I do not know anything about your medical state or history, but if you were recently released from the hospital, be very cautious about starting an Atkin's diet. If I were you, I would go to my family practice doc, tell him/her that you are interested in losing weight and ask if Atkin's is okay for you. If Atkin's is not, I would ask him/her to hook you up with a good nutritionist. Or you could take the anectdotal advice from the posters on this BBS.
I would suggest that you all read this article by one of the country's leading nutritionists (and one of our own - a Houston resident), Keith Kline. Atkins This guy has probably forgotten more about nutrition than everyone in this thread knows, combined.
Doesn't make him right. Doctors said smoking was healthy for you as late as the 1950s. Atkins was labled a looney tune in the 70s, only to find out he was right all along. DD
10 Easy Weight loss tips: 1. Cut out unnecessary fat I.e. get salad dressings on the side not all over your food where they can account for more calories than a big mac meal (its true!) 2. Drink more water 3. Don't skip breakfast 4. Cut out soda 5. Reduce desserts 6. Make exercsie a part of daily life even if it is onmly minor like walking up stairs insetaed of taking the elevator 7. Hire a physical trainer if you have the money 8. Don't let yourself get so hungry that you are forced to pig out on junk! 9. Don't let the scales determine who you are! 10. Realise that most diets are fads that don't support long term maintenance of the weight loss and tend to be a short term fix. Enjoy life and relax!
This has actually been studied extensively by people who want to prove Atkins wrong. Studies unfortunately proved him right.
One things that I hear a lot of is that low carb diets are bad for you and that they are unsubstainable for the long term. What does this say about diabetics who are low carb lifers and who are not experiencing health problems due to their low carb diet? They don't count since they have serious health condition?
Man, you are HUNG up on that. There is a SIGNIFICANT difference between what you would normally do to maintain good health and what you would do in the event of a serious health problem. I can point to a wide range of illnesses where the EXACT OPPOSITE is true: hypoglycemia, heart disease, high blood pressure, irritable bowel syndrom - all ailments where low fat, low protein, high fiber diets are prescribed. But that has NOTHING to do with generally healthy people eating a diet designed to sustain that health. It has no bering on maintaining a healthy diet whatsoever and is proof of nothing. The average diabetic also has a significantly shortened life span. I would not think to attribute that to their high protein diet, so why would you bother using them as proof that a low carb diet is good for you?
One thing to consider is that the whole 'low carb' portion of Atkins is not designed to be permanent. You just restrict your carb intake until you find your healthy weight range. All the other things suggested by others: whole grains, fruit, exercise, no donut/pizza/chips/sodas - are also recommended by atkins. And all the stuff about people regaining their weight after atkins is just people eating donuts and drinking sodas and not exercising again, like they were when they went on atkins. The same would be true for Jeff if he stopped running and ate three times a day at Krispy Kreme.
What studies have you read? All the recent studies have shown that Atkins/low carb diets have the same long term efficacy as low fat diets. They do show that you generally lose weight quicker at the beginning, but the levels plateau off at about a year. This means that the low fat diets and Atkins' diets both have the same weight loss potential in general. If you don't believe me try doing a search on PubMed.
I'm not anti-Atkins, but some of you defend him as if you were on his payroll. It's like you're in a club and you hold your nose up at people who aren't on Atkins. "You guys wouldn't get it, etc." Hey, Jared lost alot of weight eating carbs. The main thing he reduced was fat and calories. There's more then one way to skin a cat. I still think burning more calories then what you take in is the key.
Seriously, I have to agree with jcantu here (I think he is talking about the studies published in I believe JAMA, but I could have the journal wrong). I have been doing obesity-related research for over four years, and I am not sure which studies you are pointing to that CONCLUSIVELY say that Atkins is better than all the other diets in a long term study. As far as I know those studies just do not exist. Use PubMed or even Google Scholar and please give me a link to a research article from a major medical journal backing up Atkins.
All the recent studies have shown that Atkins/low carb diets have the same long term efficacy as low fat diets. My contention was that the *convention wisdom* that a low carb, high fat diet (versus a high carb, low fat) diet was *unhealthy* has been studied and not proven to be the case. BTW, those above mentioned studies are a bit bogus. Their great claim is that over a year that the *convention wisdom* diet and the Atkins Diet will get you to the wieght destination. The thing that they don't mention is that the *convention wisdom* diet is really effing hard to stay on for a year while that is not the case for Atkins.
Almost like a cult. I'm glad it works, but it's not the be all end all........there's mroe then one way to cut a chicken.
I think this is more the result of the 'medical community' categorizing the basis for atkins as 'snake oil.' Now we find out that large chunks of atkins contentions are correct despite what that community has said for decades. Its really the opposite of how you guys are characterizing it - atkins was/is looked down on by those supposedly 'in the know.' Meanwhile lots of people (including many of those in this thread) have followed atkins with great success. In addition, many detractors of atkins continually mischaracterize what atkins actually laid out - it not no carb, or even low carb after a certain period, it doesn't say you can't ever eat fruit or vegetables, it does encourage whole grains etc instead of 'white bread,' increased water intake, and excercise.
One thing that bugs me about Atkins is that it makes many people who are on it say that "Carbs are EVIL." I don't mean everyone on Atkins feels this way, but that feeling is rather popular. What I would just like to stress is that "EXCESS calories are EVIL." There are some cultures where carbs are huge. For example, the Japanese diet consists of lots of carbs (rice and noddles are a staple). However, a traditional Japanese diet is low-fat (lots of good fish oil) and overall MUCH smaller portions and hence LOWER calories. The Japanese society has a MUCH lower prevalence of obesity than most industrialized nations. And it's not in the genes either. Take the same group of Japanese people and give them a nice American diet, and you will see their weight balloon and an increase in all those fun diseases associated with obesity such as diabetes, hypertension, and cardiovascular disease. This specific study has been done. Lower calories. Everything in moderation is still the key here until I see a medical study proving otherwise. How you get there might be up to you (low-fat, Atkins etc), but be forewarned that there are still no long term studies done on the effects of an Atkins diet long-term. Does increasing your protein intake by that much have no effect on your kidneys? Not really known. Is long-term ketosis such a good thing? You do know that ketosis is one sign that your body is starving for glucose or carbs in this case (seen a lot in diabetics and people who are literally starving). Why does the body have such a system in place? Not to mention having excess ketones could lead to acidosis and needless to say that is not a good thing. I am not saying that being on Atkins is bad for you especially short-term to lose some weight, but we still don't know enough about it especially in the long-term. That's all.
I've done atkins probably 3-4 times to cut weight quickly (vacations, etc). I typically just go thru the intro phase (no carbs, just meat for a couple weeks) and never stick with it after that (I love bread, beer and sweets way too much). I can tell you I can drop 15+ pounds in a couple weeks and generally lose the "groggy" feeling after a few days. So it does work. But at the gym I was at I was talking to one of OSUs strength coaches and he was telling me some players stay on the intro for 3 weeks. So I tried it the last time. Big mistake. I not only didn't lose much weight the last week but I began losing alot of strength. Basically it got to the point where it was eatting muscle instead of fat. Anyways the third week really set me back (took me almost 3 months to get back the strength I lost, especially in my chest).
