Stalled (Round 2, Phase2, Day 18)

OMFG this is dragging, especially now that I'm stalled. Why I am I stalled? The possible reasons are legion. The top two contenders are 1) a pretty major cheat on Saturday (babysitting swap at a neighbor's house and ate probably 300-400 calories of their corn chips, wheat thins, dried apricots and peanuts). They tell you on this diet that a cheat will show up for several days in a row. 2) My period; when I got my period in Round 1, I stalled for a few days too.

I've been saying I would probably stop at 23 days, but now that I'll hit that this week, I don't want to, especially on the heels of a stall. Interesting conversation with R this morning. He's been against the diet since Day 1, but now that I am so close to just finishing, he says it is his opinion that I should just knock it out and finish the 40 days.

15	2/11/2011	188.4	-1.0
16	2/12/2011	188.6	0.2
17	2/13/2011	188.8	0.2
18	2/14/2011	189	0.2

Meanwhile, I have been on this diet for Thanksgiving, Christmas, both my kids' birthdays,both my parents' birthdays, my birthday, and now Valentine's Day. Dieting this time of year is not for pussies.

I'm learning less about my habits and my behaviors this time around. It just feels like a slog, like something I have to endure. Maybe that's just where I am right now.

I need a loss tomorrow, and I need a decent loss. I'd really like to get under 187, which seems unlikely, but that's what I'm wishing for. My motivation needs a boost.

Leave  me some motivating comments!

What a Difference a Day Makes (Round 2, Phase 2, Day 12)

I know I must come across as totally schizophrenic. But I'm feeling positive again, mainly because I had a nice loss and feel like maybe this is working. I was down 1.6 today for a total of 8 pounds in 12 days (not counting load up weight. If I count load up weight, I'm down 13.2 pounds in 12 days).

Yes it's less weight than last time, yes it's less percentage of total weight, but it's still decent. Yesterday I had one egg + three egg whites in the morning (in addition to my regular protocol foods) because I was planning a long run. I still lost. I will do the same tomorrow.

I think I have mentioned that I am working with a local HCG coach, and she sent me an email this morning advising me to choose--I either have to stop training for the 10k or stop doing the diet. I think she made this suggestion based her read of the frustration I was feeling the last few days, but even when I said I was determined to stick it out at least the minimum of 23 days for a short round, she said she doesn't think that's a good idea. I also think that she is probably frustrated that I am monkeying around with her program--her philosophy is either do it right or don't do it at all. And it's true, I have had these small cheats almost every day--1/2 an extra grapefruit, an extra 20g of chicken, a cup of chicken broth, salsa, etc. I think those small cheats are the only thing that have kept me from an absolute binge when I am super hungry late at night. But I've still managed to lose 8 pounds in 12 days even with those cheats. Maybe I would have lost 10 or 15 if I hadn't been doing the cheats, but what is the harm of experimenting with it a bit?

Don't you love how, yesterday, I was all pissed about losing only 6 pounds in 11 days and now I am all happy about losing 8 lbs in 12 days? I fully recognize that I am ridiculous. I will be the first to admit it.

The coach's beef is not only about the cheating, it's really that she says it isn't a good idea to do any intense training during the VLCD portion of the plan. And the training I'm doing is intense (at least for me): it is training sessions 3x a week of roughly 70 minutes each where I alternate walking and running. This week was running for 3 minutes and then walking for 2 and repeating that 13 times. Next week will be running for 4 minutes and walking for 2. I am definitely wasted after these sessions, which is why I added in the egg white omelets. The treadmill tells me I am burning 600 calories in 70 minutes so it seems fine to add an extra 100 calories to my day.

I'm feeling frustrated and unsure...on the one hand, I finally feel motivated to actually stick this out for awhile, so why not just finish it, at least 23 days? On the other hand, someone who knows a lot more about this says I should stop, and I want to stop SO BAD because I am hungrier. I'm sitting here tonight thinking, "fuck it, I should just stop, finish the 10k training, and pick it up again in the late spring to lose the last 20." But I don't know. It's kind of working, even with my naughty modifications.

What to do, what to do? This diet is hard enough when you have people encouraging you every step of the way, when you have people actively telling you to stop, it's even harder to stay on the path.

It is 8:30 p.m. here on the east coast, and I feel like I would sell my soul for a handful of peanuts and a slice of cave-aged triple-cream brie on a crusty baguette.

