LBJ From Minnesota’s Low Carb Success Story

Success Stories

LBJ from Minnesota is 53 years old and 5′ 4″ tall. LBJ has been low carbing for since April of 1999, and has been at the maintenance level for nearly four years. She follows the Protein Power program. When LBJ began low carbing, she weighed 150 pounds and wore a size 14. Currently, LBJ weighs 114 pounds and 1s wearing a size 3. She has dropped 36 pounds and more than 5 dress sizes!

“When I was a child, I was severely overweight,” LBJ began. “When I was in my early 20s and discovered boys, I wanted to be someone they would take notice of. I dieted just by simply tossing out some of my meal. It drove my mother crazy, but the pounds came off in about six months. I stabilized my weight at about 110 pounds back then, and I kept this weight until I reached my mid 40s.

“At that time, the pounds started to slowly creep back on. I really wasn’t overweight at 135 pounds; I was just a little more rounded,” LBJ smiled. Then menopause hit in my late 40s, and my face started to look like a chipmunk’s. I was topping the scales at 150 pounds. For my size and frame, this was obese. I’m 5′ 4″ tall and have very tiny bones. I wear a size five shoe, and I have to buy children’s watch bands because normal adult ones are too large and won’t fit me.”

“The push to lose weight began in earnest when I had my picture taken for my driver’s license renewal in March of 1999. That is my “before picture.” I couldn’t believe that this fat woman was me. It sort of sneaks up on you! I looked at pictures that had been taken of me, and my legs resembled tree trunks. I was VERY sturdy!! I was a true Minnesota woman, capable of felling trees, cutting and splitting them, and hauling them into the house all by myself. This is NOT my image of what an ideal woman should look lie,” LBJ laughed.

“I started a rigorous exercise program and ate the prescribed high carb/low fat foods. However, all I did was gain more pounds. My well-meaning friends told me that this was natural for a woman going through the change. I didn’t want to be THAT natural! I was hungry all the time, and I consistently had a lightheaded sensation in the afternoons. It felt like my blood sugar was out of wack.”

“Then my sister in law told me about Protein Power. She had been put on it by her doctor and had already lost weight. I was intrigued, and bought the book. I read it from cover to cover, and started low carbing immediately. The first week, I lost 10 pounds! It settled down after that to about 3 pounds a week, but it was so easy to eat this way.”

“On Protein Power I was never hungry. For snacks, I would eat cheeses. Breakfast was a joy because I was eating eggs and bacon again. I found out that I could convert my favorite recipes to be low carb very easily. I lost the 40 pounds I needed to lose in just 5 months!”

LBJ said the best part of low carbing for her is that she is ALWAYS satisfied after a meal. “I can eat REAL homemade custard ice cream, and I really enjoy developing new recipes for meals and treats,” she said. “The bad part is that I do still miss my potatoes. But I do have them every once in a while, and that seems to salve my cravings.”

LBJ has experienced many health benefits from being a low carber. “My blood pressure went down to what it was when I was a young woman. I don’t get those lightheaded spells in the afternoon from my blood sugar spiking. I don’t have stomach pains anymore. I used to have such severe pains that I would turn as white as a ghost. Those are a thing of the past!” LBJ exclaimed.

“I usually get good responses from my friends, though only a few have tried it. They just can’t give up their favorite carbohydrates, whatever they might be. I only have my brother alive in my family, and his reaction was that I was out of my mind for doing this. Of course, he’s on blood pressure medications, cholesterol lowering medications, and he’s fat. But he’s ‘right,’ and I’m ‘insane.’ I am thin, healthy, on no medications, but totally insane.” LBJ shook her head. “About 50% of my hubby’s family is following a low carbohydrate lifestyle. The rest are open to it.”

“I wanted share how following a low carbohydrate lifestyle made me search for a different way of feeding my dogs. It might be something that someone else following a low carbohydrate lifestyle person just might be interested in, because it is truly the best way to feed our companion animals.”

