BLT with B + T in the L – no dressing and then a ruby grapefruit but 2 hours later BS was up to 10.2, Last night and this morning was 6.2 so a bit down that I need to avoid grapefruit

Ate at harvester last night and had ribeye steak and salad with sweet potato fries and they didn’t seem to send it up that much – which is nice!

Hi Izzy!!
Thanks for the info…. Had no idea you were also on the no gallbladder boat!
I used to only have an issue if I ate something liked fried fish so am surprised this has been an issue.
I am gonna try the lower fat in my day version and see how that works. In the book it does say most people don’t have cheese since its high in calories.
Hugs!! 💜💜

Thanks Orchid, I did use egg with the courgettes, but I think they were not dry enough – even though I’d drained them and squeezed, just too much trouble to do again. I also added some gram flour.

I just found this https://cookingonabootstrap.com/2015/01/31/carrot-cumin-kidney-bean-burger-9p/ which I may try, with addition of a little egg, as some said it was crumbly. Will let you know if they work.

Yes I found a lovely old Cranks nut loaf recipe, but way too many cals for me at the moment. When I’ve lost 5 stone, maybe as a treat 🙂

Lynne I am so happy for you!! It must feel amazing to be near reaching so many goals you have worked to achieve and you are still losing so much in one week!
Thank you for giving me hope as I look forward down my own road with this journey.
You are an inspiration truly!

Hi Stacy, thanks for replying. I managed to go to sleep so didn’t eat! I look forward to the scales dropping. I’ll keep the cheat with meat in mind if I get desperate. Hope thinks are going well for you and meat cheating or tuna hunger is minimal. Xxx

You ARE doing it – and doing it well.

Hi Bounce, I too have a massive amount of weight to lose and I have only lost 1.5kg in the last four weeks. I lost more weight on Optifast (the shake equivalent) but I never felt well on it. I feel great and my BG readings have fallen and are in the range of 4.9 – 5.7 and quite steady. My blood pressure has also dropped and my heart rate has dropped into the 60s. All great results but I am so upset about the weight loss – it is heart breaking to be working so hard for so little result. On Optifast I was dropping 1 – 2 kilos a week. I am going to persist but I am feeling very down about it today. I hope the scales move for you this week.

Thank you for your support, I managed to go to sleep without eating any avacardo. Hoora. Yes you are correct I am in the UK.
Day two going well, had a bit if a headachand have felt a bit bad tampered. Its the evenings that are the most difficult as thats when I used to comfort eat.
So jealous you have a dog, mine died nearly 20years ago. Now have 3 cats. Xxxx

On the 800 diet can you swap the meal plans around?

I am confused. Some here count carbs, some cals.

I want to buy a supermarket salad dressing if poss, for days when I don’t have time to make it.

I like quite a lot of dressing on my salad, I have a lot of varied leaves/spinach, and it needs dressing for me. I was having full fat Hellmans mayo , but this is too many cals.

I think Neohdiver said she uses low cal dressing, but does anyone know which is also lowest carb? It is so annoying not being able to buy low carb items that don’t have added sugar. I really hope the manufacturers catch up soon on the demand.

The Pizza Express light dressing is 298 cals and 5.2 carbs per 100 mil.

The Filippo Berio Extra Virgin Olive Oil is 822 cals per 100mls and no carbs.

Hellmans FF is 721 cals and 1.3 carbs.

What do you all do?

Hi Linda, that’s a great loss.Well done.
My blood sugar was down to 7.4 today. That’s an all time low for me, so I am really happy today.
I won’t make a habit of eating out but I think we all need a break sometimes. It has worked for me in the past (I’ve tried all the main dieting clubs over the past 30 something years!).
I’m going to re read the book today and tweak my diet again.
Good luck for this week.
Lisa

When you calculate calories do you calculate for raw meat or cooked? As you roast 3.5 kg of pork it will loose a lot of weight in cooking, so you end up eating much less than 400 g. If you check calories for 400g of raw pork then it is about 480 cal, but cooked is around 1000 cal. I actually don’t think I could eat 400 g of meat (cooked meat)… that is a lot of meat. So probably you have eaten much less and probably you are OK.
Did you have any salad with the roast or just the meat and apples?
Thank you,
Melita.

