On May 14, 9:29 am, Doug Freyburger <dfrey...@yahoo.com> wrote:

Do you mean that because there's more work involved in figuring out
what works best for you (fully customized), not as many people
actually do it?  Nothing good in life comes without work.  "Your Last
Diet" seems to be very sensible and I like that I feel like I'm
understanding more about how our bodies process what we eat.

I'm keeping a journal for every meal and also writing everything down
including the protein and carb contents.  I googled the Atkins diet
and one url said that starting at 20 grams of carbs isn't the best
idea because of the likelihood of not staying on it.  They suggest
starting at 80 grams or even higher and then gradually reducing it.
That makes sense to me.  Even though Your Last Diet doesn't really
speak about the number of carbs, I am trying to control the number.

It's been a few days now and I haven't had any processed sugar.
Yeah!  Only from fresh raspberries and blackberries which I mash and
put on top of a mini wheat bagel in the morning, which I have
alongside my Metrx Whey Protein drink.

It's a way of life, not a diet.  I used to live that and I'm trying to
get back to it.  I feel like an addict going through withdrawal!

Laura, I know what you mean. I have started LC and the withdrawals were
strong at first. Now I have more energy than I have had in a long time. I'm
62 years old and doing the LC thing is the best plan for me and my body. I'm
at 40 grams of carbs a day, and that is what my body lets me know works
best. Very slow in losing, but I feel sooo much better.
Good luck  with YLD. Sounds like that is the best for you

Peaches

That's one issue.  Plus most folks who read a plan expect
that they can reduce it to a menu.  Plus as far as skill as a
professional writer, Dr Atkins was, well, a good clinician.
He didn't have the sense to employ a ghost writer until his
2001 edition and then he didn't use one who'd bothered to
figure out the material in the 1972, 1993 and 1999 editions.

Yet so many people look for a magic bullet.  And not
finding one they move on to the next fad.  Sigh.

Another issue with the Atkins process is even though it
works, it doesn't look like he ever learned the science
behind why it works.  His explanations are very poor
hand waving.  There are folks who see the poor science
and then falsely conclude that the process itself is
wrong.  Nope, he spent decades of clinical work tuning
the customized process and when followed as such it
works extremely well.

The Atkins process was determined by experiment and
it was honed by decades of experiment.  The way science
works, explanation is optional in a case like that.  Dr A
knew that and he never did put in much effort at explanation.
The result is his explanations suck and people who want
explanations more than they want working process object.

When I first tried Atkins I noticed that his science was
terrible, but I knew people who had followed the directions
and succeeded.  So no matter that the directions told me
to do stuff I didn't understnad or believe, I followed those
directions.  Phases on schedule, carb quotas on schedule,
introduce new foods on schedule, detect problems and
write off problem foods as discovered, out of ketonuria and
back in on schedule, and so on.  It worked and it worked
extremely well.  Because it worked but I didn't understand
it I started studying the hormones.  Ten years later I'm
still encountering pieces of the puzzle.  But consider that
my starting point on 21 July 1999 was only a couple of
years before his final edition.  My starting point was near
his finishing point.  He spent his career determining by
experiment what to do.  I understand why he left it to
others to figure out why it works.

There's a giant drive to understand, but what does
understanding really achieve?  Folks understood why
blood letting worked, so they practiced it.  But in fact blood
letting did not work.  I know enough science to know that I
should take a process that *works* and *use* it.  But I don't
have a common attitude.  So many folks want to curse
something, anything, about Atkins that instead of attempting
to follow the directions they trash his explanations.  It's like
Henry Ford building a gasoline powered car and then
explaining it in terms to mystical fumes and spirits in
pipes.  The explanation would be nonsense but the car
doesn't care about the explanation so it just works.

Good plan.  Just the act of keeping a journal improves
how most folks eat.  Increased awareness.

So you discovered someone making judgements about Atkins
without actually having read the book.  There is a lot of
material on the topic by such idiots.  Blow them off.  Unless
they get the simplest basic point that phase one lasts 14
days, they are utterly unqualified to discuss what Atkins
says in his books.

Try it some time and see how hard it is.  Then try a couple of
months of low fat to reset.  Then try what Atkins really says in
his books and see the difference.  The initial two weeks at
20 *greatly* reduce the intensity and duration of carb cravings.
The high fat ratio in the first two weeks also contribute to
decreasing both the duration and intensity of the cravings.

The suggestion may make sense, but what it really does is
demonstrate ignorance of how the biochemisty actually works
and how carb cravings are turned on or off.

Cool.

Sounds pretty high carb to me.  My bias - Wheat is my main
binger trigger food.  Anything with wheat in it sounds high to
me.

Folks love to deny that high carb foods are addictive.  Addictive
behavior patterns happen no matter the furosity of the denials.