Aliyah
I'm 14 years old and I'm on the Atkins diet. I was wondering what I should eat, especially for lunch because I usually have sandwiches but the Atkins diet tells you to stay away from bread. Please help. And would much appreciate it if you guys wouldn't say ohh your perfect the say you are or your to young... Thanks
Answer
Avoiding bread is a good first step on any weight loss plan. But there are more effective and healthier plans than Atkins. Atkins is right about some things - you don't need bread, or any grains. You definitely don't need sugar or all the excess carbs in the standard American diet. But you do need a little bit of healthy carbs from veggies and some fruits, especially if you're exercising (as you should be) and growing (as you are.)
Try a better plan like Whole30 http://whole9life.com/2012/08/the-whole30-program/
Whole30 is about eating real food, and learning good habits for life so you can maintain optimal health and your best weight, forever.
Plus, it's free to do it, and there are whole communities and forums devoted to getting you through it. You can talk with your parents about it. It's a healthy plan, and has benefits for everyone. Maybe your folks will even do it with you. There's no chance you'll get your parents to do Atkins with you, and very little chance you'll be able to keep your food at home compliant with Atkins. You're setting yourself up for a lot of dinnertime fights and subsequent failure on Atkins. Plus, Atkins will make you constipated.
On Whole30, you eat real, whole foods. You avoid all grains, all added sugar and fake sugar, white potatoes, legumes, dairy, and certain food additives. These foods are all excluded because they a) mess with blood sugar, b) mess with hormones, c) create addictive behavior, and/or d) create inflammation in the body. Many of them do more than one of those things.
There aren't special breakfast-only foods and dinner-only foods. At every meal, you eat veggies and protein. For lunch, just bring leftovers from other meals.
For breakfast, lunch, and dinner, choose foods you like - it doesn't have to be eggs for breakfast and chicken for dinner. Every meal has to include lots of veggies, a healthy source of protein like meat, fish, or eggs, and a healthy source of fat, like olives, olive oil, coconut, or avocado.
Vegetables are necessary at every meal, and should be on your plate any time you are trying to lose weight, get healthier, or feel better in any way. They are nutritionally dense, which means they have a lot of vitamins, but very few calories. They also have a lot of fiber, which helps you feel full. And they have small amounts of good carbohydrates, which fuel exercise, especially cardio. Of course you should choose large quantities of lower carb veggies like greens, and smaller portions of the sweetest veggies, but diversity in your diet is very important!
A dense source of protein is necessary because you need it to build muscle and perform hundreds of other actions your body needs to do in every cell all the time. Protein is also important because your body can actually turn protein into carbohydrate when it needs to! High quality protein is essential.
Fat is necessary because it makes you feel full. It is also a good fuel for your body. After a couple weeks on a limited carb, grain free diet, your body will learn to burn fat more and more and that is a very good thing! Your body will learn to burn the fat from your food AND the fat from your belly. Plus, many vitamins in veggies can only be absorbed and used by your body when you eat them with fat. There is a very good reason that salad dressings are made with olive oil. Oil helps your body get the most out of the healthy, nutritious salad! Plus, it makes the light salad a lot more filling, so you won't be reaching for an unhealthy snack an hour later.
So for any meal, try:
Scrambled eggs or omelette with spinach and avocado, with salad on the side
Meat loaf made with lots of finely chopped veggies, with tomato sauce on top (not sugary ketchup) and sauteed collards on the side
Baked chicken with kale salad and roasted butternut squash
Broiled salmon with steamed broccoli, and riced cauliflower made with coconut milk
A "sandwich" made with your favorite sandwich fillings, tomato, mustard, and homemade mayonnaise - use Boston lettuce or nori seaweed or both as the wrap
A burger, but instead of a bun have it on a roasted portobello mushroom cap
Frittata (basically a baked omelette) with lots of leftover veggies inside
Carrots, celery sticks, and bell peppers with pate or liverwurst
Meatballs and red sauce, over roasted spaghetti squash
Fried eggs over a nice big salad
Sushi made with chopped veggies and avocado, or riced cauliflower, or minced carrots and parsnips, instead of rice
Homemade crab cakes or salmon cakes (look up paleo recipes online for these and more)
Just remember every meal has to have veggies, it has to have protein, and it has to have a reasonable amount of a natural fat. No fake stuff, no weird stuff, no hydrogenated garbage. Only real food!
Avoiding bread is a good first step on any weight loss plan. But there are more effective and healthier plans than Atkins. Atkins is right about some things - you don't need bread, or any grains. You definitely don't need sugar or all the excess carbs in the standard American diet. But you do need a little bit of healthy carbs from veggies and some fruits, especially if you're exercising (as you should be) and growing (as you are.)
Try a better plan like Whole30 http://whole9life.com/2012/08/the-whole30-program/
Whole30 is about eating real food, and learning good habits for life so you can maintain optimal health and your best weight, forever.