Hi, I just saw your posts about the tv program. Could you please tell me what the name of the program is and which network it was on? I didn’t know about and would like to see it. Thanks 😊

Three weeks down, beginning Week Four with a total of 22 pounds lost. This past week the loss was not as dramatic as the first couple of weeks, but on I go . . .

Hi Deb, how are things going?

Hi Bounce – the answer maybe to increase your good carbs a little – they are still needed by the body! I am sure I remember someone else doing what seemed counterintuitive – add a few more carbs in, and the weight loss restarted. There are no recommendations, but we all seem to have a tipping point – real or in our heads – I lose on 60g a day, below that I get too many leg cramps. Others are on 50g a day and some have gone as low as 20g a day to get consistent weight loss.
It really is worth the time to measure – portions, calories and carbs.
good luck.

Hi Barby – easy mistake 🙂
Veg loaf sounds good, and yes it is great for freezing afterwards. I was looking around and most of the recipes I have are quite high carbs so would need to be a small part of the meal. I did find a few recipes on the BBC website for veggie burgers – http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/collections/5_very_good_veggie_burgers
I don’t understand how some of them hold together….. from many years ago trying to make meat burgers, you always added a binding agent – usually egg so get them to stick together and stay together in the pan. The Quinoa and halloumi burger I will look at and try – maybe next week as it does have an egg in it so I can see it keeping together. I need to see the carb count in it first because if it is just 0.5 of a burger on the plate for a sensible carb content, it is not worth cooking! I may look at an alternative for the quinoa – buckwheat maybe and see how that goes. The egg trick is worth thinking about for some of the recipes that did not work – maybe that was what was missing?
I’ll let you know if I get them done.
You weight loss is good – one dress size down in 6 weeks is wonderful! Keep going – we are all different and it is very hard to make sensible comparisons – the main thing is to have sensible goals and dress size is a great one; as is no longer having carb cravings.

Hi Lucia
No indoor soccer here!!!!
Just got up from polishing my cupboard fronts…..no not a euphemism.
I am however sweating and my pulse rate is up but just needed to give my old knees a rest.
Dull and windy here but the thought of your 7000 and going out for a walk is motivating.
Need to up my steps from under 4000 so far today.
When the sun does come out eventually….. my kitchen will gleam and if I go out for a walk I will have a faint glow of self -satisfaction!!!
Thanks for the motivational talk;-)

Hi Orchid

Thanks so much for such an in depth answer, really appreciate it. Am virtually carb free and 800 calls but think the portion sizes may have crept up. Also the excersize has dropped off so will up that again now. Thanks again x

DemiMondaine – 2kg is more than 4lbs. 4.4 to be precise, since 1kg is 2.2 lbs!

I am on here to report a milestone for me. 93kg at my heaviest, got down to 80.8 and lapsed a bit. But I can today report after a few days back on the stricter 800BSD rather than the looser low carb approach, that I am now down to 79.8kg – not much difference but I am really pleased because psychologically 70 something kilos sounds so much better than 80 or 90 something kilos.
Julia

What are you all doing indoor Soccer?
The sun is shining , the birds are screaming (well there sounded like it at 5:30 thus mornings)
Go out for a walk, go buy a newspaper, or a piece of fruit.
Go and enjoy the sunshine, I am expecting snow and blizzards in half an hour 🤔🤔🤔🤔no I told you a million times I do not exaggerate.
Just under 7000 at the moment, going for a walk.

Love Lucia
Xxxxx

Every time I do something right I am choosing to congratulate myself. We don’t do that enough you know. We are all hard on ourselves when we think we’ve failed but how often do we say nice things to ourselves? Not often enough that’s how often.

So today I am pleased to report that I have once again avoided *carb catastrophe* which is a phrase I just made up but sounds totally relevant to our lives here.

For a while now having enjoyed my fitbit flex I have lusted after a fitbit alta! An extravagance of course but it feels good to prioritise my health. I got paid yesterday and had a bonus and decided… I’m gonna treat myself.

My husband forgot to leave me our sons car seat, and I decided that we should go on the train. Bit of an adventure for my son! So we did. Got the train into town, got my new fitbit, a few things my daughter needed and then of course the kids wanted lunch. So bacon bun for the eldest, sausage bun for the youngest and for me.. . Tomato and basil soup. Did I want a brown or white bread roll? Just the soup Thankyou, and a cup of tea 🙂 enjoyed the soup too. I confess I stole a bit of my son’s sausage but I’m thinking… that’s ok.

