Hello all!

Is this the regular forum? I swear when I used to peruse this site it looked a lot different (maybe about a year ago...)

Anyways, I'm just wondering when the body makes the switch from losing water-weight to losing fat.

Thank you :)

As far as I understand it - your body needs water to aid digestion. It requires more water to process carbohydrates then it does to process proteins or fats.

Therefore when you discontinue eating high carbohydrate foods your body does not hold on to water that it would normally have needed to digest your food intake.

It is kind of a misleading term in that way. You don't actually LOSE any water - not directly - you just don't keep it in your system, like you would have on a high carb diet.

This results in a 'loss' on the weight scale. But you may not have actually lost any fat yet.

Our muscles and our brain require a fuel called glucose.

In order to begin losing fat you need to burn off the glucose stored in your body (we usually have 24-48 hours worth stored up) Once the glucose ( which is easily converted from carbs ) is gone - the body begins to use stored and ingested fats for creating it's glucose requirements.

It is a big longer of a process - your body prefers to use carbs, but we are ingeniously designed to have this back up plan for when carbs are not readily available. It is why we store fat in the first place.

Since most of us don't eat enough protein or dietary fat for what our bodies require in glucose the body will go to the stored fat. This is what the induction phase of Atkins does. It takes your body from a carb burning phase to the fat burning phase.

I hope this answered your question. I can tell you I have been on the Atkins lifestyle for 5 years now and am a loyal advocate of the plan.

Hi Hannah,
C gave you some great information!

It typically takes a couple of days to switch to burning fat. The inital loss is usually water - perhaps up to a week. It will vary greatly from individual to individual.
:)