Atkins Diet Food Restrictions Worried Me

by Liza Kwiecien

I tried the Atkins Diet. All my teacher friends were on it and claiming to be getting amazing results.

So, I only needed to lose about ten pounds and thought I would give it a try.

I'm a very health conscious person and after seeing all the restrictions on foods I was initially a little worried that not eating a lot of fruits and vegetables may actually be unhealthy.

It isn't just weight loss that makes something "healthy" which I think may be a misconception in our society. "If it helps you lose weight then it is healthy." Well, maybe this isn't true.

So I tried the diet for about a week, eating nothing but high protein and fat filled foods and not getting my favorite fruits and vegetables.

I did lose about two pounds but was starting to feel sluggish and rather uncomfortable in my day to day activities.

I guess I felt slowed down, and continued to worry about what a radical change this diet was for me. I was used to eating a lot of rice and vegetable meals, lots of fruit and grains.

And now I was eating a lot of meat and other high protein and fat foods. My meals consisted almost primarily of beef and chicken main dishes.

I normally eat very little meat, so this was the biggest change for me.

I also started seriously questioning the safety of so much protein -- I was getting up to go to the bathroom at night which normally isn't an issue for me.

This can be an indication that your kidneys are having problems and an overload of protein can lead to just that happening.

I guess the final straw was when I had to pass up some of the most delicious looking blueberries. I know that berries, especially blueberries, have huge health benefits and the Atkins diet does not allow blueberries.

That's when I realized that "healthy" does not necessarily correlate with "weight loss diet" and went off the Atkins diet and returned to my previous eating habits. I started walking routinely every day and that really took the weight off.

Liza

Note from Dr. Dan

Liza,

No blueberries? I have to agree with you. You should be able to eat a variety of healthy foods and still be at a good weight.

You can overdo fruit, of course. But you can overdo anything.

Unrefined fruits and vegetables should not need to be eliminated completely from any diet.

Dr. Dan