Could caffeine cause me to stall

[melimeli]

even though my ketostix are always showing ketones? I know it is not from fat because I do not have a High fat diet.. mainly chicken with some red meat sprinkled in there... red meat is too expensive Anyway I have been stalled for about 2 weeks and I drink about 3 cups of coffee in the morning.. black with only 2 splenda's total... Could i be on a stall even though my sticks say no? OH and BTW.. no inches either haha

[pipee_pl]

Re: Could caffeine cause me to stall

could be- maybe try going down to one. but you need to have fat for induction to work- have you read the book?

[Georgiana]

Re: Could caffeine cause me to stall

Normally I would play the record that says "a stall is defined as 4 weeks with no loss of weight or inches", but there are some other things I believe you might have to tweak.

Ketostix don't turn purple from the fat you are eating, but from the stored fat your body breaks down for energy when your carbohydrate intake is low enough. Otherwise you would be eating fries and still be in ketosis.

On the other hand, Atkins is a high-fat diet. So I am not sure what you mean by "I do not have a High fat diet". If you are doing Atkins, you should be having a high-fat diet.

Are you drinking decaf? What caffeine typically does is mess up with one's blood sugar levels, hence causing cravings. However, I have also seen people on the board who don't get cravings from coffee, but are just stalled by it.

Another thing that is very possible to stall you is a low fat intake. Atkins is designed to work if you keep your fat intake high. Otherwise you would either be eating too few calories (thus putting your body into starvation mode) or eating too much protein (the excess protein being turned into glucose).

Are you on OWL or extended induction? Did you add any new food?

Congratulations for the weight lost so far! That's a great progress!

[SunnySmile501]

Re: Could caffeine cause me to stall

Ketones are in fact detected from dietary fat we eat. Carbohydrates in fatty starches like French fries keep the the ketones from happening.

[Georgiana]

Re: Could caffeine cause me to stall

Oops, sorry, my way of putting it was too extreme, especially with the fries example. To correct... The ketostix don't differentiate between the fat you're eating and the stored fat you are burning. However, they can turn pink even if fat does not account for the majority of your calories, as long as you keep your carbohydrate intake low enough. When I started "Atkins" (no book and pretty much clueless about the rules), I was living on salad veggies, a little olive oil and lots of tuna and chicken, but the ketostix still registered ketones. I assume that was from a high enough fat:carbs ratio (Fitday says approx. 40% fat, 5% carbs, 55% protein and 1000 calories), although my diet was more on the high-protein side. Obviously, it didn't take me long to stop losing weight... Anyway. The point is, you can still be in ketosis even if you keep your fat intake low (i.e. lower than someone who does Atkins correctly), but from my experience you stop losing weight after a while.

[melimeli]

Re: Could caffeine cause me to stall

Ok I don't have the book I really can't afford it right now..... It is necessary that I eat a lot of fat? I just have been limiting my carbs to under 20. So, is the high fat in order to get enough calories a day? here is what I ate yesterday...

Breakfast
1/2 avacado coffee

Lunch
8 celery sticks ranch(o carbs)
14 pepperoni

Dinner
1 large Chicken baked breast stuffed with mushrooms, cream cheese, blue cheese, bacon
A big dollop of the stuffing on the side

Snack
Avacado
blue cheese

[Georgiana]

Re: Could caffeine cause me to stall

I'm not sure what phase of Atkins you are following. Is it extended induction? Then you are only allowed 1/2 avocado per day.

Use something like Dailyplate or Fitday to track your foods. If on induction, about 65% of your calories should come from fat, 5% from carbs and 30% from protein.

I'm not sure how much cheese you are eating, but it is limited to 3-4 oz per day. You should be also eating 3 cups of veggies per day -- 2 cups from the salad veggies list and one cup from the "other veggies" list.

Here are some sticky threads w/ the rules and foods for induction:

http://www.atkinsdietbulletinboard.com/forums/atkins-low-carb-dieting-faqs/6782-what-rules-induction.html

http://www.atkinsdietbulletinboard.com/forums/atkins-low-carb-dieting-faqs/6781-what-foods-can-eaten-induction.html

[melimeli]

Re: Could caffeine cause me to stall

so i'm gonna give up coffee for a week and see if i get a change... then if not i will add more fat

[Sharon_Wants_Help]

Re: Could caffeine cause me to stall

Just looking at what you ate I'd say it's the fat. You need to eat more period. Instead of celery sticks try eating something like pork rinds. There are actually lots of recipes to make pork rinds more ... well, tastey. I personally enjoy making mine taste like churro sticks from taco bell.

OK maybe I should rephrase that; In addition to celery.... you should have something high in fat as well. You should also have more diversity than celery as well! Do you like pumpkin pie? Then buy some canned pumpkin (with no additives or sugar - Walmart always has it) and add a bit of sweetner!

BTW you can get the book easily for 3 bucks if you go to a half price book store, or any store that buys and sells used books. They always have like 8 or 10 copies.

[SunnySmile501]

Re: Could caffeine cause me to stall

Ok I don't have the book I really can't afford it right now..... It is necessary that I eat a lot of fat? I just have been limiting my carbs to under 20. So, is the high fat in order to get enough calories a day? here is what I ate yesterday...

