atomic sagebrush
January 16th, 2013, 05:27 PM
If you're looking for LE Diet support and meal ideas please check out the following threads:
https://www.genderdreaming.com/forum/trying-to-conceive-a-girl/54174-brand-sparkly-pink-new-diet-thread-girl-sways.html
https://www.genderdreaming.com/forum/trying-to-conceive-a-girl/54926-le-diet-thread.html?highlight=le+diet+meal+ideas
https://www.genderdreaming.com/forum/trying-to-conceive-a-girl/67718-time-new-le-diet-support-thread.html#post1000046
And specifically for alternate here (even though we often call this "PCOS Diet" it is not just for those with PCOS! Anyone who has insulin resistance, concerns about egg quality, is over 38 and especially over 40, or has more than 30 lbs to lose and is using one of our alternate diets): https://www.genderdreaming.com/forum/trying-to-conceive-a-girl/47264-le-diet-pcos.html
In the interest of hopefully saving myself a bit of time and clearing up confusion, here are most oft-asked LE Diet questions under one roof.
:princess:What is the LE Diet?
The LE Diet is the Gender Dreaming pink sway diet, atomic sagebrush’s diet that I made after realizing no one could stick to the French/IG Diets with LE principles, because it was way too restrictive and people were ready for a new option. This is what I believe is a good sway diet for the average person without PCOS/insulin resistance Low Everything Diet - Nutshell Version (http://genderdreaming.com/forum/trying-conceive-girl/16780-low-everything-diet-nutshell-version.html)
The general jist of the LE Diet is low calorie, low protein, low fat, low sodium, somewhat low nutrients, losing a little weight, and keeping blood sugar on the low side.
:princess:Where is the list of the foods I can and can’t eat?
There ARE no foods you can and can’t eat. Really. As long as you stay within the limits of the diet, you can have whatever food you want. There ARE no magic foods that make you have a baby of a certain gender. http://genderdreaming.com/forum/swaying-studies-scientific-research/466-myth-magic-foods.html Most people do like to avoid the big offenders like red meat, avocado, and so on, but don’t feel that your sway will fail if you eat a banana or potato…my daughter is like 30% potato!!
That having been said, there ARE some foods that are better choices than others and will make it easier for you to stick to the diet. While meat is allowed (most people choose to totally avoid red meat), it’s very low cal and high protein, and so when you eat it, you’ll quickly go over protein, but will have eaten very few calories. This leaves you nothing to eat for the rest of the day, because even things like pasta, rice, and bread have protein. It’s best to pick foods that have smaller amounts of protein with higher amounts of calories, like pasta, beans, rice, and so on instead of chicken, eggs, or fish.
:princess:Low Everything? So that means I should starve myself, right?
NO. It’s LOW everything, not NO everything. The guidelines are not only meant for reducing your nutrient intake, but also for making sure you have ENOUGH nutrients. The lower limits are just as important and maybe even more so, than the upper limits. The purpose of the LE Diet is to gently help lower your maternal condition and overall fertility, while still keeping your body able to conceive and sustain a healthy pregnancy at the end of it all. NEVER lose sight of the fact that you need to be able to conceive and sustain a pregnancy at the end of the diet.
DO NOT attempt to cut out fat, protein, sodium, nutrients all together, and especially be sure you are getting the 2500-3500 mg potassium a day. This is the same amount of potassium as allowed on French and In-Gender Diets, you are NOT harming your sway if you eat that level of potassium. You can DIE if you do not get enough potassium, as in “feel fine one minute and then keel over dead from a fatal heart arrhythmia the next” kind of thing. No warning.
:princess:Is that even safe?? How long is it safe to stay on this diet?
The caloric guidelines of the LE Diet are those recommended by reproductive endocrinologists for safe weight loss while going high tech, and the protein and fat guidelines are those advised by the WHO as the safe lower limit of protein and fat intake for a healthy pregnancy. If I did not believe this diet was totally safe, I would not be doing this. Safety is my FIRST priority above all else.
You can stay on the LE Diet forever, with a couple of supplemental additions I mention below. The reason I made this diet was to provide a safe option that a person could stay on indefinitely to allow them freedom to pursue other sway tactics.
:princess:But my doctor and every women’s magazine I’ve read tells me I need to take prenatal vitamins for 3 months before I TTC!!
I have a somewhat unique perspective on this because not only am I super old LOL, I have adult kids so I’ve been doing the baby bit for quite some time now. This “must take prenatals” mandate is all new. Doctors like it because it’s easy and IDK, maybe it makes them look like they’re doing something. Vitamin companies LOVE IT because it sells lots of vitamins. Women’s magazines promote the idea because they have pages and pages to fill up and have to have something to write about.
The fact is that until very recently, NO ONE was taking prenatals before they got pg and certainly not for months prior. My mom didn’t take them when she conceived me in 1970 (no one did) and her mother and grandmother of course never took them and the three had 14 healthy children between them. When she was pg with my brother and sister in the 80’s, the doctors didn’t have my mom start taking them until the third trimester and that was only because her iron was a little low. When I had my oldest son in 1991, they didn’t have me start them until after I was out of the first trimester and I had to ask about them at that point. Even then the doctors were like, you’re young, you don’t even need to take these, save your money. I also had to walk uphill in the snow 2 miles to get to the doctor’s office BTW:rofl::rofl:
My point is, Socrates, Shakespeare, Einstein, Steven Hawking, you, me, and everyone we know, were all conceived without benefit of people taking gobs of prenatals and in many cases absolutely awful diets. For most of human existence we survived on a handful of termites, a half rotten mango, and a couple bites of antelope scavenged from a hyena; we kept right on churning out mostly healthy kids anyway. We do not even KNOW that high doses of vitamins are totally safe – it’s a novel thing that’s never been done before, we’re all a part of the Great Vitamin Experiment.
In the modern world in which we dwell, we’ve spent our lives eating highly fortified foods, taking vitamins, having the ability to get fresh fruit in January, and overall just eating way, way more of pretty much everything imaginable all the time, than any other generation in human history. Our body stores ample supplies of Vitamins A, D, E, K, iron, B12, calcium, magnesium, and various other nutrients. Vit C, the B vitamins, and a few other micronutrients that are not stored up, are going to be present in ample supply on LE Diet.