I can do this 🙂 I really can!

Hi Imogen

I wouldn’t worry about the increase – you may well find it has disappeared tomorrow or the next day. As a scales addict (I actually find weighing every day helps keep me motivated, not the reverse, but we are all different!) I can attest to the fact that weight can vary by even 2 kilos in the same day… and while mine is usually more in the evening than in the morning, the reverse also happens sometimes. So keep looking at the bigger picture, as indeed you are! You are doing really well.

Hi Bounce, this is not uncommon; many people have a flat few weeks during weeks 3-4 then it moves again. Use the search on the forum for ‘plateau’ and you will see lots of others asking about them! Your body may just be re-adjusting.
For things to do proactively – check your carb intake, it may be higher than you realise. Also – don’t just rely on the scales – what are your clothes telling you and what does the tape measure say? Also – read every label and weight everything out. It is amazing how inaccurate the eye can be! My glug of oil that I would have estimated at a tablespoon is actually more than twice that!
I noticed that I was losing weight on average 1.5kg a week, but my waist was reducing at the same rate as my weight loss and I was losing from my hips and bust, but not my waist. I was using Shakes for the first couple of weeks to make it easy to start and they were high in carbs. So yes, 800 cals a day, but with 80-100 g carbs. Once I ditched them and used real food, and stuck to 60g good carb per day, I found the cms came off of my waist and the weight loss continued.
You can also try to increase your exercise – a little more each week can help.
Hope that helps and things move on the next weigh-in.

Hi Captainlynne, I have the same question. I have stopped the 800 and morphed over into ‘med where possible’, but in an uncontrolled way as I was away from home with a couple of long car journeys, staying with family then on a holiday for a week – so been off for 3 weeks.
I was not diabetic when I started, just heading towards pre-diabetic and 23kg above ‘normal weight’. I kept on the diet for 10 weeks before I went on holiday. I had lost 15.2kg, blood sugars now firmly in the ‘normal’ range and I was ‘fat-burning’. When I started BSD I had looked at my diary and decided is had to be done then as that was the best 8 week window I had. This coming weekend I am on a course and then my cousin is down for a holiday and we will be at Chelsea :-), plus be out and about ad hoc stops etc for a week. My aim was to keep within 2kg of my 10 week finish weight and restart on losing the last 10kg after that – probably first week of June.
So how did I do when I was away – my new clothes are still fitting me, so I knew I had not put on much weight. I did weigh myself yesterday for the first time in 3 weeks and I am 2kg higher (mainly gut-fill) so happy enough with that, no longer fat-burning though and have not yet done BS. I have been eating carbs again at times when I had no choice, but did avoid rice, potatoes, chips etc and deserts except for ice-cream which I had a couple of nights. I still do not feel that I have made a full change and am worried about reverting to old habits.
I read recently that you need a year on a change programme to actually hardcode the change into your system – be that eating or exercise. So – I have started to think about the next phase as I do want this hardcoded into my system.
What did I learn in the 8 weeks?
1. Losing weight fast was such a high……. and strangely great fun. The forum helped.
2. Weight everything – the eye is not accurate; read all labels.
3. Avoid all processed foods – make things from scratch where at all possible.
4. Don’t beat yourself up if one day does badly, the next day starts afresh.
5. Full fat is not the enemy – it is a friend.
I have ordered a paper copy of the BSD book and will reread it over the coming weeks. I read it in January on the Kindle, and gone back often to check things, but it is a nuisance as there are no page numbers for referencing. I also want to scribble on it – saw a comment from someone about that in the last couple of weeks – personalise the book – great idea.
I particularly want to read it in light of my own experiences and look at the longer term especially the fasting which others have been talking about. I took the 800 cals and 60g carbs approach.
The first question for me is whether to go for another 8 week stint on 800 cals to get rid of the last 10 kg then move to the 5:2 or full med; or to go onto the 5:2.
From Judith’s posts she just increased her calories a little each week for a number of weeks until she got to the calories she had calculated was her maintenance point.
So – first step – calculate my maintenance calorie intake per day. Reread the book to see if the fasting days and sticking to maintenance calories for the other days will work on the last 10kg or do 6-8 weeks to get rid of that. Also – look at some of the other ideas that came out of the January ‘Trust me, I’m a Doctor’ series around olive oil for the heart, trying to eat in an 8 hour window per day, barley and oats to reduce BP etc. and see if they can be added into the 5 ‘normal’ days.
Sorry for the long ramble – I have been thinking about what to do a lot and procrastinating on putting it into action. Putting down my thoughts and concerns down has helped me work out my next steps.
I will be very interested in anyone else’s experience, approach or thoughts.

