so far so stable

well... I ate ALL day yesterday.  I was sure I was going to wake up today to find that I needed to do a correction day to stay within 2 lbs of my last injection weight (137.2) but hey, hey, instead I went down .6 lbs from the prior day's weight to 136.8.

oddly enough though... I still feel really kind of bloated and fat... well I don't really feel fat but I feel like I'm getting fat... some how.  it's probably psychological.

cop to it

I stopped doing the low calorie thing 3 days early.  I just couldn't do it anymore.  I felt pretty awesome the day after binging at my aunt's funeral but I just couldn't stomach the same old no fat 500 calories.  I was surprised that I didn't have any carb cravings after the funeral... just fat fat fat fat.  It's all I've craved since day 5 vlcd.  MOAR FAT!

So I gave up... I don't know.  I feel my body sucking up the fat.  I FEEL it.  I also feel like I'm gaining weight... and everyone can hang me and say I didn't follow protocol and its my fault but I'm not sure I believe in hcg any longer.  Actually... as tough as eating crow is (is crow fatty?  Maybe it's not so tough.)... I'm pretty sure that I don't belive in hcg.  I believe that the protocol works though I think it's inefficient and not right for me.

I've been reading many blogs and many forum posts (and not enough physics and calculus books- BAD RORA BAD) and one that I read start to finish is SugarFreeGoodies.  Like many smart people (some might even accuse yours truly of this), the author comes off a little bit abrasive and know-it-all, and her responses to her "test subjects" lack diplomacy in language, BUT she seems like she's onto something (and she's pretty funny and a clear sci-fi geek) and she might just have a working diet coming to fruition soon.  It's worth a read.  It's got me all FREAKED OUT though because it's through her that I learned that hcg supposedly makes you create more fat cells... that's the last fucking thing I need!

Now... for some calming news (for me)... reading all of these various blogs about people with insulin resistance had me thinking about my own weight and metabolism.  I used to think something was really awry with my metabolism because I gained a lot of weight through puberty (about 10-20 lbs a year from 12 to 16) and I thought I was just particularly - as in more than most people unable to deal with sugar because what caused me to drop own to a normal BMI/150lbs completely effortlessly was to stop drinking soda and juice.

Today, I calculated how much sugar and how many calories a day I was ingesting during those formative teen years... want to guess?  ok, I'll tell you... on any given day, just from juice or soda alone- so not counting any other shit I was eating- I took in between 130-200 grams of sugar and between 600 and 1000 calories.  So, honestly, I think my metabolism dealt with that pretty impressively.  Calories in/calories out is pretty imperfect, but let's assume for a minute it's true... I guarantee you I wasn't eating much healthier outside of my juice/pop but let's say that the juice was my ONLY excess caloric intake... 600calories X 364 / 3500 calories to a lb of fat = 62.4 lbs.

Likewise, in adulthood (age 17 to present), where I only on occasion enjoy soda or juice, I've been losing about 1-2lbs a year... doing nada else (and anyone who has had the unfortunate experience of seeing me eat knows I'm into long distance eating and can go eat a LOT) except not drinking anything but seltzer water on a regular basis (other than water water) and I don't eat sugar too regularly.  I'd be lying to ya if I said I hadn't polished off an entire bag of chocolate peanut butter covered Bugles in late July but I try to keep sugar binges to once a month because it does tend to make me iittttccchhhhyyyy.

My theory was that as I continued to cut out sugar and opt for more sugar free things, I was going to slowly lose weight over the course of many years.  I figured, "why not get the weight off first and just maintain it?  why wait?!" so I did hcg... it's too early to say if I'm going to gain it all back, and my period stopped for like two days when I had eaten a little more carbs, but started right back up again so it could just be period emotions- but I feel like I CAN'T STOP EATING now that I'm in p3 (which isn't that abnormal for me to feel even not on a diet) and I feel like I can FEEL my ass getting bigger.  can I?!  I'm paranoid.  I'm neurotic.  All this food and diet research is making me obsessive.  is giving me an eating disorder.  what the fuck to do...

ok alright

So yesterday was my last injection weight, which means the goal of the next three weeks is to keep my weight within +/- 2lbs.  So far so good... up only .4 today.

Yesterday, I was supposed to eat the p2 foods.  but I ate almost none.  I ate probably half a bag of macadamia nuts, MANY almonds, 2 or 3 slices of cheese, cottage cheese, full fat greek yogurt, lettuce onions and cucumbers with ranch, some snappea crisps, a couple bites of meatballs, 4oz of ground beef in spaghetti sauce.  The nuts alone were probably 500 calories.

