Day Six-Deliciousness At Last! (Apple Cider Recipe)

Weighed myself this morning and I dropped 1.5 pounds! YEAH! That's even with delmem's Chocolate Delight! WOOOO!

I feel a lot less bitchy today because I actually had food that was delicious! I made a spinach fritatta omelette for lunch (enjoyed that with tabasco on top, mmmmmmmm) and I made albondigas (or Mexican meatball) soup for supper-panfried the meatballs and added them and my cabbage to the vegetable broth I made. Tucked it up into my Thermos and enjoyed at work with a raging, cold, thunderstorm outside Mmm. I made apple "cookies" from Tammy's recipe book but they didn't cookie so much as fall apart, so it became an apple crumble.

I was wondering what to do with the juice I squeezed out from the apple pulp, and it hit me.

Apple Cider! What an excellent idea!

So, without further ado:

Quick Warm Apple Cider

Juice from 1 apple

Water (if needed-I added in about 1/8th cup to fill half a mug. Too much and you'll dilute the apple taste)

Pinch of cinnamon

Pinch of nutmeg

Stevia to taste

Mix everything together and nuke in the microwave for approximately 1 minute until hot. Keep an eye on it, it likes to explode!

Mmm, warm soup for dinner and now a warm mug of apple cider. What more could I need? :)

Day Five-Promising But Disappointing.

My weight shot up by 2 lbs this morning, from 213-215. I FREAKED out until I realized that it would be a better idea to weigh myself naked, sans clothing. Behold-I only gained half a pound (water retention from the salt or the chocolate, not sure which). Which makes me wonder. If I started at 213 the 1st day, went up to 218 the third day, down to 213 yesterday and am up today, I wonder how much of that was clothes weight, except for today. Hm.

I had forgotten how difficult P2 is. It's only the 3rd day and I am dreaming of the olive oil roasted almonds and peanut butter eaten straight from the jar and peanut butter Atkins pie and almond meal cookies and baked chicken breast in olive oil and cauliflower pizza crust I had the last time. I've spent my time searching for Atkins recipes and bitterly wish I could have cream or oil or chocolate. I only tend to want sugar if it's presented to me in the face-like the tub of cookies in the kitchen or the bread rolls from "Blertucci's" Italian chain restaurants. I am also starving like I don't remember doing the first round.

I remember when I was at work in Round 1 and one apple would be able to sustain me from 7 am-noon with some water. Today, that apple lasted me half an hour, even microwaved with stevia, cinnamon, Butter Buds and nutmeg to make a "baked apple". Half a grissini did not touch the starvation, weakness and dizziness I had-it touched it for five seconds each bite. The same with water, it did not help. I resorted to stealing a bite of chicken and 2 celery sticks from my lunch and eating that and poof, my hunger disappeared for 2 hours until I ate my lunch and the other half of the grissini. The second grissini got transformed into onion rings that I ate for dinner with ground beef browned in taco seasoning and Tammy's Spicy Orange Sauce in her cookbook. Onion rings were nom but the sauce? Tasted like shit, wanted to puke, won't make the sauce again. I also allowed myself a "cheat"-a Chocolate Delight ice cube to get rid of the taste of that horrible sauce. I also got very tired of peeing all day at work (every half hour on the half hour, I visited that bathroom 10 times today and quickly got annoyed after the 3rd trip). I find I pee less when I have something to occupy myself mentally rather than the repetitive spiel with customers. I am still running to the bathroom but much less.

I just discovered the Lean Test-finding out how much of a substance your body is supposed to receive each day by asking it a yes or no question-yes is a lean forward, no is a lean backward. I've added those links to the sidebar.

I just hope I can lose tomorrow, that would be nice!

Day Four-Experimentation.

