Week 1 - New Year 2014 Low Carb Bootcamp - And We're Off!

[BIWI]

Morning all!

I see several of you have already weighed in on the Spreadsheet of Fabulousness

As of today, though, we also have our bright, shiny, new Bootcamp section on Mumsnet, including our own Weight Tracker, which will only show your own weight/progress.

You can either use the Spreadsheet as we have done before, which everyone has access to and can see, or you can go here and enter your weight.

Obviously you can do both!

When you're in the new Bootcamp, if you click on the tab that says 'more info' that will take you to a section which has loads of information about low carbing, as well as Bootcamp Rules

Before we get going formally, I have to make an important disclaimer:

I am not a doctor, a medic, a scientist, a nutritionist or a dietician. I have no formal training in food, dieting or low carbing. The information that I provide here is based solely on my reading on the subject, as well as my own experience. If you have any kind of medical condition and/or you are taking any kind of ongoing medication, you should consult your GP before starting a low carb diet

That done, good luck everyone!

Guess what I'm doing...

So far so good here. Just had a fry up for lunch- DP looked at it like . He has just helpfully commented 'losing weights just calories in versus calories out, thats the answer' and buggered off.

Can I eat him?

You can laugh at him in a week's time when you've lost some weight

laura kerrygold is lovely. i find it's very spreadable from the butter dish, it's even quite soft straight out of the fridge but probably not spreadable

Only if he's really fatty, stairs...

Yesterday B: Lidl yoghurt and linseeds
L: roast chicken and mayo and salad ( leaves, 2 cherry tomatoes and half an avacado, and a chunk of Cheddar D: home made bacon cheeseburgers ( ground steak and a little onion grated into them) without the bun of course, veggies and mushrooms and swede chips.

B: More yoghurt and linseeds
L: smoked salmon and scrambled eggs ( with a tablespoon of extra thick cream -3.6g/100)and leaves and half an avacado.
I haven't drunk as much water today so off to remedy that......

Thanks very much for your advice on the weigh in BIWI (and congratulations on the new job!). It really resonated with me - I'm running a bit now and my scales (when I was doing well on LC) weren't showing much movement - even though my clothes were fitting far better. So I'm going to go with fitting into clothing, which means I'm no use on the Spreadsheet (for now at least) but will know I really am making headway. That's cheered me up no end as obviously my scales are broken

Hero, are you sure you're not me from 10 years ago? I ballooned once I got married - not from 'letting myself go' as much as I was/am just so bloody happy with DH. And we both love food - so it was sharing little gourmet treats here and there, romantic meals together and ooh hello size 16 knickers before you could say 'happy anniversary'. It's amazing what you've lost so far this year and you've really inspired me to stick to the straight and narrow.

Speaking of which

Lunch was a breast of chicken, smothered in garlic, butter and oil, roasted, on a bed of romaine lettuce and avocado. Followed by a bowl of homemade sorry, artisanal minestrone soup.

He is very fit and slim and therefore has no bloody idea!

I had fried bacon & cabbage yesterday, that was nice.

Stars - you can send him to the naughty step with my DH who keeps offering me bread. I suspect there are too many carbs in him to eat

That was yum, even if I did rather overdo the browny burnt bits.

Stairs yes you can absolutely eat him! He's absolutely wrong, by the way.

I'm having a bit of a wobble at the moment. I think I've lost most of my water weight, having started about a week and a half ago now. Interestingly I'm down to the same weight that I got down to with 5:2, at which point 5:2 stopped working for me.

In fact, that's the main point of my wobble - what if I stop loosing weight here? I suspect I'm pre-menstrual also - spots and carb cravings. The scale never moves for the two weeks before my period anyway.

today:
B: 2 oopsie rolls and butter and a lump of yarlsberg for breakfast - stomach too off to have eggs which is weird. Before starting this I would have two eggs and a slice of bread.

L celeriac cottage pie, green pepper, olives, marinated artichokes, mayo. Oopsie roll and butter.

A snack of total yoghurt and some lemon chicken breast and salad for dinner.

Another one here who ballooned after getting married! Other circumstances didn't help, but damn that happiness!

Laura - Do you do anything with the egg whites? accidentally just typed egg shites I'm a yolk lover too, but can't quite bring myself to chuck the whites, so I keep eating them, too.

