I started the BSD Diet on 29 August at 14stone 1 lb. full of hope after reading the book twice! Weighed four days later and had lost 9 lbs, jubilation unrestrained! Checked again 2 days later and Nooooooo I had gained 6lb! I haven’t varied from the diet as I have followed the recipes in the book, except I have porridge each morning, large rough oats 40g with water and 8 raspberries, about 100 ml of skim milk on top. I worked this out to be 100 cals. Am I wrong? Is it too many carbs? Haven’t given a thought to carbs really, just noted the calories in each recipe and have not found it easy to get to 800 calls. Plainly I am not going to shed as rapidly as I had hoped, but I have not been at all hungry and have gone for a walk each day, trying to work up to 10,000 steps, best to date 7,387, that’s a 35-45 minute walk. My 70 year old frame (which lurks beneath the blubber) has very arthritic knees and lower back, so I sometimes struggle with the walking. My pluses? I’m extremely stubborn and intend to see this through, and my OH is very supportive.
Any tips? I have only eaten berries and grapes, so will knock off the grapes. My addiction has always been sugar, I can eat sweets like you wouldn’t believe, but not a grain has passed my lips, so I’m very proud of that. Should I add more fat? Please help, I’m lost to know what to do, but reading blogs all morning has made me aware of carbs…..and grapes 😄.

Hello Kiwiscot!
When i saw rough oats, I thought – CARBS! – but thought I’d better check as I don’t actually know, looking it up 40g shows as about 26g carb which to me seems awfully high.
Although 800cal was key to me to lose weight quick my focus now is carbs. Some people try to keep below 50g and I kept below 30, so if you have already had 26 in the oats alone, plus the milk and rasps, over the day it mounts up quicker than you believe.
Do you like yoghurt? Try some full fat yoghurt (need the fat to burn the fat) with your berries in the morning.
Also drink drink drink water, can’t emphasise this enough, it flushes the system and aids the weight loss. Aim for at least 6 pints of just water plus everything else.

Hi Kiwiscot – sorry you are feel a bit confused and disheartened.
Firstly, many of us lose more slowly than others, so we just need to accept that is how we are and not measure ourselves against the achievement of others. Our achievement, is our achievement and is of no less value for that. Secondly, yes, do take a look at the carbs you are eating, as well as the calories. When I was struggling I was advised to do this and it really helped. I try to keep my carbs under 50g a day – most days are between 20g and 30g. Eating more fat help to boost the calories without adding carbs, make you feel full quicker and for longer and is a good fall back for a satisfying snack – a cube of cheese, dollop of full fat yogurt with a few chopped nuts for instance.

Personally, I would ditch the porridge, but I know others on the forum are keen. Bear in mind you can make a sort of porridge from grains other than oats and you could even use quinoa, which is higher in protein and lower in carbs. If you want to stick with the oats, why not reduce your amount to 30g and maybe add a dollop of full fat yogurt or crème fraiche, to make it more filling and satisfying?

Remember to drink plenty, hydration is very important and it helps to keep the digestive system running. Retention of waste products can make our weight vary by a surprising amount even just from day to day. Drinking plenty helps to ensure our systems have enough fluid to keep it work well.

It’s great that you are stubborn and determined to see this through. You will soon find your tastes change and you no longer want or enjoy the sweet stuff any more. Keep us posted on your progress – good luck!

Thank you SunnyB and Barista Girls, I was really impressed to get such rapid responses! Looks like I need to Ditch the porridge then! Will try Full Fat Yoghurt and raspberries instead!
I think drinking water might be another item needing attention, I drink heaps of tea with s.s.milk every day, but guess those small amounts of milk mount up! Back to the tap then!

With the oats, I think the packet I had (I’m eating them a lot less now its a few weeks in, and tend to think of porridge as a “cold weather” food), I think the standard portion size was 30g, rather than 40g – it was smaller than I’d have usually eaten, but I did adjust to it & it soon seemed loads! That takes it to under 20g of carb, but probably an occasional rather than every day breakfast.

The other thing is to use whole oats, rather than the milled instant variety – and soaking them overnight has lots of benefits too, they taste creamier and sweeter. I find that they are great made with water when soaked, and don’t need any milk added, as they sort of form their own oat milk overnight. If you’re concerned about blood sugars, soaking them is beneficial GI wise, and is less likely to cause any spikes.

As Sunny says, there have been several threads and discussions about porridge and oats – using the search box will help you find them. There’s a thread somewhere about benefits of rolled-v-steel cut oats somewhere.

I just had some soya ‘yogurt’ with almonds – it didn’t taste very yogurt like, but quite pleasant and very low carb, 2.3g in a 100g serving. Currently half price in Waitrose (hence trying it!)

Hi Kiwiscot

I’m not sure what oats you are using, but if I use My Finess Pal, the nutrition of your porridge comes out as follows:

Oats 40g 156 calories, 27g carbs, 3g fat, 7g protein, no sodium or sugar
Fresh skim milk 100ml 35 calories, 5g carbs, 0g fat, 4g protein, no sodium, 5g sugar
Raspberries 8 berries 15 calories, 3g carbs, 0g fat, 0g protein, no sodium 2g sugar

So your breakfast is a grand total of 206 calories, 35g carbs, 3g fat, 11g protein, 0 sodium, 7g sugar

More than you thought in calorie terms, but I absolutely agree with Baristagirls and SunnyB, that is too many carbs as it will work best for you, most probably, if you keep under 50g per day. If you aim for that, you won’t want to have 35g of it for breakfast!

