The Atkins Diet Plan and Low Carb Beginners Guide

There are tens of weight loss diets known to improve healthy weight loss without the need of taking diet pills, appetite suppressants or fat burners. Some say the best weight loss diet is the low carb diet, others say the results of low carb diets are only myths. What it is the true? Do low carb diets work or they are only myths?

The truth is that low carb diets can be beneficial, but the misconceptions connected to them tend to take people’s courage away. The main truth is that low carb diets focus on healthy eating, food rich in nutrients and low in carbohydrates. One of the main misconceptions and myths about low carb diets are about the fact that people think low carb mean no carbohydrate consumption. This is not true. Even low carb diets, like Atkins diet, are containing carbohydrates, and do not urge people to total carbohydrate elimination from their diet. We need carbohydrates even if only a small amount of them, mainly good carbohydrates. The carbohydrate level depends on individuals and has to match everyone according to their health level.

Another myth connected to low carb diets states that these diets discourage vegetable and fruit consumption, because they are high in carbohydrates. This is not true, because non-starchy vegetables are the main part of the low carb diet. These non-starchy vegetables are on the bottom of the low carb pyramids, and people who are following a low carb diet usually eat more vegetables than everyone else following diets or no diets at all. In the majority of low carb diets, fruits and vegetables are the only source of carbohydrate, replacing grains.

Some think that low carb diet have inadequate amount of fiber in them, because of the fact that fiber is carbohydrate. The truth is that every low carb diet encourages fiber consumption since it lessens the impact of other carbohydrates on the blood sugar level, because it remains undigested.

The majority of people think following a low carb diet have increased risk of heart diseases. This is not true. Scientific researches have shown that the risk of high blood pressure, heart disease, cholesterol and triglycerides decrease at people following a low carb diet.

One of the main misconceptions is that a low carb diet is higher in protein than other types of diets. This is not true, because these types of diets are not too high in protein, not causing kidney problems and do not eliminate calcium out of our body.

The American Cancer Society and the American Heart Association recommend a diet containing less than 30 percent of calories as fat. Getting fats from the right sources and in proper amounts doesn’t have to be difficult if you remember a few simple rules:

• Skip the appetizers when you go out to eat. They usually are very high in saturated fat.
• Choose lean meats (chicken, turkey) and fish over red meat.
• Read labels. Avoid foods containing partially hydrogenated oils.
• Eat more plant foods (vegetables, seeds, nuts and grains) and fewer animal products (meats and whole-milk dairy products).
• Use liquid fats (most oils) instead of solid fats (margarine, butter).
• Choose foods that have been sauteed, baked, broiled or grilled instead of fried.

Changing the way you eat doesn’t have to be difficult. The best advice is to learn to associate the foods you eat with how they effect your health instead of how they effect your weight. You will lose unwanted pounds, but without stress and guilt.

In a paper published in Nutrition Journal (Open Access, available without subscription at http://www.nutritionj.com/home), two researchers from SUNY Downstate Medical Center show that low carbohydrate, high protein diets can be expected to be more effective than low fat diets, going against long standing prejudice of the nutritional community, which has claimed that only calories count.

“There are numerous examples of low carbohydrate diets being more effective than low fat diets with the same number of calories. It doesn’t always happen but it can happen,” said Dr. Richard Feinman of the Department of Biochemistry. “The nutritional establishment has been reluctant to accept this, because they say it violates the law of thermodynamics. However, they never seriously look at the thermodynamics, which not only says its possible, but it is to be expected.” he added.

In their paper, Dr. Feinman and Dr. Eugene J. Fine explain that thermodynamics is as much about efficiency as it is about energy conservation. Carbohydrate is an efficient fuel, whereas protein is not. On a low carbohydrate/high protein diet, even though total energy is conserved, more energy is wasted as heat, a process known as thermogenesis. This energy comes from burning fat.

The researchers stress that “the human body is not a storage locker. It is a machine and the efficiency of the machine is controlled by hormones and enzymes. Carbohydrates increase insulin and other hormones that regulate enzymes, leading to storage rather than burning of fat.”

“Of course, people are different” said the authors, “but many people are sensitive to the effects of carbohydrates and for them, a low carb diet is going to work well.”

The practical point is that getting rid of the idea that “a calorie is a calorie” opens the door for serious research into what kind of diets will be most effective and which people will benefit most. “This is important,” they explain “because millions of people
are seriously trying to lose weight on low carbohydrate diets, and instead of being given directions on the best way to do this, they have been largely discouraged by health professionals and self-appointed expert groups. The obesity epidemic is too important to allow this to happen.”