The other thing is to avoid the mistake that everyone makes when they low-carb. Most people start out on a diet that is relatively low in fat, and when they switch to low-carb, they continue to stay on a low-fat diet too, which means they are eating almost nothing. Many people who adopt a low-carb diet successfully probably take in around 60-70% of their total daily calories from fat and that's a huge conceptual shift to get your head around. You're supposed to eat plenty of eggs, butter, nuts, cheese, avocados, olives etc. If you simply carry on with your normal diet but cut out the carbs and don't do any further adjustments, what you're really doing is cutting out the calories. It's not a case of thinking "I normally have a ham sandwich, a packet of crisps and an apple for lunch, so now I'm low carbing, I'll just have the ham" - it's putting the ham in a salad with plenty of olive oil and maybe some cheese, having peanuts instead of crisps, and then some regular (not low fat) Greek yogurt with berries, for instance.
The flipside of this is that fat actually makes you feel fuller for longer. You know all that nonsense that dieticians spout about how wholemeal is amazing because it is slow release and so you have a regular, steady supply of glucose? Fat's even slower release energy, so eat the right amount and you'll not be short of energy in general and feel fuller. I second Mark's point about the difference between feeling full and uncomfortable. We're all familiar with that feeling of when we've eaten too much bread - that stuffed, lethargic, bloated feeling. That goes after a couple of hours. But I've found if I have a decent sized omelette for breakfast, I get to a point where although I don't feel stuffed, my body just refuses to want to eat anymore...and that feeling can last for hours and hours. I don't feel full, but neither do I feel hungry, and the end result is, counter-intuitively, I probably eat fewer calories in a day.
Just to emphasise, I'm not telling people they must go on a low-carb diet or that low-carb fixes everything. As a T1, lower carb intake introduces a whole new set of complex issues that need to be managed. I'm also a great believer in that people need to pick a diet that delivers the lifestyle and blood sugar goals they need, and that may or may not be low-carb. I just think it's important that everyone is in full possession of the facts, rather than the dogma that is perpetuated by nutritionists terrified of fat or Bernstein acolytes who view bread as a crime against humanity.
I don't see how that adds up...
