low carb Does work!!!!

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  • SezxyStef
    SezxyStef Posts: 15,268 Member
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    tlflag1620 wrote: »
    SezxyStef wrote: »
    tlflag1620 wrote: »
    nutmegoreo wrote: »
    So you ate less than you burned (CICO) while choosing foods that met your satiety needs?

    I think her point (and I suspect you understand this, even if you want to play coy) is that for her, and many others, restricting carbs helps with satiety, making it easier to create a deficit without going hungry. I think she realizes that she ate less than she burned, she's just saying that LCHF made it easier for her to do that.

    /end thread indeed.

    But this is the thing you don't have to restrict carbs to help with satiety, I went low carb 4 or 5 years ago and it was horrible...absolutely horrible...I never had that satisfied feeling....and by carbs I mean starches, I ate lots of veggies.

    But after coming here and reading I realized it was okay to eat potatoes and white rice and pasta and I was so very happy

    Even to this day I eat more protein and fats then carbs and I am "satisfied" and guess what lost weight and maintained....
    So, I'm sick of when people on here say they are struggling and someone on here suggests low carb and then another person berates them and says it's all about calories eat as much as you want but stay within the calories but heres the thing, did that and could not stay within my calories because carbs don't keep me satiated....they satisfy for an hour then I'm hungry again.. For example I used to have cheerios for breakfast but by first break at work (930) I was starving and usually grabbed a cookie or bag of chips...now I have 3 scrambled eggs with salsa (more calories) but I'm good till lunch!!I may have a small healthy snack like some Spitz or a handful of almonds but that's it!!!Now I'm not saying this works for everyone but I've lost 6 pounds in 2 and a half weeks doing this, it's working for me...so when someone on here suggests low care it is a VALID suggestion...the whole "eat whatever you want and stay within calorie goal" is not the ultimate answer so don't be quick to judge someone's suggestion.. Different lifestyles work for different people.

    I bolded what was the actual problem for you. How about grabbing something low calorie instead of cookies and chips?
    BTW. cookies and chips? Loooooots of fat.

    What I've said on here many times when I get to The point where I'm starving I have no self control and go for unhealthy stuff, eating a low carb high fat meal allows me to not feel that way and I can get away with a handful of almonds or a healthy snack till I get to lunch cause at break, I am still satiated from breakfast.....

    but you didn't have to go low carb for that all you had to do was plan ahead for what you knew was coming and pack yogurt, fruit, veggies etc to snack on...

    You might not have to restrict carbs for satiety. I do. I used to eat lots of whole grains, veggies and fruit, modest amounts of lean meats and low fat or fat free dairy, very little added sugar very little added fat. Cutting back on obvious "junk" (soda, chips, cookies, etc) helped, but not enough. I still struggled with hunger much of the time. When I dropped the grains and sugary fruit (keeping low sugar and savory fruit), started favoring fibrous veggies rather than starchy ones, switched to fattier cuts of meat and whole eggs, switched to full fat dairy, and increased the added fat (good fats like butter, lard, and bacon drippings), my hunger diminished in a big way. I was able to make more rational decisions and trust my hunger signals. Yes, I was obviously in a calorie deficit, so I lost weight. But for the first time in my life I was able to easily stick to that deficit long enough. I wasn't fighting hunger all the time. You may do well on a higher carb diet. Not everyone does.

    Yogurt (at least the low fat kind, full fat regular or Greek yogurt is okay for me, in small doses), fruit, starchy veggies, grains (even "whole" grains)... These fuel my hunger. I'd eat those, find myself still starving, and reach for more.

    did you miss the part where I said I eat more fats and protein but don't feel that going low carb is the end all to be all...it does help with weight loss esp at first but you can up protein and fats without sacrificing carbs to a degree that you are "restricting"

