The Do-It-Yourself Diet

Posted April 9th, 2008 at 11:04 pm in Low Carb

I heard somewhere that a whopping 70% of us Americans will go on a diet this year. And with all the choices in miracle weight loss plans available just in he supermarket check-out alone it's no wonder we get confused as to what will actually work. After all the goal is to lose weight healthfully and still satisfy our hunger, isn't it? So it isn't really surprising that most of us find it hard to stick to any of these plans, small portions, low-cal, low-fat, ow-carb, prepared foods, etc, and when we fail we take it hard. (we gain back what we lost and add a few more pounds for good measure)

I Did it my way

This website advocates losing weight by cutting back on bad carbs and the research backs us up, however, how YOU do it is up to you. I combined elements of the South Beach Diet and the Adkins Diet to lose weight and at the same time tried to watch my fat intake. It worked! The point is, I made up this diet myself. I used proven weight loss tricks but I personalized my own plan where I adapted each diet plan to fit my life, not the other way around. Check out ome of these proven strategies and choose ways to make them work for you.

Cutting Carbohydrates = Success

And by that I mean the bad ones, refined flour in the form of white bread, pasta and especially refined sugar. Did you ever stop to think how much sugar there is in all of our so-called low-fat foods? Just look at the labels and it becomes obvious, when a product removes the fat they have to add sugar to get the taste back – otherwise, no sale! All of these foods may taste good but they provide zero nutrition and empty calories. Learn to eat your way around them. Just avoiding one 20-ounce soda per day could translate into savings of 25 pounds or more over a year! Try the ones with Splenda, like RC Zero or my personal favorite, Diet Ocean Spray Cranberry Grape Juice with Splenda. Both have zero calories and zero carbs and they taste very good.

Eat Smart, Eat Well

Your body needs carbs for energy but if you eat the wrong ones your body just ends up storing them as fat. Eat smaller portions of good carbs like vegetables and whole grains. These will give you a satisfying feeling between meals and will steady your blood sugar. If you have to eat refined foods (like white bread) try to combine them with a food that has protein or healthy fat like lean meats or greens.

Eat to lose

That may sound like a gimmicky statement but it actually works, IF you know what to eat. I know that when I am hungry I need to eat. And I don't mean one of those wimpy diet meals that will have me sneaking into the fridge an hour later. I like to choose foods high in fiber and water content so that I can eat a lot, feel full and still lose weight. I eat a lot of salads. At first I found it hard to control the amount of salad dressing I used because I was using the low carb ones like Ranch and Oil & Vinegar. But even low carb dressing can defeat you by using too much. Here is a tip for you: dry your lettuce well with either a salad spinner or using paper towels, a tablespoon of salad dressing will then go a long way. My favorite is ranch but again, don't get carried away.

Add some bulk to every meal by adding high-volume foods like fruits and vegetables. If you are just starting out and you want to lose weight quickly in a short period of time try the Atkins two-week induction plan. Fruits are a no-no during this period but plan on adding them back in when you finish induction. A lot of fruits are high in carbs but they are good carbs, natural carbs. Atkins got a bad rap from his critics and competitors when he suggested a diet without fruit but read my lips: This was during induction only – he never meant to exclude them from a healthy eating regimen – ever.

Watch the Fat

When I first started advocating both the South Beach Diet and The Atkins Diet people would say, "oh, thats the one that says it's ok to eat a pound of bacon for breakfast." Well, that's just ridiculous and it only goes to show you ignorant people can be. If you are interested in the facts, read the books. What I did that worked for me was to try to control my fat intake as well as my carb intake. Naturally I banned the bad carbs from my diet but all of those things that Atkins said were ok like butter, mayonnaise, olive oil, meats and seafoods, cheeses, eggs, etc, I cut back on too. It was scary at first, all the things that the low-fat bunch had drilled into my brain, but after I saw the weight loss and how good I felt, it all started making sense. I mixed low fat mayo with real mayo, I ate two strips of bacon for breakfast instead of four, I cut out bread and subbed Parmesan wafers, I kept the half&half for my coffee but cut it down, etc. Just use common sense and it will work for you as well. There is no other diet that will allow you to eat as much and as well as a low carb diet.