It's taken me a month but I've finally solidified my own personal "eating plan" that I think is workable and appropriate for me.
It is based on several factors, including:
- Because I'm so heavy, I need to stay at lower-carb levels than most folks for a long time. That has several built-in considerations, though:
- I need to stay lower than some of the lowcarb eating plans recommend for post-induction. Yet,
- I can't make it so low, that my food range is drastically limited. If it's going to take me years to lose the weight, I really need as much variety in my diet as possible.
- There needs to be some 'allowance' of deductions for fiber and SA carbs, as part of hugely expanding the menu. Yet there should be a cap on them, because SAs in particular can really get out of hand when you're "not counting" them.
- Because it is very easy to 'slide out' of ketosis or at least slide into very light degrees of it, I need to ensure that if this should happen for any reason, it is shortly curtailed and my level of ketosis brought back to something good for weight-loss, carb-craving suppression and appetite suppression. Beginning every month with a few days (or whatever it takes) of "core food only" regularly brings me back to that.
I call it "PJ's Induction Cycling." (Added my name just in case the term is used anywhere else and I don't know about it, don't want to get it confused with other stuff.)
Here's the basics: (click the link to see the image)
PJ's Induction Cycling
Warning: If your browser is set to "resize images" it will make that unreadably tiny! Take that setting off! LOL!
This addresses some 'issues' I've observed in the field at large from reading tons of journals, as well as in myself and my own experience.
Now that I know what I'm doing and plan ahead, induction is easy. And given I'm doing it a few days every month based on the eating plan cycle, it no longer seems like such a long-suffering major thing anymore.
Changed it to 20 on standard (stage 2) after discussion with another LCer.
OK I thought I was done but that's not it.
Q. Do you do protein powder on the first-stage?
A. Yes, protein powders, protein puddings.
Q. Why no grains, mushrooms or cheese?
A. The first for bowel reasons, the second two for herbalism reasons. Basically just to make it so there's a few days each month I detox from such things for sure. And because I know if I don't rule it out I will be eating mega amounts of cheese during the induction period, as I love it, and I really want to force the protein-fat meat/seafood/poultry emphasis instead.
Q. Isn't 20 carbs + 15 deducted carbs a lot compared to 10?
A. Yeah. Monthly re-induction ought to make me appreciate what I get the rest of the time.
Q. Not counting fiber/SA carbs has an effect. You lose more weight if you do.
A. I agree. However if I'm going to be on this eating plan the rest of my natural and unnatural life, I have to have a decent variety of good tasting food to eat. So for me there has to be some middle ground between 'keep it lowcarb to lose' vs. 'keep it enough carb to enjoy it and not feel deprived'. I made it 15 carbs + 15-MAX deducted because that is a different result than just saying '30 carbs'. The deductions will allow me to make little crepes I can use as a bread-replacement of sorts, and a sweet now and then, and have daily fresh garden peppers for example (broccoli stir fried in peanut oil with garlic and ginger, YUM!). But the limit on the deducted carbs per day will probably keep me from ODing on a whole day of food that is "invisible" carbs and calling it a good day... even if carbquick and flaxmeal and my sugar alternatives can make me a ton of food with almost zero net carbs, how much "not quite basic" food I can eat is pretty limited due to the cap on the deductible carbs.
Q. The calorie range is rather large.
A. I have a hard time making 1000 calories half the time. And due to my weight, theoretically I could eat a helluva lot more calories and still lose, but it varies by food choices - drastically. A day with bacon, butter and mayo will skyrocket calories into the 2000 zone while other days I'll be struggling to meet the 1100 minimum. Unfortunately the highest cal stuff is carby sometimes. If I could eat my extra calories in peanut butter without the carbs I'd happily do so! So I leave that a variable option because my mood, food, weight, protein intake and exercise will make me vary the calories. I put 2000 there as a 'maximum' -- not a goal.
Q. Keto sticks don't always measure ketosis.
A. Yeah, I've heard that. If I'm drinking 2 gallons of water a day (I wish) I won't worry about that, it'd flood the ketones. If I still have decent energy, little appetite and no major cravings, and I'm losing weight or size at all, then I'll have to do the three day minimum and call it good. Right now I can't taste, smell or feel ketones and every other time I've been on lowcarb, it's major and obvious. Yet I'm losing weight steadily, have energy, suppressed appetite, no cravings, and I turned a keto-stick purple, so I'm going to have to figure it's ok.
Q. How come you allow yourself nuts/nutbutters but not cheese? The Atkins OWL doesn't bring in nuts until much later.
A. True. Bear in mind this is a maintenance plan not a starting-out plan. But the main reason I allow them is because peanut butter is the only 'sweet' I'm willing to allow myself during stage 1. If I can't go three days without Splenda I've got a problem!
Q. Doesn't this seem like an arbitrary rearrangement of Atkins/Eades/etc., similar to KimKins for example?
A. Sure, everybody comes up with what works for them. Because my weight is so high and my weight-loss efforts will take so long, because my protein demands are so great and my resultant calories tend to be so low, and because I want to experiment with food and not worry quite so much that a 'gradual slide out of ketosis' will lead to my ruin, I felt I needed an approach customized to me.
Best,
PJ