ARGH (Round 3, Phase 2, Day 9)

The last two days, I hate this diet. I really fucking hate this diet. I am hungry, I feel deprived, I feel desperate for real food in a way that feels really fucked up and unnatural. Last week was pretty easy in terms of hunger, but this week is not easy at all. It is taking every shred of self-control not to dive into a pile of food and eat like a depraved, starved animal. We've had kid birthday parties the last two days, with positively delicious-looking pizza at each one. I've had to handle and serve pizza and cupcakes and potato chips and not have any. My kids had barbecued chicken, buttered peas, apples, and roasted potatoes for dinner last night, and I thought I was going to knock them over to get that food. And the weight loss is soooo slow so I don't even feel rewarded. Two nights ago, I was so hungry that I ate an extra apple and a tangerine, and last night, I had an extra half grapefruit. Sort of cheating, I guess, because I ate more than my daily allotment of 2 fruits, but it is the lamest and most unrewarding cheating I have ever done in my damn life.

At the suggestion of faithful blog readers Kristoise and Holly, I did some math. Math: the refuge of desperate people.

• Not counting load days, but starting from pre-load weights: By day 9 of Round 1, I had lost 5.6% of my body weight. In Round 2, I've lost 3.5% of my body weight in the same amount of time.
• Including load days in total weight loss: Round 1, I lost 6.1% of my weight in nine days, and in Round 2, I have lost 5.8%. 

Either way, it is definitely slower this time around, no doubt about it. Could it be because I have less to lose (but then wouldn't you think the percentages would be the same?) Could it be that I don't have the same slavish devotion to every rule? (I had an extra fruit and a half this week and even, GASP, mixed my vegetables one night). Could it be that I am approaching the weight that is ideal for my body, and that even if I'd like to lose more, I'm close to the weight my body wants to be? I don't know what it is, but it is fucking frustrating.  

Can you tell I am feeling testy?

I decided this morning that I was only going to do 20 days on this diet this time and then maintenance. Then I decided I was going to stop when I got to 187, no matter how soon that happened. I am just hating it so much.

But then I did three things:

1) I went back and looked at my day 9 blog post from Round 1, and realized I was feeling a lot of this stuff then (albeit with more positive stuff mixed in). So even though I was kind of miserable in the beginning last time, by 2-3 weeks in, it felt really easy. It helps to be reminded by my own self and my own experience that this will get easier soon. Has anyone else noticed a real flagging in motivation right around 1.5 weeks?

2) I went and tried on this pair of Gap khaki jeans that I have saved for ten years. I have a picture of myself wearing them almost ten years ago, standing with Holly's kids when they came to visit me in DC shortly after my 25th birthday. I remember getting that picture developed at the time and thinking, "wow, I kind of look . . . good! I look like a normal person and not a fat person!" I had been on WW for about a year and a half at that point and had weighed around 186 for many months in a row. I'm now 192.6, so I thought I'd try on the pants. They fit! They are a tiny bit tight, but not too tight to wear in public. They are, of course, 10 years out of style, but whatever. They're just khakis, right?. I also tried on a bunch of skirts I bought at H&M about 10 years ago, and they fit too, and even look sort of cute! So to be able to wear these very symbolic pants feels like a huge milestone even though (have I mentioned this yet? Have you heard?) I really hate this fucking diet lately.

3) I went back and looked at my old WW weight logs. When I first started losing weight in 1999, it took me TEN MONTHS to lose 37 pounds. And it did not feel easy, it felt pretty hard. This time around I have lost 37 pounds since Halloween, or in roughly 3  months. And yes, it has been hard, FER SURE, but it has been in 1/3 the time. And though I have been very focused on weight loss this second round, I daresay the biggest benefits have not even been totally weight related. I know, HERESY.

Day	Date	Weight	Daily Change	Total Loss: Round 2	Total Loss: Cumulative
LD 1	1/26/2011	199.6	-
LD 2	1/27/2011	203	3.4
1	1/28/2011	204.6	1.6
2	1/29/2011	200.2	-4.4
3	1/30/2011	198.8	-1.4	-1.4	30.8
4	1/31/2011	198.2	-0.6	-1.6	31.4
5	2/1/2011	197	-1.2	-2.4	32.6
6	2/2/2011	195.6	-1.4	-4.0	34
7	2/3/2011	194.2	-1.4	-5.4	35.4
Week 1: down 5.4 for the week (not counting load weight), 35.4 total
8	2/4/2011	193.6	-0.6	-6.0	-36
9	2/5/2011	193.2	-0.4	-6.4	-36.4
10	2/6/2011	192.6	-0.6	-7.0	-37

I felt very committed last time, and once I actually started, I was very certain I would finish the whole 40 days no matter what. I don't feel as committed or certain this time. So, look, no promises. I'm going to keep on keeping on until 21 days and see how I feel. That gives me 12 more days, which I can certainly do. I'm going to increase my drops from 12 drops three times a day to 15 drops three times a day. Either I will lose a bunch of weight in the next 12 days (10+ more lbs would be nice), in which case that will motivate me to keep going, or I won't lose a bunch of weight, which will motivate me to stay on longer.

