My menu - Please tell me what you think!

[LambChopTaylor]

So this is my 5th day on atkins! I feel great and have noticed much of my bloating has gone from the vacation I took to England.

I wanted to post my menu of the things I have been eating for some feed back. Please tell me what you think.

B: 2 fried eggs in olive oil 2 pieces of bacon (have yet to find nitrate free bacon, but I am looking!) Decaf americano with 1 splenda and 1 tablespoon cream. (Yes, I count the carbs in the cream and splenda)

L: 1 can tuna fish with mayo in a salad (1 cup spinach, 3 cut mushrooms, 5 olives, 4 slices of red pepper, cracked pepper and a little bit of crumbled cheedar cheese. It comes out to be about 6 carbs)

S: Some babybel full-fat cheese (I always count it as 1 carb even though it says it has none), 5 olives (1 carb) or perhaps 1 cup of pork-rinds if I am craving something crunchy (2 carbs for snack)

D: Lamb, chicken, cornish game hen...etc (0) with some veggies carefully measured out (Usually ends up being 5-6 carbs)

I also have been drinking so much water you wouldn't believe! At least 3-4 liters a day!

Anyway, please tell me what you think and I am always looking for snack ideas

[losetocruise]

Re: My menu - Please tell me what you think!

sounds good to me. Cheese should be 3-4 ounces a day, but I think you are within that. I'm not sure what cafe americano is. Is it plain coffee? If it is one of those powdered mixtures, I would watch out for it as all of those I've ever seen are very carby. Looks like you are doing a good juob spacing the vegetables out too!

[LambChopTaylor]

Re: My menu - Please tell me what you think!

Americano is just espresso and water. I just have to have that coffee taste!!

[Sheba12106]

Re: My menu - Please tell me what you think!

Hi Taylor,

I just found your post and thought our menus were very similar. I have been on induction for 4 weeks, but I am not losing any weight. I lost over 13 lbs the first week, then gained it back the second week and now I go up and down and I am currently at only a total of 5 lbs lost.

I don't take a bite of anything that is not on the induction list.

Breakfast-2 scrambled eggs cooked with butter, 1-2 ounce sausage patty

Lunch-1 can drained tuna with 1/4 cup mayonnaise, 1 cup iceburg lettuce with 1 teaspoon extra virgin olive oil over the lettuce.

Dinner-5 ounces meat or poultry and 1.5 cups ceasar dressing, which I make myself with one of Atkins recipes and I count it at 2 carbs per Tablespoon, I use 2 Tablespoons or less on my romaine lettuce.

For a snack I might have: a celery stick with 1 oz cream cheese or 1/2 a deviled egg. Sometimes I'll have 2 develed egg haves spaced out.

I drink over 90 ounces of water daily.

I have read the Weight Loss Revolution book and I refer back to it and reread all the time. I don't know if I am missing something or if there is a chance that some of the meds I use to take are still not completely gone from my body. I used to take an antidepressant and a diuretic. I have not taken them since the 3 or 4 day of induction.

What am I doing wrong? It is hard to believe that I would be one of those people that have to try the most extreme version of the diet to lose when I have lost weight in the past very easily. I have gained alot of weight since my back has gotten really bad. I used to be very active and now I am not due to having so much pain.

[LambChopTaylor]

Re: My menu - Please tell me what you think!

The only thing I can possibly think of is maybe there are hidden sugars in your sausage patties? Also, 1/4 of a cup mayo seems to me a tad bit much. I only use 1 tablespoon and count it as one carb.

Also, iceburg lettuce is really JUST water and has no real vitamins... Perhaps trading that out for spinach which is much darker and full of vitamins.

Another thing could be...are you eating enough? I know from my previous times with calorie counting if I did not eat enough I stalled my weight loss if not gained some back.

Keep me posted on how you are doing!

[Sheba12106]

Re: My menu - Please tell me what you think!

Hi Taylor,

I could cut back on the mayo a bit, instead of using 3 Tablespoons (1/4 cup) I could use less, its just awfully dry then. Someone in another thread suggested I use more fat and cut down on the protein, I am so confused....lol. As for the sausage, there is no sugar listed on the nutritional label and it is not mentioned in the ingredients, no form of it, just salt. I have cut out tomatoes, thinking that there was too much natural sugar in it for me to lose, I cut down of my cheese except for 1 Tablespoon of cream cheese on my celery stick. I cut down to two eggs instead of 3, I cut out my caffeine completely. I stopped using salad dressing on my lettuce. I'm not sure what else there is to cut out. Yesterday I had approxiamately 1730 calories. I had chicken wings for dinner and that combined with the mayo is what brought my calorie total that high. If I had a chicken breast and cut down the mayo the calories would be around 1200, but then I wouldn't have enough fat in the diet to lose would I?

I starting putting my food intake into fitday and let it count my calories, fat, carbs and everything. According to fitday, my carbs are only at 10 (which is 2% total intake) a day. My fat is at 68% (total intake) and my protein makes up the remaining 30% and I read in another thread that those numbers are real close to where they should be.