Also, I find Kerrygold is actually surprisingly spreadable. Not that I'll be spreading it on anything for another 10 weeks now myself.... :)

Oooh... food pics!

Someone at work today, who was admiring my lunch (corned beef, mixed salad of iceberg lettuce and baby spinach, lots of oily dressing), and saying how healthy it looked, agreed that low carbing was probably the healthiest way to eat. General nice, pleasant chit chat, then she asked about chocolate. Her face was when I told her that chocolate was a carb!

Not the WOE for her, I don't think!

BIWI- I've got a lovely friend with type2 diabetes and lots of weight to lose, who's the same. He agrees it all makes sense and looks lovely, but always just says that he personally would "never be able to live without candy and bread." Given how many times he'd ended up in hospital with shockingly bad blood sugar issues, I'm afraid that he won't be living with them long, either. :(

I think my weight loss stalled when I gave myself a permission to treat myself with dark chocolate a bit too often... It's a relief it's not completely off the table - no need to debate with self in the shop. :)

grr... meant that it's a relief that it IS completely off the table now.

HeliumHeart - if it's any consolation, my periods are much much better now that I eat low carb all the time (ahem - except over Christmas!!).

LittleMiss - it's nice to have you here

Lovecat - I have been LC'ing for a year now, but I was awful over Christmas, if it had a carb in it I ate it and if it wasn't a carb I didn't. Honestly, I think the only 'good stuff' I had was Christmas dinner . I quite rightly suffered last week going back to LCing, but I was in Ketosis by lunchtime (if not earlier - hadn't checked) of the second day (I use Ketostix from time to time - BIWI doesn't, she says we don't need to be in Ketosis for this to work). So yes, you could quite well be - it will help the taste in your mouth if you drink a lot of water. Weirdly, I never get the taste?

BIWI - Nice to have that initial boost isn't it. It's glycogen & water when I'm putting it ON and 'weight loss' when I'm losing it

I am a 'daily weigher' too and it helps me a lot. I write it down each day, along with a note about what I've eaten and how much water I managed that day - it helps me spot trends :) However, as much as I love it when they go down it doesn't 'ruin my day' if they STS (stay the same) or even go up, because I know it's just a fluctuation. I have found it good in the past when I have gone down, sts, gone down, sts, gone up, sts then gone up on weighing day - so overall maybe either STS or went up from one weigh in week to the next, to know that things were actually going up and down all week and that my efforts weren't 'wasted' (hope that makes sense to others!!) but I wouldn't do it if it would bother me to see it sts or go up. Each to their own eh! I need to pull out some of my summer clothes and see how they fit - to use as my 'trial things'.

Cbeebi - what did you have and why did you have it? It's useful to know what your 'weak' points are :)

Stairsinthenight - Of course you can eat him, lots of fat & protein - try roasting. tell him to read 'John Briffa - Escape the Diet Trap' and if he wont, just tell him to STFU Please don't let him derail you.

dolly I might be :) we both love food, eat out more than is probably good (health and money-wise!) and love a snuggle with a film and treats...

BIWI - you never know, you might convert her if you keep taking fab lunches in and tell her she can have 85% dark chocolate as a treat

Steeleye - that's a shame about your friend :( I started low carbing because I was diagnosed with T2. I didn't want to take Metformin (or the statins or the bp pills etc). I started a thread on MN (under a name change) as I was a little upset & confused [read - right old mess!] and was getting lots of lovely advice, but mixed advice.

I was reading about low carbing on a diabetes site (very pro lc and anti NHS advice). Then a few low carbers came and said that it was the way forward, after a couple of days BIWI couldn't contain herself any longer and came to rescue me! I owe her so much, I don't think I could have done it without her help/advice/reading list/links. She poo-poo's the idea and says I did it myself - but I didn't really, she laid down the path and I just followed it while asking a million stupid and undoubtedly annoying questions and with more excuses why I shouldn't/couldn't & resistance than a resistance band

I owe a lot to BIWI and to MrsHercule and Scotch and many others on MN. I am now 2.5 stone lighter (with a lot more to go) and my blood sugars are normal. I have improved my insulin resistance so that even when I do eat carbs my sugars are 'ok' - not good enough that I could eat 'candy' without a spike I'm sure (haven't tried), but good enough to eat bread/potatoes/chocolate/cake without too much of a rise. This time last year I thought I would never ever be able to do that again.

