Stop psyching yourself out!

[Goldenrod]

I apologize in advance for the stream of consciousness that is about to follow. I’ve been thinking about this topic for a while. I have a lot to say, but I’m not sure I can put it all together coherently. I hope I can, because I think what I have to say will help a lot of people here, particularly those who are new to the low carb lifestyle and find themselves having trouble staying on plan, or beating themselves up for not getting through a clean induction if they’re on Atkins, or the first phase of whatever program they’re on.

Before I start, though, I’ll give you a quick background, so you can decide for yourselves if what I have to say is worth listening to. Take a look at my stats: I’ve been a member of LCF since 2002, but the number of times I’ve posted doesn’t qualify me as a “blabbermouth,” or “big yapper,” or any of the other titles members get for posting a certain number of times. I lurked for a while, reading and learning, reading and learning. Finally, I started posting pretty regularly. (I had an office job in which I was free to surf the Internet as long as I kept up with my other duties.) Then, I went to grad school, quit grad school, and joined the military. I was no longer able to devote the kind of time to LCF that I used to, but I logged in every now and then to see what was new. I was low carbing on and off (mostly off), and I tried Body for Life, too, but my motivation gave out in the tenth week of the twelve week program.

Okay, long story short, as you can see, I’ve been a member here for almost six years, and I’m still not at goal. Like I said, I was not low carbing for most of that time. Part of it was that I was a nearly broke student and living off of loans, but I’ve stopped making excuses for myself. The fact is, even after having read Dr. Atkins book (1992 version), it still hadn’t really sunk in what low carb was all about, and I just wasn’t ready to give up my favorite “foods” (and now, I use the term loosely, LOL). I was working out like crazy, and even though I wasn’t losing any weight, I was still “brainwashed” by the low-fat, low-calorie mindset. Had I done low carb right the first time, I would have known better, but again, without making excuses for myself, I half-@ssed it.

During all that time, with all the stops and starts of a low carb WOE, I read, in addition to the Atkins book, Protein Power, The Ketogenic Diet, and Natural Hormonal Enhancement. I knew low carb worked. I’m a pretty smart cookie; I had no trouble understanding the science behind it. For whatever reasons, though, I still wasn’t willing to really commit to it. I was so focused on all the things I couldn’t have, and all the fun things I thought I was missing out on, instead of having faith that the LC WOE would work, if I only gave it a fighting chance. I was also a little younger then, and much more worried about how I looked than what processed foods and refined starches were doing to my long-term health, and really, to the economic security (from exploding healthcare costs) and physical health of a nation whose entire population (in general) is getting fatter, sicker, and increasingly dependent on drugs that only treat symptoms, instead of getting down to the nutrition (or lack thereof) that is often the root cause of so many maladies in the industrialized world. Okay, mini-rant over…

As you can see from my stats, I now claim my start date as November 2006. Since then, I have been loyally low carb and would never go back. I’m not at goal yet, and I’m not happy with the way I look, but if I do say so myself, I’m closer than I’ve ever been. I recently looked at some pictures of myself from basic training, and I actually look better now than I did then. I’ve discovered the combination of how to eat, how to exercise, and what vitamins to take, that seems to work for me. I’m not an expert, and I’m not a maintainer yet. I have learned such an amazing wealth of information from people like Julia (JuliaL), Dyan (dae tona), Betty (sugarlessforlife), Allie (AllieCat), Sheila (SugarFreeSheila), Fawn, Charski, and others. Among others, they are the ones I look to consistently for advice, motivation, tips, and inspiration. That being said, even though I’m not “one of them,” I think I have some insights that are worth sharing. So here goes:

(I'm going to break this up into a few posts, so it's less overwhelming!)

[Goldenrod]

1. STOP MAKING LOW CARB HARDER THAN IT IS. I think a lot of us psych ourselves out, because we constantly obsess over every gram of carbohydrate, every ounce on the food scale, and every pound on the scale. We think of it as some big, scary science experiment that you have to have a PhD to perform successfully. After all, if it was easy, why would doctors have to write books about it? Well, STOP THINKING LIKE THAT ALREADY. The science behind low carb is actually very simple, and in my opinion, quite beautiful. It’s giving the human body exactly what it needs to function at its best – physically and mentally. By removing sugar and refined starches from the equation, you save your body from the physically uncomfortable and emotionally damaging highs and lows of insulin spikes.