    I eat lots of meat, eggs, cheese, butter, cook with lard and bacon fat...
  • kmsnyg
    kmsnyg Posts: 100 Member
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    I eat moderate carbs (average between 100-150 g per day) but what I've learned recently is that I'm less hungry if I eat less processed food. I can eat carbs, but I try to make them whole grain and/or get my carbs from veggies and fruits. Occasionally I eat white carbs and notice I'm hungry much faster. I'm losing pretty consistently right now, so I'm happy with the moderate carb intake.
  • seaandski14
    seaandski14 Posts: 3 Member
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    I don't believe in carb-free diets -- I just don't think that is sustainable -- but in limiting carbs. I truly don't know whether it's a satiety thing or the way carbs work in my body, but I know that limiting things like bread, pasta, potatoes and crackers make an enormous difference for me. It may have to do with insulin response. I think a major drawback of flour and flour-related products is that they are very calorically dense, so you get very little food in exchange for a tremendous amount of calories. And it's frightfully easy to swallow a lot of pasta and not even feel like I've really eaten anything. It's also too easy to just take dry pasta and just pour a ton of it into a pot without measuring.

    I used to be a pasta and bagel addict, and I know these are very difficult carbs to give up or limit for many people. When my doctor suggested giving up bagels years ago, she may as well have been suggesting I cut off my right arm. But today, I actually find both pasta and bread kind of flavorless and boring, and they just don't have the lure for me that they used to. I don't know how it happened and don't really have a secret for that, but it just did. I think that I think of them the way most people think of tofu -- very bland, very boring, unappealing in texture. I feel like I have to work hard to make them appealing, and why bother, since they have so many calories anyway?

    The following carb limitations worked for me, and maybe they will work for others. Even though they are carbo-laden, I did lose a lot of weight eating potato chips semi-regularly, but just a single-serve bag with lunch, and not every day. I could never keep giant bags of chips in the house, nor even the little bags, because if they're at home I'll plow through them when I'm bored. So I would rather pay a little more and buy just the one bag I'm going to eat that day. I also found Progresso vegetable soup with rotini pasta helpful...you get just a few pieces of pasta, but enough to feel like you ate pasta. I also regularly ate a 2-pack of Reeses peanut butter cups most days and lost weight. They are just 210 cals. and satified me (I also prefer the dark chocolate version.) Whether this particular candy was better since it added the protein of peanut butter, I don't know; I just know I found these things enough to scratch my itch and keep my calories controlled. At the end of the day it's caloric deficit that results in weight loss; how you get there has to work for you. Everyone is different. Hope these suggestions are helpful!
  • SezxyStef
    SezxyStef Posts: 15,268 Member
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    tlflag1620 wrote: »
    peter56765 wrote: »
    I did low carb for over a year and it worked as advertised. I lost the weight and wasn't hungry but ultimately I gained it all back and then some. The reason? Restrictive diets are boring to me and ultimately my cravings for (literally) forbidden fruits got to be too much. Low carb means saying goodbye to 85% of everything at the grocery store and 95% of everything at a restaurant. No thanks. Last night we had homemade strawberry shortcake with fresh strawberries. I adjusted my lunch and exercise to fit it in calorie wise. Pretty easy to do and IMO, life's too short to miss out on things like that.

    Low carb means any kind of meat in the market, most veggies, many fruits, any full fat dairy product, dark chocolate, seeds and nuts of all kinds. Okay, 85% of the "junk food" in the grocery store is off limits, but I'd have a hard time fitting soda, chips, and candy into my calorie limits regardless. Dining out is easy - some kind of meat plus salad and veggies. It's as hard or as easy as you make it.

    I regularly eat berries with heavy cream. I just skip the shortcake. Leaves room for more berries and more cream ;).

    this sounds like lchf...not just low carb.
  • tlflag1620
    tlflag1620 Posts: 1,358 Member
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    SezxyStef wrote: »
    tlflag1620 wrote: »
    SezxyStef wrote: »
    tlflag1620 wrote: »
    nutmegoreo wrote: »
    So you ate less than you burned (CICO) while choosing foods that met your satiety needs?

    I think her point (and I suspect you understand this, even if you want to play coy) is that for her, and many others, restricting carbs helps with satiety, making it easier to create a deficit without going hungry. I think she realizes that she ate less than she burned, she's just saying that LCHF made it easier for her to do that.

