Why Low carb?

When friends of mine started on the Atkins diet, I rolled my eyes. I don't "get" fad diets and was always under the impression that any diet that allows you to eat bacon, but has a problem with whole grain bread is a little crazy.

My diet has always been low in saturated fat, whole grains, with lots of fruits and veggies. We ate vegetarian meals several times a week and filled in with boneless, skinless chicken, seafood like baked fish fillets and shrimp and the occasional good lean cut of red meat.

Imagine my surprise when I had my annual lab work done and my cholesterol was borderline high. It's not high enough for meds, but it certainly wouldn't take much to push it over that edge. In addition, while my weight is under control, the fat I have likes to congregate around my middle. Visceral fat increases your chance of heart disease. And my final worry, type two diabetes, appeared in my family. My grandpa, before he died, was diagnosed with type two diabetes that he needed daily insulin to control. The reason this was such a surprise to me, is that he was not a large man. You hear about the risks involved for those who are overweight. Since he was not, I can only assume that my family is a bit more sensitive to it.

A few weeks ago, my husband read a study on how low carb diets work. The body burns carbs (otherwise known as sugars such as glucose and lactose) first before touching the longer chained fat molecules. Sugars are simply easier to break down. There is a lot more science behind it, but that is not the point of my post. Let's just say that ideally, we want the body to burn fat instead of sugar. To do that, we need to reduce the amount of sugar the body consumes, and when I say sugar, I mean starch as well. The science behind it seemed sound so we did a bit more research.

When I discovered people who cut carbs actually lowered their cholesterol and balanced out their blood sugar, I was ready to get on board. My husband had a few pounds he wanted to lose and was right there with me. We made a major diet overhaul.

Eating a low carb diet is not quite as simple as people made it out to be. Before actually doing the research, I fully believed that these crazy people ate nothing but meat and cheese. Nothing could be farther from the truth. While protein, usually in meat form, is a part of almost every meal, you should not be eating more than 4-6 oz for women, and 6-8 oz for men. That really isn't very much. So what is the rest of the diet made of? Veggies, veggies and more veggies.

I created this blog to share what we are eating, using low carb recipes and adding my own touches to them. While I used Atkins as a guide, we are not in the induction stage, or even stage two. I would consider it between stage 3-4 as the weight needed to be lost was minimal and we are looking for a lifestyle change instead of a diet. Consequently, most of the stuff I post will probably not be induction friendly.

I have to offer up a big apology to my friends, even if they didn't know I thought they were nuts for jumping on this. Since we have started, my digestive system has regulated for the first time in a long time, and I have energy that I was lacking before. So kudos go out to them :)

The real test will come sometime around September when I have my lab work repeated. That will be the determining factor if this is for life.

One last note, my children are not on a low carb diet. I don't know how such a diet works with growing bodies. They still have breads, muffins, pasta, waffles, and cereals. They are, however, getting more veggies than they used to. I consider that a total bonus.