Why do people give Atkins up after experiencing success?

[cmcole]

I am not against the Atkins diet, but I thoroughly believe it is not the cure all for everyone who is overweight and in the battle of the bulge there are several ways to "skin a cat" and one size does not fit all.

That is true. People have experienced success on many other plans. Whether it's for a short time, or a long time entirely depends on the person (and the plan). I could not afford to stay on some plans (financially); I could not replace most of my meals with shakes or bars; I could not count every "point" that a meal consisted of . . . and the list could go on and on.

However, that does not mean that Atkins is the ONLY plan in existence that will work for a lifetime commitment. It just happens to be the one that the majority of the people on this Board follow and support.

[Iapetus999]

Re: Why do people give up Atkins after success?

I'll list and try to be brief.

1. Didn't turn out to be the "cravings cure" so many of you experience. I did a clean, strict induction. 14 days later I still craved sweets, my biggest weakness. Two months later still craved sweets. Three months later...the same. Four months...well, you get the picture.

For me it was so bad I DREAMED EVERY NIGHT the entire time I was on the diet about pancakes, cookies, muffins, garlic bread, spaghetti... pizza , burgers, hot dogs, donuts--- everything basically off limits.

I never found that I suddenly acquired a taste for veggies I didn't like before or lost the taste for junk due to the diet...which brings me to my second point.

I still have cravings and I've been on this thing 18 months.
What I found is that there are "trigger foods" that cause the cravings. For me its stuff like citrus fruits, rice, and of course real candy.

As far as the veggies tasting better...that might happen once you eliminate all sweeteners from your diet...real or artificial. Once I did that suddenly a lot of veggies tasted better...kinda sweeter.
But no I still don't like cauliflower. :nono

2. Disgusting tasting "carb alternatives" or "low carb foods". I ate as much whole foods as I could, but I am in the news business and my schedule is BEYOND ERRATIC. Depending on what I am covering I am either stuck somewhere far away from food, period or surrounded by nothing but junk.
I often tried to pack a cooler with food, but sometimes there just wasn't time or I packed enough say for lunch, dinner and a snack and ended up staying somewhere for 12+ hours on a story. So it would obviously be more convenient for me to pack a bar (s) or a shake sometimes...something easily portable, that can be eaten quickly and that won't spoil.

However, I found all of the Atkins brand low carb products with the exception of the baked muffin quick bread mixes, and frozen pizza to be the most horrendous tasting over priced concotions I ever put in my mouth. Ditto for the majority of most of the other stuff on the market by other companies. The few things I did like had other drawbacks...like an outrageous amount of calories for a small serving or trans fats. Which leads me to the next and most common complaint I hear...

I agree that stuff is crap. People for some reason have this idea that "lo-carb" means just eat "lo-carb" versions of your regular food. That doesn't work because you just wind up craving "real" food.
You need to just find a whole new diet. I have salad almost every day (sometimes twice) whereas before I'd have salad maybe once a month.

3.IT's Expensive as **** to maintain this diet if you are person on the go or with limited income. Any of the decent low carb alternatives are so overpriced that anyone with any money sense or lack of money just can't justify buying the stuff. To keep the diet interesting you have to buy exotic or unusual produce sometimes which is very expensive. I didn't have a very well paying job when I started and I thought I was going to gag if I ever saw another can of tuna or an egg, or salad or can of green beans. I had to have flavored water because I despise the taste of regular water unless I am thirsty from activity.
Anyway, that was all I could really afford at the time. Not to mention the price of supplements and the book....which brings me to my next point.

Just rent "SuperSize Me" sometime and then see if that "cheap" fast food is really worth it. Why is McD so cheap? It's NOT FOOOOD! :no
Fresh food is always going to be more expensive that canned/processed junk. Most supermarkets throw out half the produce they get...stuff that would easily be included in the cans of slop on the shelves.

4. I was raised a Southern Baptist, but never have I seen so much irrational and unnecessary "bible thumping" as I have since I've been on this diet. In this case, the "bible' being Dr. Atkins book. I got extremely nauseous at work one day so I had a sip of giner ale and some crackers. Another Atkiner practically condemned me to ****. Several other Atkiners often talked and behaved like they were in some sort of cult, beginning every sentence with "Dr. Atkins says...blag blah" Likewise the health nuts I work with who traditionally tended to be folks with natually slender builds and high metabolisms could not stop themselves from snickering or berating people for bad carbs.. No amount of logical explaining to either side seemed to make any difference. Being a lurker on this site for such a long time I was shocked at the level of vitriol over people's personal eating habits!