I lost 7kg in my first 2 weeks and felt amazing. No hunger etc. but then the second 2 weeks I’ve only lost one kg and don’t understand why the huge slow down? I have a massive amount of weight to lose so am concerned. Has anyone else had this happen? Any tips to get it going again? Don’t want to fall off the wagon……

thanks collie
and you are so right about sugar

I haven’t given it up completely, well indeed since I had two pieces of the lemon cake yesterday, that is for sure

back in jan when I started the 5:2 fast diet I had two weeks of horribleness when I stopped bingeing and stopped all sweets biscuits and cake (didn’t stop fruit)
had headaches and felt sick and hated the world
but after a couple of weeks that calms down

I feel clearer too at the moment – think the MASSIVE reduction on gluten to almost nothing is a great thing for me
the tricky bit comes with the mh side as its hard to know what is what sometimes

but on thurs my heart was racing the entire day and I have no idea why (but apparently the mh stuff could have caused that too – ahhhhhhh)

annoyingly I was calm earlier but its all kicked off a bit so I am going to go now before I start saying too much and sounding weird or weirder or whatever

thanks for replying to my post and I hope this eating is working for you
sometimes wish sugar had not been discovered!!!! – never thought I would say that – but hey
have a good day x

Hi Rozy,

Swimming sounds great! Once I feel I can go out in public in a swimsuit I want to learn to swim 🙂

Don’t be hard on yourself, life happens and we get sidetracked, its ok…now you’ve come to the point of wanting to swim again which is better than never doing it again…so definitely a win!! Well done 🙂

So far so good, been sticking to my 800 calories but only lost 700g when I checked again yesterday. Im on day 6 today….was day 5 yesterday so expected sometging more than 700g….been stuck on 700g for a while now so I got annoyed and ate a whole 8oz rib eye steak with a teaspoon of English mustard and a few leaves…thought I’d be a rebel and not add up the calories but this morning weighed myself and lost 400 grams so a total of 1,1kg in a week. Not as fabulous as everyone else on here but not bad…. Ended up adding up my steak dinner calories which came to 410 so I got it in my journal 🙂 happy to say was only 60 calories over for the day and did my 10,000 steps coz my bus took forever so walked half way home…

Today I have this insatiable hunger for salmon with garlic and paprika…trying to shake it off and plan meals for the week but adding up foods which aren’t paprika salmon is making me a bit crazy with the craving so I’m going to get dressed and go to the big tesco to find some courgetti and cauliflower rice 🙂

Hope your weekend is going well…

Hi Izzypeach,
great to hear you are getting support from the nurse and even better – she is being training in low carb eating!
If you want to add to your ‘satisfying meals’ how about soups? I find these to be very filling and with a salad for lunch keep me going all afternoon. They have the advantage of being easy to make large amounts and freezing the rest for future days.
I was driving up from Herts to Orkney the other week and very worried about how to cope with ‘meals’ on route. I took a flask of soup and that really helped, but I also the M&S Food Halls that are now at many stopping areas have a few salads that do not contain rice, potatoes etc. The one I like as it is all greens is the super green salad – edamame soybeans, apples, sugar snap peas, & coriander with a dressing of apple, soy and ginger. Calories – 87 and 5.5g carbs per 100g. Pack is 176 g. It was really tasty and took a while to eat – you can add cheese, meat or fish to it if you want to.
Good luck with the curry – check out the recipe section for the onion bhaji’s!

Bother!! Just on the verge of throwing a major hissyfit because my weight increased by one pound 😤 when I remember that I have lost over a stone in the last 4 weeks….😁guess my mood fluctuating also.
Hmmm,. Busy day yesterday + reduced water intake may have played a part! Flare up of arthritis not helping as slowing me down.
All good: will eat well, drink more and meditate.