By feeding your body meat, vegetables, fruits, nuts, seeds, eggs, and cheese, you’re giving it what it was biologically designed to run on. You wouldn’t pour ketchup into your car’s gas tank would you? Of course not. Your car was designed to run on a specific substance, and so were our bodies. Kudos to all the ingenuity during the last few hundred years that have led to industrialization. We can get goods a lot faster and cheaper than ever before, but at what cost to our lives? The fact is, our technology has far outpaced the human body’s ability to adjust. Our systems aren’t designed to run on foods that come from factories. There’s a reason preservatives are added to so many foods – it’s to make their shelf lives virtually endless. Think about it – if something’s designed to be edible after two years of sitting on a shelf at the supermarket, why would you even want to eat it?!


2. STOP WAITING FOR A LIGHTBULB TO GO ON OVER YOUR HEAD. I said this in another thread, but it’s worth repeating: Stop waiting for an epiphany. Stop waiting for an “ah-ha” moment that will make this all click for you. It might come, but it might not, and if you sit there waiting for it, you might be waiting a looong time. Like the Nike slogan says: just do it. A lot of us wait for motivation, but you know what? I’ve often found that action begets motivation. It sounds backward, but it’s true. If you just make a move and start, and then keep on going, you’ll see results (even small ones), and that will be a huge motivator to keep at it. Maybe you’ve already been at it for two weeks, and haven’t seen much movement on the scale, or don’t feel any wiggle room in your clothes. So what? Are you just gonna quit? Did you put all that weight on in two weeks? Probably not, so give your body the benefit of the doubt, and trust that it just might take more than that to take it off, too. And that leads me to my next point…

3. STOP COMPARING YOURSELF TO OTHER PEOPLE. I’m envious of some of the progress I’ve read about on this forum. Some people seem to have magical bodies that take to low carb instantly, and they get where they want to go pretty quickly. Others have a tougher time. Whether it’s due to eating more carbs than they should, more calories than they should, too much cheese, too much cream, too many artificial sweeteners, sneaking in some alcohol here and there, or any of the other combinations that sometimes hold people back, they don’t lose as fast. And then, there are people who promise they’re on plan 100% of the time, and still can’t seem to lose as quickly as others. THAT’S THEM. THEY’RE NOT YOU. STOP COMPARING THEIR RESULTS TO YOURS.

I’m a victim of this game, too, so I say this as much to myself as to you. But we would all be wise to judge our progress against ourselves, and not against anyone else here. If I’ve learned anything from this forum over the years, it’s that there are so many factors that go into how people lose weight, that it’s really not even fair to compare ourselves to anyone else. None of us live in the same house, with the same family, or work with exactly the same coworkers, or have the exact same family history, or daily routine, or the exact same medical conditions, or bone structure, or hormonal makeup, or any of the physical and environmental factors that can help or hinder weight loss. The only thing we do have in common is a desire to lose weight, get healthy, and stay healthy. We can argue until kingdom come about the most efficient ways to go about this, but at least we have the ultimate objective uniting us. (Let’s think about that the next time a thread gets a little out of hand and people start threatening to walk away from what I think is the most fun, educational, and supportive spot on the Web…)

[Goldenrod]

4. BE HONEST WITH YOURSELF. When you think you’re not losing as quickly as you’d like to, take Allie’s advice and OWN YOUR CHOICES – the good, the bad, and the ugly. Be proud when you do well, and learn from doing not-so-well. Maybe you snuck a slice of cake from the party at the office. Maybe you grabbed a few fries off your child’s plate when you did the dishes. Maybe you had a few beers when you went out with friends. Or maybe you overdid it on “legal” foods. Maybe you ate more nuts than you’re admitting to yourself. Maybe you’ve been living on Atkins bars and shakes for two weeks and calling it “induction.” Whatever you do, before you decide your plan “isn’t working,” see if maybe you’re not *following* the plan.

(And do NOT make excuses for yourself. I have never been in a situation where there was “nothing low carb.” I’m going post another thread about accountability, so all I’ll say here is, as long as you’re prepared, I can’t imagine a situation in which there is “nothing” you can eat. Even if it means keeping string cheese, nuts, beef jerky, and LC bars in your purse, or briefcase. Like Allie also says, you can eat low carb in any situation, but “you gotta wanna.” You have to believe in your WOE more than you want to avoid hurting someone’s feelings at the pot luck supper because you won’t sample the casserole, or the banana bread. You’ve got to believe in you WOE more than you believe you might have more fun with your friends if you give in and have the cheesecake, or the chips.)


