I am somewhat bigger than you are, and I exercise regularly (45 minutes to an hour five days a week). I think that if I were eating what you are eating I would gain weight -- at a minimum I know that I would not lose weight. Can you cut out some of the cream/sweets/high calorie snacks? I very occasionally eat cream as a treat, but I eat it knowing that it will stall my weight loss. If I snack after dinner, it also totally stalls my weight loss. I make sure to eat enough at dinner that I am not hungry later in the evening.

You might try entering what you are eating into fitday.com to see exactly how many calories and how many grams of carbs are in your daily diet. I noticed that someone said to try to 10x to 12x times your weight in calories. In my opinion, that rule does not apply to people over 200 pounds. I think trying for 10x to 12x your goal weight is more realistic. We don't have to count calories on Atkins, but calories do count.

You also might try posting your question and typical menu in the Triple Digits Club (listed under lowcarb support focus groups) so that people of similar weight to you are more likely to see it.

This is a typical daily menu for me:

Breakfast: cottage cheese with some blueberries or strawberries

Lunch: large salad (spinach or lettuce, red pepper, cucumber, whatever else is around), meat, cheese, egg and/or tunafish on top of the salad, homemade olive oil and red wine vinegar dressing. Sometimes I put half an avocado on the salad if I am particularly hungry.

Snack (occasional -- not every day): Some nuts or a piece of cheese or a piece of meat or a few more berries or a small piece of melon or a sliced up cucumber.

Dinner: Small salad with olive oil and red wine vinegar dressing; meat, fish, or chicken; cooked vegetable with butter on top.

Lots of plain water through-out the day.

On weekends I often have a bigger breakfast -- an omelet or scrambled eggs -- and I am more likely to snack on weekends than on workdays.

I want to add to my original post about eating more than 20 g of carbs a day. If you eat more, you are less likely to lose, because if you read atkin's book it will tell you to do 20 g/ day. Then, after 2 weeks of that you can go on to ongoing weight loss at a slower pace of losing weight by adding 5 g of carbs/week. However, if you still have a lot to lose, he suggests staying at 20 g per day.

You have to go through the 2 week induction to jumpstart your metabolism to burn fat. If you start induction at higher than 20 g per day, you are less likely to be burning fat and may not be in ketosis.

In addition, some people are very resistant. He also covers that in his book.

I am new to the Atkins WOE and I am no expert but I agree with what was posted before. The 14-day of induction is a very strict regimen of very few things to eat. This is to get your body from fat "storing" to fat "burning" mode. Without going through this induction diligently, you cannot get your body into fat "burning" and will stay in fat "storing" and all you have done is changed the foods you are eating.

Also, I have read that many people will not lose weight eating the Atkin's candy bars. As tasty as some of them are, they are not good. I tried them and could not lose weight. Try for a snack some sugar free jello with Cool whip or Redi Whip.

Best of luck.

Cool Whip & Redi Whip are no-no's. If one is in induction, they should try and stay away from the SF jello and especially the Cool Whip/Redi Whip. If you want a Cool Whip type treat, whip up some heavy whipping cream w/Splenda- it tastes much better. Remember, induction is not only to get your body into ketosis (burning mode), it is also to break your need/dependence of sugary, nasty carbage.

My two cents...
Nikki

This jumped off the page at me. If your diet has been chronically lacking in protein, your body will use its own muscle tissue to get the essential amino acids that it needs and when you start getting adequate protein in your diet again, it will use that to rebuild the muscle that has been lost before any weight loss occurs. A stressed body will not easily let go of fat and will give priority to repairing itself over shedding fat stores.

Your calorie count could be a bit too high, but fitday can tell you exactly what that is and you can base your decision on whether you need to cut back a bit or not on that. Too much dairy can and has caused stalls in many. Consider cutting back on the cheese and cream (especially the Velveeta...lots of hidden carbs there!).
Hormone factors could also be playing a part.

Given that you have so much going on right now, it's going to be difficult to pinpoint exactly what the problem is, but my money goes towards your body repairing itself before letting go of the fat and perhaps a caloric intake that is a bit too high.
There's lots of good suggestions above. Give some of them a try and see if things to start moving.

Hey Cindy,

I'm going to have to come in on the side of too much cream and cheese. You are allowed 2 -3 tbs. of cream/day and you say you're eating 3 oz. which is 6 tbs. Also, sounds like alot of cheese since it seems to be included in breakfast, lunch, snacks and dinner. Again, only 3-4 ozs. allowed/day.

