I have yet to experience a stall. At least, I have not experinced an "official" stall, which can be defined by a period of four weeks (or more) with no loss of either inches OR pounds. However, I have found that there are some things that definitely slow down my loss.

Polish Sausage
Too bad, because I LOVE Polish sausage. I'm not sure if it's the nitrates or the salt, but I definitely don't lose anything if I have it more than once or twice in any given week.

Ovulation
This is a toughie, because I can't just eliminate it, but I don't lose from ovulation until the start of TOM. I think it's water retention, because after TOM starts, I usually have a big whoosh.

Low Fat
It took me a while to figure this one out. I don't lose if I'm not taking in enough fat. I can lose almost every week if I eat a lot of fried chicken or tuna salad with plenty of mayonnaise. 60 to 65% of your calories should be coming from fat, 30% from protein, and 5 to 10% from carbohydrates.  This might be worth looking into if you're having trouble losing.

Common Stallers
These include aspartame, caffeine, cheese (or other dairy products), citric acid, glycerin, nitrates and sugar alcohols among others. Most diet sodas contain aspartame, caffeine and citric acid, so if diet sodas are causing your stall, it may take some investigation to figure out exactly which one of these is the culprit. SF Jell-O has aspartame and citric acid. Bars have glycerin and sugar alcohols; it's what keeps them moist and chewy. Nitrates are in processed meat products. You may be able to eat all of these- or you may be able to eat none of these. You have to find out what works for YOU. Anything you can put in your mouth will stall someone.

Opinions- and I have one on just about everything!

Induction
Induction is great! I loved it. I was very comfortable with it at the end of the two-week period, and stayed on another two weeks. After a lot of reading and research, I have decided that three weeks is the optimum amount of time to spend in induction, based on the amount of time it takes to reach ketosis, and the amount of time it takes AFTER reaching ketosis to begin experiencing ALL the benefits.  I know people who have stayed on induction for months and months. Not a good idea, in my opinion. I, for one, do not want my body to become accustomed to functioning on 20 grams of carbohydrate a day. Most of the people I know who are stuck for months at a weight which is not their goal have admitted to using induction for extended periods. Their bodies have become accustomed to functioning on 20g carbs, and now they can't add more without gaining. I don't want that to happen to me. I do induction-level carbs for a day or two every week. But I also have a lot of carbs one or two days a week. My carb intake ranges anywhere from 15 to 50g per day and as long as I stay in ketosis, and keep losing, this is the way I will handle OWL.

Ketostix or Other Brands of LTS
According to the stix, I have never been OUT of ketosis. The common misconception seems to be that darker purple is better. It is not! Dark purple can indicate dehydration- if you don't believe me, try a stick after a couple days of a stomach virus. Mine was almost black! And rather than rejoicing, I was drinking fast and furious to get it to lighten up. Read the stix like a pregnancy test: any hint of a color change is POSITIVE. Only time you don't have a positive reading is when they're wet beige.

You do not need the stix to tell if you are in ketosis.  There are other ways to determine ketosis, such as bad breath, metallic taste in the mouth, smelly sweat, stinky urine, hot flashes*, night sweats*, increased thirst, increased energy, decreased appetite, weight loss!

Not everyone who goes into ketosis will have the same experience.  You will not have ALL the signs listed above.  Don't think that because you stink but you aren't thirsty, that you are not in ketosis. 

*Hot flashes and night sweats are not usually present during the whole period of ketosis.  These are common during the first days of lowcarbing, when your body is converting from glycolysis to lipolysis (from burning sugar for energy to burning fat for energy).  Once ketosis is established, these two signs, if they appeared at all, will usually disappear.

Water
This is a biggie. Water is SO important. It helps the kidneys filter the blood. If the kidneys don't get enough water to do their job, then the liver has to help. If the liver is busy filtering blood, then it is not doing its own job, which is metabolizing fat. You need half your body weight (in pounds) in ounces of water- every day. (If you weigh 180 lbs, you need 90 oz of water per day.)  Another benefit of drinking the proper amount of water is that it helps to decrease the intensity of "keto-breath".

