Blood sugar diet thread 9

[thenewaveragebear1983]

Shiny new thread for the blood sugar dieters!

Oblov - I am sure you know this but I suspect a lot of what you have put on will be Glycogen. When you go into ketosis it means that your glycogen stores in your liver have been used up and your body is now utilising its fat stores for energy. Glycogen can weigh between 5 and 7lbs depending on the person. That's why on any of these type of low carb diets people tend to lose masses in the first week which is indeed a good motivator but a lot of it is not actually fat.

When you eat carbohydrates again your glycogen stores refill and it looks like you have put on weight - you haven't put on any fat, only filled up your glycogen stores.

Don't fret, you might have put on a couple of pounds of fat but it probably won't be 11lbs and you can probably get a lot of it off in a couple of weeks .

I think we’ve all had one of those moments oblomov - mine came when I realised that I’d gained more in December than my sister in law gained during her entire pregnancy
The exercising is somewhat of a revelation to me; I was never sporty at school, smoked for 17 years (bar pregnancy and immediate aftermath x 3), I don’t do team sports, I can swim only to prevent myself or one of the kids from drowning- but I bloody love running I have discovered. It’s my 30 minutes of peace and headspace, tunes on, no distractions. Considering the first time I used the treadmill I was almost sick, I’m now running 5k without stopping. I can’t quite believe it myself!

Oblomov have a fabulous birthday, carbonara sounds delicious. Don’t beat yourself up and please don’t let it spoil your day.

Oblomov I have gained so much recently, overall more than half of what I lost and cant get back on it, it's really common. Only 10% of dieters keep the weight off, if you are lower than when you started BSD hold on to that, don't feel bad and enjoy your birthday. I still would/will do BSD again I think my mind and body are just rebelling right now!

Closing the kitchen on 958 cals, 58g carbs (15g fibre). 15k steps including a 5k run. I’m feeling stuffed after my dinner, I am actually in love with jamie Oliver’s roasted celeriac (almost considered eating dh’s and doing him something else!).

However, despite my good day I am feeling grouchy, cranky, mean and crabby. I can’t wait for the children to go to bed, and I’d kill for a glass of wine. I will remain strong, but it will test me today.

Happy Burns Day!
I'm writing today off as Burns' suppers aren't particularly BSD friendly (although I did replace some of the oats with toasted almonds instead).

Bear. I think just so disheartening. It also makes me worry about maintaining once the weight is off. I’m not sure I can spend most days of my life eating 800-900 calories to maintain my weight.

Oblovom your here now and you can do the best you can now.

Last night I had Halo ice cream. Do you have it in the UK? It’s very low calorie ice cream. 280 calories for a pint! After managing to go to the movies and nit buy a choc too I’ve been obsessing about ice cream. So I the Halo was a good way out of the loop of obsessive thinking.

My friend was talking about that halo ice cream today - it’s on offer in tesco for £2.50. I don’t know if it’s technically BSD compatible though, is it low fat or low sugar? It’s still got to be better than Ben and jerry though, if it’s a Must have ice cream situation! I was contemplating sugar free jelly made with Greek yogurt (an old slimming world favourite I used to love) for emergencies the other day!

To be honest, it’s not the sugar I’m missing, which is surprising as I’m such an addict normally. I haven’t been bothered about biscuits and chocolate, but that’s probably because the dc aren’t having them either so it’s not under my nose all the time. What I’m missing is big meals, and evening snacks. I lay awake last night tossing and turning and ended up having some milk and cheese in the night, I just felt so ‘empty’ and like my metabolism was pumping which was keeping me alert. And I miss breakfast; my shakes are nice, but I do miss having a proper brekkie, although I try to avoid as then I just eat all day!