My fiance and I eat all our meals together, we eat the same things, except that he eats a little more protein than I do, and he will eat cheese slices now and then. I stopped eating the cheese because I wasn't losing. He has lost 18 lbs now. I guess I am just the definition of weight loss resistance lol.

I take a multivitamin and fatty acid supplement daily along with drinking enough water. I haven't bought the other supplements that aid in losing weight, but I plan on doing so today. I have just been trying to work with the Atkins diet to figure out what I need to do in order to lose weight. Any help or suggestions are greatly appreciated!

[LambChopTaylor]

Re: My menu - Please tell me what you think!

I know this may sound really weird - but have you tried stop thinking about it?

You are making all the right steps - I know and you know it. I would stop counting calories to begin with - atkins tells us that's we don't need to count calories - only carbs but listen to our tummy to see when we are full. I would start with that.

And just relax. Oh, and get the book if you don't already have it.

[Sheba12106]

Re: My menu - Please tell me what you think!

I went into this diet not worrying about it. But when I started gaining back the weight that I lost the first week and was almost back where I started 4 weeks later, I started to worry lol. Getting the tips and things from posts on this site has helped me alot, especially when others tell me what they did to correct certain areas of their diet. What works for one doesn't for all. I have tried different things and I believe it is starting to work. I have lost almost 4 lbs in the last couple of days, but still not down to where I was the first week of induction. I didn't want to go another month with nothing happening. I have all of Dr. Atkins books, I've read the Diet Revolution and Atkins Essentials so far. I was following everything in the books, the way that I understood, and wasn't doing anything wrong as far as I could tell.

I did take your advice and I cut down on the mayonnaise in my tuna salad and I even bought raw spinach to use in place of the iceburg lettuce and I think this may be helping.

One downside, I had a upper endoscopy this morning and the dr. wants me to take Nexium for 3 weeks and I was reading the side effects etc. and it can cause edema (which I already have), weight gain, candidosis (which I think is candida or yeast). I am not sure how this will effect my progress for a while and its really discouraging, but maybe I get lucky and I won't see those side effects.

Thanks for your replies they are very helpful.

[choeve]

Re: My menu - Please tell me what you think!

I took nexium and didn't have any side effects and I lost weight without even trying on it. Not sure why, but I always thought it had to do with the way my body digested food with less stomach acid.

[Sheba12106]

Re: My menu - Please tell me what you think!

Hi Choeve,

Well that's good to hear. I have been on other meds that I have since been able to stop and I thought maybe I still had traces of them in my system because I was not losing anything but finally I am losing again. When I read the possible side effects of the Nexium it didn't look good lol. I really appreciate your imput.

[Sheba12106]

Re: My menu - Please tell me what you think!

Hi LambChopTaylor,

I haven't been on the post in a few days and I was wondering how you are doing. I followed some advice I got on the posts and my weight loss got turned around and I am now down 14 pounds!

My energy level is finally high and I'm feeling great!

[JimboK]

Re: My menu - Please tell me what you think!

I could cut back on the mayo a bit, instead of using 3 Tablespoons (1/4 cup) ....

Please forgive the nit-picking here (I generally avoid it on forums), but 1/4 cup actually equals 4 tablespoons. Doesn't matter so much with the mayo, but I mention it only because you want to make sure your conversions are correct when measuring carbs.

Congratulations too for getting back on track!

[LambChopTaylor]

Re: My menu - Please tell me what you think!

I actually stopped doing atkins a few days ago. It really dropped my moods and made me feel SO BAD. I couldn't handle it. I went back to calorie counting because that's the healthy way anyway.

[momtomany1]

Re: My menu - Please tell me what you think!

If you count calories along the lines of Dean Ornish, you will probably do alright, please make sure to get essential fatty acids in supplements. If you eat grains, make sure they are whole grains, etc.

Please don't suggest though, that Atkins is any less healthy. Much research and anecdotal evidence to the contrary. When I did Atkins in 2004, I was skeptical, because I had extreme heel pain for years. One doctor had told me it was fat in my blood stream causing pain in my heels, and to eat low fat. I did a lot of walking.. on very painful feet. I lost some weight, but never lost the pain. I read the Atkins book thinking.. sounds great but surely the fat would make my heels so much worse? within two weeks, my heel pain was gone, and never returned, even when I gained weight again.

We'll be here if you need us!

[Sheba12106]

Re: My menu - Please tell me what you think!

Hi JimboK,

Oops...LOL, I just realized after reading what I wrote. I wasn't using 1/4 cup of mayo for my tuna salad, but was using that for a double batch. I was actually only consuming 2 Tablespoons in 3 ounces of tuna, but have since cut that down to 1 Tablespoon for now. I was making a double batch for myself and fiance. I was making the tuna just now and laughed to myself about how much a quarter of a cup of mayo in 3 ounces of tuna would definetely be overdoing it a bit!

Actually I am pretty good about measuring everything so that I stay consistant. Once I cut down on my portion of protein, tomatoes I started losing again and that's been consistant now also.