ATKINS QUESTIONS ANSWERED: read this first!

I use an app called 'Carb Diet' - i love it, similar to fitness pal.

Can I just add one thing about point 6:- You don't store water in your liver, the liver is an organ that has a capsule and any fluid in here would be extremely painful (this can happen in pregnancy induced hypertension ie Pre-eclampsia). Where there is carb molecules you will have a water molecule sticking to it and the tissues of the body become boggy with excess fluid such as lower legs (socks making ring marks, shoes getting tight, band on skirts/pants digging in) this is bloating from fluid sticking to carbs and trapped in the cells/tissues. Once you drop the carbs then there is no carb molecule for water to stick to - resulting in a massive diuresis and the fluid gets shipped off to the kidneys to pee out - giving a huge wgt loss in the first week, ending the bloatedness! I love not being bloated anymore. Sorry, just had to make that clear or we'd all have huge livers. :)
 
Water weight is a simplified name given to glycogen, a secondary energy source which is, in fact, primarily stored in your liver. That's what gets shed in the first week.

Its a very simplified version of events, yes, but I didn't want to get into the science bit - that's what the book is for. Have changed liver to body though as it may have been confusing - thanks!
 
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LOL your confusing me now :D - glycogen is a polysaccharide (glucose) which is stored in the liver as the bodies primary fuel, the main fuel for the brain, secondary fuel comes from free fatty acids where ketones are a by-product when glucose (made from carbs) is not available. It isn't water weight, if you remove glucose molecules(carbs) then you snap the hydrogen bonds holding the glucose and the water molecules together, resulting in water being removed from the tissues as a diuresis, you know when your stored glucose molecules are used up when your back and forth to the loo, hee hee - yipee the ketosis begins (sorry - just tell me to shut up,:p it's the doctor coming out of me)
 
Glycogen requires water to be stored. In the initial stages of the diet your body depletes these glycogen stores, reducing your bodyweight from the elimination of both the weight of the stored glycogen and the weight of the water. Hence 'water weight' which is just a really simple term to describe the process without confusing anyone with the sciencey bit.
 
Bumping MLs post for the newbies:)


Moonlight - hope you are ok xx
 
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