So today I was browsing youtube for ideas for things I could make for the break on October 9/the end of the VLCD (very low calorie diet) on October 22 and saw almond cookies, but also saw a user had created something called a "chocolate delight" for those on phase 2-coconut oil, cocoa powder and stevia, with a pinch of salt. I MISS my chocolate like you would not believe so I made some up and had some, and was it EVER good. Oh my GOD. I am hoping it won't stall my weight. I hope not, because I intend to make it tomorrow morning and bring it to work.

Aside from the delight, I had some Hot and Sour Egg Drop soup from Less of Me for lunch. It was ok, but I think it would taste best made with chicken or beef broth and NO vinegar. I also had shrimp in fire roasted tomato sauce for dinner (my own creation). It was nice but quite spicy at the end. I was VERY liberal with the salt and I wonder if it will affect the weight loss too, due to water retention. I doubt it since I've been drinking like a mad maniac but I feel slightly thirsty anyway. Oh dear.

I am still rather hungry but I keep telling myself "only 43 more days, only 43 more days, you have that break in the middle, keep going..."

Day Three-Chicken Curry=Quite Disgusting, Actually.

Today I got up and immediately took my HCG under the tongue before I had a bath. I had a bit of an "OH SHIT" moment when I realized I never bought any "on protocol" non aluminum deodorant and soap. Oh well, I used what I had.

The apple I had this morning was delicious-a Gala, sprinkled heavily with cinnamon. It was like eating candy, but better for you.

Unfortunately that was about the only thing I enjoyed today.

I drank down my giant 2.2 liter bottle of water all morning and for lunch I cooked up some French Onion soup with chicken and prepped my dinner, which was curried chicken with diced apple and celery. I ended up using a red onion because the one other onion we had was rotten. Red onions have more sugar than plain white ones, so I was a bit worried. The French Onion soup was nice, even with the homemade broth, but I added in too much stevia so it was too sweet. Bleh!

I had the other half of my apple that went into the salad as an in between meals snack before I popped the lot into my new (PINK!) bento box. The top tier had the salad and the bottom tier had the one grissini breadstick I was allowed, broken in half so it could fit. At work, even with the water, I was hungry in about 3 hours so I ate half of my grissini and I was ok. There was a party at work so everyone was munching on pizza and cake and I was SO MAD that I couldn't. That was a temptation that sucked a lot.

My chicken curry that smelled beyond awesome on the stove and that even Dad said smelled good? DISGUSTING. AWFUL. I had a HARD time choking it down. It was just YUCK. The apples in it made it awesome, but the rest of it was TERRIBLE. Yuck. I briefly wished my grissini was a cinnamon breadstick and it became my "dessert". More like a palate cleanser. But even after all that, I felt like I had pigged out, which is truly amazing for less than half a bowl of food.

I have a funny taste in the back of my throat and mouth now; which is probably the ketosis, or fat burning process. My stomach has gotten extremely flabby and I feel better. I felt sleepy around 1:30 today, I slept for about 15 minutes at 2 pm and woke up bouncing. So ^_^

Tomorrow I'm looking forward to an HCG friendly egg drop soup (which is odd since I don't like egg drop soup in non diet life) and tomorrow some sort of chicken dish again for dinner. Hm.

Day Two: Can't Eat Anymore...

So in between yesterday's noshing on coconut bars (ate 3/4 of the pan), I had half a small (10") pepperoni pizza, some baklava, more coconut bars, more handfuls of chocolate coated macadamia nuts, and 4 glasses of 16 oz each water. No surprise that I was full to just about fricken bursting.

This morning I weight myself. Starting weight was at 213 lbs, my weight was 215.5, so I gained 2 pounds. I noshed on more macadamias, more coconut bars, some cheesecake, some pumpkin pie, a turtle cake loaded with whipped cream and caramel, a Whopper Jr with fries and a coke, chicken tenders from the Puritan (local restaurant-they have the best chicken tenders around), and the rest of my pint of mint chocolate chip coconut milk ice cream. Yesterday I was full to bursting; today I'm not and I'm rather worried. If I don't load properly, I will be hungry. Maybe I'm going overboard. Even Sam yesterday had his eyes bugging out of his head when I listed all the food I ate. *laugh* Even Lindsay had her eyes bugging out at the amount of food I packed in.