    /end thread indeed.

    But this is the thing you don't have to restrict carbs to help with satiety, I went low carb 4 or 5 years ago and it was horrible...absolutely horrible...I never had that satisfied feeling....and by carbs I mean starches, I ate lots of veggies.

    But after coming here and reading I realized it was okay to eat potatoes and white rice and pasta and I was so very happy

    Even to this day I eat more protein and fats then carbs and I am "satisfied" and guess what lost weight and maintained....
    So, I'm sick of when people on here say they are struggling and someone on here suggests low carb and then another person berates them and says it's all about calories eat as much as you want but stay within the calories but heres the thing, did that and could not stay within my calories because carbs don't keep me satiated....they satisfy for an hour then I'm hungry again.. For example I used to have cheerios for breakfast but by first break at work (930) I was starving and usually grabbed a cookie or bag of chips...now I have 3 scrambled eggs with salsa (more calories) but I'm good till lunch!!I may have a small healthy snack like some Spitz or a handful of almonds but that's it!!!Now I'm not saying this works for everyone but I've lost 6 pounds in 2 and a half weeks doing this, it's working for me...so when someone on here suggests low care it is a VALID suggestion...the whole "eat whatever you want and stay within calorie goal" is not the ultimate answer so don't be quick to judge someone's suggestion.. Different lifestyles work for different people.

    I bolded what was the actual problem for you. How about grabbing something low calorie instead of cookies and chips?
    BTW. cookies and chips? Loooooots of fat.

    What I've said on here many times when I get to The point where I'm starving I have no self control and go for unhealthy stuff, eating a low carb high fat meal allows me to not feel that way and I can get away with a handful of almonds or a healthy snack till I get to lunch cause at break, I am still satiated from breakfast.....

    but you didn't have to go low carb for that all you had to do was plan ahead for what you knew was coming and pack yogurt, fruit, veggies etc to snack on...

    You might not have to restrict carbs for satiety. I do. I used to eat lots of whole grains, veggies and fruit, modest amounts of lean meats and low fat or fat free dairy, very little added sugar very little added fat. Cutting back on obvious "junk" (soda, chips, cookies, etc) helped, but not enough. I still struggled with hunger much of the time. When I dropped the grains and sugary fruit (keeping low sugar and savory fruit), started favoring fibrous veggies rather than starchy ones, switched to fattier cuts of meat and whole eggs, switched to full fat dairy, and increased the added fat (good fats like butter, lard, and bacon drippings), my hunger diminished in a big way. I was able to make more rational decisions and trust my hunger signals. Yes, I was obviously in a calorie deficit, so I lost weight. But for the first time in my life I was able to easily stick to that deficit long enough. I wasn't fighting hunger all the time. You may do well on a higher carb diet. Not everyone does.

    Yogurt (at least the low fat kind, full fat regular or Greek yogurt is okay for me, in small doses), fruit, starchy veggies, grains (even "whole" grains)... These fuel my hunger. I'd eat those, find myself still starving, and reach for more.

    did you miss the part where I said I eat more fats and protein but don't feel that going low carb is the end all to be all...it does help with weight loss esp at first but you can up protein and fats without sacrificing carbs to a degree that you are "restricting"

    I eat lots of meat, eggs, cheese, butter, cook with lard and bacon fat...

    I guess I missed the part where I, or the OP, said that low carb was the end all be all. I did see where you said "you don't have to restrict carbs to help with satiety". Had you said "*I* don't have to restrict carbs to help with satiety" I would have agreed with you. Plenty of people don't have to restrict carbs. I'm just not one of them. Not that low carb is the only way, or even the best way for all, just that it is the best way for me. And, for what it's worth, while many might find my diet "restrictive" I've never felt freer or more in control of my eating habits. Since I'm not hungry al, the time, I am free to indulge in true moderation without fear that that one little slice of cake will end up being half a cake before the night is over. I couldn't trust myself before. Now I can. To me, that's liberating, not restricting.