Do you spot the carbs in the skimmed milk – all sugar! That’s because if you have the fat taken out of milk, sugar is added. The BSD recommends full fat milk, and certainly no 0 fat dairy.

I agree that you should try full fat greek yoghurt with just a few berries (even raspberries add quite a few carbs to the party), or you could, like me, switch to eggs – I have just had a breakfast of 2 fried eggs, 77g portobello mushroom, 6 baby plum tomatoes on a bed of 20g of baby spinach leaves with plenty of salt and pepper, and even making sure to add in the olive oil I used it came to 140 calories and 8 carbs.

Understand that you like porridge, but maybe swerve it unless you plan for it and treat yourself and reduce everything later in the day?
I would recommend you use an app to check nutrition because until you explore this a bit, some things can take you completely by surprise! I just wondered about having a small flat peach, and on checking, it weighed 80g (!) and has 6 carbs in it. Just under what I had for breakfast. So I didn’t have it, would prefer to ‘spend’ those carbs on something else.

I hope that helps, you will soon get the hang of it! Keep us posted.

Kwiskot
with the milk, either work out what think you use daily on average, and log that as a daily food.
OR
Measure what you think that you use into a jug or separate bottle, add that quantity to your food log. What you don’t use can be added to your allowance the next day.

If you drink tea away from home a lot, remember to include that too.
Maybe work out what you have in an average cup (by measuring at home), and keep track that way.

If you don’t have an app, register on line with http://www.sparkpeople.com and go into nutrition, type in what you are eating under ‘search’ and it will come up with lots of varieties. Type in the amount then click on ‘nutritional information’ to find out the calories, carbs, fat etc.

Thank you everyone for the hints. Igorasusual, I do have the MyFitnessPal App, not the Premium, but I can’t see how I can work out the calories and carbs at all, rather, it wants me to put them in, I downloaded it thinking there was a calorie chart on it, but plainly not! In fact I find it quite a difficult ( for that read useless) app and wonder if I’m using it correctly? For the first time in my long life of various diets, I’m counting carbs and becoming quite anxious about correctly working them out. I’m sure it will become easier, but I only realised today I had to factor that in! I’m on a steep learning curve, I’m definitely programmed to go low fat and the advice to go full fat is taking me a while to accept. I’m not giving in though, no way!

I’ve only used the PC version, not the app (and personally switched to FatSecret after a few weeks because I find the database more accurate, it has a UK site, and I like the way it brings menus up better, but they both do much the same thing)

you select “food” from the bar at the top
for whichever meal you are entering, select add food, and type in what it is
you adjust the quantity to whatever you’ve had or are about to eat.
When you select the food, it adds up the calories, fats, carbs and other nutrients
Once you have some entries, it remembers items that you’ve had recently for speedier selection

Hi, just thought I would introduce myself as we sound similar. I am 70 with arthritic knees and lower back and a few other joints. I am starting the diet on Monday, Yes I know it is always Monday but we have guests for the weekend so that is my excuse. I am an English lady living in Ireland and am desperate to lose weight and avoid diabetes. Perhaps we could help one another. I must do it now before it is too late. I have read the book from cover to cover, got myself prepared and am doing some shopping to make sure I have some nice nutritional food in. I think it is going to be hard but not impossible. I love carbs but don’t like what they are doing to me.

Good morning. Just reading this blog and finding it to be brilliantly helpful..started 9 days ago lost six pounds in six days then gained a pound and haven’t moved since arghhhh. Interestingly I have changed my breakfast. I was having eggs and smoked salmon. Now having 4 rashers of bacon – could that be an issue? Any comments very gratefully received. Thank you

Hi there
I’d like to introduce myself to the group.
I’m 40 year old female, 90kg but not yet diabetic. My weight has crept up steadily over the past 15 years, and I decided it really is time to get it under control. I’ve done the 5:2 before, and I did lose, but then I started my own business and everything else went out of the window for a while. The batteries went in the scales and I didn’t replace them for about 6 months – then got a real shock.

I’d like to do a mini triathlon next May, so need to lose the weight (around 30 kgs) and get fit. My son weighs around 30 kgs, which keeps reminding me the scale of the challenge.

I’m saying I started on 4th (although it was bit of trial and error at first, as I worked through the book) so its day 11. Loss so far is 2.2kg, with 1kg in the last 2 days since I started looking at carbs as well as calories. I was having 2 meal replacement shakes in the first week (for convenience) and only when I hadn’t lost for 3 days did I investigate and found that they each had 19grams of carbs in! I was also having a cordial in the evening (I miss wine!), which added up to at least 10 grams of carbs.
Yesterday I had bacon, egg sausage and mushroom for breakfast and some pastrami and gherkins for lunch, salmon fillet, cauliflower rice and green beans for dinner. I also had a small piece of dark chocolate in the evening – felt like a feast (I was just under 900 cals) and I still lost 0.4 kg this morning. I think I’ll aim for 30 grams of carbs a day and see where it takes me. I’ve filled the fridge with smoked salmon, mackerel, cheese and lots of low carb veg, so fingers crossed.

I’ve been low calorie for a while and struggling to understand why I wasn’t losing weight, so I’m hoping controlling carbs is the answer. I’m also drinking 4 litres of water, and building in 15 mins of cardio a day (I was already walking a lot but it didn’t help with my weight loss). I’ve just done a 15 min jog, which I couldn’t do 10 days ago.

Anyway – that’s me in a nutshell. Good luck to everyone over the weekend. I’m planning bacon and eggs again for brunch tomorrow, with a gourmet burger and rocket salad in the evening – which will feel like a treat as I love burgers.