I don't know why it's so hard to stick to this now.  I think it's because I don't believe hcg actually does anything.  It's all in the food combining.

down a lil

ok down .8 of my 3.6# gain.. leaving just 2.8 to lose by tomorrow (not going to happen).  so that shit was pretty dumb.  schwatever.

up down and away

ok so I am up 3.6lbs over yesterday.  I was expecting it to be more but I did drink almost 4 liters of water yesterday.  at most, only 1 lb of that is actual fat (and I actually doubt it's a pound)... so I'm hoping it all comes off quickly and my metabolism is boosted a bit.

Today and tomorrow- strict protocol.  no mixing veggies, no adding fats, blah blah blah.

refeed-om

My aunt passed away and today my family all got together and it was so early in the morning and we got to bed so late last night and I just didn't prepare.  I suck.  I just wasn't ready.  I started small but the day just turned into a big, carb-y, fatty reload.  Loading.  at the end of the round.  I don't know!  I'm curious about the results though, because I ate absolutely NO sugar.  but I did probably consume like 4000 calories.  Obviously my weight will be up tomorrow, but I wonder if I'll have boosted my metabolism.  meh.  shrug.  whatever.  if it takes me til the end of this round to get back down to 136-so be it.  Just saw some pictures of myself from today (before eating) and I didn't photograph much skinnier than before.  So it looks like I still have ten more lbs to lose anyway.  we'll handle that in another round...  might even take a planned interruption for Oli's birthday and then do another 15 days on p2

ready to move on

my dedication to p2 is waning... it's not that I'm tempted by junk food or anything (thought actually grosses me out)... I'm just... ready to move on... even though there are still losses to be had... I'm hungrier, I'm less content.

I was kind of bad today.  Did this survey at the mall where I had a few sips of vitamin water and a bite of a saltine (to cleanse the palate).  I think the saltine bite can count for the melba I skipped, and probably any sugar from the vitamin water was burned immediately as I walked ALL DAY today.  I didn't drink enough water.  I'm trying to make up for it now... we'll see.  I ate Fage 0% but felt REALLY hungry afterward so also had 3.5 oz of steak.  No vegetables though (I'm out).  Ate too many fucking almonds... I'm just feeling so meh.... so unsatisfied by everything (except fat)... so wanting to move on.

Tomorrow, if there's a loss... no injection... I'm moving on.  If there is a gain, I'll go until I get back to 136 and then I'll move on.  I know I only have four injections left so... who knows I might feel better in the morning (or worse) and feel okay about going about the entire 4 days.

Going about 1.5hrs away to Tonica to attend my aunt's funeral... will be out there all day... not sure what I'm going to do to stay on protocol... guess I'll have to make food in the morning to bring.

is it fat?

down .8 today to 136!

and I'm SURPRISED... because yesterday, I skipped my first fruit, ate my eggs and only threw away one yolk instead of tossing the usual 2, ate almonds in the middle of the day, ate a 5oz steak for dinner (with fat) and cut up cucumbers and onions and ate them with... RANCH DRESSING ZOMG.  then ate even more almonds.

So the fat experiment continues, though... it's only been going on for 3 or 4 days... need MOAR EVIDENCE.

what is this?  it's awesome!  why am I asking what it is?  I'm the one who found it.

not including today, I have a total of 4 injections and weigh-ins left.  My lofty-probz-not-gonna-happen goal was to get down to 132.  That's probz-not-gonna-happen, but It's possibly I get down to 134!

I'm three-fourths done with this phase, and I've lost three-fourths of the weight that I wanted to lose.


I gained slightly today, .2#, and even though I know it's probably because I sucked at drinking water yesterday and I ate too much salt, I'm sort of glad to see just .2 lbs and to feel kind of dry and bloated at the same time.  I was a little worried that the 1.6# loss wasn't real and was going to come back.  This solidifies that loss.


Lotsa water for me today!

some ponderings

So, as this diet phase comes to its final days (I have only 8 days left), I've been thinking a lot about my future of eating.

This is the first diet where I've had to cook every single meal (okay, minus the two times I ate Taco Bell).  When I did Atkins, I cooked more than usual, but it was also easy to just munch on some deli meat.

At this point, I'm trying to decide what food items I will eat often, eat in moderation, eat rarely, and banish forever.  Months ago, I came to the conclusion that sugar really has no place in my life.  I'm still really young so I can't say what causes me health problems, but I know that just cutting out soda and fruit juice allowed me to go from obese to normal (though, I'd been, in the words of Louis CK's doctor, "cosmetically overweight" for some time).  If sugar allowed my weight to skyrocket as a calorie-burning-machine teenager, I'm sure it's not going to get any better for me.  Granted, I did consume it in large amounts.

