Yup. I'm gonna do it..

I guess I'll just post this here and duck. I've handed out a lot of grief to others who have followed the Atkins diet over the years. I have often made comments, voiced concern over others' future health, and just plain proclaimed it as wrong. However, I'm about to change my tune.

I've decided to give it a run. Why? What would possess me? Well, let me tell you. There are a number of things that have led me to this point.

1) For the last few years, I have been working to follow traditional food guidelines (see Weston A. Price Foundation). Traditional Food is food raised and prepared according to traditional (slow food) methods. This is the way people ate prior to the modern food industry. Ideally, it includes grass-fed, pastured meats and eggs, raw dairy products, traditional fermented foods (yogurt, kefir, saurkraut to name a few examples), minimal traditionally prepared grains (like sourdough bread) and organically raised fruits and vegetables.

Lessons learned: fat is not evil; grains aren't all that; sugar is the debil.

2) The value of grains as a food source has come into question in my mind. A few years ago, you may know, we were on a gluten and casein free diet. I think a major problem with it is that we subbed a lot of starchy crap in place of things we missed--bread, pretzels, cakes, cookies. What was wrong with that? The problem was that the reason we were removing gluten was ultimately to deal with yeast and leaky gut syndrome. With further study and insight, I am pretty sure that the diet we were on, though it was without gluten and casein, was not one that would rid anyone of yeast. It's also kind of sad if you know the amount of thought and effort and tears from everyone involved that went into it. I think there is likely a place for properly prepared grains (soaked or sprouted) in a balanced diet. But, that probably doesn't include rice flour, potato starch and guar gum, LOL.

3)I haven't lost a single pound since Reagan was born. I'm still at full term pregnancy weight. I didn't even lose the 7 lbs. 12 oz. that was Regan. And, if you don't recall, Reagan is 37 1/2 months old.

4) I have a serious sugar problem. Serious.

So, I've been perusing eating plans. Low carb diets really appear to be what I need. I've dropped sugar outright for a good six weeks during the last year and not lost any weight. I presume I made up for it somewhere with carbs, and whether they were good or bad carbs, and I think they were "good," they apparently caused me some problem. I also didn't cut fruit.

So, I'm thinking that this diet is just what I need. I will be watching the cheese closely because I am not sure it's OK for me. It is a feeder of yeast, and I'm quite certain I have systemic yeast (reason #5). I will not use Splenda. Nope, not gonna do it. I may use some stevia. My hope is that the induction will help me get through sugar withdrawal. BTW, a high protien diet is recommended for people who are recovering alchohol and sugar addicts, so another reason why this makes sense. I will continue with taking cod liver oil daily and increasing my intake of coconut oil. I think both of these are very important, and certainly don't appear to be contraindicative on this plan.

Not quite sure when we're going to get started here, but within the next two weeks. Ben and I will be doing this together.

Teamwork

It's time, now, for some restructuring in our household. I've been thinking about it for awhile. About a week ago, I put together chore schedules and lists for each of the kids. I can't say they're totally up and running yet. I told them on Sunday that they were now in effect. So far, they seem to be going OK. There has been some balking and disbelief about what they have been asked to do--"I have to clean the bathroom?!" But, it has been done, and I think that they are seeing that the chores I have asked are not majorly time consuming. Killian did the weekly cleaning on the bathroom yesterday afternoon. I did come in and supervise and give some pointers (like mop the floor as you back out rather than all around you, LOL). Perfection? Probably not. But it's shiny, and cleaner than it was, and I didn't do it!

I am sure that in a week or two, I will need to refine the system, figuring out what might need to be done more often, better checklists to make sure everything is done, etc.

I also just read Have a New Kid by Friday. I have some mixed feelings on some of his advice and flat-out disagree with some, but it has given me some ideas and inspiration for working with the kids behavior-wise.

We placed our first seed order of the year to Totally Tomatoes. I will share that info in Remaking Suburbia.