I hope to reduce my insulin resistance even more through low carbing and losing weight :)

I went into town hungry and DP had a full English which i picked at. Eggs and bacon which isn't awful but then i had a couple of teaspoons of baked beans and a few sips of his diet coke. Plus one bit of sushi he bought just before. Won't let myself get so hungry next time!

chesterdrawschicken -( now referred to as CDC ) is the house favourite here ..... Delish mummy says DD3 !

Loving the photo crabby will have to play with that !

SarahBeeny have faith, and have patience too. This is likely to be fluctuate-y weight loss but after the fluctuations - downwards. I have been at many weights thinking "that's it, I don't think I can go below Xlbs" only a couple of weeks later to be thinking the same about a lower weight. It can, and will, come off. But you do need to stick to the rules and not cheat.

It also helps to pay attention to how it works for YOUR body - for example, notice whether cheese affects your rate of loss. If it does, on the spreadsheet there is a tab called "ubercamp" this has 3 days of non-dairy menus. Its always worth trying if you stall. But I don't think you've necessarily stalled yet - give it time!

There have been weeks when I've gained weight and weeks when I've stayed the same, but overall I started with an obese BMI and I've just made it into normal BMI. I'm sure you can get below your current weight if you stick with it.

Cbeeni - not great but not too bad. You identified the why (being hungry) and the what (nothing specific, just what was there) and found a solution (not going hungry next time). One step up the ladder :) One other question though - you were hungry, you were in a cafe that sold low carb food - why didn't you eat (bacon & egg, mushrooms etc)?

Sarah - as Eva says, we've all been there :( I'm sorry I haven't got time right now to scroll through to see if you have said before or not, but have you taken measurements/sorted out some clothes that are too tight right now. I definitely lose 'size' more than I lose 'weight' and those things starting to fit (again) really does help when the fucking bastard scales aren't shifting!!

Right - off to work! Have a good afternoon all!

Sarah

"I'm having a bit of a wobble at the moment. I think I've lost most of my water weight, having started about a week and a half ago now. Interestingly I'm down to the same weight that I got down to with 5:2, at which point 5:2 stopped working for me."

So you're only giving it ten days? You won't always lose every day, and there will be days when your weight might even go up. But these first two weeks are critical, not just for weight loss but for making your body switch from carb-burning to fat-burning. Ten days is nothing! I bet it didn't take ten days for you to gain the weight that you want to lose.

"In fact, that's the main point of my wobble - what if I stop loosing weight here? I suspect I'm pre-menstrual also - spots and carb cravings. The scale never moves for the two weeks before my period anyway."

Assuming that you have weight to lose and you follow Bootcamp rules, why wouldn't you lose weight? But I can guarantee you one thing - if you give up now then you definitely won't! Being pre-menstrual will affect your weight - it's something to do with your hormones (always with the bloody hormones ) and can also be water retention. Drink lots of water. Eat lots of fat and make sure you're eating well, so that you are satisfied/not hungry, and this should minimise the carb cravings. And once you're into low carbing, you will suffer less, I believe, from these problems

"today:
B: 2 oopsie rolls and butter and a lump of yarlsberg for breakfast - stomach too off to have eggs which is weird. Before starting this I would have two eggs and a slice of bread.

There's a lot of dairy here (not including the butter), as the oopsie rolls are made with cream cheese. Do you think you might have an issue with dairy?

"L celeriac cottage pie, green pepper, olives, marinated artichokes, mayo. Oopsie roll and butter."

Sounds lovely, but more dairy ...

"A snack of total yoghurt and some lemon chicken breast and salad for dinner."

More dairy ...

It's very early days to be trying to diagnose any 'problems' - I think you're just being harsh on yourself, as well a teensy little bit impatient. But you might want to keep an eye on that dairy.

Thanks Eva and BIWI - thanks for the kick I'm not thinking of giving up though! I just wanted someone to say "patience....., don't panic" and "don't eat the chocolate" - which I haven't!

I will keep an eye on the dairy and see how things go for the next week or two. I'm a bit stuck for stuff I can eat at work without yoghurt - I often eat on the run. I'm trying to think of things that I can snack on that are fat and not protein - salad or veg with oil/mayo is as near as I'm getting.