Please HELP me!

[iloveshawn]

Hello everyone! I'm new to this, I want to approach a low carb lifestyle but it's really hard for me! Little info about me....I have to help my family in our business gas station. Whenever I work here, I'm always eating junk or sodas. I try to avoid it but at the end I give up. I started low carb induction for 2 days then I had to to come to work, 3rd day I went crazy eating chips sodas candies! I don't think I can stick to Induction, it's to hard for me! My son is almost 5 and I'm the same weight after I had him! Some people think I'm pregnant, my lower belly sticks out. My husband is thin, he doesn't eat junk or drink sodas. I'm so depressed, I don't know how to stop this junk food addiction! I was bulamic for almost a year but it didnt help, now i have stomach pains constantly. Sorry to be gross but 2 days after induction I started bleeding, I had my period 2 weeks ago, this has never happend before. Before pregnancy I was 135 pounds now I'm 175.....I want to have a another baby but I want to lose all my baby fat first. Please Help!

[peanutte]

First of all--take a deep breath. You sound really stressed out and desperate. Calm down a little. Okay? Hopefully we can help you.

Here's what I get from your post:

*You believe you might be addicted to sugar and junk food.

*You start out wanting to stay on plan but cave in repeatedly.

*You work in a setting that is full of temptation for you.

*You're not entirely sure low-carb is possible for you.

*You have a history of bulimia.

*You want to lose about 40 pounds.


Okay, here's the good news. 40 pounds will not be that hard to lose if you do Atkins. It might take about six to eight months. It might take less! You need to think of your goal in very concrete terms--not just "I really want to lose weight!" but "I am going to commit to losing 40 pounds!" (or whatever your goal is.)

Induction can be really hard for people who are sugar and carb junkies. I'm not going to lie--I don't have those compulsions so it was easier for me. But I promise you the cravings will get so much better if you can just tough it out for the first three or four days. You have to ask yourself some serious questions. Do you want to lose the weight or not? This soda pop, chip and candy issue isn't going to go away, so you can either deal with it NOW and beat it, or you can deal with it later when you're even heavier. Think about it. Grab the bull by the horns NOW and don't put off this struggle for some far-off time in the future.

You can drink diet soda, bottled iced tea, and bottled water at your store. You could probably have a Slim Jim or something low-carb, though I don't really approve of processed low-carb junk any more than high-carb junk. So it's not that you don't have low-carb choices at your store; it's that you're eating for entertainment, because you feel bored, or because you feel stressed.

Until you get that compulsive relationship with food under control, you're going to keep being stuck in this cycle. It's kind of a sucky cycle, isn't it? It's not much fun, is it? Wouldn't you like to be free of it?

If you don't have an Atkins book, get one and keep it at the store and READ IT. You need to have an orderly plan before you get started. The people who are successful around here read the book, live by the book and do a lot of planning so that they are set up for success. You can get started right now by going to the Main Lowcarb Lobby and reading the sticky note at the top of the page for newbies. Cheri, one of the moderators, has put a lot of very useful information together for people just like you.

I also hope you have been honest with your doctor about your purging. You say you did it for a year and yet it didn't help you to lose weight. That's one of bulimia's dirty secrets--it really does not result in weight loss. It's a panicked cycle of binging and purging that leaves your body wrecked. If you haven't gone to the doctor and told him about what you've done, you should do so. It's important to get checked out, especially since you might want to have more children.

I'm sorry you're feeling so frustrated and unhappy. I hope you are able to beat this cycle and be free of all this stuff. Atkins is a really good solution for a lot of former bulimics and compulsive eaters. You have to give it a chance, though, in order to see it work. Induction will be like detox for you, and you'll feel pretty crappy for the first couple of days, but I'm telling you it will get so much better.

[2big4mysize]

since you are junkfood surrounded why not junk food your meal should you cave while working. I'm sure you have a fridge area in the store so you could have some cheese, deli meat and the drinks peanutte suggested. If you do a 92 DANDR you could even eat some nuts and stay on plan. Funny thing about temptation once you know it is legal it isn't as tempting so enjoy your work and eat on plan while in there.
Some times shedding body fat because estrogen is also in fat cells can mess up your cycle. Also low carbing lowers the insulin levels in the body and insulin interfers with the conversion of the androgen precusor molecule to estrogen so you are also getting more estrogen made. The body will self regulate but it will take a few months of steady eating and exercise to do so.

BTW what are you doing as the mandatory exercise part of your atkins.

[iloveshawn]

thank you so much for replying back. I baught the atkins book, haven't read the whole book yet. I can't use splenda, I'm allergic to it. I drink diet coke but in the book dr. atkins doesn't approve it. I baught xilotol, can i use that as a alternative? I don't eat breakfast in the morning, maybe I need to take healthy foods with me.