Plus, it's free to do it, and there are whole communities and forums devoted to getting you through it. You can talk with your parents about it. It's a healthy plan, and has benefits for everyone. Maybe your folks will even do it with you. There's no chance you'll get your parents to do Atkins with you, and very little chance you'll be able to keep your food at home compliant with Atkins. You're setting yourself up for a lot of dinnertime fights and subsequent failure on Atkins. Plus, Atkins will make you constipated.
On Whole30, you eat real, whole foods. You avoid all grains, all added sugar and fake sugar, white potatoes, legumes, dairy, and certain food additives. These foods are all excluded because they a) mess with blood sugar, b) mess with hormones, c) create addictive behavior, and/or d) create inflammation in the body. Many of them do more than one of those things.
There aren't special breakfast-only foods and dinner-only foods. At every meal, you eat veggies and protein. For lunch, just bring leftovers from other meals.
For breakfast, lunch, and dinner, choose foods you like - it doesn't have to be eggs for breakfast and chicken for dinner. Every meal has to include lots of veggies, a healthy source of protein like meat, fish, or eggs, and a healthy source of fat, like olives, olive oil, coconut, or avocado.
Vegetables are necessary at every meal, and should be on your plate any time you are trying to lose weight, get healthier, or feel better in any way. They are nutritionally dense, which means they have a lot of vitamins, but very few calories. They also have a lot of fiber, which helps you feel full. And they have small amounts of good carbohydrates, which fuel exercise, especially cardio. Of course you should choose large quantities of lower carb veggies like greens, and smaller portions of the sweetest veggies, but diversity in your diet is very important!
A dense source of protein is necessary because you need it to build muscle and perform hundreds of other actions your body needs to do in every cell all the time. Protein is also important because your body can actually turn protein into carbohydrate when it needs to! High quality protein is essential.
Fat is necessary because it makes you feel full. It is also a good fuel for your body. After a couple weeks on a limited carb, grain free diet, your body will learn to burn fat more and more and that is a very good thing! Your body will learn to burn the fat from your food AND the fat from your belly. Plus, many vitamins in veggies can only be absorbed and used by your body when you eat them with fat. There is a very good reason that salad dressings are made with olive oil. Oil helps your body get the most out of the healthy, nutritious salad! Plus, it makes the light salad a lot more filling, so you won't be reaching for an unhealthy snack an hour later.
So for any meal, try:
Scrambled eggs or omelette with spinach and avocado, with salad on the side
Meat loaf made with lots of finely chopped veggies, with tomato sauce on top (not sugary ketchup) and sauteed collards on the side
Baked chicken with kale salad and roasted butternut squash
Broiled salmon with steamed broccoli, and riced cauliflower made with coconut milk
A "sandwich" made with your favorite sandwich fillings, tomato, mustard, and homemade mayonnaise - use Boston lettuce or nori seaweed or both as the wrap
A burger, but instead of a bun have it on a roasted portobello mushroom cap
Frittata (basically a baked omelette) with lots of leftover veggies inside
Carrots, celery sticks, and bell peppers with pate or liverwurst
Meatballs and red sauce, over roasted spaghetti squash
Fried eggs over a nice big salad
Sushi made with chopped veggies and avocado, or riced cauliflower, or minced carrots and parsnips, instead of rice
Homemade crab cakes or salmon cakes (look up paleo recipes online for these and more)
Just remember every meal has to have veggies, it has to have protein, and it has to have a reasonable amount of a natural fat. No fake stuff, no weird stuff, no hydrogenated garbage. Only real food!
50th Wedding Anniversary Dinner - Parents?
Katie09
My parents' 50th Wedding Anniversary is in June 2012, and I don't know where to start with planning something. So, here is the background. There are 3 of us siblings, me and my 2 brothers. My parents, at this point in their life, are retired from their office jobs (ages 72 and 69) and they don't socialize too often anymore other than with 5 friends they see once a month and with only (2) living relatives which is my mom's brother and his wife. My father came down with Parkinson's Disease about 8 years ago, and now is starting to have problems walking and I will have to figure this into where we go or what we decide to do (No anniversary couples dance). So, my question is, if I decide to do a dinner (30 people) at a restaurant (which I am thinking the restaurant they had their wedding reception in 1962), what do we do the entire time? There will be no dancing, so should that mean no background music either? I was thinking of doing a video montage of photos to music of them throughout the years which could be played after the dinner, and order an anniversary cake to be delivered to the restaurant/reception hall? Any input on how to have a small 30 person "anniversary dinner" at a restaurant would be greatly appreciated. :)
Answer
I think that planning this far in advance should make this so much easier for you next June and is a smart way to go about something which is obviously creating some stress for you. .
There is nothing wrong with planning an evening which includes dancing. As a matter of fact did you know that people with PD who can barely walk can get out on the dance floor and tango? Something about the rhythm of the music. But almost any type of dancing might be fine for your father especially if he and your mother like to dance. If he doesn't dance, there's nothing stopping her and he can just enjoy watching.
