What brought you to Atkins in the first place

[Desertthorn]

I've been sitting here, reading posts and thought the answer to my stall might be needing to go back to the very basic, and that means remembering why I chose Atkins in the first place.
I remember thinking....This makes sense. Carbs are sugar and sugar makes fat.

So the first time around why did you chose Atkins, and why do you come back to it.

[slimndown]

Re: What brought you to Atkins in the first place

What made sense the first time around was something that Dr A said in his book. He brought out the point that livestock is fed mainly starches of all sorts to make them fatter for slaughter. That's one reason why a high protein/low carb diet made sense as opposed to the SAD. I've come back to it because it's the only way I have to lose weight.

[cleochatra]

Re: What brought you to Atkins in the first place

My father broke his back in 1983 while training for Special Forces.

My dad was essentially bedridden and gained weight, so the doctor put him on the Atkins plan. When my mother died, dad came back to the US with the Atkins Diet in his head and in his heart.

We all ate low-carb.

I've been low-carbing since 1984, so if you want to know someone who'd been there, done that, owned all the cookbooks and soya flours, she would be me.

Why did I come back? Because I know this way of eating works. There's never hunger, my moods are elevated, and I've lost almost 110 pounds in a somewhat short period of time when every other way of eating failed for me. Thanks, dad! Thanks, Dr Atkins.

[dreamof145]

Re: What brought you to Atkins in the first place

I'd never low-carbed before 2004. I desperately wanted to lose the weight, knew a girl who was doing a basic low-carb diet and she was losing lots of weight. The more I started investigating low-carb, I found that Atkins was the one that fathered all the other low-carb programs. So, I found this site and the rest is history.....

[JenDoe]

Re: What brought you to Atkins in the first place

In around 2001 friend of mine at work was doing it and after mocking her for a while, I decided to actually find out what I was mocking, I read the book and it made sense so I started - and it worked.

Course since then I put back on all the weight and then some, but this time I'm going to do it right, not just for short term goals

[Effie]

Re: What brought you to Atkins in the first place

The first time I did Atkins, in 2003, I regretfully admit that I wanted to do it for a month to lose about 20 pounds, and then I was going to resume following Weight Watchers. I lost about 10 pounds, then resumed eating everything under the sun and ended up gaining 40 pounds. For the next 2 years, I blamed the Atkins diet for "screwing up my metabolism".

Then, in April of 2005, a co-worker wanted to know about the Atkins diet. I told her everything I knew about it, loaned her my copy of DANDR, but warned her that once you go on it, you can never go off it or you'll be screwed (even though I was saying this negatively, it really does make sense. Duh.) Well, she totally butchered the program. The book was too big for her to read, so she just looked at the list of allowable foods. The very first day, we went to breakfast and she ordered two eggs and a side of bacon AND A GLASS OF ORANGE JUICE. She'd also live on Frankenfoods, and then complain she wasn't losing any weight. She started bad mouthing Atkins and saying how she knew it wasn't healthy to eat that much fat. I was so frustrated by this, and I think it re-ignited the same fire I had when I first started in 2003. So, then I started Atkins in May of 2005, partly to prove her wrong, but mostly because after continually explaining things to her, I was actually getting excited to start this WOE again. Like, "If you can get past the first few days, the cravings go away!" and "You get to have alfredo sauce & mayonnaise with every meal!"

[tracymax]

Re: What brought you to Atkins in the first place

It's funny, Effie - once you start defending Atkins to naysayers, it's hard not to ask yourself, Why aren't I doing Atkins again?!

I came to Atkins out of pure vanity. My son started kindergarten in a place filled with hot moms in tiny jeans and halter tops. They all seemed to be actresses. Going to school every morning just about made me weep and/or yak. I had fallen in love the year prior and gained 30 pounds, and definitely felt more matronly than ****-y. There was one mom from my son's class who, while not big, really shrank to a skinny-minny size fairly rapidly. I asked her what she was doing, and she said, "Atkins."

So I went and bought the book. I lost 12 pounds on induction, and the other 18 pounds came off a lot more slowly over the course of four months. I was a size 8 and happy with that and then I got pregnant. I tried to stay low-carb, but I had a rare condition that made it a really tough pregnancy, and had severe edema to the point I could barely walk. When I swelled so much and my liver started failing and I was put on bedrest, I cracked and started eating everything in sight. Well, everything I could convince others to bring to the couch.

Luckily, I kept a good enough attitude and didn't look at the scale once in my third trimester. I figured I'd go back to a loose low-carb WOE while I was nursing. What I didn't know was that was that I'd be starving all the time while breastfeeding! I gained even more weight.

I lost about 25 pounds on WW, which I'd heard was better for nursing mothers. But now I need to lose another 40-50 pounds, and I know Atkins works. Re-started last Thursday, and I'm down 5.5 pounds the first week!

Sorry for going into verbose mode. I tend to be wordy.

[Chris]

Re: What brought you to Atkins in the first place

I used to be one of Atkin's most vocal critics. Actually, just recently my Mom came across an email that she'd printed that I had sent her about four years ago. Although the main subject was about something else, she got a big laugh, because I had included the strongly worded advice that she shouldn't go on that really dangerous Atkins diet that she was considering!

I'm an old WW veteran, having reached goal with them twice. Both times I gained back all the weight, plus more. In the summer of 2003 I decided to try again, but after staying hungry for two weeks, I told a nurse friend that I just couldn't face a year or more of that, which is what it would take to get back to goal. She suggested I try Atkins, because she'd just finished reading the "For Life" edition. I borrowed it, and liked what I was reading. After doing some additional research on the net, I picked up a copy of DANDR and started. A few weeks later, I discovered ADBB and learned even more than from the book. I went on to lose 61 pounds, just 17 shy of goal.

That's why I came to Atkins in the first place. Why did I return after falling off the wagon? Because the one thing I did learn last time is that it's the only weightloss program that really works for me.

[JenDoe]

Re: What brought you to Atkins in the first place

What I didn't know was that was that I'd be starving all the time while breastfeeding! I gained even more weight.

Glad to know I wasn't the only one, people kept telling me it would help me loose weight but I was always sooo hungry!

[Dibsangel17]

Re: What brought you to Atkins in the first place

To be honest, before I joined the Marine Corps, I had to lose about 30 pounds before I could got ot boot Camp. I had maybe less than two weeks. My main problem was fast food and chocolate. I stop the fast food and took out all potatos and bread. I saw I lost weight fast and kept it off. I ate baked chicken and fruit. Now I want to get back to 130, so I did some research and found out about Dr. A and this site and thought it would help out.

[tracymax]

Re: What brought you to Atkins in the first place

Glad to know I wasn't the only one, people kept telling me it would help me loose weight but I was always sooo hungry!

I know! Everyone kept telling me the weight "would fall right off" me. Um, yeah. How can that happen, exactly, when I'm eating four sandwiches for an afternoon snack?! I must have done something right, though, because in my chart my OB wrote, "makes a lot of milk."

I'm thinking about putting that on my license plate frame.