I understand completely ICJump about your concerns for maintenance, and post plan maintenance is one thing lacking on this diet. A lot of really successful BSDers have really struggled with maintenance. It is quite surprising how little we can lose on 800 calories a day, after the initial losses. My Fitbit app says I’m burning 3000 calories a day I’m clearly not but according to my tdee plus exercise, I reckon I’m burning 2000, so I’m only consuming 50% even on bad days. My meagre 6lb loss seems ridiculously low, especially as we were saying upthread that people are often horrified about the low calories. It just shows that the gov guidelines for 2000 calories for women must be way out.

I don’t know what the answer is re: maintenance but I do know from my own experience, for me it will have to be low carb forever if I want to remain at ‘target’ once I get there. I will too easily go back to my old ways.

Halo is low fat and low sugar. It’s also high protein. So it’s not dreadful and it’s better than regular ice cream. It’s really expensive here so it can only be an occasional treat.

Yes my Fitbit is suggesting I’m burning 2500 odd calories a day. Surely if I’m eating way under that it should melt off me.

I’ve been eating a salad bowl f mixed lettuce to give the bulky big meal feeling. That or the konjac noodles althought they are $4 a packet here so can’t really have them daily

Hi everyone.

I have heard great things about this diet and reading this thread has got me even more interested.

I was 11 stone for ages and was struggling to get passed 10st11lbs. Next thing I know, 2 stone has gone on that in 2 months and I hit 13 stone. It would seem the reason for this was an anti anxiety drug that I was put on temporarily. Side effect - rapid weight gain .

Anyway, a year later and I still can't get any of the weight off. I keep thinking that I'm being good and not eating more than 1500cals a day but I must be kidding myself. I am also fairly inactive so I need to start taking some accountability and make a real effort with a diet. I feel as of though my metabolism is non existent although obviously it must be working slightly otherwise I imagine I'd be still putting weight on.

I have a holiday to look forward to in easter and my partner and I may well book a quick wedding later on this year so a couple of things to aim for.

Eeek...wish me luck!

Yes we have similar ‘zero noodles’ here, but I’ve never tried them. I occasionally have spiralised veg noodles, but they don’t really fulfil my noodle cravings either. The best ones I have tried were called Umi (I think?) noodles, and they were made with fish protein. They had a proper noodle texture, but the concept was quite horrible and it put me off!!

Anyway, it’s Friday again. I stepped on the scales and finally saw a little bit of movement, so I’m now
11 (yes, 11!) 12.6 - hurrah! My aim this weekend is preservation of that little but huge result, as I have been dancing around that 12 stone boundary for months! We have ribeye steaks tonight, but they are very calorie heavy, so I have worked backwards when planning my menu today- dinner first, steak and griddled veg and cheese, which left a small amount of calories for my milk and my shake. No lunch- but I must Keep my eyes on the prize of a delicious, filling dinner.

The boy is at his grandparents today (yay!) so I have a nice day planned to keep me busy.

And welcome winky! If you have any questions, please ask!

bear congrats on reaching the 11's!You absolutely deserve it after all your hard work and exercising
Welcome winky I was over 13 stone when I started BSD and lost about 1 stone in the first 8 weeks (and I was a bit half-hearted about it) so you'll definitely see results by Easter. In all these threads, I don't think we've ever had a wedding so you'd be our first BSD wedding

Ooooh that’s right place. How exciting!!!

Oooh bear well done!!! I can't wait to get back into the 11's! I managed to get from 14.4 to 11.9 last year and then annoying found myself back up to about 12.12.5/12.13 after Christmas. However, just a couple of days at this and now I am in ketosis, I was 12.5.7 this morning - WHOOP!

Re exercising and fit bits....I am always really dubious about the calories burnt that fit bits give and they always seem so much higher than my garmin.

I have worked out that my TDEE is about 1750 cals - 5'7" and I set it to sedentary as most days I work from home and sit at a desk all day. I generally do a 3-4 mile dog walk that gives me another 300-360 calories on top and is about 8,000 steps - by now I am about 2,050 - 2,100 calories burnt in a day.

I then do other exercise like a Hiit type class on a Monday and Tuesday which is about 350-400 cals and then do something exercisy for another 3 days a week generally burning about 400 cals a session.

