It does actually. Invest the $6....forget that you have a bunch of diet
books.  Knowledge is power.

Not true.

Well, think of this as a long term investment in YOU.  Don't let this notion
that you've done this before and it didn't work.  If you think like that
you'll never succeed.  You just have to keep trying until you find what
works for you.

And since you haven't read the book let me tell you this: If Atkins (or low
carb) works for you, you'll need to do it for the rest of your life to
maintain your weight loss.  So if you can't think in those terms, you may
wish to not even bother.

Here comes my advice/opinion (emphasis on opinion): the book is
emormously valuable, not so much for the "how" chapters as for the "why"
chapter. If fact, Dr. A forbids you to read the later chapters before
reading the introduction. From your use of the word "uni" I'm assuming
that you're in the UK, where I've noticed that books and software seem
to be more expensive than here in the US. Do you have access to a
library?

As to your questions about side-effects and such, they've been addressed
by others in this thread, and accurately as far as I can tell.

A swift *WATER* weight loss is the norm. "Norm" does not mean everyone,
of course.

Lethargy and other discomforts are not guaranteed to happen, but do
happen to some. Think of it as something similar to kicking a drug habit
for those first two weeks. First 4-5 days, more likely.

For me, my morning cup (mug, rather) of coffee was entirely
non-negotiable. I'd druther die than give that up. Used evaporated milk
and Splenda in it too. I (again, as always, your mileage my vary)
experienced no difficulty with that. But again, some people have
reported problems from caffeine. My instinct is to look for some other
explanation. By the way - if I can't have my morning caffeine I'd fully
expect  lethargy and headache. Maybe that's part of what you're seeing.

Anyway, good luck. If you do this thing right, it works.

--
6/2/2003  181/165/here

Was I ever glad to see the Low-Fat craze go away!

When I starterd an LC program the first time,  I felt fine for about
three days and then all of a sudden I felt terrible for about a week.
Thankfully this ended and I started feeling better than before I
started.  For the next few weeks, though, if I did anything even semi
strenuous I would usually crash and sleep for 1 -3 hours.  For some
reason this also seemed to be followed by a significant drop in weight
the next day that stayed off.

The second time I starrted on LC, I wasn't as strict at first.  My
focus, however, wasn't so much about the weight issues as it was the I
was tired of feeling so poorly.  I avoided all the sugary, starchy junk
but I did add in small amounts of things such as beans or other not
strictly low carb foods.  As a result, the weight drop was slower, but
I started to feel better starting the first day and didn't experience
any crashing sensation.

It is also possible that your headaches are attributable to the caffein
deprivation, if you have been giving up your tea.  After I had been LC
for a while, I gave up the caffein and found that doing so didn't
bother me a bit.  You might want to consider holding off on doing so
yourself.  I personally thought that the dietary change was a radical
enough move for me to make at one time.

Go to a used book store and buy the book. I know they have those in the UK
because I buy books that way by mail. You NEED this book. Without it, you
are just bumping around in the dark and setting yourself up for failure.

Pat in TX

  Just get the damn thing from the library and skim it. You don't need
to do anything more than that. That's what I did, and I'm 60 pounds
lighter because of it.

"Natasha Silverman" <natasha.silverman@btopenworld.com> wrote in

Natasha, you cannot afford not to buy this book, it's like and owners manual
for your body!

This group is here for support, but not to solve obvious questions!

Believe me, this is my second time around doing Atkins and it really does
work.
I was foolish enough to get back into my old habits and now I'm paying the
price again, but at least I have the power and knowledge to take control of
my appetite and feed my body what it really needs.

cheers

DB
BTW, I'll be breaking free of the 50's by the weekend and working on getting
out of the 40's by the end of April! :-)

That's okay.  Not a lot of people start out understanding how
it's different from so many other plan types.  Atkins is a
fully customized process that contains a number of points
that are very non-obvious.  It takes the book to know what
the directions are and acts of faith to step out and follow
them.

Once the good doctor died and the Atkins Nutritionals
company took over control of the website, the quality of
the material there started to fall.  They sell products not
books, and they've since had enough financial issues
that the site isn't as well maintained as some would like.

Side effects are discussed in the book.  They have to be
or folks would freak out.

No, it's that support requires some amount of starting point.
Without the book you don't have the background yet.

When I was a student in a dorm I spent money on a lot more
frivolous stuff than a book that ended up permanently improving
my health.

I had a friend who complained about constipation.  She had to use one of
those high fiber drinks several times a day.