Is it because of lack of calories or lack of carbs?
 

I am curious if anyone here has tried to limit carbs to 20 a day (Not strictly Atkins) and lost weight regardless of where the carbs came from?
20 carbs is 20 carbs, right?
In my case, I have lost my appitite. I'm lucky if I get 20 carbs a day in. I am working on that!
This diet has caused me to drastically cut my caloric intake. (Any diet will result in weight loss if calories are restricted.)
If a person needs 1800 calories a day to 'maintain' their current weight but, restricts the calorie intake to 1300 a day. The result is going to be one pound a week lost, more if exercise is included. It isn't going to matter where those 1300 calories came from. The final result will be negative one pound a week. (Even if a huge amount of Carbs were consumed during that week, as long as the calories did not go above 1300 a day).
I have lost 9 pounds on this diet and I use Fitday. Looking back on the past week. I have noticed I average around 1000-1100 calories a day. I can't eat more than that. I am NOT going hungry. I am wondering if that is why I have lost the weight.
I guess my main question is.... If I up my calories to the amount my body needs to maintain my current weight will I still lose weight because I have cut out the carbs?
I hope that there is proof out there.. someone who does just that and doesn't cut the calories along with the carbs. I understand that it could be a combination of both in the long run, and that is helping with weight loss. But I am rethinking my decision to be on this diet when sometimes I feel I could have the slice of bread and just stay at a certain amount of calories and still lose the weight.
Please help me see the light.
Thank you.

Are you doing this diet only to lose weight ? No health benefits in mind ?

Looks Like I Found the answer to my original post. I hope this helps others too.
 

This is why all carbs/calories are not created equal. :)

Now, look at another hypothetical diet, consisting again of 30% protein but 70% fat with no carbohydrates. The proteins are used in the same way as the first diet, so even without consuming any carbohydrates, as much as 58% of the protein consumed is converted to glucose. This will not be enough to satisfy the energy needs of the body, so in the absence of carbohydrates, the body begins to burn the fat it consumes. This causes the body to "convert" to a fat-burning engine instead of primarily being a glucose-burning engine.

Fats, unlike carbohydrates, have a high satiety factor. Whereas carbohydrates make you hungry a couple of hours after eating, fats make you full, and the satiety lasts for hours. Therefore, you tend to consume fewer calories on a high-fat diet than on a high-carbohydrate diet. Also, remember, without carbs, your body does not produce much insulin. Therefore, the fat you eat cannot be stored. Thus a high-fat diet, in the absence of carbohydrates, typically results in weight loss. Yet your blood glucose does not drop too low, because your liver continues to convert some of the dietary protein into glucose. Any excess dietary fat is not stored but broken down by a process known as lipolysis (the opposite of dehydration synthesis) and excreted.

The products of fat metabolism are fatty acids and glycerin. The glycerin is used as a fuel source or can be eliminated in the urine and the fatty acids are broken down further into ketone bodies, which become the primary fuel of the body in the absence of glucose. Any excess ketones are not stored but are excreted in the urine. The production of ketones during fat metabolism is called ketosis.

The upshot of these different metabolic processes is that a calorie of carbohydrates will tend to make you fatter than a calorie of fat that is eaten in the absence of carbohydrates. That is because excess carbohydrates turn to fat, which is stored, but excess fat is broken down and excreted.

manucpa:

My initial decision to start this diet was to lose weight for my sisters wedding. I am not diabetic, nor do I have any other health problems (yet).
Maybe if I stick to this diet I can keep it that way. ~smile~

Low cal & low fat diets which include many carbs will lose weight for you BUT the weight may include lean muscle mass if the protein content is not enough. And that is often the case with low cal.

A very good side effect of losing with low carb is that you may be smaller at a higher weight than you expect because there is more lean muscle and less fat than when a person loses on low cal/low fat.

also, how easy would it be to stay at your current calorie level if you eat carbs? you said yourself that your appetite has been greatly reduced. this way, your body guides you

when I first started 3 months ago, I couldn't eat 1200 cal a day either. my body has adjusted and I eat about 14-1600/day. a few days, I've even wandered up to 2000! :)

I feel full and even-keeled. I recommend the plan as atkins wrote it. I think it does matter where the carbs come from. different foods have a diff impact in insulin production which controls the whole game. if you want the details of how and why, atkins spells it all out. by cutting the carbs you don't get as hungry, as pointed out above. the fat keeps you feeling full.
it works for me.

when I first started 3 months ago, I couldn't eat 1200 cal a day either. my body has adjusted and I eat about 14-1600/day. a few days, I've even wandered up to 2000! :)

I feel full and even-keeled. I recommend the plan as atkins wrote it. I think it does matter where the carbs come from. different foods have a diff impact in insulin production which controls the whole game. if you want the details of how and why, atkins spells it all out. by cutting the carbs you don't get as hungry, as pointed out above. the fat keeps you feeling full.
it works for me.

