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Well,this is a fine how-do-you-do.
Not a single ounce lost. Not one. In three days!and that's the first time that's ever happened to me. I see that my fat has dug in and is stubbornly refusing eviction.
But I'm not giving up. I WILL have my way about this.
Who's the person in charge here? Why, I believe that would be me. ME.
So I'm re-thinking some food choices. I'm going to use the old Diet Center guidelines:
2 fruits a day (one must be an apple.)
3 cups of vegetables a day (2 should be raw, usually a salad of some kind for lunch, and the remaining cupful cooked for dinner.)
6-8 ounces of lean protein (certain kinds of meat, tofu, eggs.)
2 breads (these are flatbread, grissini, and so on, not yeast breads.)
2 teaspoons of oil (not for cooking--make them into a salad dressing.)
You start each day with a cup of hot water and the juice of one lemon (or 2 tablespoons) stirred in, and it can be sweetened if you like.
You don't eat anything after 7:30 p.m.
The fruits, vegetables and proteins are only certain ones. I've been using these guidelines when I chose what I've been eating for some time (apples, citrus, berries) but I haven't so much followed the other categories.
It basically IS a low carb diet, and when I worked there, and followed it stringently (my job depended on it) it worked very well. I have seen that all these years later the original plan is barely recognizable, and there are lots of packaged foods, meals, things we never had. I wouldn't want to follow the current incarnation for that very reason. I was lucky--I found a copy of the original hardcover at Goodwill a few months ago (fifty cents!) and went through it, marking some of the recipes I'd always loved (and had forgotten) and some others I'd never tried (my tastes have changed!)
I did some research and determined that soy IS safe for me in limited amounts (I ate a lot of tofu in those days and I loved it, but only one brand and only prepared in a couple of certain ways) so I will pick up some Mori-Nu and fix it. Believe me when I say that I have considered this carefully; my risk of breast cancer is high. My doctor says it will be fine, and I am vigilant about exams and checkups (he sees me twice a year for this.)
I've realized I'm not really enjoying the large mixed salads I usually eat (and I make good ones, with about fifteen kinds of vegetables in them)and so I'm remembering a couple of salads I made during those DC days. One was a sort of coleslaw--finely chopped cabbage, diced cucumbers, alfalfa sprouts, diced chicken or tuna, and a tiny bit of mayonnaise. It was GOOD. I'm actually craving it now, just thinking about it. I'll definitely be making this again.
I'm also remembering that two cups of salad wasn't always 'enough' and I KNOW you can't diet as successfully as possible if you are hungry. So what I used to do was measure the chunky stuff that went into the mixed salads (zucchini, cucumbers, sprouts, radishes, cauliflower and so on--no carrots, no tomatoes, and yes, I missed them) into a two cup measure, and then put that on a bed of greens. That worked well. So I may go back to that, as well.
I remember eating my fruit in half portions, so I could have it four times each day (that's where I got my favorite on-program snack, a cup of herbal tea and a piece of fruit, only then it was half, usually apple or orange.) I discovered then how GOOD warm grapefruit tasted. My other favorite evening snack, if you could call it that, was a can of diet soda (it was supposed to be Diet Rite, because at the time it was the only one with no caffeine, no sodium, no sugar--and no taste--poured over a tall narrow glass of ice, with lemon slices (lemons and limes were unlimited, thank you Lord). So much ice that I could fill the glass more than twice, and I sipped it slowly and savored it. I was a heavy drinker of soda in those days but now, not so much, and I'm trying to get back to tea, both iced and hot, coffee ditto (I didn't drink coffee then) with diet soda as a treat when we go out, instead of dessert.
The thing was, the longer I ate this way, the cleaner my palate was, and so what I did eat, could eat, tasted better all the time. This was 30 years ago (how can that BE?! but it was...) and I've been cooking so many years since then, professionally, that I know a lot more than I did then and I think I would be able to be a lot more creative with the allowed foods. And some of them were pretty darn good as they were--one of them, sauteed chicken with a citrus/Dijon/rosemary glaze, became a much-requested entree during my catering business days. My husband still asks for it now and then!
Thinking too that I will start incorporating broth or zero calorie veggie soup (a WWW recipe that I've always enjoyed)as a starter, either for lunch, dinner, or for that evening snack, especially now that winter is coming and something hot is wonderful at night.
Now, I don't intend to follow this exact diet to goal weight. For one thing, it was meant to be done with their special Supplements, which we took eight times a day--vitamins and protein powder, nothing weird or harmful--and without them I would be hungry (I remember that well when I left that job and tried to continue the diet without them.) But it would be a great jump-start. I'm not going to do the Conditioning Phase that we did then--where you eat EIGHT pieces of fruit, unlimited proteins and vegetables for two or three days and yes, you have to eat that much. It cleanses your system, pulls a lot of salts and sugars and chemicals from your body, so you don't crave them. And it worked beautifully, as well as being a great shot in the arm--you could easily lose several pounds in just those two days! But it also means you're basically doing NOTHING but eating all day long for those two days, and I just can't take that kind of time to do it.
I did stay in the habit of drinking water. There is that. And this diet, by the way, is where I learned it was important to mix up what you ate, so as not to slow down your metabolism. I know, I know, after I shared that with another person here, someone else almost immediately said I was wrong. Well. He can think that if he likes. I believe it, and I've seen that to be true in my own journey. I worked hard at getting as much variety as possible from the list of foods we were allowed to eat!
So, yeah. The whole point of this journey is to figure out EXACTLY what works for me (and I haven't even figured out the exercise part. That comes next.) I think I'm on it.
Here's to us, ladies and gentlemen. We got this. We SO got this. One way or another, we're going to come out on top, and we'll be a lot healthier when we do. (See? I said WHEN, not IF!)
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