So with the dog walks and exercise I guess I average 3,500-4,500 cals a week burnt on top of my TDEE which gives me an average of 2,250 per day. (some weeks if I can find the time to dog walk 4 miles and do 1 hours cardio, I might get nearer to 6,000 cals burnt on top of my TDEE but it is rare) The days I do the HiiT class plus a dog walk I can get about 16,000 steps and regularly do 10,000 with the dog walk and general steps.

My weight loss over time has shown that I am not burning more than this because if 1lb = 3,500 calories then I have historically lost about 1.5 lb a week with that much exercise and a 300 drop in daily calories from my TDEE.

My point is that burning 3,000 true calories a day would mean a 2.5 lb weight loss a week for me even whilst being able to eat 1,750 cals!!!! I would have to do shed loads of walking and exercise to do an additional 1,250 cals on top of my TDEE.

Loubilou I agree- my Fitbit certainly doesn’t differentiate between the almighty strenuous steps on a 5k run and the little back and forth steps I clock up while toddler herding all day. It counts calories equally, so I largely ignore it. I do like the ‘active minutes’ feature though, and it’s probably the most useful in terms of tdee because it allows me to see how many of my steps have actually been ‘useful’ in terms of calorie burning.

I think what I learned very quickly on the plan was that calories in vs calories out is not everything- and certainly for me I can have more calories provided they are fat or protein, but carbs will be detrimental. It’s almost like a scientific experiment really- balancing having enough energy to actually do what i need to do, with keeping carbs low, and getting calories low enough to lose weight while eating very high calorie foods. And also tailoring that to me specifically, because what works for one doesn’t work for everyone.

I’m sure that’s why there’s no maintenance plan- I think pretty much everyone will lose something on 800 calories for 8 weeks, but maintenance is do much more difficult as our tdee/exercise/lifestyles affect weight loss so much.

The other thing to bear in mind is that 800 calories is specifically to burn away visceral fat quickly from around the organs so that insulin function is improved in T2 diabetics. In your case loubilou, you may find that as you were doing so much exercise to begin with you simply don’t have that much visceral fat. It’s also why subsequent rounds aren’t always as successful as the first time.

(Although it does annoy me when I see my friend doing slimming world, eating her body weight in pasta, bananas, baked potatoes and losing 3lb a week- grrrrrr)

Hi. I’m starting the diet tomorrow. I did it before for a couple of weeks then it all went to pot.
Do you all follow the recipes in the book or do your own?
I’m thinking of a bean based soup for lunches or chickpea salad and chicken or fish with veg and a couple of spoons of brown rice for dinner. Does that sound ok?
Can anyone give me any ideas of what to have in a day please?

Hi all; checking in. I did 6 weeks on the BSD for Lent last year, and felt amazing... But as soon as Lent finished was out of control with my eating and have put it all back on and more. Starting Monday am back on for 'Lent+' ie 8 weeks, and then aim to have a plan once Lent has finished... Currently I'm thinking of something similar to the 5:2 diet. Am aware of how hard I found the first few days and dreading the repeat!

Hi live life and Mona! Welcome!

Mona- mosely recommends a 5:2 method in the book so it might be worth reading. Rather than the old 5:2 way of ‘eat what you like on 5 days’ he recommends a sort of ‘no count’ BSD, so sticking to the BSD foods/Mediterranean style but just not calorie counting, and doing 800 cals on 2 days. Would that work for you?

And livelife, i tend to design my own menu plan now, because I find the book plan has too many foods I am not keen on, plus I was cooking 2 meals each day as the dc weren’t keen either. My usual day consists of:
Milk in coffee; a shake which I make using almond milk, frozen raspberries, peanut butter and maca powder; if I have lunch it will be soup, salad or just ham/cheese/olives as a sort of snacky meal at about 4 pm; dinner is usually meat + veg in some form. I try to avoid all rice, pasta, potatoes, grains (so bread/cereal are out) and obviously, sugar. I can usually accommodate the rest of the family by adding pasta, rice pouches or chips! You can count carbs (aiming for about 50g or less) but you don’t need to if you avoid the worst carb offenders!