I can't imagine someone being that way on this board ensive
Oh yeah, like everyone! It's all the happy waves we get from this diet! :yes

5. When I did occassionally have bad carbs....surprise...no headaches...no sluggish tired feelings....no sick feeling....and no weight gain. Every Atkiner doomed me to a life of overweightness if I ever looked at another cinnamon roll. Well, it just didn't happen. While my cravings did not go away I did learn how to better monitor my food intake on this diet...when I started to feel a little fat or perhaps fluctuated a few pounds or so...I'd cut back on carbs and up the exercise, but I have to date not found it necessary to totally abide by the rules of the book to maintain my weight.

kewl

6. . I can wholeheartedly relate to those of you with families constantly shoving bad food at you. Luckily I am single and live alone so I could completely stock my apartment "low carb'" without anyone else caring...but family functions, office parties, or any group outing became ****. Friends invited me over for Christmas dinner..they TRULY did not have one item on the table acceptable for Atkins. I kid you not. And since I was raised with Southern sensibilities and I have no real health issues to shun the meal (like diabetes or heart disease, high blood pressure, et). I ate just small portions of everything in order not to offend.

Yup, whenever I go to DW's folks in TN, there's not a thing I can eat.
But at least they make (and sometimes grow) it from scratch. :joy

7. I travel alot. I like to experience regional food and cultures. There's no way I'm not going to eat and experience new things in new places. I think life is too short to spend it always exercising total restriction. Italy, Mexico, New York City...all places I went this past summer. I ate what I wanted. I drank what I wanted. I THOROUGHLY ENJOYED myself and luckily I didn't gain weight because I stayed physically active throughout.

I am not against the Atkins diet, but I thoroughly believe it is not the cure all for everyone who is overweight and in the battle of the bulge there are several ways to "skin a cat" and one size does not fit all.

I actually had a doctor prescribe a modified form of it when I first started to pick up pounds suddenly at 30. It was closer but not identical to South Beach. For example, you could have a burger with half the bun instead of no bun at all. You could have sugar free candy and desserts from the get go . Aspartame was discouraged but Splenda was thoroughly endorsed. I actually lost weight quicker initially on this diet, but a friend talked me into Atkins so I quit and started over on Atkins about a month later.

Congrats to all of you who've had success no matter how you achieved it.

Good luck to you...everything is different, everyone starts at different points. Men lose differently than women, elders lose differently from kids, people with health issues are different, etc etc.
I once had a chiropractor that claimed he could cure all my ailments. I stopped going 'cause I still felt like crap and a lot poorer.
You're wise to look at this objectively. I think the main book of the Bible...I mean DANDR is that you need to experiment to find out what works for you.

[Perry]

Re: Why do people give up Atkins after success?

I once had a chiropractor that claimed he could cure all my ailments. I stopped going 'cause I still felt like crap and a lot poorer.

I had the same experience. But now I know it really was the extra weight!

Welcome back, Iap.

[2big4mysize]

cnwade wrote about dinner at friends and about traveling and experiencing the local culture as a drawback to staying on plan. I can't for the life of me understand how either of those things could be an issue if a person is truely doing Atkins and has read their book and followed the advice in it.
1)recruit your friends, family and co workers for part of your supprt network. I can't see any member of my support network deliberatly serving not one item I could eat Sharing meals is about the love and friendship you share with the people, not the actual food. No hostess would be offended if you ask what was being served before you arrived and ofered to bring a few dishes to share so you could stay on your diet. Many will alter the main dish to accomadate your food plan. There is nothing rude about not eating an offered food. What would be rude would be to put the host in a posistion where she had messed up your weight loss because you didn't let her know about your food restrictions ahead of time. Just think how badly our friends and family would feel if they knew we on purpose wrecked our weight loss and health gains from our Atkins WOL becase we at food they had offered us. :sadblinky

As to the travel, the Atkins site has a whole section of foods that can be eattern in each ethnic region. We can come to the board and use the international forum to ask our fellow memebers what foods where they live are okay on our plan. so enjoying the local culture should not be a reason to not follow your WOE while traveling :sadblinky

We can chose to do Atkins following the plan Dr Atkins ttold us about or we can chose to do our own low carb ketogenic plan. We might or might not be successful with our plan.

