Ladies, FYI there is another post under diet and exercise that already had 4 pages about the Atkins diet. You might want to check it out.

My husband has lost 9 pounds and only needs to lose a total of ten. He is doing a variation of the Atkins. Tried to go whole hog and at first it was great because he dropped several shots of insulin a day (which we first thougth was incredibly great) but after 2 middle of the night lows, we decided no more. So he cuts lots of carbs, but not as many as Atkins requires. Whatever works!

http://atkinsathome.com/sample-menus.asp

here's a page on the Atkins site with sample menus. It's part of their "Atkins delivered to your home" program.

I'm not in their area yet, but by golly, as soon as I am, I'm going to sign up!

Happy Impending Birthday JawJaw....

I TOLD you that Atkins was a good thing! But if I were you I think I'd pick somewhere other than Olive Garden for a meal right out of the gate. Right when I started, my friend... the one who tried to warn me about the candy (?)... she took me to Chevy's. I don't know if you have them back there but it's kind of a 'fresh Mex' thing. We had steak and carnitas fajitas which consisted pretty much of strips and chunks of meat with bell pepper and onion, really good. And I told the waitperson, "NO Beans, NO Rice, No Tortillas and don't even bring 'em because I might eat them and then there won't be a tip for you because I told you not to in the first place and now you've sabotaged my diet....get it?" And so he didn't but I did get the guacamole and sour cream and salsa......it was wonderful. And there was just so much food that I ended up asking for a couple of tortillas and made a couple of burritos to take home to my husband.
ANYWAY.... really, if you don't make it complicated, it's a very simple plan to follow JawJaw. I can't stand complicated things so I make it easy.

I'll have a couple of eggs and maybe a couple of pieces of bacon for breakfast. Or an omelette with avocado and cheddar. Or just the bacon. Or a hard boiled couple of eggs if I'm in a hurry.
For lunch I'll have a salad and a grilled hot dog, or Polish sausage, chicken breast, tuna or ... my favorite if I'm not broke, a small steak.
For a snack I'll have one or two pieces of string cheese and maybe a handful of pork rinds, which come in all kinds of interesting flavors these days.
Dinner, steak and salad but I've made a turkey, made meatloaf, salmon croquettes but without the bread crumbs (you can crumble pork rinds to substitute) or sauteed fish or scallops or tuna salad.... even a sort of taco salad without the shell.
And my most favorite thing - HELLO - it's my new best food friend - CAULIFLOWER!!I'm in love, it's like potatoes...my vehicle for butter and sour cream.
Really JawJaw. I've got a hundred pounds to lose and I'm 32 pounds into already. I can be done this year! I swear, after the first few days of getting rid of the sugar/carb bloat and detox... you'll embrace this. I swear! Really.
I'm not all that into rules and I hate fussing or having to think about what I'm going to eat, but it is really so simple.... meat, green leafy...that's it. And a ton of water, because you like it...you love it, you want some more of it!

Go for it. What do you have to lose?

Kate

Wait, hold on.. Dreamrkate what about the candy? What was the warning. You don't get any candy. Right? But is there some warning? If so, I'm sure I will need it very soon because my sweet tooth will be acting up and I only started today.

smile

you know...the more I read (on their site) and the more I hear from you all, this just sounds like it was tailored for me! You have all said over and over that it's easy and it sounds like it is. Also, I think I get the jest of it...no bread, no potatoes, no caffeine, drink water...

Ketchup? but can you have things like salad dressing? Someone told me you could, but you are saying the dressing at OG is not good for you. One girl told me you could eat all the Ranch dressing you want...but somehow that doesn't seem right to me. Is that true?

She also eat these little candy bites which I call log cabins.

No, we don't have Chevy's...but we have Rosie's which is similar.

Hmmmm.... you really shouldn't have ANY candy, at least not in the first two weeks of induction. Really. You shouldn't. You don't want to sabotage yourself right out of the gate. And if you just stay determined, two weeks isn't that long really. I just kept thinking.... how big do I reeeeeeeeaaaaaaaallllllyyyyyy want my butt to be?

And then... and this was a big deal for me.... I had to ask myself... "Will there be cheeseburgers out there in the world when I get done?".... "Will cheesecake still exist in a year?"... "Will Ben and Jerry just fold up and cease to exist if I take a break?"