We visited the mall in Concord today with Lindsay so mum could go shopping for the anniversary. I was bored stiff with looking at clothes but in between wandering into Chico's and Talbots and Christopher & Banks, I looked at a mirror and saw myself as being thin for a moment. I looked at the clothes in Lane Bryant and said that I wouldn't need to wear their sizes anymore soon. Even had a wander into Hot Topic and laughed at the cute little gothic bikinis they had and said that I would be thin enough to wear them soon. Half of losing weight is mental; so if I say I am thin enough to wear something, then I will be.

My asthma has been bugging me all day and I've had to take albuterol because of it; my theory is too much food forces my stomach up to press against my lungs; plus too much dog and too much of whatever shit Lindsay puts on her skin-I SNEEZE and SNEEZE and SNEEZE for 5 minutes straight if I have too much. I'm not supposed to take the albuterol more than twice a week; this is the 6th time this week I've taken it. Mum says it's my heart; but I agree with Sam on this one, my heart is unfit. once the fat deposits around it and my lungs are gone, my breathing troubles will significantly decrease. In addition, I am tempted to take up yoga once I have a decent job to afford the yoga classes to begin with to improve my fitness and stretchability.

Tomorrow begins the very low calorie portion of the diet for 45 days (minus a one day break for the anniversary). I am somewhat looking forward to this because it will mean I can stuff myself on the allowed fruits and vegetables and 100 grams per meal of seafood, fresh white fish, one whole egg pus whites of two others, cottage cheese, chicken breast, beef or veal (though I cannot have beef or veal more than one meal per day). However, for 44 days I will have to sacrifice my favorite foods. Imagine, no chocolate, no sugar, no cream, no butter, no honey. It will only hit me during my period, I think. I am allowed stevia, so I will sweeten my tongue with liberal amounts of dark chocolate stevia.

tomorrow's menu will be curried chicken salad and some sort of other chicken dish. Most likely French Onion soup with chicken for lunch since I don't have cabbage, which is what I wanted. Hm. Oh well, I will figure something out! Tempted to make a beef soup for work Saturday. Like I said-I'll figure it out.

Day One: Who Am I?

My name is Myriam and I am obese.

Believe it or not, it's taken quite a bit of searching to admit that. Yes, I have a problem with my weight. I was "that fat kid" all throughout school, as far back as I can remember-elementary through university. I had the humiliation of my mother telling me at age 9 that I was too fat to be a ballerina anymore, so I had to stop going. I've had insults thrown at me through middle school. "Whale", "fat," "jerk" "makes the house shake". My family life hasn't been as rosy as I hoped. Sure, my parents are still married; but my father is the king of the house. I internalized the tense atmosphere by turning to food. I couldn't understand why I wanted food, just food in general, and my weight ballooned.

I turned to everything I could to lose weight. Weight Watchers, Jenny Craig, my own diets. All of them ultimately failed, with Jenny Craig working the longest (I lost 16 pounds in about a year). They failed because I could never get to the real cause of why I ate myself into oblivion. I basically chalked it up to "oh well I'll be fat forever" and continued to eat, bemoaning the lack of sexy clothes I could find for my teenage self, hating the rolls of back fat, wondering why I developed so many health problems including asthma and stress fractures.

Last year I discovered the HCG diet. What a wonder! Losing 30 pounds in 30 days by taking this hormone and following a diet of 500 calories a day? Hundreds of thousands of people losing weight by following this miracle diet, discovered nearly 60 years ago by a doctor in Rome? Sign me up! I followed the diet to a T-even through Thanksgiving and Christmas (that was torture). It was as comfortable and easy as they said. I wasn't hungry; I was comfortably empty. I could chew on the one grissini breadstick I was allowed and say "I am FULL". I felt no need or desire to cheat, except for the first week. I had been warned about the first week that it would be difficult if I did not eat enough fat as required during the first 2 days and if my system was full of Candida yeast, that it would be difficult to resist the immense cravings for sugar and carbs. Well, it was. I was hungry through the first week and I can remember wishing for the one baked apple I was allowed to miraculously transform into apple pie, topped with caramel and mountains of whipped cream and served with an entire hot fudge sundae.