The only nutrients you need to worry about are potassium (mentioned above), folic acid (all pink swayers should take 1200-1600 mcg folic a day throughout the first trimester and then gradually wean off, and if you’re over 35 or have a history of repeat losses, you may want to up this to 2000 mcg), iodine (use iodized salt and be sure you are getting the 700-1000 mg sodium a day, both for the sake of the salt which you also need for your health, and the iodine).
IF you go for longer than 3-6 months without getting pg or would like to stay on the diet longer, add in 8-15 mg zinc 3 times a week because there’s hardly any sources of zinc in the LE Diet. If you have had a miscarriage, a history of anemia, or you’ve gone longer than 6 months without getting pg, add in 18-30 mg iron taken 3 times a week (take the iron every day for awhile if you just suffered a late first trimester/early second tri miscarriage).
Once you get a BFP, add in a prenatal vitamin and a DHA supp immediately and continue taking the higher dose folic acid until after the first trimester is over, then gradually wean off.
:bfinfant:Well if I shouldn’t starve myself, I should at least avoid vegetables, right?
No, vegetables and fruits are TOTALLY 100% COMPLETELY allowed on LE Diet. IF you have the choice between eating a lower nutrient fruit or veg like an apple or iceberg lettuce, vs. a higher nutrient fruit or veg like an orange or spinach, then naturally, pick the less nutrient dense one. But you can STILL have the spinach or an orange if you would like one. You would literally have to eat a mountain of broccoli before you could get anywhere near the level of nutrients in a Big Mac, fries, and a chocolate shake.
Low carb vegetables are free foods meaning you can eat as much as you like, no need to count them.
High carb (sweet or starchy) veg and fruits, count calories but not protein or fat.
High protein vegetables (legumes), count calories and protein.
High fat vegetables (avocado and olives) should be limited but if you have some, count cals and fat. (handy tip - Avocado can be a good “rescue” food on a day when you have had a lot of protein and sodium, but not enough fat, potassium, and calories, and an olive or two for flavor in a burrito or on a salad is fine on occasion, just count the fat.)
:princess:I’m confused – I thought we were supposed to be unhealthy to TTC pink and broccoli is healthy!
There is some confusion between healthy in terms of heart health and preventing cancer (lots of colorful fruits and veg, low fat, less meat) and what is healthy in terms of fertility. You’re trying to decline in condition in terms of your FERTILITY, not your heart health. What’s good for keeping you fertile and popping out lots of little chubby boy babies, is not what is good for keeping you alive in the long term.
Mice and rats fed a very low cal diet lived a long time. But they stopped having babies. There is a tradeoff between fertility and heart health. Cholesterol makes the sex hormones and without cholesterol, you don’t get pg.
For TTC pink, we are trying to lower fertility somewhat while still staying able to conceive. Ergo, broccoli is allowed and being as it’s a low carb veg, is actually free and you can have as much broccoli as you would like. It may even help lower estrogen.
:princess:Why do some people eat lots of sugar for TTC a girl? Doesn’t that raise blood sugar?
I know this is confusing, but actually NO, it doesn’t. For anyone with a normal insulin response, eating sugar can cause your blood sugar to go up temporarily but then it drops very low – lower than it was before you ate, even. You may recognize this sensation as a blood sugar crash. When this happens, your body has to start cannibalizing its own stored reserves to keep you going. We believe that either or both, the low blood sugar that comes after eating something sweet/pure carbs, and the fact that your body then has to burn its stored reserves as fuel, is swaying pink.
Eating lots of carbs and sugar has been shown to lower overall fertility in the Nurses’ Study 2.
:princess:I’ve read that sugar can raise testosterone.
Anyone eating lots of meat/protein and a lot of sugar/carbs together at the same time, will keep their blood sugar higher for longer and that can also raise testosterone. In most people, sugar and simple carbs eaten alone or with low protein intake, actually LOWER testosterone. Testosterone decreases after ingestion of sugar (glucose) (http://www.endo-society.org/media/ENDO-09/Testosteronedecreasesafteringestionofsugar.cfm)
However, if you have PCOS or insulin resistance, eating more carbs and sugar can raise testosterone levels. So you’ll need to eat less sugar and simple carbs, and focus on getting carbs from fruits and higher carb and low carb vegetables. This is STILL the Low Everything Diet, it’s just making slightly different food choices to get the same results.
If you aren’t sure if you have PCOS or insulin resistance, start off doing the standard LE Diet with the simple carbs – most people will rapidly lose weight. If you don’t lose weight or even gain it, then you may be insulin resistant and would do better eating whole grains and fruit and vegetables rather than simple carbs.
:princess:What about the protein + carbs stuff? Do I have to worry about that? Should I eat just protein or just carbs at meals?
No, worrying about protein and carbs is for blue swayers. If you stick to 2-3 meals a day, you are fine to have both protein and carbs at your meals, your blood sugar will go down in between meals regardless.
It’s best to avoid ginormous meals where you eat megaservings of carbs, protein, and fat all at once (like Thanksgiving dinner) but on LE Diet, you’ll never really do that. 3 meals of 500 cals or even 2 meals of 900 carbs are not a problem, provided you’re sticking to the rest of the diet in other ways. 2000-3000 calorie meals should be avoided except on special occasions.
What you REALLY don't want to do is eat your normal LE Diet and THEN eat a ginormous meal as a cheat.
:princess:Do I need to track carbs while on LE Diet?
No. Keeping track of calories, protein, fat, and potassium is important to ensure you are getting enough, and some people like to track sodium too to stick within 700-1000 mg sodium recommended by the French Gender Diet. But unless you have PCOS or insulin resistance, you do not need to worry about carbs at all.
:princess:How can people lose weight on a high carb diet?
Calories in, calories out. If you eat fewer calories than your body burns off, you lose weight. You can lose weight eating nothing but birthday cake if you eat little of it.
:princess:How long should I do diet before TTC?
That depends. We have been seeing better results with people doing diet for longer – 3 months as opposed to 6 weeks, and have not seen very good results with people doing diet for only 2-4 weeks, even when they dieted pretty strictly. (Keep in mind that it’s no guarantee even if you do diet for a kajillion months!!)
But if you have literally NO weight to lose - we’ve had swayers who weighed 85-90 lbs before even starting to sway - then you simply CANNOT do diet for 3 months before TTC. Anything lower than BMI 18.5, you should not spend very long on diet, you’re risking ovulation if you do.