Breakfast
1/2 avacado coffee

Lunch
8 celery sticks ranch(o carbs)
14 pepperoni

Dinner
1 large Chicken baked breast stuffed with mushrooms, cream cheese, blue cheese, bacon
A big dollop of the stuffing on the side

Snack
Avacado
blue cheese

The fat is necessary. Atkins is high fat, moderate protein and low carb. What gets you into ketosis is the ratio of fat to carbs. Excess protein can and will be converted to glucose. You need dietary fat to burn fat.

What you are eating is in no way Atkins. At least read the stickies. You could check the book out of the library.

[LadyT]

Re: Could caffeine cause me to stall

From your sample diet you are not eating low fat. Maybe you ment low in saturated fat but I wouldn't even say that. First of all Avocados are fully of good fats and pepperoni is an international symbol for fat. All those little white bits are actually chunks of fat. Plus the cream/blue cheese has fat content as well.

I put your foods into my fitday food log and your percentages came out roughly like this:

Cals - 1,313
Fat - 58%
Protein - 33%
Carbs - 9%

Even though your net carbs are below 20 the overall percentage is a bit high. This could be easily remedied by having one cup of salad with your protein (1 carb) and a tablespoon or two of full fat mayo. Other great ways to boost protein and fat in your diet is by having eggs and small amounts of nuts. Plus don't forget to count any olive oil/butter used in cooking in your percentages.

I personally wouldn't have more than 1 cup of coffee a day but something to watch is how much milk you are having with your coffee. Are you drinking diet sodas? Artificial sweetners can interfere with weight loss. The other thing is that that Dr Atkins advices against eating too much processed meats such as pepperoni. The nitrates can be carcinogenic. I don't know if they interfere with weight loss or not. Use Fitday (it's free) and hang in there, maybe it's just something you need to push through.

Lady T

[melimeli]

Re: Could caffeine cause me to stall

no milk or cream just black. I don't think I am low fat just not high fat I mean like soo much that it would be making my ketone sticks turn (I think) I am working out and I hope the ketones I am burning is my own fat haha...

ok I am going to go to good will this weekend and look but tell me.. why the fat? If I keep my calories at around 1300 and my carbs below 20 do I still need a high amount of fat? I don't usually eat cheese at all because I feel it keeps me out of ketosis... but it went with the recipe..

I really can't do anything sweet as it is a trigger so the coffee is the only sweetener I have a day and it is just 2 packets of splenda.. and I repeat I still show up in ketosis.. so

can you be in ketosis with out loosing weight for weeks? No inches either

[Georgiana]

Re: Could caffeine cause me to stall

It is possible to be in ketosis without losing weight/inches if you eat one or more foods you have an intolerance to. The same thing can also happen if you don't drink enough water, if you are eating hidden sugars, if your fat intake is low, if you are taking certain medication, etc.

Why the fat? As Sunny also said, it's important to have a high fat to carbs ratio. Fat has 9 calories per gram, while carbs and protein have only 4. This means it's more difficult to eat enough calories to be satisfied and avoid starvation mode if you do not eat fat, because it would require you to eat too much protein or too many carbs. Besides, on this diet it is fat and protein that give us energy and keep us from getting hungry between meals. Since too much protein = sugar and carbs are obviously restricted, the only thing you're left with is fat.

While 58% is not ideally high for induction, it is a pretty good percentage nonetheless. As for how many of the ketones come from dietary fat and how many from stored fat, it's impossible to tell. Ketostix only measure excess ketones, so if you are using them, they will have nothing left to measure. Ketones are used for energy, so if you are exercising for example, the concentration registered on the stix will be lower. Drinking a lot of water also "dilutes" them and a lower concentration will appear on the stix. Don't sweat over what the ketostix say, they lie just as much as the scale does.

That being said, I'm shooting two more links at you:
Food Causing Diabetes (read especially the first 3 parts of the "In Detail" section)

http://www.atkinsdietbulletinboard.com/forums/atkins-diet-extended-induction/5090-weight-loss-not-linear.html

[LadyT]

Re: Could caffeine cause me to stall

I'm fairly new to Atkins so I want to be careful about giving wrong info. First of all you can have cream in your coffe if you so desire as long as you keep within your allowances. Secondly just watch how many packets of splenda you use in a day. A max of 3 is recommended. As far as I can figure a higher fat content combined with the protein helps you feel satisfied longer. Being a long term low fat dieter it also gives me the feeling that I'm not dieting as I'm eating a once frobidden food.

Other foods that you can think about including in your diet that would increase your fat percentages would be sour cream, melted butter on your vegies, salmon, etc.

As far as if you can be in ketosis and not burn fat I don't know, but I feel that if you keep at it maybe all the weight might fall off at once instead of in a steady rate.

[NewToAtkins]

Re: Could caffeine cause me to stall

Just looking at what you ate I'd say it's the fat. You need to eat more period. Instead of celery sticks try eating something like pork rinds. There are actually lots of recipes to make pork rinds more ... well, tastey. I personally enjoy making mine taste like churro sticks from taco bell.

OK maybe I should rephrase that; In addition to celery.... you should have something high in fat as well. You should also have more diversity than celery as well! Do you like pumpkin pie? Then buy some canned pumpkin (with no additives or sugar - Walmart always has it) and add a bit of sweetner!

BTW you can get the book easily for 3 bucks if you go to a half price book store, or any store that buys and sells used books. They always have like 8 or 10 copies.

I just bought a new copy on Amazon.com for $4.10, and that includes shipping. ($.11 for the book, $3.99 shipping)