4. “CAN I HAVE _____ ON _____ PLAN?” I DON’T KNOW, *CAN* YOU? This is probably the most important thing I’ll say in this ridiculously long thread. If you decide to do Atkins, do Atkins. If you decide to do South Beach, do South Beach. If you decide to do Protein Power, do Protein Power. But do them to the letter as best you can, all right? Those books lay out pretty well what you can and can’t have, and it seems like when newbies ask if they can have a particular food on a particular plan, they’re really asking permission to have something they already know they shouldn’t. I read Protein Power a long time ago, so I’m not sure of “the rules,” but I know the Atkins and South Beach plans are pretty clear on what you can and can’t eat in the initial periods. Atkins is also clear on how and when to try adding other things back into your diet.

If you don’t feel you can stick to a specific plan, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with doing it “your own way.” There are plenty of people here who have lost and are still losing by following their own strategies. That being said, I still highly suggest that you read a book (if not several) that does detail a plan. I’m partial to Dr. Atkins’ 1992 book, as it is what inspired me to start low carbing in the first place, and I also think it explains the science behind it very simply and succinctly. (It also came out before most of the Atkins “products” on the market today, so there’s almost no mention of bars, shakes, etc.)

As I said earlier, low carbing is simple, but it’s not so simple that you can “wing it.” Think about all those people who “do low carb,” and quit a week later, because they get so sick of living on nothing but butter and bacon. Most of them have never read one of the books that lays out the how’s and why’s of low carb. These are the same people, of course, who warn us that A) we’re going to die, eating like that all the time, and B) we’ll never stick to it, because you can’t have any “real food.”

You’ve got to educate yourself about what foods are truly low in carbohydrate, as opposed to gimmick-type items that are labeled “low carb,” or “low GI.” You’ve got to be willing to take the time to read labels at the store. Just because something is “low carb” doesn’t mean it’s good for you. (I know this is not a low carb food, but I can’t help going back to my favorite example of how manufacturers try to fool the public into buying cr@p by masking it as “healthy.” What is it? WHOLE GRAIN LUCKY CHARMS. Wow! Whole grains! It must be good for my kids now that it’s made from whole grains! Please, please, for the sake of your success as a low carber, do not fall for this garbage. Be educated, be aware, and be a discerning shopper.)


But back to the issue of doing it your own way. If you’re the type that’s going to keep asking whether certain foods are “allowed,” maybe a specific plan isn’t for you. Maybe you need to go with trial and error, that way, when you eat something that isn’t “allowed” on Atkins, you won’t feel the need to beat yourself up, because you’re not following Atkins in the first place. If you make your own plan, then you’re “allowed” to eat whatever foods you want to allow yourself to eat. That being said, you still need to be educated. Perhaps white rice isn’t the smartest thing to allow yourself. Perhaps white bread and regular soda aren’t wise choices, either. But if you honestly think you can’t stick to a low carb WOE without a glass of wine or two a week, or without an apple every few days, there’s no sin against letting yourself have those things. What you need to discover for yourself is how often and in what quantities you can do so and still be content with your progress. You also need to understand that your progress will likely be much slower than that of people following a more restrictive, structured plan.

Still, if you’re not ready to give up certain things “cold turkey,” or jump feet first into Atkins induction or a related phase from another program, this might be the way for you to go. People have said this over and over: the best plan for you is the one you’ll stick with. You can do Atkins, or Stillmans, or any other plan, but if you feel trapped by it, or feel like a slave to every little ingredient, you might wind up feeling bitter and resentful, and you’ll quit before it even has a chance to work, instead of experiencing all the positive, life-changing effects of living low carb. Some people here are militantly loyal to a particular plan, but I think even they would agree that any reduction in overall carbohydrate intake, specifically from refined sugar and processed junk, is a step in the right direction. Plenty of people here follow their own plans, and allow themselves to indulge at weddings/birthdays/holidays, or even just let themselves have more carbohydrates than would be permitted on a specific “plan.” Their loss is usually slower, but allowing themselves to be a little more liberal helps them stick with this for the long-haul, and that’s what this is all about.

Low carb is not a quick fix. It’s not a band-aid because you’re going on a cruise and you don’t like the way you look in a bathing suit, or because your twenty-year reunion is coming up and you want to show up all those catty b*tches from high school. Yes, it can help you lose a lot of weight in a short amount of time. But unless you permanently change your habits, that weight will come right back, usually with interest.