Another thing to consider is how strictly you want to sway. If you really want to do a lot of sway factors that are going to make it pretty hard to get pregnant, you may want to spend less time on diet before you TTC. You probably won’t get pregnant the first couple months of your sway so by the time you fine tune things and drop whatever you feel is not working for you, you’ll have quite a while on diet and other supps under your belts. And if you get lucky and get pg right away, you can feel good knowing you were able to include a lot of strict sway tactics.
In an ideal world of course, we’d all get pg with superstrict sways and a long time on diet, but in the real world it just doesn’t happen for people.
Another option to consider is to switch to a vegetarian or even vegan diet for several months prior to your sway.
:princess:I’m doing something wrong – I actually LIKE this diet and I think it’s easy to stick to. Aren’t I supposed to be miserable?
The LE Diet is meant to be easy to stick to so you can stay on it in the long term and free you up to pursue other sway tactics that may make it harder for you to get pregnant, like frequency, jellies, antihistamines, and even timing if you want. If you’re miserable and white-knuckling it through your day ready to take down a wildebeest (my spell check insists that’s how you spell wildebeest) with your teeth and fantasizing about talking jars of peanut butter trying to persuade you to eat them, you’re not doing it right!
If you cut back too far, you’re going to cheat, or worse yet, do what many swayers on IG used to do – drop diet all together after a BFN or two. Remember the 80-20 rule…you get 80 percent of the results with 20 percent of the effort, and to get that extra 20% you have to expend 80% of the effort in order to do it. Do the doable!!!
:princess:Are you sure I shouldn’t starve myself?? I’m really short and I think I only eat 1200 calories anyway. I think I’ll start off eating 800 calories.
No, you shouldn’t starve yourself. Really, truly, I PROMISE you should not starve yourself. This is MY diet, I invented it and I swear you're not supposed to starve yourself!!!
Most people overestimate the amount of calories they’re actually eating by quite a lot, so even if you think you’re eating 1200 calories, you’re probably eating a lot more than that. Petite people may need to drop to 1200-1500 cals a day, but do not ever go lower than that.
It’s best to start off higher than you think you’ll need to go, and then gradually reduce over time. Doing a very low cal diet is a bad idea for many reasons – firstly because you’ll lose too much weight and stop ovulation, but it goes beyond all that. You actually may end up hurting your sway if you cut back too far. People who are super thin will stop ovulating. Even if you have some weight to spare, your metabolism will get totally screwed up and you’re going to plateau a lot sooner than you would otherwise.
It’s always best to start off eating more than you think you’re going to need to, because then you can always cut back if you don’t lose weight or if you plateau. If you start off super draconian on calories and stop losing or stop ovulating, then what do you do?? There’s no way to fix the situation because the only direction you can go in that scenario is towards better condition.
Aside from the biology involved, starting off strict looks great on paper but after a few days it gets very old very quickly and sets you up for cheating. LE Diet should be easy to stick to!
:princess:I’ve got some extra padding, shouldn’t I just starve myself to lose as much weight as I can?
Even if you’re not thin to start with, it’s also important not to cut back too far. Aside from the reasons I mentioned above which apply to everyone, even people with some extra weight, if your body perceives a starvation situation, it assumes things are dire and that you may need to fight and struggle to get food for yourself and your children. It will use anything it can get its greedy little enzymes on to make testosterone if it thinks you need that hormone to fight, up to and including your stored body fat. Survival is a more important priority to your body than getting pregnant is and it will do what it takes to keep you alive, even at the expense of having offspring.
To your genes’ way of thinking, you can always have a baby when times are better, but if you die, you’re dead forever, no chance at future offspring and the odds are that (in nature) the offspring you already were caring for would be more likely to die as well. If your body "thinks" you need testosterone, it will make it at the expense of everything else.
It’s always best to start off higher and then you have room to drop if you NEED TO, instead of starting off super strict and having nowhere to cut back to if you plateau.
And again, biology aside, it’s going to set you up for cheating in a big way. Esp. if you love to eat in the first place, it’s way better to aim for something achievable rather than trying to do something that you’re never going to be able to stick with. “She who reaches for the stars, often ends up flat on her face.”
:princess:Should I try to time my weight loss to coincide with ovulation? And should I gain weight to relose before or during swaying?
No, we’ve had nothing but trouble with people trying to time weight loss. So much can go wrong…some have not been able to get the weight off as fast as they thought they could, others cut back too much right before ovulation and delay it, and the whole thing adds a level of stress and tension “omg omg I gotta lose 4 lbs this week or I’ll be behind schedule!” that seems tailor-made to raise testosterone levels. It’s best to lose what you can, when you can, and then just hold steady if you lose your weight before you’re ready to TTC.
Gaining weight to lose/relose is a bad idea too. If you haven’t started swaying yet, you are just giving your body an opportunity to store up nutrients before you start your sway. If you’ve just lost some, your body will hold on to even more nutrients than it would otherwise. Lose what you can, when you can, and don’t worry about timing it.
:princess:Should I fast before ovulation?
No. There’s no evidence this even helps. It’s very, very likely that it’s the overall pattern of your diet that matters and not any one or two days here or there. It would be a pretty dumb move on the part of your genes to be convinced to conceive a boy or girl on the basis of one or two days’ eating pattern.
Plus, drastically reducing food just prior to ovulation will often delay O – your body doesn’t like to ovulate when it feels like things are not good in your environment. There are tons of posts on the site from people who were very upset and frustrated when their O was delayed right when they had everything ready to go for their sway.
UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES should anyone try to fast on water or Crystal Light, ever. Not even for a single day.
:princess:Can I have caffeine?
Yes, caffeine is totally allowed on LE Diet for both DH and DW. The best study done on diet and baby’s gender found no difference between moms who conceived boys and moms who conceived girls.
The only reason caffeine was ever said to sway blue was because was once thought to cause calcium to leach from the body and reduce bone mass. This has subsequently been totally debunked and researchers found that the reason why there was originally ever a link between caff and bone mass, was because women who drank only caffeinated drinks had worse diets overall, worse exercise practices (exercise builds bone mass) and lower calcium intake, NOT that the caffeine was doing anything at all to the calcium.
