Low Carb Diets: The Atkins Diet

By Jonathan Berohn

The Atkins diet is the original and most well known of the low carb plans.

You can check out the Atkins diet on its official homepage, where you can read all about it and order books and diet products.  You can also buy Atkins meals and sanctioned food products at most grocery stores.

Originally, Atkins didn’t bother at all about fat content—you could essentially eat as much of any kind of meat and non-carb vegetable as you wanted.  People flocked to it because it seemed to work quite well—and you didn’t have to go hungry.

In response to some of that criticism about the fat issue, the latest version of Atkins reigns you in a bit, but the premise is still the same.  You start out eating nothing but protein and no-carb vegetables.

Over time, you slowly add in some carbs and some fruits, the bulk of your food will be in the meat, nut, and no-carb vegetable categories.

My wife and I decided to try the Atkins program after some friends had success, and we didn’t have too much success.  OK—to be fair we couldn’t even take the first week and gave up, but that, to me is not an encouraging sign.  To make a long story short, I basically felt like I’d just gargled with bacon fat all week—and we didn’t even eat much bacon.

The constant intake of meat, cheese, nuts, and more meat, cheese, and nuts just left me feeling—for lack of a better word—gross.  The main issue I had with the diet is the moratorium on fruit.  I’ve always been a firm believer in all things in moderation (although, obviously my actions didn’t always back me up or I wouldn’t be dabbling with these diets in the first place), and cutting out fruit seems to be cutting off your nose to spite your face—especially with all the research out there about antioxidants and such these days.  Additionally, skipping fruit just makes me feel unhealthy.

I know—I probably could have sucked it up for a week, but the long term prospects of me sticking to this diet were slim at best.  My wife—who again is generally far better about these things that I am—agreed that she just didn’t like the way she felt while on Atkins either.  In a nutshell, we quit and moved on.