Owl What are we doing wrong??

[scottish punter]

Hi,

My wife and I have been doing Atkins for about eight weeks now and have both lost about a stone, the problem being that most of this was in the first two weeks. We have been sticking to 20 carbs a day and don't think we have been cheating - but have bought Ketone sticks to check and we are only just into the colour.

We are mainly on a meat diet:-

Breakfast - Bacon & Eggs, or baby bells
Lunch - home-made mushroom or pepper soup, burger and cheese or a cheese salad
Dinner - cheese burger pie, burgers, steak, chicken curry made from spices etc.
Snacks - Mr. Porky pork crackles

Only other items are jelly and cream, or atkins cheesecake, I drink coke zero but wife is all water.

Have had alcohol a couple of weekends, but have had fourteen days straight without and still no difference.

Thanks,

 

[southwestgirl]

As you get into this way of eating, weight loss does slow down - it depends on how much you have to lose. About 1 or 2 lb a week is probably average, more at the beginning of course because there is some water weight that you lose at that point. So I'd say you are doing ok really!

But it does sound as if you are not eating enough veg. Remember that it is supposed to be around 20 grams carb a day of which 12 -15 grams of carb has to be from salad and/or veg - I have just started weighing things out and have realised I've been making the same mistake, not enough veg.

The thing is that you want the body to burn fat for energy - it can burn protein instead, remember. You want the right balance of proteins and fats, plus you need the veg for proper nutrition.

Don't worry too much about ketostix, the new Atkins book does not mention them and with good reason, they can be very misleading. There can be a lot of reasons why it doesn't show purple - drinking lots of water so ketones are diluted - most of the ketones used up for energy - and some people don't produce much of the type of ketones that the sticks test for. Rose Elliott writes about this in her Veg Low Carb book, there are two sorts of ketones that we can produce and the stix react to only one sort - some people mostly produce the other sort - she is one of them.

Would suggest, check your vegetable amounts, and maybe think about restricting things with artificial sweeteners perhaps, some people find they cause a stall.

Hope this helps a bit!

 

[scottish punter]

Thanks. We have cut out almost all vegetables and thought we were doing good! Started off the first two weeks with cauliflower rice and cauliflower mash, but did get bored with it. Will start monitoring and add some back.

 

[moonlights]

You should be getting 15g carbs a day from veg! Cauli, courgette, celeriac chips, rhubarb, spinach, spring onions!

Do you have a copy of the book? The full veggie list is in there.

Aim for 65 percent of your daily calories from fat, 30 percent from protein, 5 percent from carbs.

You may also be eating too much protein with not enough fat.

Weight loss tends to be around 2lb a week after the second week, as said.

 

[southwestgirl]

Eeek almost no veg? And you do need to get the protein/fat balance right or else you won't be burning fat.

 

[scottish punter]

Thanks for your help, I knew that we must have been doing something wrong. We do have the book, and will revisit the vegetables and add these to our diet. I think our protein % is probably too high and fat & veg too low.

 

[boggins]

Along with the comments about veg and the protein/fat ratio, which I agree with, try avoiding artificial sweeteners like those in jelly or Atkins products.

How much weight have you to lose?

 

[Attorney AK]

you need some more veggies!