I do not see myself getting rid of wheat, assuming I do not show any signs of inheriting my mother's MS.  I do, however, see myself limiting my wheat consumption.  I think it'll be worth the extra cost for some Dreamfields pasta and other lower carb specialties.  I also intend to use low carb options whenever viable alternatives exist- but I'm not going to get all fanatical Atkins about it.  I like bread.  I like pasta.  I like tortillas.  I also like corn, sometimes, but not really...

I don't really like fruit that much.  I could go the rest of my life without ever eating a banana again.  I love strawberries, blackberries, and raspberries though- and hey!  they're low carb- I win.  There are some higher carb veggies that I really, really, really like (love, in some cases), particularly pumpkin, squash, and beets.   AND I INTEND TO CONTINUE TO EAT THEM.

I really like rice but, unless I'm eating out and it's not an option, brown rice is a-okay with me.  I like wild rice too.  So I want to continue to eat rice.

I would fucking die for most cheese.  Would take a bullet to the FACE for a brick of smoked cheddar.  It is non-negotiable.  Dairy stays.  IDGAF about milk though.  Heavy whipping cream is delightful.  I'm from the Midwest, so ranch dressing served with ranch dressing is a meal to me.  It is the greatest dressing, outside of Western, which I just found a SF recipe for.  Fuck yeah, life just got sweeter.

Almost all fast food chains serve unsweetened ice tea, so I'm covered out and about, but I do enjoy the occasional can of "sohda pahp"... don't care for Splenda in general, but will enjoy a few cans of Diet Coke with Splenda or Diet Rite or Diet RC (but probz not Pepsi One because the caffeine content is through the roof and I'm fairly sensitive).

My all time favorite foods and my plans for revamping them are as follows:

• romaine salad with a variety of veggies (especially snap peas when available) topped with ranch dressing and pickled beets hey!  it's already low carb, doesn't require tweeking except that pickled beets have a small amount of HFCS.
• pesto-drenched cheese tortellini will attempt to get by with Dreamfields noodz- pesto drenched.
• chiles rellenos probz shouldn't eat it out but it's VERY doable low carb made at home.
• grilled cheese and tomato soup. low carb bread should handle it and some homemade tomato soup.
• pizza-flavored Pepperidge Farm Goldfish crackers.  nothing I can do about that shiz.
• vegetarian burritos, filled with avocado, cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, rice and beans, topped with some kind of red sauce and covered in melted cheese, served with beans and rice.  occasional treat... This is a meal I refuse to shit on with low carb products and it is also something I usually eat when I'm drunk, anyway.
• random Indian food I get at Trader Joe's, particularly punjab choly and palak paneer- served on rice.  not inherently high-carb, until you get to the rice.  I can't imagine eating palak paneer on cauliflower rice, but I'll try it.
• thai tofu curries on rice.  occasional treat, I guess, unless I prove to have no adverse reaction to rice.  I will try to ask the lady at the local Thai restaurant if she'll consider using a sugar substitute, provided by me, when she makes the curry.
• lasagna, cheesy, cheesy lasagna.  will make at home with Dreamfields.
• tofurkey with wild-rice stuffing and mashed potatoes.  shit's only available once a year anyway.
• Cafe Luigi's New York style "special" pizza (ricotta, tomato, spinach, and fucking LSD or something because it's un-fucking-believable and IDGAF about pizza, generally).  ok, it's a very particular pizza, at a very particular restaurant that is NOWHERE NEAR my home and is not in a neighborhood that I ever need to go to.
• homemade potato salad. When I see it, I'm eating it.
• veggie scrambles on hashbrowns with ketchup.  This is something I order from 24 hour restaurants.  If I have the foresight to bring my own ketchup, I will.  I have an insanely amazing, gourmet sugar-free ketchup recipe.
• pumpkin pie I'll figure something out.

meat is never my favorite food... most meat is take it or leave it for me, apart from chicken breasts, which I generally can't stand.  I like bloody steak (new to me just these last few months!  who am i?!) and I like dark chicken meat (mostly in the form of wings because they want to be covered in ranch and it is my duty as an American to see that they get their wish) but I don't really like meat that much.  A lot of foods on my list above could contain meat but I think it makes them worse.  I do love cheeseburgers and hot dogs though because I am patriotic about being from Chicago and- hey putting ketchup on hot dogs is sacrilege here so no sugar issue there!  By the way, I am patriotic within limits, Chicago-style pizza (deep dish) is kind of gross to me- and I like cheese a lot.  Anyway, I'm going to try to eat more meat to keep carbs low, but if wheat and rice don't give me too much trouble, and all of my issues lie with sugar, I will probably just go back to being a vegetarian like in the old days.  Oh, I do like fish a lot though!

