I'm at my weakest point, and stressing out big time(obviosly.. it's almost 6 in the morning and I haven't even slept yet). Here's the thing (and please, don't tell me to just eat more fat and it'll get better). I honestly am sick of meat (I can't even look at another caesar salad either!). Everything makes me lose my appetite. Not only that, but I'm embarrased to say that this WOL is costing me a fortune. I try and buy wise... but for 3 meals a day (all containing some sort of fat &/or protein, eg: meat) it's expensive as hell!

So I've been stressing all night (after having given in and eating rice tonight, and feeling guilty as hell ... but everything else turned my stomach). To make matters worse, I've stalled and haven't lost a pound in over a week.. I've actually gained one!

I want to do this.... I really do. But how can I fit it into my budget and still eat when everything on the induction menu makes me sick. And I've checked into the atkins shakes... they're over $40 here and only makes 11 shakes. Whoa. Other protein shakes are just as expensive (and I have to admit very unsatisfying). I'm about to jump on slimfast or something, that's how lost I feel. Please, some words of advice... something to get me back on course. The money issue is my biggest concern since I have to eat differently than everyone else in my household (who are ironically on a low fat diet) and I'm on a tight budget. How do you guys do it??

Crimson,

I have found that I now spend about the same amount of money that I did when I bought all of the high carb junk.

As far as meats:
Whole chicken or chicken theighs and legs are really cheap. There is a whole bunch of ways to cook chicken. You can even make a coating with pork rinds and you will feel like you are eating fried chicken with breading.

Pork is usually pretty cheap. I make a pork roast about one every week or two.

Bacon, sausage and hotdogs are cheap. Check just the sugar and carb count.

Eggs! Eggs are incredible. You can stretch your meat dishes with them by making a casserole or quiche. You can make a sweet treat by adding cream or artificial sweetner. Check out the readers recipes on the orange bar above. I love the bacon cheeseburger caserole and the mock danish.

Get creative with meat. It is boring if you make it the same way everyday.

I eat cheese but not that much. I stock up when it is on sale since it last so long.

I buy my vegis fresh and whatever is on sale. The forces me to have a variety because rarely the same vegis are on sale two weeks in a row.

PORK RINDS! Oh how i hated them in the beginning but now I couldn't live without them. I even make french toast with them (check out the recipe section above). Pork Rinds are cheap and can be eaten alone or added to so many things.

Another tip is the big wholesale clubs like Sam's or Costco. You can buy things in bulf and freeze and store until needed.

When I do buy a low carb substitute product, I make sure it is something I really want and I read reviews first before I gamble on it. Nut flours and anything that might spoil I keep in the refridgerator to extend its shelf life.

I hope this helps but if you read around, I am sure you will get more money saving tips as well as how to make this WOL more enjoyable!

Okay....

You've been low carbing for 6 weeks and you're still on induction? I'd say it's time to start adding some variety. Add some veggies other than salad, add some berries or a small amount of melon.
If you're sick of meat how about eggs and tofu? Experiment with different ways of preparing meat other than just plain. I've been doing this for almost 2 years and don't find my grocery bill to be too much higher than it was before because I'm not spending a lot of money on convenience and junk foods like frozen pizza, chips and ice cream. Have you checked the price on a box of cereal lately? How about what they want for one of those Lean Cuisine frozen meals? Talk about expensive! Teresa gave you some good suggestions for less expensive protein sources. I always shop the sales and base my menus on what I can get on sale like a 10 pound bag of chicken leg quarters for $3.00.
Since my whole family basically eats the same way I do, at least for breakfast and dinner, I've put a lot of effort into coming up with tasty low carb recipes that everyone enjoys and also finding a variety of them. Over Christmas break, I found 4 new dishes that everyone enjoys.
About the weight loss...you don't have that much to lose so it's likely that it will come off very slowly. Average weight loss on low carb is about 10% of what you need to lose on induction, then 5% every month after that. Some people also find they have better success by increasing their carbs slightly instead of trying to keep them at 20 grams or less indefinitely.
Find a couple of low carb cookbooks or check the recipes forum here and start adding some variety to your meals.

