Hello! Long time no post! I have been back at my way of eating for a few months now and keeping on. I've just been very busy with work and my husband buying and taking over his boss' business. Whew. Anyhoo...

I went to the dr today (I saw the Nurse Practitioner) about a couple of minor nagging things and she mentioned she's noticed I've lost some weight since last visit. I said thanks I've been running 3-5 miles a day 5 days a week and looking after my diet. Then she mentioned shed lost a lot of weight but had put back 20 lbs recently. She said she's a carb addict. I said well I've given up refined carbs. She immediately went kamikaze on my and said "don't cut them out completely! You need at least 30% of you diet to be carbs or your brain doesn't function." Then she repeated herself a couple more times.  I didn't feel like arguing over ketones and the brain utilizing ketones more efficiently then sugar with her because I know she is Scottish like me and VERY stubborn. I just okay. Thank you. I'm frustrated. Why can't people read up and be supportive of something that is working and helping me and my brain is working better then ever thank you! Ugh. 😕😡 I wish I had an open minded medical professional anywhere near me. The only ones near me are 85 miles north. Sigh. I would love to share how great I feel with people around me but right now I get so much negativity from people when I mention it. I'm going to stick with the "I've cut out junk food, refined sugar, and eat a tone of veggies now" schpeal. I don't get people lecturing me. Grrr! Do some research on some of the latest studies! I'm even what I would consider a keto-adapted runner and I still can't explain how I can run for 10-12 miles with no Gatorade or energy gels and feel fantastic!

I'm just gonna shake my head at this one. Can any of you guys commiserate on this topic?

Hi all, I went to my doctors office yesterday (I've been sick) and finally got a helpful PA who listened to my problems (chronic issues I've had for years) that have been worse as of late and he ordered a bunch of tests. I had basically pleaded my case with my worries about my swelling being something other than just normal swelling. I explained how long it's gone on, how bad it gets and how miserable it makes me. I told them what helps (rest, watching my fluid intake) and what doesn't (drinking more, water pills) and how I've tried to manage with it. I'm finding it difficult to travel anymore and that makes me really concerned. I'm too young to be so swollen in my feet even after an hour sitting. Water pills don't help. He signed me up for many tests to help find out what this is, I'm so tired of it. He is checking to see if it may be my thyroid as I have a family history of hypothyroidism. He says that could be why my cholesterol is a little high too and I've been losing hair. He's also testing me for hormone imbalances and congestive heart failure as some of my symptoms indicate that as well (arrhythmia, shortness of breath when I lie down, a few other things). Ugh. I'll let you guys know when I get my results. I'm home today doing another test that takes 24hrs that tests for kidney function (I think). However I have a terrible headache today and I'm trying to deal with that. All I know is that my three back to back pregnancies in my teens really started it all. My fourth and last pregnancy I almost died in delivery so I think maybe its just too much stress on my body! I just don't know what it's doing anymore and I'm not really that old to be having so many problems like this. I had these problems in my 20's too and always tried to just think it must be normal but now I'm realizing its not. My ankles and feet get so swollen just after a day at work that it hurts to bend at my ankles - it's just so bad and its like my skin is burning because its stretching so much. Ouch. It seems the more I drink the more I swell. I avoid sodium which helps very little. I watch my electrolytes closely and make sure I get potassium and magnesium, calcium, etc. and I told them I eat a very low carb diet and its cleared up a lot of my problems and helped with my energy levels (I've always had trouble with my energy). I hope the doctor can help me figure out why. Cross your fingers for me I can find out what's going on and get some help with it. I think the hardest part is not knowing and I've let this go on way too long without insisting we get to the bottom of it. I certainly don't want to end up like my brother - not getting tests done until you collapse from a grand mal seizure on the basketball court, end up with a diagnosis of glioblastoma (stage 3) at age 32. Wasted away and dead by 34. No way. I can't be too careful!

