Atkins For Life? How Long Should You Stay On the Atkins Diet?
Monday, March 23rd, 2009The Atkins Diet was designed by Dr. Robert Atkins in the 1970s. He designed the diet to followed forever. That is, the diet is more of a lifestyle than a fad diet. The Dr. was a proponent of ketogenic fat burning. This is accomplished by consuming few than 40 grams of carbohydrate daily. He also suggested using dietary supplements to maintain nutrition within the body’s systems.
The Atkins Diet has 4 stages: the Induction Diet, the Ongoing Weight Loss (OWL) Diet, the Pre-Maintenance Diet, and lastly the Lifetime Maintenance Diet.
The Induction Diet strictly limits carb intake. Only 20 grams of carbs are allowed daily, but to offset this there is a generous allowance of fat & protein. The suggested source of carbs during this stage is low starch vegetables. This stage lasts 14 days and is followed by the OWL diet.
The OWL Diet Phase is more forgiving. At this point, participants can consume 40 grams of carbs per day. This phase lasts until dieters reach their ideal weight. Once this goal is accomplished, dieters move to the pre-maintenance diet phase. Now the participant must establish how many carbs they can consume without gaining weight. This is known as finding their carb tolerance level.
At this point, where dieters know how carbs affect them individually they have reached Lifetime Maintenance. They will now continually (read forever) avoid sugar, hydrogenated oils and fats, processed foods, and worst of all white flour!