Hi Kathie -

No caffeine because it may cause the same insulin spike as sugar does.

The whole point of low carb dieting is to retrain your pancreas to release insulin at the appropriate times.

One of the problems with high carb dieting is the *low* you feel about an hour after eating a carb-ladden meal. That is your insulin overreacting to the blood sugars in your system. It is chomping them up so fast and sending them to *storage* in the form of fat, that your pancreas doesn't know when to knock it off. Your insulin stores too much blood sugar and you have no *fuel* left. (You also experience this during the first few days of low carbing, because your body wants to continue to store blood sugar as fat and removes too much of it from your blood stream)

Low carbing teaches your body to use stored fat as fuel instead of carbohydrates.

Spikes in insulin release causes your body to overreact and store blood sugars, staying away from caffeine reduces this likelihood while you adjust to low carbing. You can re-introduce coffee afer 2 weeks and see how you feel - then gauge your own reaction.

Lots of folks complain that they get *bored* on this WOE - my response? It's GOOD to get a little bored with food while you are trying to lose weight. Get focused and past the boredom.

I eat exactly the same thing every breakfast and lunch (omlette for breakfast - tuna + mayo + a salad every day for lunch) dinner is meat, veggie and salad EVERY DAY! I've been doing this for 20 months now, and the only difference I have made is that I have decreased my meat portion and increased my veggie portions. That and a couple of slices of whole wheat bread every week (homemade) and fruit about 3 times a week.