Cravings can be tracted down if we spend the time to search for the root cause and take corrective measure just as that leaky dripping faucet that keeps you awake can be fixed properly or things can be used to ignore the problem like closed doors, earplugs, stings channeling the water but the drip is still there. once we know what is causeing our craving it is our choice as to how to deal with it. I don't use the stuf I know causes me trouble even though it is allowed on Atkins because i know my body will not accaept it. we make choices all the time about how we will deal with something. the choices you make determine your Atkins success rate. You can have the rapidest possible weight loss for yourself by staying with the induction program all the way to goal or you can explore the food groups and foods permitted on each level and lose slower but enjoy the larger food variety you have.

it is your choice how you do your weight loss plan and as long as you accept responsiblitiy for doing your plan amd post your happy doing it your way and not Atkins way nodody is going to aurgue with you, but when you post I was sick and had to eat crackers and gingerale you will get folk posting that we don't have to eat crackers and ginger ale and there are other things we can choose and then list the choices that could have been made. yep I remember the ginereal and cracker post. :no

SOme folk bring an attitude to this board I didn't follow the plan and lost and what are you going to do about it or they tell new folk well I ate bars and shakes and I lost so you can too without knowing that persons metabolic type or anything about them. Once somebody has finsihed their 14 days and knows they are a low average or high metabolically ressitant person then they can decide if eating those foods will be a part of their Atkins or not and understand the effect that choice will have on their rate of loss. And that is why folk popping in saying well I did it this way on MY ATKINS and lost get fok posting behind them saying don't do it their way follow what Dr Atkins said. here we want the most folk trying Atkins to be successful.

As Dr Atkins says in DANDR chapter 11 Q and A you can lose weight on any plan where your caloric intake is less then the total caloric output. He just felt his plan gives us an advantage.
SO we can be life long Atkins sucesses or successes on our own plans they aren't mutually exclusive, but the purpose of an Atkins diet board it to help everyone be an Atkins success and the posts here will continue to p[oint out any variations from the program Dr Atkins wrote about as niot being Atkins.

Happy low carbing..

[cnwade]

Uh....what? I read the last two posts but had trouble understanding them as well as interesting that you all made so many assumptions about what I am and am not doing. I don't have nearly enought time in the day to point out where your assumptions are WRONG...anyway... I never said one thing about fast food, because I don't eat fast food, but I am given a lecture about a movie that I actually interviewed the filmmaker about when it was released....you know what they say about assuming.

Someone asked a question and I answered ...but some of you decide you need to argue every point. It's my answer I don't need you to convince me of anything nor did I get that to be the point of the post. I'm telling you why I had trouble...I didn't ask you to instruct me on how not to have those particular feelings. If so I would have asked for advice in the appropriate thread.

Yes, I realize some of you think its a way of life. My faith is way of life for me, food is not. However I am not going to try and argue why what you eat should not be considered a way of life because you've stated that's what you believe and this thread was not started to argue that point.

As for the crackers and giner ale...the point wasn't that was all I had that might help settle my stomach... the point is that some of you are complete fanatics when it comes to this diet and it gets damn annoying for those of us who can think of a thousand things more important to get defensive and upset about . I'd feel the same way if people were saying Slim Fast or Lean Cuisine was a way of life. It's just food and clever marketing and Dr. Atkins was just another man who walked the earth who saw both potential in both.

[BikerGoddess]

wade, others were just giving you their opinions, to which they are certainly entitled. They deserve the same respect they gave you.

Laura

[Iapetus999]

I actually interviewed the filmmaker about when it was released.

Kewl

Tell us more!

[theresad]

I would just like to offer my 2 cents to the original question. Some people (us) have the misfortune to need to watch what they eat as part of their everyday lives in order to maintain their weight and stay healthy. That's just the way it is. We can't eat whatever we want and not suffer the consequences. I myself have had my struggles and disappointments with weight loss in general for most of my life. What can I say, I like a good peanut M&M. Following Atkins made me feel better generally speaking, but I have had my share of problems sticking to it and over the past month, I've been pretty awful with the WOE and have just started getting back on track. So what makes people successful at sticking with it you ask? A good support system, availability of proper foods, lack of availability of bad foods, mental fortitude, a constant awareness of your choices, forcing yourself to turn off the TV and go to the gym, distracting yourself when a craving hits, avoiding situations that are likely to create weakness, etc. Hmm, insert any addiction above and its all the same. I just quit smoking - finding the similarities very spooky.

So what makes people unsuccessful? I would say that the reason is easily identified - its like being an alcoholic and having to drink three times a day.

[Helena_HastingsUK]

WHAT TO SAY TO THE JEERS

I have the answer! Prompted by the previous post this is what you say to people when they say taht people who lose weight on Atkins put it all back on. Say to them:

Yes, well lots of people who give up smoking start again, don't they? Is that a reason to tell someone to keep on smoking?