They’ve tested calcium loss after drinking coffee and know for a fact that it doesn’t cause you to lose tons of calcium, and this is true no matter how many websites make claims to the contrary.
Caffeine has been said to lower fertility but it’s not clear whether it’s the kind of reduction that may sway pink or some other thing going on.
Some people have expressed concern over studies they’ve seen where caffeine affected blood sugar levels negatively. This was caffeine PILLS, not coffee or tea. Tea, esp. green tea, may sway blue a bit and is probably best to limit overall, but coffee has been shown to actually improve insulin response and prevent diabetes! Coffee is FINE for a pink sway. I got my girl drinking tons of the stuff.
People often ask if coffee with sugar and milk is ok in the morning in lieu of breakfast. I believe that it is, because while sugar can raise blood sugar temporarily, without anything else in your stomach, your blood sugar will plummet immediately anyway. Some people prefer to use artificial sweetener which is also ok. I used sugar and a bit of milk in my morning coffee when I got DD.
:princess:Can I have alcohol?
Yes. Alcohol may lower fertility for both DH and DW. It can also be a good way to get some potassium and calories without any other nutrients. You do need to include it in your calorie count for the day.
:princess:Do I have to skip breakfast? Snack?
You don’t have to skip breakfast if it doesn’t work for you. It’s just one thing that may help and can’t hurt. The point of skipping breakfast is to give your body a long time without any food coming in so that in order to keep your body going, it has to use its own fuel for food. It’s not a magic bullet, plenty of people have gotten boys skipping breakfast and girls eating it. If you need to eat breakfast for work or sanity, please do.
Some people may prefer to skip lunch or dinner rather than breakfast. This is also fine and will work, but most people find it easier to skip breakfast – personally I have a tough time falling asleep on an empty stomach and skipping breakfast was easiest for me. Just do what is easiest for you and that can even vary by the day. If you ease into it over time, you may find it easier to adjust…just delay the time you eat by an hour, then two, then three, etc.
Snacking should be avoided while on the LE Diet – you want to have a little while between meals with no food coming in to prevent your blood sugar levels from staying high. Eating every 15-30 minutes, regardless of what you eat (unless you eat nothing but pure protein), will keep your blood sugar levels high and may sway blue.
Some people have a belief that skipping breakfast somehow renders you incapable of losing weight (there are a couple studies done on dieting that indicate skipping breakfast can make weight loss more difficult, but these studies are done in people who may be crash dieters and/or already have messed up their metabolism from years of yo-yo dieting.). Trust me, if you’re motivated and cut calories, you will still lose weight if you skip breakfast. Several of us have done it successfully with no problem at all.
:princess:How should I handle special occasions if I need to cheat, what should I cheat on, and OMG I cheated!
Cheating on special occasions is not only allowed, but encouraged on LE Diet. Cheating on rare occasions makes it easier to stick to the diet the rest of the time because you don’t have to feel deprived eating rice cakes at your cousin’s wedding. Plus, it’s the overall pattern of your eating that counts, not any one or two meals, or even days – even our prehistoric ancestors had good times where they managed to bring down a mammoth or found a bee’s nest. One meal cannot send a “loud” enough signal to your body to undo weeks or months of dieting.
If you need to cheat, you can eat less that day or the next, or just write it off with no worries. It’s totally up to you and how you feel about it. You may want to try to stay in your overall totals for the day, but as long as it’s a one time thing, you don’t have to. If you have an option (such as going to a restaurant) shellfish and vegetarian options are always good.
In terms of day to day cheats, I believe it’s perfectly fine to go over on sodium, like, literally all the time. I personally am not even remotely convinced sodium sways blue and in fact in high levels, may sway pink by reducing overall fertility. I didn’t limit sodium at all when I got DD and neither did DH. The only reason I leave it in the diet is because it’s good for health so I figure can’t hurt, may help, and it is good for you regardless.
If you need a protein cheat, I strongly advise shellfish. You don’t tend to eat a lot because it’s expensive, the protein is not that high, and it may suck up some pesticide residue that can sway pink (yummy!)
:princess:Everyone is saying I’m anorexic! Help!
Nothing seems to make frenemies hate you more than if you lose weight and they don’t. And even among people who mean you well, it can be concerning to see a loved one dropping weight and eating oddly. If it’s bothering you and you don’t care to explain, some people have had luck telling friends and family that they have some food allergies/sensitivities and are trying a food elimination diet. Or, when you’re around those family members, it may be time for a planned cheat!!
:princess:I AM anorexic! Help!
If you have suffered from eating disorders in the past, it’s best not to do a full sway diet. You don’t HAVE to do diet to get a DD…people do it every day without any of this effort whatsoever. Let go of diet and do a strict sway in other ways. If you want to, you can just go vegetarian, it’s still a good sway.
Even if you have no history of eating disorders, while swaying, if you ever start to feel out of control or having repetitive or obsessive thoughts about food or your body image, STOP. Take a month off to regroup. If the feelings continue, seek help right away, sooner rather than later.
:princess:What to do after bfp – how long to do diet, and how to normalize??
Yay! BFP! Congrats!! :running: :cheer:
First thing, add a prenatal vitamin and DHA supp such as Enfamil Expecta. If you were really restricting sodium and/or not using iodized salt, you should add a low dose iodine supplement throughout pregnancy. (about 200 mg).
Continue the higher dose folic acid throughout the entire first trimester and then gradually cut back to the amount in your prenatal by spacing doses farther and farther apart. Wean off baby aspirin after BFP by gradually spacing doses farther and farther apart until you’re taking only one and then stop. Never quit aspirin cold turkey.
Feel free to start gradually resuming your normal diet. You can eat breakfast and snack – you DO NOT need to stick to the diet after 7-10 days ovulation and especially not after 14 days. Some people have thought that by sticking to the diet longer they’d give XX a head start, but we believe this only matters BEFORE implantation.
You should have your doctor check your iron levels at your first appointment to see if you’re anemic. Try to eat meat regularly; some pink swayers have struggled with meat aversions after doing LE Diet. You need at barest minimum, 75 grams of protein a day – that’s 3 servings of meat about the size of a deck of playing cards (of course you can get protein from other foods as well). Meat also has other nutrients like B12 and zinc that the LE Diet does not have a lot of.