Hi Crimson,

I know exactly how you feel. At first, I ate steak and salad until I gagged, because it was easy and safe. The trick is to start thinking outside the box. Have you checked out "Hot Links"? There are several threads there about LC'ing on a budget.

http://forum.lowcarber.org/showthre...&threadid=28939

Also take a look at the recipe section on the forum for ideas.

This is a major life style change for most of us. There isn't an easy overnight solution. Be patient with yourself.

judy

Hi Crimson,

Yea, it's not cheap eating all this meat. When in England I buy packets of bacon offcuts (misshapes) thay are really cheap. Also some tinned fish like pilchards and stores own pink sqalmon are a good buy. I sometimes eke out ground beef with soya as sold for vegitarians. You can make a nice shepards pie (mashed cauliflower in place of potatoes), curry or spagetti bolognese (without the spagetti!) with it.

Once in a while I have a low carb vegitarian day just to get away from all the meat.

I'd forget the shakes if I were you. There are plenty of other things to drink.

Good luck and keep it up - it's worth it in the end.

Robert

Hi, Crimson! Yes, it is hard to do Atkins when others in your household are not. I am a mom of 2, and now that my DH is doing Atkins with me, it is easier. I know what you mean about the grocery bill. In the beginning, I made two separate meals, one for me, one for them. Well, that was crazy. Now I make something we can all eat. I don't know what your family situation is, but if you are the one doing the cooking, you should call the shots. I have noticed my grocery bill going down, because I used to always buy convenience foods, and pre-made entrees. I still buy some "goodies" for the kids, but I am cutting down on that, also. They need to eat better, too. It seems sometimes that it is cheaper to eat the other way, I mean a box of pasta is so cheap, so is a loaf of bread, but in the long run, this way is better. It's healthier, and you will probably save money on medical bills in the long run. I know myself that I will save money on clothing, when I no longer have to keep buying different sizes!!

I agree about the recipes - there are hundreds of them on the net, just go to google and do a search for low carb recipes. I made "mock mashed potatoes" yesterday with cauliflower, and they were awesome! Even my picky seven year old ate them. I also got three pounds of chicken thighs for three bucks. I baked them, then cut up the meat for chicken salad. I had enough for lunch for a week. It is versatile, every day I added something different, and it tasted different every time.

You can do this!!! Good Luck!!

-Jess

ps

don't worry about not being able to afford the Atkins shakes, you are not missing much, they taste pretty bad!!

Hi Crimson, I agree with Jess -- you may find the most savings in figuring out how to make one meal everyone can share, rather than two sets of meals. That's got to be hard if everyone else is on a low-fat diet, but with some planning I think you could pull it off.

For instance, you might make baked salmon (buy frozen from Costco, much cheaper) and steamed broccoli for dinner. Add a crust of ground nuts mixed with butter to yours, but season theirs with a low fat marinade. Make rice for them, and a cream sauce for you (or just lots of butter on the broccoli if you're too busy to make a sauce just for yourself). That way you'd all be eating basically the same meal, but it works for everyone's diet.

If you're sick of meat, try some tofu, TVP (textured vegetable protein) or edamame (fresh soybeans). They have some carbs but it might be worth it to have a change from all meat, all the time.

yours, Sarah

I think many people get to that point of being sick of what they eat. It happened to me about about 6 months into this WOL. What I figured out was it was because I wasn't eating all the carbs that compelled me to keep on eating more carbs before. I was eating because I had to stay alive instead. I didn't even enjoy cooking at that point. It was something I had to live through and come out the other side.

Look for sales and read the grocery store flyers.