Well, just my two penny worth.


Helena

[moulin]

Hello

I am still on induction but had worries about maintaining the loss when I eventually reach my goal.

Reading this thread has been enlightening, thank you.

I think the mindset of most of us is that we should be able to eat exactly what we like ,when we like once we are at an 'acceptable' size.
Probably due to not feeling 'normal' when we were obese or overweight and having achieved'normality' we assume that we no longer have to do 'abnormal' things like dieting to remain 'normal'.

As another post said if we have a problem with drink or drugs total abstinence works.We cannot abstain from food as it is a 'normal' and vital activity.

I would liken it to an allergy, my body doesn't function well on carbs, so I'll avoid them.

If I was allergic to cats I wouldn't dream of having a houseful of them, and then wonder why I felt ill.


Yet we do it with food. That's human nature for you.

[pmcluver]

I believe that people give up on the low carb way of life because they think they can't have a great big array of foods.. you know the list as well as I do, everything that contains flour and sugar.
But with the help of forums like this, recipe sharing and extremely creative authors, you need not feel deprived at ALL! There is just about nothing I miss as I can eat desserts, Italian noodle dishes & ravioli, biscuits, breads, cakes. My favorite LC author is Carylton Cooper.

I guess the other reason people give up is that they are too lazy to create good food for themselves and live on low carb bars. A guaranteed way to get bored and quit! Eating Low carb is definitely a bit more work than fast food but, personally I believe I am worth it!

Don't you?

[AllieCat0817]

Re: Why do people give Atkins up after experiencing success?

Okay inquiring minds want to know why people give up this WOE after experiencing success with it. We know those who give it up tend to go back to their old ways, and so that is not an answer. Why does one give up something that has worked so well for them and return to ways that put them in bad health, overweight, and risking a multitude of illness that come from being overweight? On this board we are not likely to get anyone who has done this and stayed away from Atkins, but we could get some who have done this and are back with us.
So speak up and talk to us because it may help someone else stay the course instead of leaving.

If have asked this SAME QUESTION a million times in the almost 2 years I have been on this WOE. Great question.

[cmcole]

This topic got me thinking of one I saw on another forum.

The poster raised the question: why do people who are binge eaters buy the stuff that causes them problems? Now the person to which this poster referred lived alone and bought groceries only for herself, so, the assumption was made that a conscious choice was made to buy those items.

Various replies hinted at the following:

- sometimes people think they will be strong this one time, and can endure the fact that there are items in the house and will not binge.

- sometimes people begin a binge long before they enter the supermarket to get the items (it's psychological)

- and, of course, there's the psychological problem that, regardless of the complaints and proclaimations otherwise, some people haven't come to the point where they want to do something about their weight.

Now, I'm not sure if this has anything to do with the original question, but it just got me thinking.

[Lori41]

Hello, All!

I was in maintenance once, and am back in induction so I thought I would put in my 2 cents.

Since I lost the weight the first time (4 yrs ago) I have always "been" on Atkins - it was always a way of life for me and I have always told other people how great it is. I have rarely eaten potatoes, never any other bread but low-carb, haven't eaten pasta in 4 years or corn or peas, doughnuts, macaroni & cheese, yogurt, etc..

However, I absolutely love chocolate (real good dark chocolate), pizza comes with the kids, and my GREAT chocolate chip cookies (which I made with Splenda this Christmas). So, while I was trying (hoping) to maintain (I know, not the right way), I was cheating. Everything but these three items were always Atkins based. I know - dangerous - and fattening. Also, during this time I met my husband and we ate our way through honeymoon bliss. Now, I weigh more, everyone else in my house is skinny and the kids come with temptations - I can't eliminate everything in the house that's bad for me because I'm overweight and have made bad choices in my life. They are doing fine and should be able to have a cookie once in a while, and nuts, and yogurt, and corn.

I am thankful for what I have and thankful for this board and look forward to joining this forum permanently in the future!

Take care everyone,
Lori

[scaleslave]

yep

I totally agree with you -especially on the points it being too expensive and it's annoying to give up your favorite cusines.

For me Atkins "for life" is not something i'm into or look forward to.

I lost 30 lbs on this diet before, i gave it up because it was too expensive and i felt disgusting just eating meat and veggies all the time.

I'm on it again, but this time my meat source is lean poultry, i must admit i feel a lot better than when I ate all that bacon and sausage.