:curtsey: I hope this helps answer most of your LE Diet questions! If you can think of any more, post them below!!!
https://www.genderdreaming.com/forum/trying-to-conceive-a-girl/54174-brand-sparkly-pink-new-diet-thread-girl-sways.html
https://www.genderdreaming.com/forum/trying-to-conceive-a-girl/54926-le-diet-thread.html?highlight=le+diet+meal+ideas
https://www.genderdreaming.com/forum/trying-to-conceive-a-girl/67718-time-new-le-diet-support-thread.html#post1000046
And specifically for alternate here (even though we often call this "PCOS Diet" it is not just for those with PCOS! Anyone who has insulin resistance, concerns about egg quality, is over 38 and especially over 40, or has more than 30 lbs to lose and is using one of our alternate diets): https://www.genderdreaming.com/forum/trying-to-conceive-a-girl/47264-le-diet-pcos.html
In the interest of hopefully saving myself a bit of time and clearing up confusion, here are most oft-asked LE Diet questions under one roof.
:princess:What is the LE Diet?
The LE Diet is the Gender Dreaming pink sway diet, atomic sagebrush’s diet that I made after realizing no one could stick to the French/IG Diets with LE principles, because it was way too restrictive and people were ready for a new option. This is what I believe is a good sway diet for the average person without PCOS/insulin resistance Low Everything Diet - Nutshell Version (http://genderdreaming.com/forum/trying-conceive-girl/16780-low-everything-diet-nutshell-version.html)
The general jist of the LE Diet is low calorie, low protein, low fat, low sodium, somewhat low nutrients, losing a little weight, and keeping blood sugar on the low side.
:princess:Where is the list of the foods I can and can’t eat?
There ARE no foods you can and can’t eat. Really. As long as you stay within the limits of the diet, you can have whatever food you want. There ARE no magic foods that make you have a baby of a certain gender. http://genderdreaming.com/forum/swaying-studies-scientific-research/466-myth-magic-foods.html Most people do like to avoid the big offenders like red meat, avocado, and so on, but don’t feel that your sway will fail if you eat a banana or potato…my daughter is like 30% potato!!
That having been said, there ARE some foods that are better choices than others and will make it easier for you to stick to the diet. While meat is allowed (most people choose to totally avoid red meat), it’s very low cal and high protein, and so when you eat it, you’ll quickly go over protein, but will have eaten very few calories. This leaves you nothing to eat for the rest of the day, because even things like pasta, rice, and bread have protein. It’s best to pick foods that have smaller amounts of protein with higher amounts of calories, like pasta, beans, rice, and so on instead of chicken, eggs, or fish.
:princess:Low Everything? So that means I should starve myself, right?
NO. It’s LOW everything, not NO everything. The guidelines are not only meant for reducing your nutrient intake, but also for making sure you have ENOUGH nutrients. The lower limits are just as important and maybe even more so, than the upper limits. The purpose of the LE Diet is to gently help lower your maternal condition and overall fertility, while still keeping your body able to conceive and sustain a healthy pregnancy at the end of it all. NEVER lose sight of the fact that you need to be able to conceive and sustain a pregnancy at the end of the diet.
DO NOT attempt to cut out fat, protein, sodium, nutrients all together, and especially be sure you are getting the 2500-3500 mg potassium a day. This is the same amount of potassium as allowed on French and In-Gender Diets, you are NOT harming your sway if you eat that level of potassium. You can DIE if you do not get enough potassium, as in “feel fine one minute and then keel over dead from a fatal heart arrhythmia the next” kind of thing. No warning.
:princess:Is that even safe?? How long is it safe to stay on this diet?
The caloric guidelines of the LE Diet are those recommended by reproductive endocrinologists for safe weight loss while going high tech, and the protein and fat guidelines are those advised by the WHO as the safe lower limit of protein and fat intake for a healthy pregnancy. If I did not believe this diet was totally safe, I would not be doing this. Safety is my FIRST priority above all else.
You can stay on the LE Diet forever, with a couple of supplemental additions I mention below. The reason I made this diet was to provide a safe option that a person could stay on indefinitely to allow them freedom to pursue other sway tactics.
:princess:But my doctor and every women’s magazine I’ve read tells me I need to take prenatal vitamins for 3 months before I TTC!!
I have a somewhat unique perspective on this because not only am I super old LOL, I have adult kids so I’ve been doing the baby bit for quite some time now. This “must take prenatals” mandate is all new. Doctors like it because it’s easy and IDK, maybe it makes them look like they’re doing something. Vitamin companies LOVE IT because it sells lots of vitamins. Women’s magazines promote the idea because they have pages and pages to fill up and have to have something to write about.
The fact is that until very recently, NO ONE was taking prenatals before they got pg and certainly not for months prior. My mom didn’t take them when she conceived me in 1970 (no one did) and her mother and grandmother of course never took them and the three had 14 healthy children between them. When she was pg with my brother and sister in the 80’s, the doctors didn’t have my mom start taking them until the third trimester and that was only because her iron was a little low. When I had my oldest son in 1991, they didn’t have me start them until after I was out of the first trimester and I had to ask about them at that point. Even then the doctors were like, you’re young, you don’t even need to take these, save your money. I also had to walk uphill in the snow 2 miles to get to the doctor’s office BTW:rofl::rofl:
My point is, Socrates, Shakespeare, Einstein, Steven Hawking, you, me, and everyone we know, were all conceived without benefit of people taking gobs of prenatals and in many cases absolutely awful diets. For most of human existence we survived on a handful of termites, a half rotten mango, and a couple bites of antelope scavenged from a hyena; we kept right on churning out mostly healthy kids anyway. We do not even KNOW that high doses of vitamins are totally safe – it’s a novel thing that’s never been done before, we’re all a part of the Great Vitamin Experiment.
In the modern world in which we dwell, we’ve spent our lives eating highly fortified foods, taking vitamins, having the ability to get fresh fruit in January, and overall just eating way, way more of pretty much everything imaginable all the time, than any other generation in human history. Our body stores ample supplies of Vitamins A, D, E, K, iron, B12, calcium, magnesium, and various other nutrients. Vit C, the B vitamins, and a few other micronutrients that are not stored up, are going to be present in ample supply on LE Diet.