  • TeaBea
    TeaBea Posts: 14,517 Member
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    tlflag1620 wrote: »
    peter56765 wrote: »
    I did low carb for over a year and it worked as advertised. I lost the weight and wasn't hungry but ultimately I gained it all back and then some. The reason? Restrictive diets are boring to me and ultimately my cravings for (literally) forbidden fruits got to be too much. Low carb means saying goodbye to 85% of everything at the grocery store and 95% of everything at a restaurant. No thanks. Last night we had homemade strawberry shortcake with fresh strawberries. I adjusted my lunch and exercise to fit it in calorie wise. Pretty easy to do and IMO, life's too short to miss out on things like that.

    Low carb means any kind of meat in the market, most veggies, many fruits, any full fat dairy product, dark chocolate, seeds and nuts of all kinds. Okay, 85% of the "junk food" in the grocery store is off limits, but I'd have a hard time fitting soda, chips, and candy into my calorie limits regardless. Dining out is easy - some kind of meat plus salad and veggies. It's as hard or as easy as you make it.

    I regularly eat berries with heavy cream. I just skip the shortcake. Leaves room for more berries and more cream ;).

    "Junk food" like beans & legumes? "Junk food" like oats, rice or potatoes?
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
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    So, I'm sick of when people on here say they are struggling and someone on here suggests low carb and then another person berates them and says it's all about calories eat as much as you want but stay within the calories but heres the thing, did that and could not stay within my calories because carbs don't keep me satiated....they satisfy for an hour then I'm hungry again.. For example I used to have cheerios for breakfast but by first break at work (930) I was starving and usually grabbed a cookie or bag of chips...

    A cookie or a bag of chips is as much fat as carb, so weird to call them carbs or say the issue is carbs don't satisfy you. I note that you didn't seem to be choosing some of the more filling carbs, like whole grains and, especially, vegetables.

    Anyway, I would find cheerios unsatisfying (plus I hate cold cereal) as a breakfast due to the lack of protein. Nothing to do with low carb.

    That said, of course low carb works, if you have a calorie deficit, as does any way of eating that involves a calorie deficit. If the way you eat isn't satisfying to you, of course change it up. I am never hungry and I eat plenty of carbs, since I choose foods that are satiating for me (like lots of vegetables and plenty of protein).
  • tlflag1620
    tlflag1620 Posts: 1,358 Member
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    SezxyStef wrote: »
    tlflag1620 wrote: »
    peter56765 wrote: »
    I did low carb for over a year and it worked as advertised. I lost the weight and wasn't hungry but ultimately I gained it all back and then some. The reason? Restrictive diets are boring to me and ultimately my cravings for (literally) forbidden fruits got to be too much. Low carb means saying goodbye to 85% of everything at the grocery store and 95% of everything at a restaurant. No thanks. Last night we had homemade strawberry shortcake with fresh strawberries. I adjusted my lunch and exercise to fit it in calorie wise. Pretty easy to do and IMO, life's too short to miss out on things like that.

    Low carb means any kind of meat in the market, most veggies, many fruits, any full fat dairy product, dark chocolate, seeds and nuts of all kinds. Okay, 85% of the "junk food" in the grocery store is off limits, but I'd have a hard time fitting soda, chips, and candy into my calorie limits regardless. Dining out is easy - some kind of meat plus salad and veggies. It's as hard or as easy as you make it.

    I regularly eat berries with heavy cream. I just skip the shortcake. Leaves room for more berries and more cream ;).

    this sounds like lchf...not just low carb.

    Not being snarky, but low carb is supposed to be high fat. When you reduce carbs (as a percentage) you obviously need to replace them with something else. Too much protein can have negative health consequences. So carbs get replaced with fats.

