Many people have success losing pounds with the Atkins diet, but it is not a long term healthy way to eat. The goal should be sound health more than losing weight, which will be a by-product of healthy eating anyway (as you are already discovering).
Optimal diets are generally the most varied, not the most restricted like Atkins is. Think more small meals, 3-5 a day, moderate DAILY aerobic exercise (walking, hiking, biking, swimming, relaxed cross-country skiing and snowshoeing, playing frisbee without a dog, golf without a cart, etc...) interspersed with anaerobic or resistance training (something like yoga (this is a hands-down no lose activity, all around good stuff), pilates, sports that make you sweat, or weight training (any of these 2-4 x a week, even one day a week is great if you have low energy levels right now)), and a variety of foods - fruits, vegetables, complex carbohydrates, whole grains, nuts, oils, dark leafy greens, restricted dairy, high quality protein (love that seafood, always a good option).
Two good rules of thumb to recalibrate your stomach/appetite are A) eliminate artificial & processed foods from your diet, as much as possible anyway B) drink water like it's going out of style, a dehydrated body has trouble knowing when it is or is not hungry, tis can easily manifest in sugar cravings it also helps with the oral fixation phenomenon. Coffee and alcohol use and/or abuse make this doubly important, not for appetite reasons but for simple detoxification and basic body chemistry.
And I can bet the bank you are not going to like this last one. No booze, anything more than say 3-5 drinks A WEEK is taxing, and none at all is best (imho of course). It affects many more organs in the body than just the liver, and no, just switching to light beer makes no difference...
food for thought, pun optional,
bb