Even if you don't have dancing background music is a great idea.. Just make sure that you chose selections of your parents favorites or from the decade in which they were married. Assign the task to create the CDs to be played that evening to one of your brothers if possible. Some people have pieces which they especially associate with other good memories - how appropriate for a 50th wedding anniversary.
That said, you'd be surprised at how a slide show and/or video montage will entertain everyone, especially if you can get photo and video contributions from all beforehand. You can even ask or make videos of friends and family members just for the occasion. That way people can be comfortable and prepared when the videos are made.
One important thing is to get everyone to contribute. People like to be involved and I'm sure that your parents will appreciate the results.
Keep the crowd as small as possible so that your father isn't overwhelmed but don't leave out people who would like to be there for your parents.
Take into consideration the difficulties your father has when he moves so that the tables can be set up with sufficient space for navigation. Ask your mother if your father has any other needs with which you might not be familiar.
I do not recommend a buffet when the guest of honor has trouble walking. I would suggest talking to the restaurant for their suggestions and options. You might be surprised at their familiarity with different scenarios. You want to make sure that your parents are seated in such a way that they can see the room and greet people.
Make a tentative program of events. People arrive, the guests are greeted, is there a cocktail hour our a time for hors oeuvres? and so on. You will probably want music from the start so that the room never feels empty. I think that actually printing a program which can then be a keepsake is a great idea. To continue, do you want to have the video after dinner or break it into segments? Some before and others afterwards.
Don't try to take on all aspects of the evening yourself. Please share some of the tasks with your brothers. You don't want any hard feelings but of course, someone has to be the leader and I think that task is obviously yours. Others can help you with your golden anniversary elements. Your limits are a reasonable budget.
A couple of last things. Ask you mother if your father has any problems eating or swallowing as that could mean that he needs a different meal or that the menu needs adjustment. Also inquire about the timing of medications - if your father gets tired easily (both a symptom and a medication side effect) you'll want to plan the timing around that.
A wonderful present for both of your parents would be massages - not spa massages although that would benefit your mother - but real medical massage sessions which can be very beneficial for your father to aid in symptom and pain relief. For your mother, to help her relax from her caregiving.
I think that planning this far in advance should make this so much easier for you next June and is a smart way to go about something which is obviously creating some stress for you. .
There is nothing wrong with planning an evening which includes dancing. As a matter of fact did you know that people with PD who can barely walk can get out on the dance floor and tango? Something about the rhythm of the music. But almost any type of dancing might be fine for your father especially if he and your mother like to dance. If he doesn't dance, there's nothing stopping her and he can just enjoy watching.
Even if you don't have dancing background music is a great idea.. Just make sure that you chose selections of your parents favorites or from the decade in which they were married. Assign the task to create the CDs to be played that evening to one of your brothers if possible. Some people have pieces which they especially associate with other good memories - how appropriate for a 50th wedding anniversary.
That said, you'd be surprised at how a slide show and/or video montage will entertain everyone, especially if you can get photo and video contributions from all beforehand. You can even ask or make videos of friends and family members just for the occasion. That way people can be comfortable and prepared when the videos are made.
One important thing is to get everyone to contribute. People like to be involved and I'm sure that your parents will appreciate the results.
Keep the crowd as small as possible so that your father isn't overwhelmed but don't leave out people who would like to be there for your parents.
Take into consideration the difficulties your father has when he moves so that the tables can be set up with sufficient space for navigation. Ask your mother if your father has any other needs with which you might not be familiar.
I do not recommend a buffet when the guest of honor has trouble walking. I would suggest talking to the restaurant for their suggestions and options. You might be surprised at their familiarity with different scenarios. You want to make sure that your parents are seated in such a way that they can see the room and greet people.
Make a tentative program of events. People arrive, the guests are greeted, is there a cocktail hour our a time for hors oeuvres? and so on. You will probably want music from the start so that the room never feels empty. I think that actually printing a program which can then be a keepsake is a great idea. To continue, do you want to have the video after dinner or break it into segments? Some before and others afterwards.
Don't try to take on all aspects of the evening yourself. Please share some of the tasks with your brothers. You don't want any hard feelings but of course, someone has to be the leader and I think that task is obviously yours. Others can help you with your golden anniversary elements. Your limits are a reasonable budget.
A couple of last things. Ask you mother if your father has any problems eating or swallowing as that could mean that he needs a different meal or that the menu needs adjustment. Also inquire about the timing of medications - if your father gets tired easily (both a symptom and a medication side effect) you'll want to plan the timing around that.
A wonderful present for both of your parents would be massages - not spa massages although that would benefit your mother - but real medical massage sessions which can be very beneficial for your father to aid in symptom and pain relief. For your mother, to help her relax from her caregiving.
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