  • tlflag1620
    tlflag1620 Posts: 1,358 Member
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    TeaBea wrote: »
    tlflag1620 wrote: »
    peter56765 wrote: »
    I did low carb for over a year and it worked as advertised. I lost the weight and wasn't hungry but ultimately I gained it all back and then some. The reason? Restrictive diets are boring to me and ultimately my cravings for (literally) forbidden fruits got to be too much. Low carb means saying goodbye to 85% of everything at the grocery store and 95% of everything at a restaurant. No thanks. Last night we had homemade strawberry shortcake with fresh strawberries. I adjusted my lunch and exercise to fit it in calorie wise. Pretty easy to do and IMO, life's too short to miss out on things like that.

    Low carb means any kind of meat in the market, most veggies, many fruits, any full fat dairy product, dark chocolate, seeds and nuts of all kinds. Okay, 85% of the "junk food" in the grocery store is off limits, but I'd have a hard time fitting soda, chips, and candy into my calorie limits regardless. Dining out is easy - some kind of meat plus salad and veggies. It's as hard or as easy as you make it.

    I regularly eat berries with heavy cream. I just skip the shortcake. Leaves room for more berries and more cream ;).

    "Junk food" like beans & legumes? "Junk food" like oats, rice or potatoes?

    Yes, it also limits or eliminates grains, beans, legumes, and starchy veg, as well as low fat/fat free dairy, and high sugar fruit. Never said those were "junk food". But those don't make up 85% of the store either. Beans, legumes, grains, high sugar fruit, and starchy veg don't do anything for me (well, beans leave me bloated and wheat flares my eczema) but leave me hungry. The post I responded to claimed 85% of the grocery store and 95% of restaraunt food is off limits on a low carb diet. I call BS. Maybe 85% of junk food is off limits, and maybe you'll have to make special requests or modify restaraunt meals, but there is an abundant variety of low carb foods to be had.
  • missh1967
    missh1967 Posts: 661 Member
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    I think a major drawback of flour and flour-related products is that they are very calorically dense, so you get very little food in exchange for a tremendous amount of calories.

    Oddly enough, I feel this exact same way about fat :)
  • nvmomketo
    nvmomketo Posts: 12,019 Member
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    Sued0nim wrote: »
    2 and a half weeks is not proof of anything

    That's the land of motivation

    Hope you keep it up for 2 and a half years ...or 2 and a half decades

    Because that's when "it works" that's finding a "diet" and a way to live at your optimal weight / size

    2 and a half weeks :smiley:

    This is true of any diet. Two weeks isn't much. It is hard for all diets to keep it going for years on end. LCHF, LFHC, vegetarian, moderation... all of them.

    It is also true that LCHF can be done over the long term. Many have success with it. I'm at about 14 months in.
  • zyxst
    zyxst Posts: 9,134 Member
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    So, I'm sick of when people on here say they are struggling and someone on here suggests low carb and then another person berates them and says it's all about calories eat as much as you want but stay within the calories but heres the thing, did that and could not stay within my calories because carbs don't keep me satiated....they satisfy for an hour then I'm hungry again.. For example I used to have cheerios for breakfast but by first break at work (930) I was starving and usually grabbed a cookie or bag of chips...now I have 3 scrambled eggs with salsa (more calories) but I'm good till lunch!!I may have a small healthy snack like some Spitz or a handful of almonds but that's it!!!Now I'm not saying this works for everyone but I've lost 6 pounds in 2 and a half weeks doing this, it's working for me...so when someone on here suggests low care it is a VALID suggestion...the whole "eat whatever you want and stay within calorie goal" is not the ultimate answer so don't be quick to judge someone's suggestion.. Different lifestyles work for different people.

    I bolded what was the actual problem for you. How about grabbing something low calorie instead of cookies and chips?
    BTW. cookies and chips? Loooooots of fat.

    What I've said on here many times when I get to The point where I'm starving I have no self control and go for unhealthy stuff, eating a low carb high fat meal allows me to not feel that way and I can get away with a handful of almonds or a healthy snack till I get to lunch cause at break, I am still satiated from breakfast.....

    If your breakfast keeps you satisfied, why do you need a snack before lunch? For me, satisfied means I'm not hungry and looking for food.
  • EddieHaskell97
    EddieHaskell97 Posts: 2,227 Member
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    I used ketosis levels of low-carb for six months (along with regular exercise) and lost 61 lbs doing it. It does work, and I really appreciated the decreased appetite, but in the end it was the tried-and-true: calories in were less than calories burned.