But I survived. I even thrived on this diet. I felt like I hadn't felt in years-happy, energized, full of life. My skin never sagged, my energy soared, and best of all-I could physically measure the inches lost off the rolls of hated back fat. I loved it. Sure, I missed my grains and carbs but I survived. Until the end of the diet.

The only reason why the diet failed in the first place when I hit phase 4, the maintenance phase, was when I literally went "GRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAINS" and mowed down whatever I could get my hands on-chips, cakes, cookies. I suffered for it, literally-my stomach rebelled, but was eventually tamed as the steady influx of grain continued. And guess what happened? My weight started to go up. It went up slowly at first but then grew.

But what it left me with was this: I now had an out I could turn to when I became fat again. I now knew that once I wanted to lose weight, I could, and it would be easy and effortless.

For the past few weeks I've been doing some soul searching in preparation for this, the second round of the diet to find out the answers of why I ate. I discovered I craved chips when I'm nervous or bored (failing that, mowing down on my own body will do-nails and hair), and sweet things to cleanse my palate of the salt or, again, when I am bored. I crave chocolate the week before my period because of a deficiency in magnesium, and I crave gummy things during the actual event when I become angry (my theory is that they have a springiness that works my jaw and gives me an outlet). But what does it boil down to? Finding out the root cause of my boredom/nervousness/frustration/anger and treating it. Bada-poof, out goes the emotion, never to return.

Today is the first day of the HCG diet, which means that I must eat as much fattening stuff as I can get. Due to the HCG I've taken today (following Mamaclok's sublingual mix of 5000 IU's of hcg, 13 ml of liquid B12 and 2 ml of collodial silver, 1/2 ml twice a day under the tongue for 15 minutes), I'm finding it slightly difficult to eat as much as I can. I've eaten so far:

1 peanut butter creme donut
1/2 cup of chocolate covered macadamia nuts
1 tuna casserole (featuring a cheese sauce made with 5 ounces cream cheese, 2 tablespoons butter, fat free milk, loads of grated cheddar and a slice of American, with frozen mixed vegetables and some tuna in over spaghetti noodles)
1 slice strawberry cheesecake.

In the oven I have coconut bars, with some white and dark chocolate chips and some almonds on top for extra fattening effect.

My measurements so far are:

Bust: 51"
Under Bust: 46"
Waist: 49"
Hips: 54"
Right Thigh: 26"
Right Upper arm: 17"
Left Thigh: 27.5"
Left Upper Arm: 17.5 "
Neck: 15"

My measurements actually shrank from following this diet. In 45 days I will measure again and see how much I've shrank.

What sets me apart from most people following this diet; however, is the fact that I have a newly discovered lactose intolerance, found only two weeks ago. The reason why I'm able to eat as much dairy as I am is because I'm taking lactase enzyme pills to help me digest. They do work; however I am concerned about phase 3 (the "basically follow Atkins sans sugar and starch" phase). Last time I survived by chowing down on cream and cream cheese and meat to replenish my protein levels. What will I do if I can't this time? White wine, lactose free milk and cream, beef and steak, probably. Hm. Which means that I will have to share my recipes I find on this blog.

I am excited. I want to walk into the 50th anniversary we are having for my aunt and uncle on October 9, 30 pounds lighter and wow all the aunts and uncles and cousins I've not seen in years. I want to give myself a better chance at finding a job now that I graduated university (because believe it or not, being thin opens all sorts of possibilities). I want to be able to look at my university blue jeans a year from now and laugh that they were too tight while I step into them and hold them up.

And I am following that dream.