Meanwhile, I'll just take it one day at a time and try to be "good" so I can lose as much as I can as quickly as I can. And I'm going to a fucking superbowl party tonight, where I will furiously knit in the corner and glower at the chili, chips, and onion dip, imagining that 100g of naked chicken, a tiny apple, 2c of spinach, and a bottle of water is JUST AS DELICIOUS AND SATISFYING as queso blanco, cold beer, and honey barbecue chicken wings.

100's, We Meet Again (P2, D37)

Back in the 100's today, which is nice, and feels more permanent than it did last time. Here's what the last week and a half looks like:

Day 29	11/29/2010	203.2	-0.4	-26.4
Day 30	11/30/2010	203.2	0.0	-26.4
Day 31	12/1/2010	201.4	-1.8	-28.2
Day 32	12/2/2010	201	-0.4	-28.6
Day 33	12/3/2010	200.8	-0.2	-28.8
Day 34	12/4/2010	199.6	-0.8	-30
Day 35	12/5/2010	200.8	1.2	-28.8
Week 5 summary: down 2.8# this week; 28.8  total
Day 36	12/6/2010	200.8	0.0	28.8
Day 37	12/7/2010	199.2	-1.6	-30.4

Y'all, my body just wants to be done with this for awhile. If I wasn't trying to prove something to myself by going the whole 40 days (which it turns out is actually 43 days, since you stop taking the drops on day 40 but keep doing the low calorie thing for 3 more days), I probably would have just stopped already. I can feel my body craving fat and calories and taste and FOOD! I'm getting progressively hungrier and hungrier, and am having some low blood pressure symptoms (nothing dangerous). I guess it's good to notice those feelings, know I can live with them, know that they don't have to result in binge eating, and know it will be over soon. It's good to know that my body is capable of having intuition about what it needs, even though I will be ignoring that intuition for the next few days. Ha. Tough shit, body wisdom!!
  
Last night I went to a group meeting for a bunch of women who are doing this locally, and got mesaured again. It's only been two weeks and 8 pounds since I was measured last, so I wasn't expecting much. But I was actually way UP in a lot of areas, which just doesn't make sense to me.

If you look at this chart, you can see that I lost HUGE inches between my first measurement date on 10/27 and my second, which was after a 20 lb weight loss. It was a big deal at the time and heralded by me and others as proof of the diet's amazing success at not only reducing pounds but reducing inches.

Last night, which was only two weeks later and 7 pounds later, I actually gained inches in some areas (neck, arms, bra line, knee?) That seems unlikely if not impossible. Yes, I've been doing yoga and walking, but not enough to build the kind of muscle mass that would increase my size despite weight loss. I think what is more likely is that those 11/20 measurements were wrong (what did we expect considering they were done furtively in a bathroom in the back of a kid's gym??) Probably I should delete that column all together and just look at the first measurement compared to last night's measurement, which reflected a difference of 27 pounds and 5 weeks on the diet. It makes a lot more sense.

DATE:	Difference from 10/27 to 11/20	Difference from 11/20-12/6	Difference 10/27 to 12/6
WEIGHT:	20.2	-7.2	-27.4
Neck	-1.75	+0.75	-1
Shoulders	-3	-0.5	-3.5
Right Arm	-3.25	+2.25	-1
Left Arm	-2	+1	-1
Upper Chest	-2.25	0	-2.25
Chest/Bust	-3.5	0	-3.5
Bra Line	-4.5	+3	-1.5
Upper Stomach	-1.75	-1.75	-3.5
Waist	-4.75	0	-4.75
Belly	-4.25	-0.75	-5
Hips	-2.75	0	-2.75
Right Thigh	-2.75	0	-2.75
Right Knee	-1.5	+1	-0.5
Right Calf	-1.5	0	-1.5
Left Thigh	-2	0	-2
Left Knee	-0.5	0	-0.5
Left Calf	-1.5	0	-1.5
TOTAL	-43.5	+5	-38.5

Bottom line, I'm wearing jeans that are 2 sizes smaller, and I have lost almost 3" off each thigh and my hips, almost 5" off my waist, and 3.5" off my shoulders in 5 weeks. I'm happy.

