NOTE: The original version of this column has been altered at the request of the newspaper referenced:
With all the wealth of information about the Atkins diet that is available at your fingertips today, you would think that outright ignorance in journalism these days would be eradicated. No such luck!
An op-ed piece just goes to show you that the media version of the Atkins diet (which has nothing at all to do with the one the late Dr. Robert C. Atkins wrote about in his many books) lives on.
In his column, which I was requested to removed, he makes light of how his Jewish upbringing forces him to do what he thinks is the Atkins diet for Passover.
QUOTE FROM ARTICLE REMOVED BY REQUEST FROM NEWSPAPER
Well, if you are doing the Atkins diet, then you are defintely NOT an “anti-carb crusader.” I eat lots of carbs and actually enjoy finding the many healthy carbs I am encouraged to eat as part of the Atkins, low-carb way of eating. This idea that you remove every single carb from your diet is another one of those LIES that continues on about the Atkins diet. It’s just not true.
He said he has to shun leavened bread and any kind of grain that can be used to make bread of any kind. So during Passover he kept a stash of eggs on hand to eat for breakfast every day, had chicken for lunch with no sides and he can’t remember what he had for dinner because he was suffering too much from “food depression.”
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Can you believe people actually think what he has described is the Atkins diet? Come on people, if it was THAT bad then nobody would ever do this diet. Sheeez! During the Induction phase of Atkins you are keeping your carbs to around 20g daily which gives you more than enough wiggle room for creativity. The most important part of this two-week phase of the Atkins diet is to get your body into fat-burning mode known as ketosis.
While you probably should stick with a regular menu of foods during Induction to get your body going on low-carb, the exciting part is when that two weeks is up. That’s the time you start adding back carbs weekly and can start making lots of delicious and nutritious recipes that are available in cookbooks and all over on the Internet. The possibilities are only as limited as your imagination. This whole Atkins is boring belief is yet another one of those oft-told LIES about the Atkins diet. Again, it’s just not true.
After purchasing some matzah to fill his appetite for a bread, he said he made salmon for dinner but secretly wish it included rice, too.
Yucky poo! Just thinking about that just makes me want to hurl now. All that nasty white stuff is certain disaster for your blood sugar levels because it’s loaded with excess carbohydrates you don’t need and, trust me, you won’t miss. The idea that you’ll long for foods such as rice, potatoes, pasta, and more when you are livin’ la vida low-carb is yet another one of those LIES that tend to pop up about the Atkins diet. Do I need to tell you, it’s just not true either.
At the end of Passover when his not-so-”Atkins diet” was over, he ate an English muffin and declared the end to his low-carb dieting ways.
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Well, sir, the problem is you have never even been ON the Atkins diet so you wouldn’t know what it is like to do so. While I know you were just trying to be cute with your silly little column about your experience during Passover, you are doing a great disservice to those of us who have actually chosen to eat this way to lose weight and get healthy as well as to those millions more who actually NEED to be on a low-carb diet to get their obesity and health under control.
I strongly urge you to study up a little more about what you write about before you resort to such ignorance again because it really makes you come across as unprofessional and inexperienced. The next time you decide to write about the low-carb lifestyle or the Atkins diet, why don’t you swing on over to my blog and find out for yourself what this amazing way of eating is REALLY all about in the real world rather than relying on what you have “heard” about it from your media friends living in fantasy land. Is that too much to ask?
4-25-06 UPDATE: The columnist who wrote this article responded to me today in an e-mail.
Jimmy,
I’m sorry if any of my comments offended you, but the column was just that – a column. It was written in jest and meant to put fun in the boring holiday of Passover.
Thanks for your feedback.
You just don’t get it, do you? It’s not so much that your article “offended” me as much as it created the wrong impression about what the Atkins diet is. While I appreciate the spirit of what you were trying to do with your column using humor to make your points, I think your misrepresentations about what livin’ la vida low-carb is all about do more harm than good. If Passover is “boring” to you, then why celebrate it? It seems that kind of “going-through-the-motions” of a religious ritual is less about the convictions of your heart and more about attempting to please someone else. Be a man! It’ll serve you well in all aspects of your life. THANKS for responding to my concerns.
