A friend of mine just called and is having trouble. She started into it a month before me and has lost thirty pounds in five months. But, that isn't her problem.
Medications and Low Carbing:
She is fifty-one, on HRT, Thyroid medication, BP meds and taking an anit-depressant and a diabetes pill twice a day for Type 2! On Friday she was feeling weak and dizzy at the office and went home early. She called and went to her doctor who immediately put her in the hospital for over night.
Her blood pressure was 90/65, and her blood sugar and potassium levels were drastically low. Her physician took her off all meds and she stabelized over night, but he told her not to be on a low carb diet because she had to take her blood pressure meds, the diebetes pills, etc. When she told him that she'd rather not take the medications and let her body heal itself with diet and exercise he told her it wouldn't work and that the diet she was on was a hoax and not a scientific fact. She is in tears thinking that she'd been making progress, but now her physician has her scared to continue.
Can anyone help here?
Isn't it a good sign that her body wasn't needing the medications anymore?

Hi Katryding,

This is exactly why we tell newbies that they must educate themselves and read any low-carb book they want to follow.

Your friend might have not read the book? One basic advice was to consult her doctor. Had she done that and realized how uneducated her doctor is about low-carb from the beginning, she would have looked around for an open-minded doctor.

Once a sympathetic doctor is found, they'll be able to help her which medications she can stop and which she shouldn't.

I whish her well, and hopefully a lesson learned.

Wa'il

I didn't realized that she was low carbing until I overheard her talking about her new diet that a friend had told her about and some of what she was saying didn't make sense so I approached her and asked where she heard what she was telling another mutual friend. She told me and I asked if she had done any research on any of it and she said no that it was easy and her other friend was telling her what to do. I loaned her my Protein Power book and gave her this web site and said that she should read up on it before jumping in the way she was. At that time her leg muscles were almost constantly cramping and she was having bowel problems that lasted for weeks. She took the book, but later I asked if she'd read it she said no that it was confusing and boring! She gave it back and I didn't push it.
This is a healthy way to eat if you follow the rules!

You're a really good friend to loan her the book.

Why do people hate reading books now days? I keep getting emails on daily bases "What should I eat?"

Wa'il

It took me a few days to part with it as it's almost become my bible (no disrespect given) and then I thought, oh well, I have the other two related books, months of magazines, internet info that I've printed off and pasted into a notebook and my memory which is so good since low carbing that I parted with the book for all the good it did!
Thanks

I am no doctor but from experience I can say that I have nearly fainted and have had leg cramps and the problem was definetly low potassium. When I remember to take my pills I am just fine.
I also have trouble from time to time with constipation so I eat flax seed meal or take something else like a herbal laxative.
Hope your friend finds another doctor. Why do they thiink they are the next best thing to God?

NNN

Okay! I give! What's with cat's everywhere? Is this really a secret cat loving sight, cause I've never seen so many cat photos in one place as here. I have a couple of cats, Simba (a seven yr old long hair gray) and Peaches or Morris or Clark or Garth or whatever he is called when my youngest daughter decides to change his name on a daily basis. If this is a cat club then I'll scan in their photos sometime. lol

Hi,

Sorry to hear your friend is so sick. Before I read the whole message I was thinking "low potassium" based on her symptoms. I concur with the other posts - your friend needs to read a LC book cover to cover. Also Half Salt or No Salt should be added to the diet immediately, but I'm sure the Dr has taken care of that. Low potassium can, I believe, lead to an electrolyte imbalance, which can be life threatening. Doreen where are you? Help on the potassium/electrolyte balance relationship please. Am I way off base?

Hopefully your friend can ditch her Dr & find one who is supportive of her efforts to get off Rx meds. There are good docs out there & she will need less & less meds as she loses weight the LC way.