Hope all you guys have a great day.🌻

Hi Alipalicat,
Well done on a difficult two weeks. If you can keep going through a high stress event, then you should have no issues getting to the end of the 8 weeks!
If you have been hospital visiting, you have probably been getting more exercise than you thought….. I know from the last few hospital visits I have had to make the car park is miles from the reception area and then the ward is as far away from there as can be – plus the stairs as I was never prepared to wait for the lifts!
Let us know how you are getting on in the coming weeks.
good luck.

Well done Jim, great results, well done! Please let us know if you are confirmed as clear of T2, as Bill says the more confirmed there are the better the chance that this approach can be pushed out through as standard in the future.

Hi Alan,
Maybe a quick review of what you are eating and your exercise prior to starting the last few weeks? I did that every couple of weeks and tweaked what I was doing as I went through. Check your carb intake – especially any foods you ‘assumed’ were good. If you can, up the steps a little each day.
You have already achieved a lot – 1.5 stone off and reduction in your meds, so don’t be too hard on yourself – celebrate what you have achieved as you go forward.

Hi Cicipops,
I was not disagreeing that porridge is a great way to fill you up – I have had oats in homemade muesli for years.
What I was pointing out is that the BSD book does not recommend the kind of porridge oats that are processed – and most that we now buy are processed. Porridge is fine if made with the oats that you need to soak the night before then cook next day – steel-cut or rolled oats.
There are many posts on this topic and some diabetics find they can manage oats, others cannot – please use the search engine and you will find the posts.

From the BSD book:
Page 34
‘In one study, he took 12 overweight teenage boys and on separate days gave them three different breakfasts. One was instant oatmeal with milk and sugar. Another was traditional, unprocessed oats, “steel-cut”, the sort your grandmother would recognise. The third breakfast was an omelette. The worst breakfast was the instant oats. After eating it, the boys’ blood sugar and insulin levels soared. This was followed a couple of hours later by a “crash” as blood sugar levels fell below where they had started. This crash was accompanied by a surge of the stress hormone, adrenaline. The boys felt tired, hungry and irritable. At lunch they each are a whopping 620 calories more than those who had had the omelette.’
P113
‘Avoid most breakfast cereals: they are usually full of sugar, even the ones that contain bran. Oats are good as long as they are not the instant sort.’
P131
‘Q There are carbohydrates in this diet, yet you say I should not eat them.
A There are some carbohydrates in the menus provided – but the right sort. As you will know by now, starchy carbohydrates are essentially concentrated sugars and are disruptive to blood sugar. You will find recipes here that include jumbo oats, and even brown rice – but in small quantities. It’s a taste, not a main component of the meal. These carbohydrates are the slow-burn kind, meaning they take time and energy to digest, which means you’ll feel less hungry.’

After reading this, I adapted my eating to the principles of the BSD diet and instead of breakfast with 30g oatmeal and 100g fat-free yoghurt plus berries and seeds, I now have 60g full fat yoghurt, berries and seeds and find that every bit as filling as the one with the oatmeal. The full fat yoghurt is what keeps me feeling full.

Hi I am finding I can now tell the difference between mouth carb hunger and the real need for food . Not sure I will ever lose my love of carbs but oh so feel better without them I think they were killing me slowly sorry if that sounds dramatic but it’s true for me . I truly believe I was/am addicted to them.

Hi Odette C
I have e mailed you , sounds interesting .

Just to add to this, have kept carbs well under 50gms for the last few days and a step on the scales this morning show 3lbs gone!

Will persist with this low carbs strategy. Still some way to go, but a better result than I’ve been able to achieve for some considerable time, and I’m not hungry and am really enjoying my food. Eggs, spinach and smoked salmon this morning – what’s not to like?

Hi I don’t feel shaky but certainly more alert and can think clearer. I have taken to camomile tea at bed time and no electronics as quite wired at night , feel so hungry as well and the two seemed to go together for me. I look on sugar as a drug so for me I am de toxing or de fixing as I don’t like that word . I am hoping that these will settle but as I am in for the long haul I am willing to give it at least 6 weeks before this settles I ate sugar for a whole lot longer . Wish you well

Hi All I went for my first bike ride in ages all good and felt the love with my bike. On a different note mu UP band has stopped working what fit bit step counters etc would people recommend . Loving the posts thanks for the motivation.