And now for my final point…

5. Define what YOU mean by “low carb.” Folks, you could cut out pasta, bread, and potatoes, and be considered “low carb” in comparison with what they call the Standard American Diet. You have to define your goals, see what degree of carbohydrate consumption will get you there, and how long you’re willing to take to get you there. Again, don’t be fooled into thinking that by living a low carbohydrate lifestyle, you’re giving up fruit and cereal for the rest of your life. If you think that way, then you’re just as bad as the people who badmouth LC because all they know about it is steak fried in lard. Read posts from successful maintainers here. Many of them have incorporated fruit, oatmeal, whole grain breads, whole wheat pasta, etc. Many have also maintained long enough that they’ve learned to indulge without it wrecking years of steady commitment. They can have that piece of cake at the wedding, but that’s all it is. One piece. And then they move on as usual. They’ve come too far to go back to their old habits, and you will, too.


If you’re brand new to this, start simple. Keep to the basics, and you won’t have any questions about what you can and can’t—or rather, should and shouldn’t—eat. Yes, it takes time to cook. Yes, it takes planning and preparation. Yes, it takes a little extra time to read labels at the supermarket. But aren’t you worth it? Isn’t giving your family a happy, healthy wife/husband/mother/father/daughter/brother/sibling/friend worth it? Frankly, folks, I can’t think of anything more worth the effort.

[sugarless4life]

WOO HOO !!!! All I can say to that is:

Betty

[thestreets]

great post. i'm glad you took the time to write that all out.

i see posts from newbies all the time stressing over the things you address and i always think to myself, damn if they are already going through this they will have a hard time sticking to atkins and won't get the wonderful benefits down the road.

your post should be required reading.

[Nikouli]

[lwcrbldy]

Awesome post! Thank-you so much.

[Antonya]

Awesome! I'm almost at goal too, and I really need to take what you've said to heart. You look lovely in your avi, btw!!

[suncstgirl]

WOW! Great post!! Thanks!!

[txjewel]

Well said and very insightful! Thanks for sharing.

[BuffBabe2B]

Awesome post! Thank you.

[Tooter]

Preach on!!!

[hummingbird11]

Amen Sister!!!!!!!!

[junkfoodmonkey]

Great post, excellent advice for newbies and oldies alike.

[AllieCat0817]

Originally Posted by Goldenrod

4. “CAN I HAVE _____ ON _____ PLAN?” I DON’T KNOW, *CAN* YOU? This is probably the most important thing I’ll say in this ridiculously long thread. If you decide to do Atkins, do Atkins. If you decide to do South Beach, do South Beach. If you decide to do Protein Power, do Protein Power. But do them to the letter as best you can, all right? Those books lay out pretty well what you can and can’t have, and it seems like when newbies ask if they can have a particular food on a particular plan, they’re really asking permission to have something they already know they shouldn’t.

Yeah. That. For REAL. I ALWAYS think to myself with the 'can I have___' threads, I DON'T KNOW, CAN YOU???????????????????????????? Seriously.!

[tinatina]

great post

[SharonGAPeach]

Thanks for sharing your thoughts, Goldenrod. Very good reading!

Sharon

[annamazing]

Goldenrod,


That was a phenomenal post....kudos to you to devote so much TIME and THOUGHT in writing it for the benefit of others.

[beth30]

And THIS is exactly why I started posting in the ML instead of just in my challenge thread....yep, yep, yep......

[whatjelly]

Great post!

[mom2carli]

Good job! Well written.

[sugarless4life]

Originally Posted by AllieCat0817

Yeah. That. For REAL. I ALWAYS think to myself with the 'can I have___' threads, I DON'T KNOW, CAN YOU???????????????????????????? Seriously.!

Truth is, of course you can *have* anything. The question is, will eating it contribute to your success or sabotage it ?

Betty

[nolagina]

Goldenrod, I missed this post and just read it..

All I can say "Girl, Preach it!!!!!"

[Patlaf]

What a fantastic post. Thank you so much for taking the time and effort to compose it. It definitely should be a "sticky".

Pat

[DiSa]

excelente!

[KJ-43]

I think you have sumed it up in a nutshell. It took me over a year to figure out what works for me and now I am not obsessed about carbs and calories but I am conscious. This is a woe that lets you get in touch with you and your body and what works for someone else may not work for you. I know certain foods even lc foods set off cravings or a binge so I don't eat them thats what I have found out among other things. I glad you took the time to write that out.
kj