The only nutrients you need to worry about are potassium (mentioned above), folic acid (all pink swayers should take 1200-1600 mcg folic a day throughout the first trimester and then gradually wean off, and if you’re over 35 or have a history of repeat losses, you may want to up this to 2000 mcg), iodine (use iodized salt and be sure you are getting the 700-1000 mg sodium a day, both for the sake of the salt which you also need for your health, and the iodine).
IF you go for longer than 3-6 months without getting pg or would like to stay on the diet longer, add in 8-15 mg zinc 3 times a week because there’s hardly any sources of zinc in the LE Diet. If you have had a miscarriage, a history of anemia, or you’ve gone longer than 6 months without getting pg, add in 18-30 mg iron taken 3 times a week (take the iron every day for awhile if you just suffered a late first trimester/early second tri miscarriage).
Once you get a BFP, add in a prenatal vitamin and a DHA supp immediately and continue taking the higher dose folic acid until after the first trimester is over, then gradually wean off.
:bfinfant:Well if I shouldn’t starve myself, I should at least avoid vegetables, right?
No, vegetables and fruits are TOTALLY 100% COMPLETELY allowed on LE Diet. IF you have the choice between eating a lower nutrient fruit or veg like an apple or iceberg lettuce, vs. a higher nutrient fruit or veg like an orange or spinach, then naturally, pick the less nutrient dense one. But you can STILL have the spinach or an orange if you would like one. You would literally have to eat a mountain of broccoli before you could get anywhere near the level of nutrients in a Big Mac, fries, and a chocolate shake.
Low carb vegetables are free foods meaning you can eat as much as you like, no need to count them.
High carb (sweet or starchy) veg and fruits, count calories but not protein or fat.
High protein vegetables (legumes), count calories and protein.
High fat vegetables (avocado and olives) should be limited but if you have some, count cals and fat. (handy tip - Avocado can be a good “rescue” food on a day when you have had a lot of protein and sodium, but not enough fat, potassium, and calories, and an olive or two for flavor in a burrito or on a salad is fine on occasion, just count the fat.)
:princess:I’m confused – I thought we were supposed to be unhealthy to TTC pink and broccoli is healthy!
There is some confusion between healthy in terms of heart health and preventing cancer (lots of colorful fruits and veg, low fat, less meat) and what is healthy in terms of fertility. You’re trying to decline in condition in terms of your FERTILITY, not your heart health. What’s good for keeping you fertile and popping out lots of little chubby boy babies, is not what is good for keeping you alive in the long term.
Mice and rats fed a very low cal diet lived a long time. But they stopped having babies. There is a tradeoff between fertility and heart health. Cholesterol makes the sex hormones and without cholesterol, you don’t get pg.
For TTC pink, we are trying to lower fertility somewhat while still staying able to conceive. Ergo, broccoli is allowed and being as it’s a low carb veg, is actually free and you can have as much broccoli as you would like. It may even help lower estrogen.
:princess:Why do some people eat lots of sugar for TTC a girl? Doesn’t that raise blood sugar?
I know this is confusing, but actually NO, it doesn’t. For anyone with a normal insulin response, eating sugar can cause your blood sugar to go up temporarily but then it drops very low – lower than it was before you ate, even. You may recognize this sensation as a blood sugar crash. When this happens, your body has to start cannibalizing its own stored reserves to keep you going. We believe that either or both, the low blood sugar that comes after eating something sweet/pure carbs, and the fact that your body then has to burn its stored reserves as fuel, is swaying pink.
Eating lots of carbs and sugar has been shown to lower overall fertility in the Nurses’ Study 2.
:princess:I’ve read that sugar can raise testosterone.
Anyone eating lots of meat/protein and a lot of sugar/carbs together at the same time, will keep their blood sugar higher for longer and that can also raise testosterone. In most people, sugar and simple carbs eaten alone or with low protein intake, actually LOWER testosterone. Testosterone decreases after ingestion of sugar (glucose) (http://www.endo-society.org/media/ENDO-09/Testosteronedecreasesafteringestionofsugar.cfm)
However, if you have PCOS or insulin resistance, eating more carbs and sugar can raise testosterone levels. So you’ll need to eat less sugar and simple carbs, and focus on getting carbs from fruits and higher carb and low carb vegetables. This is STILL the Low Everything Diet, it’s just making slightly different food choices to get the same results.
If you aren’t sure if you have PCOS or insulin resistance, start off doing the standard LE Diet with the simple carbs – most people will rapidly lose weight. If you don’t lose weight or even gain it, then you may be insulin resistant and would do better eating whole grains and fruit and vegetables rather than simple carbs.
:princess:What about the protein + carbs stuff? Do I have to worry about that? Should I eat just protein or just carbs at meals?
No, worrying about protein and carbs is for blue swayers. If you stick to 2-3 meals a day, you are fine to have both protein and carbs at your meals, your blood sugar will go down in between meals regardless.
It’s best to avoid ginormous meals where you eat megaservings of carbs, protein, and fat all at once (like Thanksgiving dinner) but on LE Diet, you’ll never really do that. 3 meals of 500 cals or even 2 meals of 900 carbs are not a problem, provided you’re sticking to the rest of the diet in other ways. 2000-3000 calorie meals should be avoided except on special occasions.
What you REALLY don't want to do is eat your normal LE Diet and THEN eat a ginormous meal as a cheat.
:princess:Do I need to track carbs while on LE Diet?
No. Keeping track of calories, protein, fat, and potassium is important to ensure you are getting enough, and some people like to track sodium too to stick within 700-1000 mg sodium recommended by the French Gender Diet. But unless you have PCOS or insulin resistance, you do not need to worry about carbs at all.
:princess:How can people lose weight on a high carb diet?
Calories in, calories out. If you eat fewer calories than your body burns off, you lose weight. You can lose weight eating nothing but birthday cake if you eat little of it.
:princess:How long should I do diet before TTC?
That depends. We have been seeing better results with people doing diet for longer – 3 months as opposed to 6 weeks, and have not seen very good results with people doing diet for only 2-4 weeks, even when they dieted pretty strictly. (Keep in mind that it’s no guarantee even if you do diet for a kajillion months!!)
But if you have literally NO weight to lose - we’ve had swayers who weighed 85-90 lbs before even starting to sway - then you simply CANNOT do diet for 3 months before TTC. Anything lower than BMI 18.5, you should not spend very long on diet, you’re risking ovulation if you do.