Hi Cicipops
Completely relate to your post. Well done on doing your induction at the Gym. I also felt terrible when I first went.
Go to a few classes now and have been going for several years……suppose I am a bit of a veteran.
I completely agree that the so called ‘easy’ classes are far from it…sometimes Yoga/Body Balance or Pilates feel positively evil…..though they are obviously not supposed to. However what would be the point of going if you didn’t push your body a little. After all our goal is to be healthier.

Certainly remember being positively purple at the end of the classes. Think I still am but people no longer come up to me
to ask if I’m alright…… more likely to be telling me, in the last couple of weeks certainly…… that I look well… aka lost loads of weight.

Moving more is a great goal and moving easier has worked for me.
Good luck to all the movers and shakers 🙂

I did like the 5:2 but it caused all my reflux issues to get worse so not sure it is the best for me
this way doesn’t seem to be so bad – so far

thank you for your reply and yes I agree that the emotional and weight etc etc gets very tangled and tricky

things have calmed a little in my head today so that is good

oh the lemon polenta cake was gorgeous and everyone loved it – really lemony and yum – and not a hint of wheat or gluten anywhere

I had a better nights sleep last night – I have a lot to catch up on from the past few days – so hopefully things will settle back down now

thank you so much for your support
I hope things are going ok for you

something that might help – if the issue is ‘upset’ stomach as in needing loo quick etc!!!!!!!!
lots of people find taking calcium tablets helps (after gall bladder removal)
but take just calcium – NOT the ones with magnesium added as that can make it all ‘loose’ again

I used to take some from Holland and barrett – and I still had a gall bladder, but had lots of other issues and they even helped me too

only thing was the tablets were big and not the easiest to swallow

After 2 weeks:

7kg off
7cm gone round my middle
Signs of a waistline returning
Feeling much better in myself
Not hungry so often
Dug a whole pile of tight clothes out of my wardrobe and some nearly fit again
Been clothes shopping 😉😀
Saving money

Only downside is my innards seem bunged up.

Week 2 weigh in and I’ve lost 2kg. Keep reminding myself that’s 4lb so not bad at all.

Hello, I’ve been doing the BSD for 7 weeks – great results and I’m on a bit of a mission to help others understand that reclaiming your health and vitality IS possible. I am starting a local group using my experience of being a coach and trainer so that we can explore the science, the food (mmm.. cooking and tasting), and how to create a plan to make moving more and reducing stress work for YOU whatever your starting point . You can find out more on http://www.8weeks.co.uk.

Hi Jim
Wonderful results for you, if your doc isn’t impressed by that, bin him.
I really hope your blood sugar results come back as well as your weight loss has. Make sure to let us know, anyone who manages to get a diabetes reversed decision is a cause for celebration in my eyes.

Hi everyone

Weighed in a day early as going out for alcoholic drinks this afternoon 😱

Anyway, end of week 10 and after my plateau last week it’s another 2.6 lb loss this week.

Pretty happy with this as I was out for dinner on Wednesday, and while I had steak and veg, I also had some carbs. My plan was to enjoy it, have a few chips etc if I wanted them but leave the majority of the carbs on my plate and it worked!

On a lighter note – in my obsession with the scales (I’m one of those who finds them motivating!) I stepped on again this morning and they say a pound and a half gone… Given I’ve only been back on the 800 BSD proper for a couple of days I am well pleased. Definitely need some calmer days though – I managed to prang the car on Wednesday, got it scraped on hinge of our driveway gate. All stress…
Hoping for better days ahead in the sunshine (even though it is freezing again it’s lovely to hear the birds singing).

You’ve done an amazing job even managing to stick to most of it through your husbands emergency, you should be super proud of yourself! That hospital sandwich would have been a much needed meal for you that day. Glad to hear he is home recovering and I hope he will be well soon.

Lynne you just keep going from strength to strength
Anyone following your posts can’t fail to be inspired by them, I always have been.
You’re going to be right where you want to be in the not too distant future.
Well done 🙂