So, if you're at the bottom of this and you read the whole thing, I'm kind of sorry... this is really meant for me to map out what I am and am not willing to live without so that I can plan accordingly with my diet... I can't imagine anyone else would have enjoyed reading that.

takes fat to lose fat

I am very excited about my 1.6lb drop today.  I'm convinced it's because of the almonds.  Yes, ate more almonds yesterday.  and ate beef TWICE.  AND DIDN'T CUT ALL VISIBLE FAT OFF MY STEAK.  and I lost a bunch of weight.  Wish I had realized this earlier in the round but every time I eat a little more fat an usual, I drop a little more weight than usual.

So I'm thinking about it... and I'm feeling rogue.

oops

so today I am down .2lbs.  I'm actually a little surprised I'm down at all.  I didn't sleep well, I think I might have had too much water, and... I *gasp* cheated.  YES, cheated.  "Hilarious" because I just told someone yesterday morning that I hadn't cheated once, then that night I ate 11 almonds.  HAH.  I thought that it was going to turn into a binge thing but I felt completely satisfied with 11 almonds.  Entirely content.  Not eating them after that (and right now)... not a problem.  I don't want to be one of those people who cheats and then goes "I just think my body needed Chips Ahoy cookies; I think we should listen to our bodies."
BUT
I do think my body needed those almonds.  I'm not sure if it's because I'm now anemic because of/causing a month long period or if my body just wants fat.  My vote is on the anemia... next time I get a craving for almonds I'm just going to eat more beef.  And I'm going to try to take an iron supplement, if I can find one that isn't useless.

and I may take this back tomorrow or Thursday but I just have a good feeling about having eaten those almonds.  I wonder if sometimes people produce so much cortisol stressing about cheats that they gain.

inches!

this morning I was only down .2 at 138.4, but... I measured my waist and it was a whole .5 inch down from just a week ago... which means I've lost 2 inches overall.

I am 2/3rds of the way done with p2.  I have (including today's) 9 more injections and (including today) 11 more days of low calorie.  It's almost over!  I think I'll get down to 135 by the end of it... then hopefully I drop down just a little bit more so I can have lost 20 lbs.

onward ho!

so it's day 21... so I've completed 3 weeks of vlcd... WOW.  just 10 more days to go... which also means it's 10 days until my son Oliver turns 3.  Can't wait to make a sugarfree cheesecake!

I'm feeling good about my losses (was 1.2 lbs down this morning- awesome) but I'm not excited about blogging.  I don't really know what's what or why some things happen.  I haven't taken good enough accounts of my meal plans to notice any patterns.  I will say this, I've eaten taco bell twice and lost well the next day both times.  I've been veering from protocol lately... today I had eggs and onions and tomatoes and spinach for lunch and ground beef in spaghetti sauce (sugar free!) for dinner.  Kind of don't care but the spaghetti sauce has olive oil as an ingredient and has 1g of fat.  It was really good.

At this point, I'd like to drop about 4 more lbs... but I'm feeling good where I am.  I don't really care.  I've never been in the 130s as an adult and here I am and I feel... pretty much the same... so there you have it and there it is.

minus 10000

and we made it

So I'm finally into the 130s... very much just tiptoed over the line.  It's getting harder and harder to find images for some reason so I had to go to some stupid generator and generate this one:

 

took a pretty big dose of potassium last night on accident but nothing happened... it didn't dry me out nor did it make my leg cramps go away AND I didn't have any heart problems.  Either I'm very K deficient or this bottle is crap.  Next time I almost accidentally OD on something, I WANT TO FEEL IT.  Actually... despite the concern of the ladies on the hcg message board, I wasn't anywhere NEAR critical levels.  I've been reading about people taking what I took (600mg) 3X a day... I'll never almost die!

ehhhhh

back down to 140.4 today... getting annoyed.  not going to bother posting the same picture.  meeehhhhh.  I had to eat a few bites of steak just go to bed last night... period is making me all crave-y and hungry.

another gain

So another little .2lb gain... very annoying.   I did walk a lot yesterday but I know I don't drink enough water AND, although I've had my period THIS ENTIRE TIME, it's really heavy right now.  I've been a bit hungrier these past few days.