Another thing to consider is how strictly you want to sway. If you really want to do a lot of sway factors that are going to make it pretty hard to get pregnant, you may want to spend less time on diet before you TTC. You probably won’t get pregnant the first couple months of your sway so by the time you fine tune things and drop whatever you feel is not working for you, you’ll have quite a while on diet and other supps under your belts. And if you get lucky and get pg right away, you can feel good knowing you were able to include a lot of strict sway tactics.
In an ideal world of course, we’d all get pg with superstrict sways and a long time on diet, but in the real world it just doesn’t happen for people.
Another option to consider is to switch to a vegetarian or even vegan diet for several months prior to your sway.
:princess:I’m doing something wrong – I actually LIKE this diet and I think it’s easy to stick to. Aren’t I supposed to be miserable?
The LE Diet is meant to be easy to stick to so you can stay on it in the long term and free you up to pursue other sway tactics that may make it harder for you to get pregnant, like frequency, jellies, antihistamines, and even timing if you want. If you’re miserable and white-knuckling it through your day ready to take down a wildebeest (my spell check insists that’s how you spell wildebeest) with your teeth and fantasizing about talking jars of peanut butter trying to persuade you to eat them, you’re not doing it right!
If you cut back too far, you’re going to cheat, or worse yet, do what many swayers on IG used to do – drop diet all together after a BFN or two. Remember the 80-20 rule…you get 80 percent of the results with 20 percent of the effort, and to get that extra 20% you have to expend 80% of the effort in order to do it. Do the doable!!!
:princess:Are you sure I shouldn’t starve myself?? I’m really short and I think I only eat 1200 calories anyway. I think I’ll start off eating 800 calories.
No, you shouldn’t starve yourself. Really, truly, I PROMISE you should not starve yourself. This is MY diet, I invented it and I swear you're not supposed to starve yourself!!!
Most people overestimate the amount of calories they’re actually eating by quite a lot, so even if you think you’re eating 1200 calories, you’re probably eating a lot more than that. Petite people may need to drop to 1200-1500 cals a day, but do not ever go lower than that.
It’s best to start off higher than you think you’ll need to go, and then gradually reduce over time. Doing a very low cal diet is a bad idea for many reasons – firstly because you’ll lose too much weight and stop ovulation, but it goes beyond all that. You actually may end up hurting your sway if you cut back too far. People who are super thin will stop ovulating. Even if you have some weight to spare, your metabolism will get totally screwed up and you’re going to plateau a lot sooner than you would otherwise.
It’s always best to start off eating more than you think you’re going to need to, because then you can always cut back if you don’t lose weight or if you plateau. If you start off super draconian on calories and stop losing or stop ovulating, then what do you do?? There’s no way to fix the situation because the only direction you can go in that scenario is towards better condition.
Aside from the biology involved, starting off strict looks great on paper but after a few days it gets very old very quickly and sets you up for cheating. LE Diet should be easy to stick to!
:princess:I’ve got some extra padding, shouldn’t I just starve myself to lose as much weight as I can?
Even if you’re not thin to start with, it’s also important not to cut back too far. Aside from the reasons I mentioned above which apply to everyone, even people with some extra weight, if your body perceives a starvation situation, it assumes things are dire and that you may need to fight and struggle to get food for yourself and your children. It will use anything it can get its greedy little enzymes on to make testosterone if it thinks you need that hormone to fight, up to and including your stored body fat. Survival is a more important priority to your body than getting pregnant is and it will do what it takes to keep you alive, even at the expense of having offspring.
To your genes’ way of thinking, you can always have a baby when times are better, but if you die, you’re dead forever, no chance at future offspring and the odds are that (in nature) the offspring you already were caring for would be more likely to die as well. If your body "thinks" you need testosterone, it will make it at the expense of everything else.
It’s always best to start off higher and then you have room to drop if you NEED TO, instead of starting off super strict and having nowhere to cut back to if you plateau.
And again, biology aside, it’s going to set you up for cheating in a big way. Esp. if you love to eat in the first place, it’s way better to aim for something achievable rather than trying to do something that you’re never going to be able to stick with. “She who reaches for the stars, often ends up flat on her face.”
:princess:Should I try to time my weight loss to coincide with ovulation? And should I gain weight to relose before or during swaying?
No, we’ve had nothing but trouble with people trying to time weight loss. So much can go wrong…some have not been able to get the weight off as fast as they thought they could, others cut back too much right before ovulation and delay it, and the whole thing adds a level of stress and tension “omg omg I gotta lose 4 lbs this week or I’ll be behind schedule!” that seems tailor-made to raise testosterone levels. It’s best to lose what you can, when you can, and then just hold steady if you lose your weight before you’re ready to TTC.
Gaining weight to lose/relose is a bad idea too. If you haven’t started swaying yet, you are just giving your body an opportunity to store up nutrients before you start your sway. If you’ve just lost some, your body will hold on to even more nutrients than it would otherwise. Lose what you can, when you can, and don’t worry about timing it.
:princess:Should I fast before ovulation?
No. There’s no evidence this even helps. It’s very, very likely that it’s the overall pattern of your diet that matters and not any one or two days here or there. It would be a pretty dumb move on the part of your genes to be convinced to conceive a boy or girl on the basis of one or two days’ eating pattern.
Plus, drastically reducing food just prior to ovulation will often delay O – your body doesn’t like to ovulate when it feels like things are not good in your environment. There are tons of posts on the site from people who were very upset and frustrated when their O was delayed right when they had everything ready to go for their sway.
UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES should anyone try to fast on water or Crystal Light, ever. Not even for a single day.
:princess:Can I have caffeine?
Yes, caffeine is totally allowed on LE Diet for both DH and DW. The best study done on diet and baby’s gender found no difference between moms who conceived boys and moms who conceived girls.
The only reason caffeine was ever said to sway blue was because was once thought to cause calcium to leach from the body and reduce bone mass. This has subsequently been totally debunked and researchers found that the reason why there was originally ever a link between caff and bone mass, was because women who drank only caffeinated drinks had worse diets overall, worse exercise practices (exercise builds bone mass) and lower calcium intake, NOT that the caffeine was doing anything at all to the calcium.
