Posted on 01/04/2004 7:26:23 PM PST by SamAdams76
Next time you see a baker begging in the street, feel free to blame people like me for his plight. It seems that sales of bread have fallen so sharply in the US as a result of the spread of the Atkins diet and what happens there soon follows here that bakers are pondering a bleak future. One, Sara Lee, is attempting to revive its fortunes with a low-carbohydrate brand Delightful Bakery Breads which will go on sale next week; another large company will follow suit in May. Low-carb bread may sound like an absurdly contradictory invention, but I have a pretty good idea what it will be like, since I have already tried low-carb muffins, chocolate cake, crisps, chocolate and breakfast snacks. They have one thing in common. They all taste like ground cardboard.
Ive eaten them because I am a convert to the low-carb, high-fat Atkins diet. This means I am also a turncoat. Last year, I wrote on these pages in response to a report which claimed to find that fatties are thicker than stick insects that Im fat, Im thick and Im proud. Fine in theory, perhaps. But it turned out to be a lie. Soon afterwards, I started dieting.
So much for being fat and proud. I plead just one factor in mitigation. Take a look at the picture next to these words. See what I mean? I think the word is jowly. Less diplomatic souls might say porker.
Lets make a deal. If you have the heart to forgive me my slide from porker to porkies, then I wont mention if you, too, need to follow that January tradition and go on a diet. As millions look in the mirror this morning after the Christmas binge, my message is simple: its a doddle. Within a fortnight of starting, even I had lost 5lb. Five months on and I have lost more than three stone with more to come. For the first time ever, Im on a diet and don t have constant hunger pangs. Im eating plentifully and yet the weight is cascading off.
Ive noticed a common reaction from people I meet. Some are fascinated and want to know all the details. But quite a few are, well, angry. They seem somehow put out that I am losing my jowls so easily and so enjoyably.
Im now used to the looks of admiration and surprise at my success turning, when I mention Atkins, to sneering. Its usually followed by a variation on the theme of well, it isnt a proper diet, as if the only acceptable form of weight loss is one which involves much suffering (lets leave aside the low-carb muffins for a moment).
If these people themselves were fat I could understand their attitude, but my fat friends are generally hugely supportive. No, its normal-size people who seem affronted. Its also an exclusively male phenomenon. Neither I, nor anyone I know following this diet, has ever had such a response from a woman.
One newspaper diary column became mildly obsessed and rather offended by my weight loss, suggesting that its readers send me gifts of stollen and mince pies for Christmas.
The writer wasnt to know that I had already been allowing myself small periods off the diet anyway. I spent last week in Vienna, where it would have been a crime not to eat cake, and stuffed every carb I could find down my throat. But the more potatoes, chocolate and bread I put away, the hungrier I felt. Within a day back on the wagon my appetite had shrunk again and Im finding it as easy as ever to stick to the diet.
Now that the weight is dropping off, Ill happily endorse the fathead report which so annoyed me last year. It wasnt specific about the IQ points lost per pound gained, nor did it say if it worked in reverse.But thats an assumption Im prepared, for the good of mankind, to make. And since Ive lost 45lb, I must have put on quite a few IQ points. So if you have any tricky personal problems that need solving or any philosophical dilemmas which need unravelling, just get started on Atkins or ask me to apply my now enormous, lean, honed, brain power.
In the gym, I try to lift the amount of weight I have shed and wonder how I avoided a heart attack. So yes, this year Im now an evangelist for weight loss. Call me a turncoat if you want. I dont care. I feel better than I can ever remember before. If only I could so easily shed those self-interested charlatans and nutritionists who would stop me and others from losing weight and enjoying it.
I really would lose weight if I did that, since I'm left-handed.
So how'd you do? Hoping for good news for you.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.