The Diet Chronicles. Ep1 – The Atkins Diet

Welcome to the Friday edition of the blog. Brought to you by extreme procrastination, the kind that would rival a sloth on holiday.  

I am finally embarking on The Chronicles of Dieting. Unfortunately, unlike CS Lewis’, these chronicles won’t take you through a wardrobe into a wondrous, magical land. More like into a pantry in the middle of the night to find that hidden bag of Cheetos on the top shelf. Depending on who you ask that can be equally magical and wondrous.

This might be a weekly thing, maybe monthly…maybe yearly considering how hard I procrastinate. I thought I’d start pretty tame. Nothing too crazy so you don’t automatically think I need professional help. So we’ll start with the Atkins Diet

Let me begin with a Reader’s Warning: All of my stories are true. These are all ways in which I lost weight TEMPORARILY. Yes, I lost weight, but it didn’t stay off and often it would come back with a vengeance. None of my stories are instructional manuals. If you want to lose weight consult your physician.

Also, footnote, side note, front note, back note, etc. These stories will not be posted in chronological order

This story begins as all many of my diet stories do, with my mother. Nancy has always been a proponent of diet culture. It’s how she lives and breathes. Thus and thusly it’s how I live and breathe as well. Don’t judge us. These are our own beautifully twisted memories and my life would not be nearly as colorful without them. And you would have nothing to read. It’s a gift.

When I was a junior in high school, 16 years old and long time diet vet by this time, my mom began talking about this new diet with no carbs and lots of weight loss. “We can lose 15 pounds in two weeks!” The Atkins Diet. For all you #ketofam people, this is the OG keto diet. Basically the same thing. (Be quiet, Mildred. I know there are differences! I am not here to explain them.) Nancy was probably much more informed on the matter than I was. She had the book. All I did was figure out what I could and couldn’t eat. I was immediately drawn to it because it was all the protein I could possibly consume with NO RAG-RETS!

For those who were (are?) really serious about Atkins, understand that my 16 year old brain only grasped on to, “Don’t eat carbs.” I wasn’t all about the Atkins “phases” or gradually adding back carbs. Also, the Atkins book was like one of those novels that’s been shrunken down to mini size with small print and too many pages. Like romance novels from a spinning rack. (I don’t know why they do this to books. It should be outlawed.) And I wasn’t about to read the whole thing. I’m a reader, but come on, this was too much. I read what I could and forged on.

I really like rules which is probably why I am a serial dieter. I love a new set of rules or steps to follow. The one rule in the Atkins book that I clung to was that you should never be hungry. Actually, the rule is “eat until you are satisfied, but not overly full.” That’s generally a good rule for life, but whatever, I read it like, “never, ever be hungry!” And I sure was faithful to follow that rule. I ate all the time!

I’ve found that if there is a certain type of food that is a “freebie” on a diet, I will eat tons of it because my brain is convinced I’m starving. For example on one diet I tried, cucumbers were “free” so I ate them every single day for every snack and every time I felt peckish. On the Atkins diet I convinced myself that meat, cheese, and eggs were “freebies” because they weren’t carbs. Meat. Cheese. Eggs. Meat. Cheese. Eggs. MeatCheeseEggs. ALL DAY LONG. I did it. I ate huge breakfasts of bacon and eggs. During lunch, another Atkins buddy and I would leave school to get double cheeseburgers (plural because more than one) with no buns. Dinner was the same. More meat. More cheese. I frequented the Rudy’s BBQ drive-thru often enough that I should have had a punch card.

I don’t remember eating a single vegetable. I do however remember telling someone who offered me a carrot, “Oh, no thank you. There’s too much sugar in carrots. I’m on a diet.” Lord Jesus, bless me. An idiot.

Here’s the other thing, I’m sure I didn’t potty the whole time I dieted. How could I? All that cheese. But I lost a quick 25 lbs.

I make this sound like I had no trouble sticking to this, but I wanted to smash my face into a loaf of bread from day one. I dreamed of pasta, tortillas, chips, and white-bread sandwiches like they were manna from heaven that Christ himself was withholding from me. When I removed a bun from a burger or skipped the rice at a meal it was all I could do not to shovel that carby goodness straight into my mouth.

And then my 17th birthday arrived and I succumbed to a bowl of pasta and that was the end of that. I’m pretty sure all my diets expire with a celebratory meal.

At some point I heard a rumor that Dr. Atkins, the founder of the diet, died of a heart attack and congestive heart failure. I don’t know if that’s true, but it makes a little sense

Have a fun Friday! Go eat some meat.

♥H.