They’ve tested calcium loss after drinking coffee and know for a fact that it doesn’t cause you to lose tons of calcium, and this is true no matter how many websites make claims to the contrary.
Caffeine has been said to lower fertility but it’s not clear whether it’s the kind of reduction that may sway pink or some other thing going on.
Some people have expressed concern over studies they’ve seen where caffeine affected blood sugar levels negatively. This was caffeine PILLS, not coffee or tea. Tea, esp. green tea, may sway blue a bit and is probably best to limit overall, but coffee has been shown to actually improve insulin response and prevent diabetes! Coffee is FINE for a pink sway. I got my girl drinking tons of the stuff.
People often ask if coffee with sugar and milk is ok in the morning in lieu of breakfast. I believe that it is, because while sugar can raise blood sugar temporarily, without anything else in your stomach, your blood sugar will plummet immediately anyway. Some people prefer to use artificial sweetener which is also ok. I used sugar and a bit of milk in my morning coffee when I got DD.
:princess:Can I have alcohol?
Yes. Alcohol may lower fertility for both DH and DW. It can also be a good way to get some potassium and calories without any other nutrients. You do need to include it in your calorie count for the day.
:princess:Do I have to skip breakfast? Snack?
You don’t have to skip breakfast if it doesn’t work for you. It’s just one thing that may help and can’t hurt. The point of skipping breakfast is to give your body a long time without any food coming in so that in order to keep your body going, it has to use its own fuel for food. It’s not a magic bullet, plenty of people have gotten boys skipping breakfast and girls eating it. If you need to eat breakfast for work or sanity, please do.
Some people may prefer to skip lunch or dinner rather than breakfast. This is also fine and will work, but most people find it easier to skip breakfast – personally I have a tough time falling asleep on an empty stomach and skipping breakfast was easiest for me. Just do what is easiest for you and that can even vary by the day. If you ease into it over time, you may find it easier to adjust…just delay the time you eat by an hour, then two, then three, etc.
Snacking should be avoided while on the LE Diet – you want to have a little while between meals with no food coming in to prevent your blood sugar levels from staying high. Eating every 15-30 minutes, regardless of what you eat (unless you eat nothing but pure protein), will keep your blood sugar levels high and may sway blue.
Some people have a belief that skipping breakfast somehow renders you incapable of losing weight (there are a couple studies done on dieting that indicate skipping breakfast can make weight loss more difficult, but these studies are done in people who may be crash dieters and/or already have messed up their metabolism from years of yo-yo dieting.). Trust me, if you’re motivated and cut calories, you will still lose weight if you skip breakfast. Several of us have done it successfully with no problem at all.
:princess:How should I handle special occasions if I need to cheat, what should I cheat on, and OMG I cheated!
Cheating on special occasions is not only allowed, but encouraged on LE Diet. Cheating on rare occasions makes it easier to stick to the diet the rest of the time because you don’t have to feel deprived eating rice cakes at your cousin’s wedding. Plus, it’s the overall pattern of your eating that counts, not any one or two meals, or even days – even our prehistoric ancestors had good times where they managed to bring down a mammoth or found a bee’s nest. One meal cannot send a “loud” enough signal to your body to undo weeks or months of dieting.
If you need to cheat, you can eat less that day or the next, or just write it off with no worries. It’s totally up to you and how you feel about it. You may want to try to stay in your overall totals for the day, but as long as it’s a one time thing, you don’t have to. If you have an option (such as going to a restaurant) shellfish and vegetarian options are always good.
In terms of day to day cheats, I believe it’s perfectly fine to go over on sodium, like, literally all the time. I personally am not even remotely convinced sodium sways blue and in fact in high levels, may sway pink by reducing overall fertility. I didn’t limit sodium at all when I got DD and neither did DH. The only reason I leave it in the diet is because it’s good for health so I figure can’t hurt, may help, and it is good for you regardless.
If you need a protein cheat, I strongly advise shellfish. You don’t tend to eat a lot because it’s expensive, the protein is not that high, and it may suck up some pesticide residue that can sway pink (yummy!)
:princess:Everyone is saying I’m anorexic! Help!
Nothing seems to make frenemies hate you more than if you lose weight and they don’t. And even among people who mean you well, it can be concerning to see a loved one dropping weight and eating oddly. If it’s bothering you and you don’t care to explain, some people have had luck telling friends and family that they have some food allergies/sensitivities and are trying a food elimination diet. Or, when you’re around those family members, it may be time for a planned cheat!!
:princess:I AM anorexic! Help!
If you have suffered from eating disorders in the past, it’s best not to do a full sway diet. You don’t HAVE to do diet to get a DD…people do it every day without any of this effort whatsoever. Let go of diet and do a strict sway in other ways. If you want to, you can just go vegetarian, it’s still a good sway.
Even if you have no history of eating disorders, while swaying, if you ever start to feel out of control or having repetitive or obsessive thoughts about food or your body image, STOP. Take a month off to regroup. If the feelings continue, seek help right away, sooner rather than later.
:princess:What to do after bfp – how long to do diet, and how to normalize??
Yay! BFP! Congrats!! :running: :cheer:
First thing, add a prenatal vitamin and DHA supp such as Enfamil Expecta. If you were really restricting sodium and/or not using iodized salt, you should add a low dose iodine supplement throughout pregnancy. (about 200 mg).
Continue the higher dose folic acid throughout the entire first trimester and then gradually cut back to the amount in your prenatal by spacing doses farther and farther apart. Wean off baby aspirin after BFP by gradually spacing doses farther and farther apart until you’re taking only one and then stop. Never quit aspirin cold turkey.
Feel free to start gradually resuming your normal diet. You can eat breakfast and snack – you DO NOT need to stick to the diet after 7-10 days ovulation and especially not after 14 days. Some people have thought that by sticking to the diet longer they’d give XX a head start, but we believe this only matters BEFORE implantation.
You should have your doctor check your iron levels at your first appointment to see if you’re anemic. Try to eat meat regularly; some pink swayers have struggled with meat aversions after doing LE Diet. You need at barest minimum, 75 grams of protein a day – that’s 3 servings of meat about the size of a deck of playing cards (of course you can get protein from other foods as well). Meat also has other nutrients like B12 and zinc that the LE Diet does not have a lot of.
:curtsey: I hope this helps answer most of your LE Diet questions! If you can think of any more, post them below!!!