All things being equal, yes. The only notable exception are the carb foods with fiber, which slows the digestive process giving a longer feeling of satiety, and slowing insulin secretion. At least, that's my understanding of fiber.

Personally, I have no idea when my body excretes insulin, and I never pay attention to fiber. Having said that, for me, the ONLY reason to ever eat veggies--since I disdain and loathe the taste--is for the nutrients. Veggies on a per calorie/nutrient ratio are the highest of any food group, but taste the worst (again, in my view).

So, if we take away the fiber from the equation, then truly, a carb is a carb regardless. Our body will treat (once again, sans fiber) 20 carbs of pure granulated sugar just as it would 20 carbs of spinach, broccoli, or whatever veggie every espouses to eat. There is no high quality carb, only complex carbs; and, only because it's got fiber. That's it.

To summarize, theoretically if I take in 20 packs of pure sugar, a multi-vitamin (for the sake of argument, I'll neglect to consider body absorption rate), and pop a fiber pill during dinner, the net effect will be absolutely identical if I had eaten the same amount of carbs in spinach as I have with the sugar packets.

Enjoy the 20 carbs as you deem fitting,

Frederick

Sbermudez ! Yes stick with it ! ; = D I'm trying to keep my calories around 1300-1400 right now to continue losing, but I'm enjoying my choices and don't feel too deprived at all. I'm not diabetic either, but I thinkI was becoming insulin resistant as a result of years of hanging around with the bicycling crowd and carb loading. MY carbs are around 30-35 right now.

Thanks to all that replied.
I am sticking to it for now... unsure for how long.
Maybe I'm just feeling a little 'weak' in more ways than one. *sigh*
It's not that I feel I can't do it. I've been doing it for 8 days without a problem.
My cousin just hired a personal trainer that put her on a 1200 a day diet, giving her one day a week of freedom to eat as she chooses. He also set her up on an exercise program. She has lost 32 pounds this past yr on her own just uping her exercise and watching what she eats. I guess seeing her lose weight and getting to have that baked potato at the same time is causing me to re-think my diet decision. I am going to do it either way... it's just a matter of which route I choose.
Thanks again.

Sorry, but this just isn't right. 20g carbs of sugar plus a 5g fiber pill is absolutely not the same as 25g carbs of spinach containing 5g of fiber, even though the net carbs are the same. The reason that fiber moderates insulin release in the spinach is that its carbs (e.g. natural sugars and starches) are actually locked up inside the plant cells, whose walls are made of cellulose fiber. Your digestive system literally has to break open the cells to get at the carbs, which takes some time and thus moderates the insulin release and blood-sugar rise. A fiber pill doesn't make the sugar physically inaccessible in the same way, so it goes straight to your bloodstream anyway, and your body just gets around to digesting the fiber pill later. 20g of sugar *will* negatively impact your weight loss no matter how much fiber you consume it with, because the fiber isn't structurally integrated with the sugar and thus won't moderate its glycemic effects. You'll still absorb all 20g very quickly, while the absorption of the 20g of spinach will be spread out over time while your body breaks down the plant cells.

Remember, the whole point of Atkins is to control your insulin balance, and so we pay attention to glycemic index as well as total carb count. Keeping the total carb count down is a good first step, but you also need to focus on getting those carbs from low-GI foods. There is no way to make 20g of refined sugar low-GI, or to block or reduce its net carbs, not with fiber supplements, "sugar blockers", or anything else. There are even differences among GI ratings for various types of refined sugars -- the reason high-fructose corn syrup is so evil is because its glycemic index is higher even than table sugar! So no, a carb is not just a carb, for weight loss or nutrition.

There is a FAQ about this on the Atkins web site at http://atkins.com/helpatkins/faqs/faqfood/index.html.

As for the calorie issue, no, it's not just about the number of calories -- that's the "metabolic advantage" of low-carb, that we can actually eat more calories and still lose weight. The short version is that you can't store low-carb calories as fat as efficiently as the same high-carb calories, because they don't generate as much insulin. You can't store fat without insulin, so the less of it you have, the less use you'll be able to get out of the calories. A calorie is not just a calorie, any more than a carb is a carb -- calories are a measure of POTENTIAL energy, not of how much energy (e.g. fat) your body will get out of them!

I posted a longer explanation of this process on another thread a week or two ago (http://forum.lowcarber.org/showthre...026#post1235026), if you're interested.

ok.. thank you I'll check out the link!