Still, it's not too discouraging, because I look and feel skinnier fo sho, but I was hoping to get down to 132 by day 30.  The weight loss will really have to ramp up to reach that goal.  WHY WON'T YOU GO INTO THE 130s BODY?!  ARE YOU FUCKING WITH ME?!

gain

So I gained .2lbs.  I'm totally not tripping... I ate most of my food and drank most of my water pretty late last night.  Also, I've been very near protocol but I haven't been on protocol exactly completely 100% in a few days (ate beef for the last 4 meals and had non-lowfat beef on Sunday).  I will attempt to stay on protocol today and drink lots and lots of water.  I didn't expect to lose an entire pound yesterday so it's all good, my average still comes out to .67lbs/day and that is above average for women.

almost into the one-thirties

almost didn't post today because my neighbor's internet was down but now I have my own internet (and phone!) so I'm back!

Ate all beef yesterday (hamburger and steak) and am down a whopping 1 lb today.  I'm halfway through with p2!

it's a miracle that i lost anything but I had a long night and don't much feel like talking about myself.

ate taco bell (beef, scooped out of shells, forgot to specify chicken) then over-ate p2 foods later because I was really crave-y.

not to scale

I think I'm still moving.  I thought I had a handle on my scale but this morning it's giving me 4 different weights.  I've decided to go with the one in the middle, since they're all had roughly the same frequency.

I didn't think I was going to lose this morning (and maybe I didn't... weird scale) but I'll take the loss.  Today is the end of week 2.  I lost 3 lbs this week.  Not bad.  Since I've lost 10.2 lbs overall (net, I'm not counting loading gains), I'm averaging about .73lb loss per day.  I seriously see that going down to about .5 but, so far I've been surprised by my ability to lose on this diet.  I knew it would work but I thought it would be a much bigger struggle.  If I can keep up the 3 lbs/week from this point forward, I will be okay... I'd end at about 135lbs... my goal is 132 lbs so schwatever, that's really close.

Yesterday (and I would call this a "cheat" really), I went off protocol and had almond milk in my coffee instead of bovine milk.  Didn't seem to be a problem.  I wouldn't even have needed milk if the lady at the Target Starbucks didn't add a sickening amount of sugar-free hazelnut syrup to my iced coffee.  I also had trouble sleeping last night.  This may or may not be due to drinking iced coffee at 10PM.

moving along nicely!

Yesterday I didn't eat perfectly... apple in the morning as usual, but then I went to my friend's house all day.  Brought a chicken breast with me (left it there and don't care.  hate chicken now.) and could not bring myself to eat it.  Drank a lot of water, munched on a handful of grape tomatoes... that was it.  We took the kids to Portillo's (if you're not from the Greater Chicagoland Area, Portillo's is a chain of hotdog/hamburger/ribs/etc restaurants) and I had a grilled chicken sandwich, minus bread and mayo.  I'm sure the chicken wasn't actually cooked in fat but it was probably cooked on the same equipment as greasy hamburgers.  It was also probably about 4-5oz, not 3.5oz.  Came home around 8 and felt munchy so I had two grissini sticks.  That was all of my food for the day.

Found my bottle of ketostix from when I did Atkins and decided to test one out (coincidentally, the ketostix expire on the very last day of p2) just for the hell of it.  It was dark!  I was surprised, what with having eaten only grissini in the last few hours.  Thought it might be a fluke so I did it again this morning... darker.  Ketosis supposedly doesn't matter on this diet but I think it's a good sign that fat is being broken down.

so yeah... wasn't expecting to lose but was down .6 at 142.4!  huzzah!  130s here I come!

progress

well, day 11 is coming to a close so I am 1/3 of the way through the low calorie portion of this diet.


Today seemed a little tougher for some reason.  maybe because there was more fast food around than there has been.  Still, I'm proud of myself... no cheats.  I wouldn't say it's hard but I generally don't restrict myself of things.  Well, okay, I guess that's not true... many a time I have sat out a party or other goings-out with friends so that I could study instead.  I guess I'll just look at it like that... an entire month of being alone, studying.

I wish I wasn't so ornery... some of the people on the message board I read just piss me off lately.  I'm a bit of a know-it-all and many other know-it-alls are like the opposite end of a magnet.  I'm really, really, really lucky though because I love all the girls on my p2 thread.  I so look forward to reading that thread every day.  If any of you are reading this, I love you guys, you're all so awesome!

alright alright alright!

Ok... so I'm down .6 today... which is great, though, to be honest I was expecting a pound or two... but whatever... just glad to see movement!

Not sure what "broke" my slow down, or if it was anything at all, but I'm going to continue what I did yesterday: more liquids (not just water because I can't drink more water because it's grossing me out), no tomatoes, more sleep, more toilet time and that's really about it.

143.8!  good work, body.