Well the answers were pretty plain... although Ben and maybe even Jerry might miss me, they'll probably still be hangin around so, since cheeseburgers and taco will still be around too... and we won't have gone to prepackaged morsels of dehydrated space food in a year....I'll still get to eat some of this stuff later. But I can tell already, in my still-novice stage, that (and this is a HUGE part to me) my approach to the whole sugar/carb thing has completely changed.

I'll get to the candy, really.

Since I restricted my carbs SOOOOOO very much in the first few weeks, I became painfully aware of what I had eaten before. And while it never seemed like a lot it obviously added up without me ever being totally aware of it. Tasting the mashed potatoes as I fixed them, grazing while I cooked... dipping the sourdough bread into the spaghetti sauce as it simmered... what else?....a couple of glasses of Coke, a muffin, maybe a bagel, ice cream, cereal......all that stuff.....(not in the same day, but realistically you actually could eat all that.

Anyway, I have become so aware of it, I'll never eat like that again. It was so imbalanced. And I wasn't even paying attention. If I got nothing else out of this, THAT would be the huge reward.

But back to the candy... you'll have to go back into the old Atkins posts....oh my god... my girlfriend warned me about some sugar free candy and I didn't listen, I JUST WANTED SOME CANDYYYYYYYY.....well all candy is NOT equal... some of it is just like setting a bomb off in your gut... and it hurts for days....not to mention you could totally destroy a bathroom if you lit a match, we're talking major reconstruction here.

The sugar-free Reese's peanut butter cups taste great but I SWEAR to you, they are the worst...well if you eat seven of them they're the worst...and that's what I started with. (I hadn't reached my enlightened phase yet. But Russell Stover has some great ones, Hershey's are good....there's more and more stuff out there, and there's even CarbSmart (I think that's the name) ice cream that's good and you can have a little bit and you'll be satisfied with a portion of it.......

......if you be good the first couple of weeks!

Be good to yourself!

K

Oh... I almost forgot... (I keep telling you guys about this web site) ... www.lowcarbfriends.com

They've got a GREAT recipe area, which you'll find on the left. And they have a great bulletin board section that has all kinds of stuff. I havent' figured all that out yet but there were recipes that would satisfy a sweet tooth easily. You've just GOT to check it out.

Kate, some of those "no sugar added" candies do have malitol, which can have a laxative effect on you. One should only eat those in moderation probably never on an empty stomach.

I got another recipe for you. Scrambled eggs.

I call it Eggs My Way

If you're feeding 1 person use 2 eggs.. if you're feeding 2 people use 5 eggs.

You'll need:
Eggs
Butter

Seasonings:
Garlic salt (w/the bits of parsley)
Chopped onions
Salt
Pepper

Kraft Mexican Style Four Cheese (shredded)(combination of cheddar, monterey Jack, Asadero and Queso blanco cheeses)

Heat your pan and put in enough butter to saute the onions and cook your eggs
Sprinkly the chopped onions and garlic salt into the melted butter and saute for about a minute

Crack your eggs into butter mix and salt and pepper to taste. Let the whites cook until you can no longer see the bottom of the pan. Then swirl gently w/spatula to break the yokes.

Keep cooking and slowly swirling eggs until they no longer glisten and are losing their "wet" look.

Sprinkle a handful of cheese onto the eggs and fold the egg mix over the cheese .. then swirl w/the spatula until "wet" look is gone. (usually on a few more seconds)

The eggs are finished!

Well thanks Vicki... I never really thought of actually using a recipe for eggs but I'll try it.
It sounds yummy.

One of the other things that helps me is sugar-free Jello...it's wonderful! And sometimes just what I need when I'm prowling for something sweet.

I don't seem to have a problem with not having bread or lots of other stuff but when I made fried potatoes and eggs for dinner the other night for my family, I realized how MUCH I missed THOSE. I had a couple of bites but hurried up and get them on the plate to my husband and son before I could enjoy any more of them.

My one little allowance is movie popcorn. Other than that, I pretty much stay right on my program.

If you know of any other wonderful little nibbly things.......let me know.

Kate

sugar free jello works for me too.. but when I'm in the mood for something crunchy I make a batch of dip (sour cream and Ranch dressing dip mix) and either crunch on celery or pork rinds. In the beginning I really couldn't even consider eating a pork rind, but with dip on it it's not so bad!