[johnny31]

Originally Posted by iloveshawn

thank you so much for replying back. I baught the atkins book, haven't read the whole book yet. I can't use splenda, I'm allergic to it. I drink diet coke but in the book dr. atkins doesn't approve it.

Dr. Atkins recommended avoiding aspartame because about a quarter of the stalled patients who called his office were able to break their stall by giving up aspartame-sweetened diet sodas. Since probably not all stalled patients called or not all of them followed up to report they restarted losing or some might have had an intolerance to an ingredient in diet sodas other than aspartame, the percentage of Atkinseers stalled by aspartame is not 25%. Also, some people might experience a slowdown in their weight loss because of aspartame and not necessarily a stall --- those folks are still affected by aspartame, but they are not part of any statistics.

That being said, if you have a diet soda addiction, Induction is the best time to kill that sweet tooth. This is why I would not recommend diet sodas in general. You might also be a cephalic responder, which means your body will confuse the artificial sweetener with the real stuff, stimulate the release of insulin and trigger cravings, thus causing you to either overeat, consume more of that sweetener or both.

I baught xilotol, can i use that as a alternative?

Yep. Xylithol is a sugar alcohol and it is allowed. Just keep in mind that it comes with all the joys of sugar alcohols (if forces some folks to make very long bathroom pit stops ).

I don't eat breakfast in the morning, maybe I need to take healthy foods with me.

Have something for breakfast, because you come after a night fast. You don't have to cook if you don't want to or don't have time for it. A boiled egg, some cheese, a few olives, leftovers from dinner, etc. would do. And yes, take some food with you as well and don't forget your Atkins emergency kit home.

[2big4mysize]

There are several Splenda challenged Atkinseers here. I talked with the Atkins folk back when he was alive and they told me I needed a new sweetner when I explained I couldn't use Splenda. You can see how your diet coke effects you. I gave mine up cause I was addicted to them and the caffeine but I do use equal as my sweetner of choice. Since we have a 3 serving per day limit of those sweetners you really only should be haviung 24 ounces a day of soda if you don't use any other sweetened products.

Yep precook your breakfast stuff and then just nuke it on your way out the door and eat on the go. I love the egg muffins and they keep well in the freezer.

[peanutte]

I think it's very important for former bulimics to eat regular meals. If you go off to work on an empty stomach, you're just asking for a binge. I went through a phase where I wouldn't eat anything until I got off work at around 9 or so. I would just drink water with Emergen-C all day long. Not only was this a very irresponsible way to eat, I'd end up eating big dinners late at night. I sure didn't lose any weight doing that, and by the time I'd get around to eating I made really stupid food choices.

Now on Atkins I have learned to eat three reasonable meals a day and I rarely, rarely have any snacks. It's just as bad to eat too little than to eat too much.

Does Crystal Light have nutra-sweet in it? That might be another beverage you could enjoy if you can't do Splenda. Or like I said, unsweetened iced tea. But try to drink plain water too.

[Malapert]

Originally Posted by 2big4mysize

Also low carbing lowers the insulin levels in the body and insulin interfers with the conversion of the androgen precusor molecule to estrogen so you are also getting more estrogen made. The body will self regulate but it will take a few months of steady eating and exercise to do so.

Please tell me more about this! I have PCOS and in a nutshell, that means I have more androgen than is normal for a woman. Do you have any links or books to suggest that discuss this? Thanks!

(and can you link me to the egg muffins recipe? Thx!)

[2big4mysize]

Originally Posted by Malapert

Please tell me more about this! I have PCOS and in a nutshell, that means I have more androgen than is normal for a woman. Do you have any links or books to suggest that discuss this? Thanks!

(and can you link me to the egg muffins recipe? Thx!)

Actually PCOS can be from a number of different factors and too much androgen is just one of them. if your doc tested you for all the stuff then you should know if you have too much insulin which is contributing to your excess androgen and low estrogen levels. those are the folk low carbing and/or metaforin will help.
any basic physiology book should explain the production of estrogen in the human body and how it starts with Androstenedione to become one of the female hormones estrone or estradiol either directly or by the testostrogen cycle depending on what enzymes are used.

The actual mechanism of the insulin effect is still being researched but lowering insulin cirrculation levels in the body will decrease the production of androgen compounds in the ovaries and cause estrogen l4evels to increase.


the egg muffins are bascially egg omelettes baked in muffin tins. you add your cooked meats,and/or veggies to the tin then cover with stirred eggs using 2 eggs per muffin. you can add cheese if you want. Bake for 15-20 min at 325 F. if you don't make 12 and your tin makes 12 fill the empty holes with water during the cooking.

some folk use sliced ham as the crust by placing a slice of ham in the tin and then filling with egg/cheese mix and baking. the ham gets crispy and acts like a pie shell to hold the filling.