You state that you need all of this food because of your weight. If you follow the rules of induction, to the letter , you will find that indeed, you do not. Your cravings will disappear and you will not be hungry. I would suggest that you read the journals of others in your same weight range to see what they ate during induction and afterwards. This will give you some idea of how to plan your menus most effectively.

Also, many foods contain carbs that you might not realize. Fitday will help identify these. Splenda, for example, contains 1 carb per packet and is limited to 3 packets/day. You should be getting most of your carbs from veggies, not cream, splenda and cheese. The amounts of cream and cheese you are presently eating would not leave much room for veggies while staying under 20 carbs/day.

I would also have to go along with Lisa that some serious reparations are taking place. Your metabolism and lean tissue mass have surely suffered from your previous dieting.

I can't comment on the fibroid since I don't feel qualified to offer an opinion on that subject.

HTH,

Jones

Edit: If you intend to do Atkins, you need to read the book and/or reread it so you know the rules of induction. You can not expect good results if you don't follow the program.

Restart Induction, & follow the rules. You might want to cut back on the cheese; Atkins says to limit it to 3-4oz daily & some need to restrict it even further. I limit it to 1-2oz daily. You're also eating a lot of cream; while cream is good on this diet, too much of anything is bad. Atkins limits cream to 3oz while on Induction. No nuts or fruit (berries or melon) are allowed on Induction, so these are not OK for snacking! No sugar free chocolates either! They contain sugar alcohols & these stall many people & are a definite no no. If you want this WOE to work for you, you have to follow the rules & give it a chance. That means no cheating. I know you can go for 2 weeks without chocolate; because I did & I too am addicted to chocolate. 14 days is a small commitment to make. Tell yourself you'll reward yourself with a low carb chocolate treat at the end of Induction if you follow all the rules. Measure all veggies & salad, veggies need to be measured before cooking. Write down everything you eat & drink or use a program like Fitday, so you know exactly how many carbs you're eating each day. I'd recommend you reread the Induction rules & start fresh. I know it's difficult, but losing weight & becoming healthier are worth the extra effort. Good luck.
God Bless,
Amy-Lynne

"Berries with cream are a great snack choice in all phases of Atkins". He also goes on to suggest some peanut butter on celery. This is under the induction rules. What is up with that? I also would love to know how much cream is allowed? 2-3 T's or 2-3 ounces???? Has anyone researched this?


Lynn

Sorry, I meant to start a new thread and I can't delete!?

Lynn,

Sorry to say, but everyone was right, according to the Atkin's web site, only 2 - 3 tablespoons of cream a day are allowed on introduction. Also you are not allowed berries on introduction.

Lynn,

Pg. 230 DANDR:

"Cream (heavy, light or sour, two to three tablespoons)

HTH,

Jones

Edit: Where did you read that berries and peanut butter are allowed on induction?

Thanks for all of the suggestions so far. I have reread the induction section in the book and am also looking for hidden carbs. Right away I found 6 carbs in the Seasilver vitamins I was taking so I stopped that. Yesterday I did not eat any SF chocolate and only had a small ice cream early in the day for a treat. I also cut out all cheese. I eliminated the breakfast veggies. I weighed everything I ate yesterday and prepared for my meals today. I will put it into fitday and let you know the totals.

I am going to try to eliminate both snacks today and sub with tuna that I brought to work.

Keep us posted AND I love tuna!

My mom uses Sea Silver. So, I am familiar with this. Not only are there carbs in this, but also Alcohol. I think you may have found a big reason why you are not losing.

Wow, Alcohol in Seasilver! Thanks for the warning. I read the label for sugar, starch and alcohol and did not see it but the label is very hard to read.

I also just found another 6 carbs in the L-Carnitine that I was taking 3 times aday. I am also taking a yeast fighter from twin labs that has 3 carbs per day( I am self medicating because I was wondering if maybe candida was one of my problems). I read ingredients and if all looks okay, I just assumed that there was not carbs. Boy was I wrong.

I took everyones advice and went to fitday to drop in what I ate for a few days. I found out that when I ate 2 snacks a day plus chicken breasts at lunch in addition to what I normally eat, the calaries were over 3500. What a wake up call. I am now down to about 2500 calories and will tweet my diet to get it down to the 2000 range. I am going to give up all cheese and cream and use just a few tablespoons of mayo for my tuna. Other than that, no dairy for me. I will also switch to eat more lean meats and fish. I think that I need to either keep my lunch salad and eliminate veggies at all other meals or have meat for lunch with small veggies at each meal.

My carb count on fitday was as hogh as 40 not counting the vitamins I was taking. I was able to get the carb count down to 19 on my 2500 calorie menu.

Keep the suggestions coming. All of them have been very helpful. I am hoping for a weight loss next week!