London drugs puts on some screaming deals for canned fish. Before Christmas tuna was .55 per tin. For cheap meat, eggs and vegetables, shop in Chinatown. Less well-to-do areas have less expensive food. Supermarkets - especially Safeway - are the most expensive places to shop. But, Safeway has those giant blocks of cheese that are different weights and a single price.

Soup is another great way to stretch your budget. Find recipes that appeal to you and treat yourself to some interesting food.

Don't stress, strategize! Once you get a game plan going of how you can succeed, you'll feel calmer.

Karen

If you are buying a lot of foods for your family that are low-fat AND buying special foods for yourself to low-carb, then you are definitely in a budget crisis - one that I understand because I did that at first, also. Eventually, I realized that my kids and husband did not need all those sweet treats they were getting. In fact, their consumption of carbs led to further over-consumption of carbs. Low-fat was not working for ANY of us.

I began looking for ways to make the meals appropriate for everybody, or at least enjoyable for all. Chili is one of the items I found that we all like without beans. Cheesecake is tempting even to a low-fat dieter - possibly tempting enough to persuade them to enjoy the occasional dessert on your side of the fence.

Broccoli with cheese sauce on the side, quiche, an occasional rice dish (just limit how much you have and use a brown or basmati type rice for the vitamins and fiber) - there are so many options with foods we can have. Perhaps you might invest in a good low-carb cookbook, or ask your family to suggest some favorite foods that might be adaptable to both styles of eating.

You probably already know this, but boredom with the menu is a stage that EVERYBODY goes through. If you can just get past it, this stage ends and you start getting creative again. I wish you the best of luck. And, maybe you need to think about why you didn't choose slimfast in the first place. (My husband did that diet FAITHFULLY for 9 months and lost a total of 5 lbs. He lost 75 in 6 months on Atkins, plus lowered his blood pressure to normal.)

...Just went to Aldi's and got 2 pounds of butter, 2 dozen eggs, 4 cans of tuna, 1 large bottle of hot sauce, 4 pounds of chicken wing sections, and 1 pound of bacon for $12.20.

Hey not fair! Vancouver is a pretty expensive city to live in! You guys get far better deals on food than we do in general.

Karen

Sorry!

I probably would have paid at least double for all that if I had shopped at one of our main grocery chains here. Butter alone is at least $2.00 more per pound at the main grocery stores than it is at Aldis and I were to buy a bag of chicken wing portions at the main store, it would have cost me $4.00 more.
Even here where food prices are admittedly less, it pays to shop the ads and go to more than 1 store to get the best deals.

Agreed!

I go to a store in Chinatown here - Sunrise Market - that has, well, almost everything! In addition to meat and vegetables, it has dairy products, nut butters, nuts, great pork rinds and even flax seeds!

It seems like I always leave there with many bags and have only spent 20 bucks or less.

Karen

Crimson:

I live in Surrey and there's a store right by me that has awesome prices on meats-great deals (2 for 1 sirloin roasts, steaks, etc) all fresh, top quality. It's called Buy Rite and it's on the corner of 96th ave and Scott Road (120th st.) in Surrey. Really great beef there.
Also, one thing I really like is to make egg foo yong (sp?). It's just 2-3 eggs, 2 tbsp cream whisked together in a bowl. Put oil in frying pan, add finely chopped veggies (measure!) like broccoli, zucchini, bean sprouts, onion, peppers... saute the veggies until tender, pour in the eggs and add 1 tbsp of soy sauce (1 g carb) and maybe some hot sauce. This is awesome and really filling.

One more suggestion, Save On Foods often has 2 lbs blocks of cheese for about $7. Two pounds is a lot of cheese. You can freeze it, but I find it's kind of crumbly when you cut it after it's thawed (but that's great for salads, omelets

Good luck to you!

N.

oops, forgot to mention that the egg foo yong is so filling that I often can't finish it and put it away for breakfast/lunch the following day. Just for the cost of 3 eggs, some cream and some veggies (maybe $1).
N.