“One of our Irish setters had irritable bowel syndrome, which only seemed to act up during stress. Then itprogressed to irritable bowel disease, and I was afraid that we weren’t going to be able to stop the disease. My hubby, Greg, and I had changed to eating a protein diet for our health in 1999, and one of the benefits of eating protein was that it relieved our acid reflux. On a high carb/low fat diet, Greg would literally eat a bottle of Tums at night. I would have excruciating stomach pains that almost made me faint with the pain. After we switched to a protein-based diet, the stomach problems disappeared. In fact, we haven’t bought a bottle of Tums since then. But this got me to thinking about why I was feeding my carnivorous canines a diet high in carbohydrates. I also wondered if a protein-based diet would stop IBD in my dogs. I decided that switching the dogs to a diet of raw meaty bones was maybe the answer to better health for them.

“My next hurdle before switching our dogs to a raw diet was my husband. I had decided that I really wanted to do this, but I didn’t know what his reaction would be. But, being a very sensible man, his response to me was, “That’s what they would eat in the wild, isn’t it?”

“The domestic canine’s digestive system is exactly the same as their wild brethren. They are built to get their nutrition from eating raw meat, raw bones and semi-digested vegetables. When we cook meats for our dogs, they can’t absorb the nutrients fully. And you’ll see this in the amount of stool that they produce when you feed a kibble. My large raw fed male Irish setter will have a stool about the same size as what a kibble-fed toy poodle gives out. Only one small baggie will be enough for a dog show pickup! No more cramming your pockets full of baggies when your exercise your dog. Even a premium dog food will cause a dog to have about 3 times the amount of stool versus a raw-fed dog. A raw-fed dog’s stool is firm and dry and crumbles into the ground within a day. No more poop scooping at home!! And no more messy poops.”

“After we switched to feeding RAW, my IBD Irish setter was cured in just a couple of days, and hasn’t had an episode since then. Everyone else seemed to get a boost of energy from their new diet, which may or may not be a good thing with an Irish setter!” LBJ laughed “I’ve had blood work done on Winston, our oldest dog at age 11, and he has the numbers of a young dog. Tribble, our little girl, started to grow a luxuriant coat, and we were able to finish her championship. And there’s no more picky eaters in our bunch; they all charge to their food bowls. Even when one of the females is in season, the boys will only stop eating for a couple of days.”

“I started with feeding the dogs chicken necks, and yes, I was a little scared. I crated everyone and gave them a neck. And everyone, except Chakotay, knew exactly how you eat them. Crunch, crunch, crunch, and they were gone. Chakotay wasn’t too sure about this slippery piece of neck. I gave it to him; he spit it out. I gave it to him again; he spit it out again. So then I tried a game of catch. Toss the neck; he’d catch it. And spit it out. OK. Change tactics. I took him out of the crate and gave a good toss so that he’d have to bite down when he caught it. And that worked! The light bulb came on in his brain when he realized that there was some darn good marrow inside that slimy piece of chicken neck.”

“I now feed the dogs a diet of chicken RMBs (raw meaty bones), veggie glop, and organ meat. The Irish setter does the best on poultry. Turkey bones are usually too big for them to handle, so I’ve settled on chicken. Now everyone has heard that you should never feed chicken bones to dogs, but this refers to COOKED chicken bones. You should never feed any cooked bones to your dog. When chicken is raw, the meat is hard and the bones are flexible. When you cook chicken, the meat becomes soft, and the bones are brittle. With raw chicken, your dog gets exercise while eating, and also naturally cleans their teeth and gums. They also don’t have doggy breath anymore – another benefit of feeding RMBs.”

“I don’t add many supplements to the dogs’ food except for flax seed and salmon oils. The dogs get their nutrition from the food they eat, which is just how it should be. I will NEVER feed them kibble again!” LBJ concluded.

I asked LBJ if she had any advice to offer to fellow low carbers about:

• Cheating: “If you cheat, enjoy it! Then just start again the next day. Don’t make a habit of it.”
• Stalls: “I increased my fat to start losing weight again. I also didn’t eat any peanuts. Peanuts seemed to stall my weight loss.”

LBJ concluded by adding, “The most important thing is to take your supplements religiously during your initial week of weight loss. Learn to cook if you don’t already know how – from scratch! And, finally, don’t forget to look for hidden carbs.”

LBJ enjoys support groups on the Internet. She is a moderator on one  of her favorite groups:

Click here: Yahoo! Groups : Atkinteers