Hidden Carbs in Protein Bars
The hidden carbs come mainly from glycerin and sugar alcohols. There is a disclaimer on the pacakge: "Note: Glycerin, polydextrose, xylitol and maltitol while included in the "Calories" count, have been omitted from the "Total Carbohydrate" count, as they have only a negligible impact on blood sugar levels."

The formula for discovering hidden carbs:
From the "Nutrition Facts" panel, multiply the number of fat grams by nine and the number of protein grams by four. Add these two numbers together. Subtract this total from the total number of calories. The remainder will be the calories from carbohydrates. Divide this by four to get the total number of carbohydrate grams in your bar.

A Carb Solutions Chocolate Toffee Hazelnut bar has 8g fat (8x9=72) and 22g protein (22x4=88). Fat and protein calories are 160 (72+88=160). There are 230 total calories in the bar (230-160=70) so there are 70 calories worth of carbs. That would be 17.5g total carbs (70/4=17.5)- or 15.5g HIDDEN carbs- because they DO admit to 2g carbs on the label.

BE CAREFUL! (Personally, I am not sensitive to glycerin. Not everyone is. I'm including this here because many are, and it's important to know how to calculate hidden carbs if you ARE senstive.)



Where are you going to find hidden carbs?

Oh wow, where do I start? Well, the obvious ones are protein bars, candy bars, ice cream; basically all the sweet stuff you would find in your store that says "sugar-free" on the label. Even Jell-O has hidden carbs. (It's a sure bet that there are hidden carbs in a product if a label states "net carbs, digestible carbs, impact carbs, effective carbs, etc". If they have to say that, then you know they are trying to hide something.)

Here's a short list of some of the hidden carbs (as well as carbs you may think you don't have to count) that I've found:

1- Cheese-
These vary, but for the sake of simplicity, count 1g per ounce.
2- Coffee-
Count .8g per 6-ounce cup of brewed coffee (keeping in mind that most cups these days are much larger than 6 ounces.
Count .7g per rounded teaspoon of instant coffee.
3- Crystal Light-
Count 1.25g per 8 fluid ounces.
4- Cream-
Count 6.6g per cup of heavy whipping cream, or .4g per tablespoon.
Count 10.4g per cup of half & half, or .6 per tablespoon.
5- Deli meats-
These vary w-i-d-e-l-y. Check the ingredients (most contain sugar in some form; corn syrup is very common) as well as the nutritional panel.
6- Eggs-
Count .7g per large egg, or 2g per 3 eggs.
7- Jell-O-
Count 1.5g per 1/2 cup (prepared).
8- Mayonnaise-
Count .25g per tablespoon of real mayonnaise. Mayonnaise-type salad dressings (Miracle Whip, SpinBlend) are 2g per tablespoon.
9-Medications-
These vary, but most of them use starch fillers, and some of the liquid preparations have sugar. Check out Cheri's newbie site for a link to the carb counts of some of the more common medications.
10- Organ meats-
Beef liver has the highest carb count I've found, with 9g carbs per 4-ounce serving. As far as I'm concerned, this is just a happy excuse to get out of eating it.
11- Shellfish-
Count 2.9g for clams, .6g for lobster, .8g for Dungeness crab, 1g for shrimp, 2.7g for scallops. (All counts are for 4-ounce servings.)
12- Spices-
Red pepper, chili powder and cinnamon have over half their carbs coming from fiber, but most of the spices you use don't have significant amounts of fiber. For 1 teaspoon, count red pepper as 1g (.7g fiber), black pepper as 1.7g, garlic powder as 2.3g, Lite salt as .5g, chili powder as 1.4g (.9g fiber), cinnamon as 2.1g (1.4g fiber), ground cumin as .9g, oregano as .5g. A fresh garlic clove is 1g.
13- Splenda-
Liquid Splenda has 0g carbs, but if you use the packets or the granular variety, count 1g per packet, or 1g per 2 teaspoons (24g per cup) of the granular.
14- Vinegar-
This one surprised me.  I would have never guessed that vinegar has twice the carbs of cream!  (Well, I knew about the balsamic vinegar, but never thought about white vinegar, cider vinegar or wine vinegar having so many carbs.)  Count .8g per tablespoon (12.8g per cup) of white vinegar, .9g per tablespoon (14.4g per cup) of cider or wine vinegar, and 2g per tablespoon (32 per cup) of balsamic vinegar.