    And though I'm happily out of ketosis, I do avoid sugar and most bread to this day.

    So congratulations on your success, OP! If it works for you, then rock on!
  • Francl27
    Francl27 Posts: 26,372 Member
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    zyxst wrote: »
    So, I'm sick of when people on here say they are struggling and someone on here suggests low carb and then another person berates them and says it's all about calories eat as much as you want but stay within the calories but heres the thing, did that and could not stay within my calories because carbs don't keep me satiated....they satisfy for an hour then I'm hungry again.. For example I used to have cheerios for breakfast but by first break at work (930) I was starving and usually grabbed a cookie or bag of chips...now I have 3 scrambled eggs with salsa (more calories) but I'm good till lunch!!I may have a small healthy snack like some Spitz or a handful of almonds but that's it!!!Now I'm not saying this works for everyone but I've lost 6 pounds in 2 and a half weeks doing this, it's working for me...so when someone on here suggests low care it is a VALID suggestion...the whole "eat whatever you want and stay within calorie goal" is not the ultimate answer so don't be quick to judge someone's suggestion.. Different lifestyles work for different people.

    I bolded what was the actual problem for you. How about grabbing something low calorie instead of cookies and chips?
    BTW. cookies and chips? Loooooots of fat.

    What I've said on here many times when I get to The point where I'm starving I have no self control and go for unhealthy stuff, eating a low carb high fat meal allows me to not feel that way and I can get away with a handful of almonds or a healthy snack till I get to lunch cause at break, I am still satiated from breakfast.....

    If your breakfast keeps you satisfied, why do you need a snack before lunch? For me, satisfied means I'm not hungry and looking for food.

    Exactly. Makes no sense to me.

    But anyway... I love people who come in 2.5 weeks into their diet claiming that they know better than people who've been on this site for years...

    Nobody ever said that low carb doesn't work, by the way. Just that it's unnecessary and not always a good long term solution.

    For what it's worth, the best diet for me is about 130g of carbs a day... but coming from whole grains, beans, fruit and veggies because fiber.
  • tlflag1620
    tlflag1620 Posts: 1,358 Member
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    Alluminati wrote: »
    tlflag1620 wrote: »
    SezxyStef wrote: »
    tlflag1620 wrote: »
    peter56765 wrote: »
    I did low carb for over a year and it worked as advertised. I lost the weight and wasn't hungry but ultimately I gained it all back and then some. The reason? Restrictive diets are boring to me and ultimately my cravings for (literally) forbidden fruits got to be too much. Low carb means saying goodbye to 85% of everything at the grocery store and 95% of everything at a restaurant. No thanks. Last night we had homemade strawberry shortcake with fresh strawberries. I adjusted my lunch and exercise to fit it in calorie wise. Pretty easy to do and IMO, life's too short to miss out on things like that.

    Low carb means any kind of meat in the market, most veggies, many fruits, any full fat dairy product, dark chocolate, seeds and nuts of all kinds. Okay, 85% of the "junk food" in the grocery store is off limits, but I'd have a hard time fitting soda, chips, and candy into my calorie limits regardless. Dining out is easy - some kind of meat plus salad and veggies. It's as hard or as easy as you make it.

    I regularly eat berries with heavy cream. I just skip the shortcake. Leaves room for more berries and more cream ;).

    this sounds like lchf...not just low carb.

    Not being snarky, but low carb is supposed to be high fat. When you reduce carbs (as a percentage) you obviously need to replace them with something else. Too much protein can have negative health consequences. So carbs get replaced with fats.

    You don't sound snarky at all but you do sound coy

    Jut trying to figure out why she's making a distinction between LC and LCHF. I genuinely don't understand. A LC diet that is also low in fat, is by default going to be high in protein, which is not good. LC should be high fat. Just waiting to see where Stef is going with this, lol.
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