My own anecdotal evidence re potassium deficiencies:

Initially the Atkin's program gave me more energy but I began to get tired, headaches, then deep fatigue. Finally figured out I might need more potassium. thanks to this site & Dr Atkin's book After buying & using Half Salt my energy and health improved. Then, dummy me went out of town on vacation for 8 days, didn't think about taking potassium with me & started using Mrs Dash instead of HalfSalt in omelets, tuna etc.

About the time I came home fatigue & headaches set in. I continued to use Mrs D (tasted so good) instead of the HalfSalt in my salt shaker. Last Wed I began to use NoSalt & now I'm feeling much better, headaches gone, more energy. Lesson I learned: Don't underestimate my body's need for potassium; 7 days was too long to be without potassium chloride. I've got both HalfSalt (table salt/potassium chloride combo) and NoSalt (pure potassium chloride), depending on what my needs are. Just use it like table salt.

Regards, Ruth

I agree that she needs to read a book or several until she finds one that she can live with b/c as we all know this is not a diet but a WOL. I have a sister in law that is very overweight and when she saw me reading the adkins book, she said " why are YOU reading that?' I said " for health reasons" she said "you are going to kill yourself' and I said "I'm not going to lose weight!" she insisted that it was not healthy and I would destroy every organ in my body blahblahblah! I got so sick of it that I looked her square in the eye and said " That is just something fat people say instead of blaming there no fat diet!" I must admit, I hurt her feelings and I am not proud of my self for calling her fat to her face, but she deserved it.

Sometimes you just have to work around your doctor. I knew that at least one of the docs at the group practice I go to was totally against lc. Anyway, I went for a check up on Monday and saw the doc I prefer.

He commented right away about me losing weight and asked me to describe the "diet" I was following. I just told him no sugar, no caffeine, lots and lots of fresh fruits and veggies (cukes and avocados ARE fruits), nuts, seeds and berries and lean meat, chicken & fish. I left out the part about no refined flours and eating cheese, butter and olive oil. I also gave him a complete list of supplements I take on a daily basis. He was totally happy with my description and complimented me on my new "lifestyle." Now, if I had gone in and given him the buzz words "Atkins" or "low carb" he'd have been on my case like a duck on a junebug.

Tell them the truth in words they want to hear, but forget to mention the words Atkins and low carb. What they don't know won't hurt them and as long as they have a good idea of what it is you DO eat, it won't hurt you either.

shortstuff

It upsets me when people don't read the book. She should read it. Katryding I know what you mean, I carry the DANDR book in my book bag almost everywhere. You never know when someone will start asking you questions.

She needs to get on this site if she won't read any books on this subject. Knowledge is power.

Short stuff is right. Your friend should use words that docs can understand clearly.I think that it was a good sign that your friend's problem was actually caused my her meds thanks to her lc woe.

If she refuses to read the book, would she be willing to read a few pages from web sites? I don't know how complete the protien power web site is, but the Atkins one has most of what's in the book. You might direct her to a few important articles such as one relating to BP meds, the how to do induction, and rules of induction. Hopefully that would be enough information to get her started the right way, then if she has good progress she would be interested in reading more.

I read the original post again and your friend's situation bugs me. The doctor is blinded by his own nose. Why is he insisting on giving meds? I would think that he would want to wait and see how her body does after being off the meds for a while.

Also, what if your friend walked into her doctor's office for the first time. Say that she had been on Atkins for 2 months before this appt. and the doc discovered normal results from her bloodwork. Would he tell her " I want you to get off of that diet and eat processed flour, candy and other crap so that I can put you on meds?"

I hope your friend forces herself to read.

I read the original post again and your friend's situation bugs me. The doctor is blinded by his own nose. Why is he insisting on giving meds? I would think that he would want to wait and see how her body does after being off the meds for a while.

Also, what if your friend walked into her doctor's office for the first time. Say that she had been on Atkins for 2 months before this appt. and the doc discovered normal results from her bloodwork. Would he tell her " I want you to get off of that diet and eat processed flour, candy and other crap so that I can put you on meds?"

I hope your friend forces herself to read.