Planning is definitely the key- I use Pinterest a lot for recipe ideas, mixed in with a few favourites.

Hi all, happy Burns day Table, and happy 11s bear! Good going lou! Everyone's doing so well. Hi fellow newbies.

Have stayed strong and not gotten on scales since Wednesday, to keep from getting thrown by the number bobbling up and down daily.

Tonight was steak night (beef medallion and an unbelievable amount of steamed broccoli). Yum. Very, very satisfying. If I can't have wine, damnit, I'll have steak.

I haven't followed the meal plans in the book - just picked out the recipes that worked for me, found some more on line, and figured out what I already eat that works.

Of the book recipes, I like 2:

The roasted veg (asparagus and red pepper) and roasted chicken breast on salad leaves has become a staple lunch: easy and fast to make at night and pack for work lunches during the week.

The Spanish chickpea and spinach soup is great and really filling.

The rest I've tried have been, eh, meh.

I have mostly been cooking from the book because I'd rather do that than count calories, and I've really enjoyed all the food. For lunches I usually do one of the lettuce cups with filling, or a version of the no-carb ploughmans. For breakfast I have full-fat yoghurt with half a dozen frozen raspberries and a sprinkling of toasted almonds or hazelnuts. In the evening, I've cooked a variety of the meals and enjoyed them all.

Ooh thank you for the lovely welcome. Starting on Sunday once we have done the shopping for the week although will make an effort not to go mad tomorrow.

Winky that’s very disciplined, if it was me I’d be eating every carb in sight tomorrow that’s why I need this diet!

We had steak too- and a glass of red wine (ooops) but it was delicious and worth every single calorie/carb!

I am going to have to avoid wine as much as possible because I can't stop at one glass so will add too many calories!

Finished day 4 at just over 1,000 calories and have averaged 1000 over the last 4 days. I am going to need to make some adjustments to get to 800 but I am going to tackle that a bit more next week as tomorrow we are out for dinner at friends (eek!!!! have no idea what they are cooking and won't have a clue on calories.....). I have another challenge next week in that I am travelling for business so it is hotel food and again I have no control of calories despite making sensible choices. I stayed in this hotel the other week and ordered omelette every morning as it was the only lowish carb option but sadly the pans they use were a bit crap and therefore chef drowned the pan with oil!! gah...Also my evening meals were tuna steak and grilled vegetables but again the veg was absolutely drowned in olive oil and the tuna steak was the size of my head!! Plus all the coffees you get are with milk that you don't know what fat content it is etc etc. Much harder but still it is only a couple of days. I have actually order a few low cal/low carb shakes and bars from a well known VLCD - I won't be resorting to a VLCD diet but they are there as a back up for my travels which will help!

Great stuff everyone and nice to see this thread active - keeps me motivated :)

Just reading this has made me realise one of the reasons I’m struggling is I’m not planning a dinner. So often get to dinner and have hardly any calories left. I think I’ll get back into planning out dinner menus and that might help. I’m also looking forward to cooler weather to have soup for lunch.

Lou the VLC shakes and bars can be really handy. In the book there is a case study of someone doing the diet with just shakes. I’ve tried it but I missed chewing too much to do it long term.

I found the fit bit discussion really interesting. I’ve been shocked at how many calories it thinks I’ve burnt given I’m mainly sitting on my bum. However I’m finding the reminder to move and all the graphs very fun.

ICJump I always forget you’re in Oz- obviously it must be summer for you right now? It has definitely helped me this time round to streamline my menu a bit, and have the same breakfast/brunch every day. It means I can then plan my remaining calories quite quickly, I usually allow about 400 calories for dinner.

You wouldn’t have to do this with a shake of course, you could do a measured salad that you replicate each day. I did it with soup as well, made a batch and stored 4 portions in the freezer to take for an easy lunch. Granted, it gets a bit boring!