I learned a lot about maintenance last night, which was very useful. The current thinking is that you should basically do the first two weeks of maintenance using the same foods as you have been using in phase 2, but just more of everything so you're getting more calories. They're advising holding off on adding eggs and cheese and nuts and oils right away, which is a huge fucking bummer, because as you know, I have been dreaming of the eggs and cheese I would have on Tuesday, 12/14, two weeks from today.

Ideally, on day one of maintenance, you would eat the same kind of stuff you have been eating with two exceptions: you would eat it 5 times a day instead of twice a day, and you can mix vegetables to your heart's content for all kinds of salads and soups. You can experiment with small amounts of oil or dairy or eggs and see what happens, but ideally not more than one new thing in a day so that you can isolate the cause if you have an increase. Then on week 3, you can start to add very limited and careful starches, always making sure you're never more than 2 pounds up from your last recorded HCG weight. I think I've got this right. Somebody correct me if I'm wrong.

As for food intake, you're supposed to eat when you're hungry, pay attention to how you feel, not count calories, but make sure you eat basically as much as you can while still maintaining your new weight.

After 6 weeks, you are ready to begin normal life, which involves eating all foods in moderation, or you can go back for another round. Still undecided on that, but leaning toward another round in late January, hoping to be done with this shit forever and ever Amen by late February/early March.

Blah Blah Blah (P2, D30)

I waited awhile to post today, because I needed to get my head in order. All my rational, calm sanity went out the window this morning when I weighed in at the exact same this morning, despite all my rational, calm sanity yesterday that was SUPPOSED to result in more weight loss, dammit. I can only be expected to be rational, calm and sane IF I AM GETTING WHAT I WANT.

I'm kidding. Sort of.

Still, I pulled myself out of it, and am still hopeful for tomorrow.

But things have definitely really slowed down for me. Is it my crazy pills? Wellbutrin should be okay, but Lexapro could be causing problems. That would be unfortunate. I just can't think about this any more. All I can do is work the plan and trust it will all work out in the finish.

Day	Date	Weight	Daily Change	Total Loss
Day 1	11/1/2010	229.6	n/a	n/a
Day 2	11/2/2010	225.6	-4.0	-4
Day 3	11/3/2010	221.6	-4.0	-8
Day 4	11/4/2010	218.6	-3.0	-11
Day 5	11/5/2010	218.6	0.0	-11
Day 6	11/6/2010	216.4	-2.2	-13.2
Day 7	11/7/2010	215.8	-0.6	-13.8
Week 1 summary: down 13.8 #
Day 8	11/8/2010	214.8	-1.0	-14.8
Day 9	11/9/2010	215.4	0.6	-14.2
Day 10	11/10/2010	213.8	-1.6	-15.8
Day 11	11/11/2010	213.6	-0.2	-16
Day 12	11/12/2010	215	1.4	14.6
Day 13	11/13/2010	213	-2.0	-16.6
Day 14	11/14/2010	212.2	-0.8	-17.4
Week 2 summary: down 3.6 # this week; 17.4 # total
Day 15	11/15/2010	212.4	0.2	-17.2
Day 16	11/16/2010	210	-2.4	-19.6
Day 17	11/17/2010	210.2	0.2	19.4
Day 18	11/18/2010	209.4	-0.8	20.2
Day 19	11/19/2010	208.6	-0.8	21
Day 20	11/20/2010	208	-0.8	21.8
Day 21	11/21/2010	207.6	-0.4	-22
Week 3 summary: down 4.8# this week; 22 total
Day 22	11/22/2010	206.6	-1.0	-23
Day 23	11/23/2010	207	0.4	-22.6
Day 24	11/24/2010	206.6	-0.4	-23
Day 25	11/25/2010	205	-1.6	-24.6
Day 26	11/26/2010	204.6	-0.4	-25
Day 27	11/27/2010	204.6	0.0	-25
Day 28	11/28/2010	203.6	-1.0	-26
Week 4 summary: down 3# this week; 25 total
Day 29	11/29/2010	203.2	-0.4	-26.4
Day 30	11/30/2010	203.2	0.0	-26.4