If you are determined that you need a pill to help you I would go for L-Glutamine and L-Carnitine. Both Atkins recomended. I was taking both and stopped the glutamine and last night had cravings like I have never before so I will go get more and start back.

Good luck and (( ))

I got the pills and I have noticed a difference in how full my stomach is. Maybe it's a placebo effect. But I still have mouth hunger.

Nice post Salamanda,

I would agree with everything you said.
As you and I know, most newbies that
come into the rooms of OA find for the
first time that they are finally in front
of a group of people who understand
what they have been going through
for a lifetime.

I hope LCNewbie44 will have a similar
pleasant observation after going to
a few meetings.

No flames please! I have heard it all and I am just posting what is working for me. Everyone has the right to make their own decisions and do their own research.
I have been following Atkins and lowcarb since 1998 (obviously not steadily) and I never had the appetite suppression many seem to have. I always had a hard time cutting my portions. I have been using ephedra for years now, it is a very effective appetite suppressant and I am sure I would not have had the success I have had without it. I lost 70 pounds the last time I did Atkins, and I wasn't even taking the full dosage. The recommended dosage for an ECA stack (ephedra, caffeine, aspirin) is 20mg ephedra, 200 mg caffeine, 80 mg aspirin (3x day). Personally I am now taking this twice a day and it not only kills my appetite, but give me an extra bit of energy, just enough to keep from sitting around all day. Please check out this website, I have found it to be very very informative about weightloss supplements: http://www.drumlib.com
I live in Canada, so I can buy it in Wal-Mart. But I am not sure about how it is being regulated in the States.
Oh, and when I have gone off of it, my weight did not skyrocket. Again, this is just my experience, no preachers please, I can get that at church.

Just to say hello... I am excited to read up on this post!

Oh, and one VERY important thing that I should mention about the ECA stack. It will not do a thing if you do not follow your diet properly. It will not burn weight off for you and it is not going to make a big change in your eating patterns. When I take it, it kills my appetite enough that I can eat reasonable amounts, only when I am hungry. It does have a thermogenic effect, I think that my metabolism is very slow and it helps to get it to a more normal level. At least I feel normal! I also take green tea capsules and coconut oil to help with that.
I would suggest to anyone that is interested in taking it to read about it as much as you can, be informed about what you are doing.
I am losing weight because I am very strict with my diet and I have made lifestyle changes. The ECA is just a tool that aids me.

I too started out this time taking a supplement - Metabolife.
I had such high hopes that it would get my hunger under control but I believe all it did was slow me down. I used them for 3 months and finally decided they were too expansive to keep using and quit. Within a week my weight loss started again, and quite nicely I should add.
There are so many out there that just aren't good for you, period. The only way to know is to either experience them or take the advice of people who have been there and done it.

I will admit now I use an herbal supplement called Chi energy and it does not contain caffeine. I feel so much better and have that little boost of energy that seems to keep me busy enough to not eat. These things are all hit and miss, and if I had to do it again I would have saved my money.

so your weight loss actually seemed to stop when you were on the diet pills?!?!? I need to hear things like that so I will stop!

edit nvm.


-

What was it you wanted to say LCNewbie? This is an interesting thread and I like reading and hearing about everyone's experiences with these sorts of things. Just because I don't take appetite suppressants, doesn't mean I'm not interested in hearing what works for people and so on. I don't have a negative or nasty opinion of them...I just don't bother, because I was lucky enough to experience the appetite suppression of lc eating. I realize that not everyone will experience it to the same degree I did, and that getting a handle on one's appetite isn't always so easy.

Come back...let us know how you're doing. This is a support board, and it's good to talk about these things and share experiences with one another.

Hope you've had a good week thus far.

I must confess, I used ephedra years ago when it was legal in the states. As long as you drink alot of water with it and eat LC, you are fine and you will lose. I lost alot more while taking ephedra (then got pregnant ) but cannot find it in the states anymore. Like the above post said, I can go to church to hear my preacher...so, does anyone know where you can get ephedra in the states now?

Citruskiss it was just a lot of stuff about my emotional eating. I thought you would all think I was just an idiot looking for sympathy so I edited it out.

This IS an interesting thread and I don't flame anyone for wanting to try other options. I just found something that worked for me (OA)

Ned- thanks for your compliment, and I enjoyed your previous post also

LCNewbie- It's totally okay to post that stuff about your emotional eating. Please do. I'm sure you'll have many responses from folks who understand and identify

Nope, I'd never think you were an idiot because I struggle with those same issues. In fact, I just did the same thing the other day (with a post)...I was writing a response to a question in the war zone about "Who do you blame for being fat?", and ended up typing out all this emotional stuff. Went back to edit out the overly personal stuff and somehow ended up wrecking my whole post (because of a weird firefox thing that somehow kept producing a "find" function every time I pressed the apostrophe key)....so I just deleted it all.

This being said, I think what I was saying was an interesting answer to the guy's question. He was asking for people to step up and "blame" someone or something for their obesity and/or weight problem. I responded with something along the lines of not wanting to get into the blame game, but went on to write a bunch of stuff about how I was starting to believe that the real reason I gained weight was because of not listening to my own anger, and using food as a way to shut myself up almost..a way of shutting down.

Anyway, there I go again with the emotional stuff.

But you see what I mean don't you? That lots and lots of us here deal with that very same thing - emotional reasons for overeating. Interestingly, once we've gotten a few weeks of successful low-carb eating under our belts, we end up realizing that part of the problem is the fact that refined carbohydrates and sugar are a big part of the overeating picture, because they are so darned addictive for so many of us.

As with any addictive thing (food, shopping, drugs, alcohol, or what have you), there's still a *reason* we went there - something nagging at us to the point that we got caught up in some kind of addictive/compensating behaviour. All the fat prejudice in our society aside, food is one of the most acceptable addictions one can have, and in my view - it often starts as a coping mechanism we learn as children. As children, we don't have access to other addictive things..and maybe we resort to food, as it's something available to us despite our age. I mean, food is always there. No one freaks out if you eat. If I'd taken up...say drinking at the age of 11, I'm sure Mom would have noticed. But not with food. And, as children, we don't have the autonomy or the maturity to choose other means of dealing with our emotional stress. It's not like we understand enough to suddenly realize, "I should talk to someone about this" or "I should start exercising to burn off some of this stress".

Anyway, I'm rambling...thanks for coming back and explaining the "nevermind" post, I was worried that maybe some of us had offended you with our response to your question about supplements. By the way, there's actually a section on these forums for writing about emotional issues and body image. It's a good place to vent and ask for support around these issues. Not saying you shouldn't write about it here, just mentioning the section in case you ever wanted to take advantage of it.

Don't you think it's interesting that you started out talking about one thing (supplements and diet pills) only to come 'around' to the reason you're asking about them in the first place? Good for you...asking questions leads us to places we might have tried to avoid in the past. You're not avoiding anymore, and you're actually moving forward with this.

Getting back to the food issue - I want to reiterate what I said in an earlier post, and that is ....if you can just get through a week or so without eating more 20 carbs daily, with the bulk of those carbs coming from green vegetables ...you will be so surprised to discover the amazing appetite suppression of low-carb eating. Yes, there are still struggles, and yes special occasions come up to tempt us all the time. Yes we crave sweets from time to time ...and sometimes it isn't always so easy...but believe me - if you can just get through a week of no sugar/refined carbohydrates you will have found an extremely effective tool in dealing with overeating.

Have a good weekend.