-Michelle

I asked my mom for one of my favorite food recipes she used to make and I wrote down what she said (she's very much like "oh a sprinkle of this and add enough to coat the top" about her recipes lol) and I realized this was a very FTS friendly meal. She calls it Meat and Zucchini. Can't get much simpler than that. I made it tonight for the first time for my large family and they all raved about it! Score! :-) They managed leave me a tiny bit for my lunch tomorrow so that's good. It's zucchini sliced, hamburger meat, tomato sauce, salt, pepper, garlic powder and onion powder, and Italian seasoning, add mozzerella on top with sliced olives all simmered for 20 minutes. I added a few fresh Roma tomatoes to tonight's dish because I was given a huge bag of them yesterday. I need to use them up! It was delicious. Glad I found a family recipe that's also good for me and my family. No one complained about no starch with this casserole!

-Michelle

Hello! I'm new to this forum and Fat to Skinny but I'm really liking it so far! I've been following it since this last Friday the 24th and so far I've already managed to drop 4 lbs! That is astonishing for me! I've been on and off Atkins for over 3 years and haven't been able to lose much weight (in fact I'm heavier than when I started to be honest I wasn't very faithful to it). I'm not even that sure what I'm doing differently except that I feel less limited somehow (?) even though I am eating less carbs. I love the concept of "don't feel deprived, just replace the foods you miss with better foods" and I never had that mentality before I guess. I have a pantry full of low carb baking stuff I'm dying to use and I'm feeling like a whole new world has opened up to me again! I can't believe how much better I am feeling already!

As for my goals, I honestly have no idea anymore how much I need to lose because I'm very out of touch with my body image. So I think measurements, sizes, and photos may be what I need to use for assessing my goal. Right now my goal is to get back down to a size 10. I'm a 12-14 now but honestly I think I look better as an eight. That's where I felt my best. However I am realistic - I am older now than before and I'd be ecstatic to be in my size 10 clothes again!

A little bit about me: I am a 38 yr old IT Director for a local government agency and have two of my six kids at home. Two are step children so they live with their mom and my oldest two are grown and in college. My kids still with me are my youngest child (7) and my son who is 17 and graduating on Saturday (yikes!).

I was always a very skinny teen but then I got married young and had three kids back to back (in 3 yrs) which took a toll on me physically. I gained weight after my second child was born and never lost it. Then I got divorced, a few years later, remarried and a couple years after that had my youngest daughter. I gained weight after she was born too. So I ended up about 60 lbs overweight or more. I lost 60 lbs on a pre packaged low calorie diet in '07 but had to starve myself even more than they recommended to make any significant amount of weight shift. I even did a super low calorie "rotation diet" and that worked the best for me but was so hard to stick to! I could just barely keep my weight off with lots of effort and lots of running.

Over those few years I ran about 6 half marathons and one full marathon (which burned me out on running for a couple years) and countless 5 & 10k races. Now I still "jog" once or twice a week but I'm just not that into it anymore. I'm happier to go for a walk or ride my exercise bike and watch a movie. I never did get to my goal weight after all of that. It was a constant, very hungry, miserable and grumpy time for me and I wondered if I'd have to starve the rest of my life to stay slim and run 30-35 miles per week forever.

In 2010 I found Atkins and I started out running about 35 miles per week on induction and felt a good endurance boost from burning fat as fuel instead of sugar (I used to have to eat up to 6-7 of those icky gels during a 10-12 mile training run). I suddenly was able to reduce my gels to 1 or none! That alone was amazing and about 5 lbs came off. My weight loss stopped after that first week and never really resumed. However, I got lazy pretty quickly and I was running slower without all of the sugar. However, I used to justify eating more carbs with "oh ill just run it off". It's a bad trap and I didn't reduce my carb intake when I wasn't running so I still managed to gain weight! So I gradually stopped running altogether. I also managed to gain about 20lbs too.

Thanks for reading! I've been lurking, reading, and learning from this forum and I really like the attitudes here: very accepting, kind, encouraging and not nit picky. I can't tell you how great the simplicity of this program is to me. Now I can eat at home, eat out, travel, and not stress about "What am I going to eat?" What a huge relief! This busy lady is actually creating menus, shopping, preparing meals ahead of time and packaging up snacks and making plans to make beef jerky. I am very impressed with the recipes so far. I made the chicken cordon blue, some taco meat for tacos or taco salad, spaghetti (with shiritake noodles), and roasted chicken ahead of time to eat later this week. My husband said to keep doing whatever it is I'm doing because I seem so happy and am looking good. *smirk* Nice to hear!

I love to cook so I will be trying lots of the recipes I am sure.

Have a great day everyone!

-Michelle