flavor. Drew's Shiitake Mushroom Ginger is really good. But whatever you like.

Oh, and try to choose your veggies wisely. For instance, I use spinach in salads instead of lettuce because it is FAR, FAR more nutritious and gives so much more bang than lettuce, which is not much better than water. In fact many here call iceberg lettuce "chewy water". Once for ounce, just switching to Romaine lettuce gives you more than 8x the Vitamin A, more than 6x the vitamin C, double the calcium, double the folate, double the potassium, and more than double the phosphorus. And that's just romaine! Spring greens, and mixed baby greens, are terrific choices. Boston lettuce, arugula and endive are better than iceberg, but not a ton better. Believe it or not Radicchio is even more devoid of nutrition than iceberg. If you move up to lamb's lettuce (aka mache) and/or leafy spinach or baby spinach, you get a huge jump in nutritional impact (the most I know of for salad greens).

Good luck, and let me know if you have any other questions!

P.S. Feel free to look at my daily menus on my web site if you'd like to see what I tend to have for salad each day. The link is in my sig. Good luck!

[hugomartin]

Thank you! I just added two cups of spinach w/ 2 tps parmesan to my diet. Question: Monday and friday I usually get home around 10:15 after playing tennis, can I eat my last meal that late? Also is gum important?

[LookingForward]

YAY about your added salad, that's great! With a good fatty dressing too, right?

I have read mixed things about eating meals late. I personally try NOT to, but for others it seems to be just fine. 2big4mysize is my Atkins hero, and if she says it doesn't matter, to eat when you're hungry, then I believe her. If you don't have acid reflux or anything that would give you a specific reason not to eat late, then just choose what's best for you.

For me, I just like to make sure I'm done with dinner at least 2 hours before bed. I don't feel right when I got to bed on a full stomach, and I wake up feeling a lot better if I've not eaten late. It's not severe, it's just something I've noticed and tend to do.

Gum? Do you mean chewing gum? Well if you choose to have it, you'd have to count each piece as one of your 3 daily allowable servings of artificial sweetener, and limit yourself to that many pieces, but other than that it's PROBABLY OK. There can be exceptions, some people are super sensitive to sugar alcohols and can have weight loss stalls from it. Also, sugar alcohols aren't all created equally (check out this article, and pick sugar alcohols lower on the list: http://www.mendosa.com/netcarbs.htm) I believe it's best to avoid them 100% during induciton, then treat them with kid gloves afterward, use them rarely as a treat, but not as a regular thing. The best advice is probably just to know your body enough to see how it responds, and do what's best for you. For me, I avoid them almost entirely because I tend to be a purist about my nutrition these days, and there's no health benefit to be gotten from the sugar alcohols or from chewing gum. I DO need it when I travel though, to keep my mouth and throat moist, otherwise I get a bad sore throat almost every time, so there are exceptions to everything.

Good luck!

[hugomartin]

3 daily allowable servings of artificial sweetener? Can u explain this a little more? I do have the book and I am reading it slowly

[LookingForward]

Originally Posted by hugomartin

3 daily allowable servings of artificial sweetener? Can u explain this a little more? I do have the book and I am reading it slowly

Page 230 of "Dr. Atkins New Diet Revolution, New & Revised Edition", published July 1, 2002.

About halfway down the page, rule #13:
"13. You may use up to three packets of sucralose (Splenda) daily."

[bluerain324]

I believe you have to listen and pay attention to what your body is telling you. I weigh myself everyday, which a lot of people are against, but it helps to tell if i'm stalling or not. Last week I hit a stall and decided to go back on full induction, although i'm not drinking as much water as I should. Since then i've lost 6 lbs. I can't handle eating before bed myself, and I do count my calories by entering them on a website I found, it gives you all the info tallied up from what you've eaten for the day. I know we're supposed to eat as much meat and carb free things we like, but I just have the calories thing stuck in my head, of calories in vs calories burned, so i keep my portions of everything limited to less than 1000 calories a day, which I know is wrong, but i'm not hungry beyond that.

I eat the same breakfast and lunch every day. My favorite salad is 2 cups of iceburg lettuce, 1 oz shredded cheddar cheese, 2 oz of shredded cooked bacon, one hard boiled egg, several chopped broccoli florets, and either 1 tbsp ranch or bleu cheese dressing. I'm having a hard time finding low carb dressings now, so I have just resorted to buying regular Kraft. It is 2 carbs per seving, which is 2 tbsp, and i only use 1, so I hope i'm not harming myself.

You just keep up the good work. You've definitely come to the right place for knowledge and encouragment!