Beef, Dreams, and Vitamin D

I have decided I am not going to eat any beef on this diet. I know I am going to get entirely sick of tilapia, I can have other types of fish including shrimp and lobster. So, my fish for the day can vary and keep me interested. The chicken is going to be another ball of wax. I am going to be so tired of eating chicken every day I know, but what doesn't kill you makes you stronger, or so they say.

Ask any most women and they will tell you about pregnancy dreams. Hell, they were so vibrant and consistent with my first three pregnancies I knew I was pg with my fourth child 4 days BEFORE missing a period. I woke up one morning after having dreamt all night long these very vibrant dreams. I sat straight up in my bed from a deep dreamily sleep and said, "I'm pregnant". I took the test that afternoon and got an ever so slight positive result. Nine months later a large 9lb 10oz strapping baby boy arrived not exactly on time, but none the less he arrived.

So what I'm trying to say is that you are going to dream and dream and dream. My sleep is so cozy and restful, I have been on diets before, taken amphetamines to curb hunger is great but lying there wide awake all night in a dreadful sense of frustration is defiantly not.

Dr. Simeon's references sun bathing in his book, he allows it, of course without the use of tanning oils. Mineral oil is allowed so I use it on my skin twice a day. I have decided to visit the tanning bed on my lunch for the duration of this diet. My reasons are multi-fold, first I usually take 15 vitamin and supplements a day, yeah I tend to rattle when I walk. Vitamin D is of course one of those. Simeon's recommends taking 99 mg of potassium daily so I take that. My physician recommended taking Calcium and Vitamin D. I don't want all the fillers the pill supplements have so I figure getting my vitamin D from tanning is better. I do take alcohol in and wipe the bed down so I don't get any oils from previous tanners. I lay a towel over the headrest even after cleaning it because it is soft plastic and still seems oily. Another reason is I am very fair and I have to build up to the summer sun. I cannot enjoy a day in the summer sun with my family without burning, even if I use sun block so for the last few years in early spring I start to build my base up. The other reason and maybe the most important reason is I want to push my lunch as late as I can. Leaving the office and doing errands is a great way to keep me busy.

Speaking of the oils on the tanning bed, I forgot to mention in the cosmetics blog a few days ago that I used a mild soap and water to wipe down my mascara, blush and eyeshadow containers to free them of any of the oils from my foundation and skinny that were left behind. I need to wipe the steering wheel of my car, I did the keyboard and mouse already.

Day 4 VLCD

I was only able to post once yesterday as I was moving 'J' into his new college apartment. I used up a good bit on energy doing that. I had my half grapefruit for breakfast and then around 1 I had my second fruit, an apple with lemon.

I was famished around 4 p.m, but wasn't able to eat until 5:30 p.m. The extreme hunger did come and go, but I was really ready to eat by then. I had chicken breast with cayenne pepper sauce, tomato with apple cider vinegar and salt and pepper. I used half my lemon ration for the day and made lemon water with stevia. I was pretty satisfied after that, but had to get my dinner in. At 8 p.m I had the fish and cucumber slices with vinegar. I used the rest of the lemon to make another drink. I felt so satisfied when I went to bed. I only got in 400 calories, I log my food on an online calorie counter website and I don't ever get to the 500 exactly. I don't do the bread stick because I've never bothered to look for it at the store and because I have an intolerance to gluten and am hoping to cut bread out in the future. I get doubled over in severe pain and am gassy daily when eating gluten. I also think I may be lactose intolerant.

I've lived with the stomach pain and gassy bloating feeling for the entire 41 years of my life. It just donned on me last month that my problems may be gluten and lactose inflicted. I feel so much better in my intestines since I've been on this 500 calories. I have had very mild gas but I think it is the normal amount the non-inflicted adult should have.

This morning I weighed and measured my waist.
Begining weight: 177.6
Yesterday       :   172.8
Today             :   171.2 = 1.6lbs in a day
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total for diet     : 6.4 lbs in 3 days of vlcd

Waist begining 37.75
yesterday         34.5
today               33.5
I can wear my pants without discomfort this morning. It feels so good to not be tugging at my waistline. On Friday I had to unbutton them to sit down, Today is Monday morning. I am sitting with them buttoned and they are not tight at all. I won't have to go up a size and waste money on new clothes, it's a win win!

Couldn't resist measuring!

Initially my plan was to measure once a week. I couldn't resist measuring this morning. I only did 5 measurements. Bust, waist, hips and knees. My knees are the same, my bust is the same but holy cow my waist and hips have changed.

Beginning waist was 37.75   after 2 days of vlcd    Waist 34.5 a decrease of 3.25 inches
Hip measurements    44       after 2 days                Hips   42 a decrease of 2 inches
Bust was 44 and has not changed
Knees were 15 inches and have not changed.

I am really excited about my waist and hips. Mainly because I was not comfortable in any of my clothes. Now I hope I can fit in some of my clothes so I will be more comfortable at work. If I can stay in my wardrobe the cost of this diet will pay for itself over and over again. Clothing is much more expensive than HCG!!!

Day 3 VLCD

This morning begins day 3. Yesterday was a good day. I had very mild hunger and didn't have lunch until 5 p.m. For me this works great, I am an evening snacker and since I had lunch at 5 p.m I was able to have dinner at 8 p.m. I don't have any cravings so maybe it would not have been an issue anyway. Sam's basketball games provided a distraction from lunch and I wasn't really all that hungry. Before leaving I had my second fruit and squeezed 1/4 of a lemon on it. I had a cup of black coffee and that satisfied me during the games.

Dave and Sam wanted to get a burger so we went through a drive thru. I didn't have a problem with them eating a full fat meal and went on my way to fix my fish and tomato. I prepared the fish using garlic and a variety of herbs. I have an old meatloaf pan which has a slotted pan with a solid bottom. Drippings are caught in the bottom so I don't get the fat in the bottom of my pan, not that there is a lot of fat in Tilapia. I diced the tomato and added basalmic vinegar. I don't know if it is on the approved list, Dr. Simeon does not specify which vinegars I can use. So unless I need a variation as the diet goes on I'm going to stick to apple cider vinegar.

For dinner I had chicken and cucumber. I baked enough chicken for a week on Thursday evening. I made that mistake because the chicken is getting dry. So I may have to make some new today. I cooked the chicken with garlic and herbs. I cut up the chicken and put habonero pepper sauce on it. Very satisfying, the pepper made me feel even more satified. I sliced the cucumber thin and used apple cider vinegar and water.
I wanted to get in another quart of water so I took the rest of the lemon and squeezed it in a quart of ice water and added stevia. Oh how delicious that was. I was totally satisfied if not a little stuffed.

My shot this morning did not go as well as it has. I felt it go in and pulled it out too soon, as there was a drip of HCG that rolled out. I need to make sure I leave the needle in until all HCG is in. I was too quick with that and too slow with the insertion. Still it was just a small sting.

Tale of the scale
Day 1  177.6
Day 2  174.2
Day 3  172.8
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Total loss:  4.8 pounds

Day 2 VLCD

This morning starts Day 2 VLCD and day  4 of my HCG injections. As you might imagine I was anxious to get on the scale. I woke around 7 and layed in bed for 45 minutes before rising. It's Saturday and Sam, my 15 yr old has basketball tournaments today beginning at 2 p.m. I am going to clean and do some laundry until around noon. I am an emotional eater and if I do not plan out my free time with activities and chores I feel I'll have a harder time with the diet. So I have decided to go through all my closets, garage, storage building and the house in town and have a yard sale early April. I have to do this anyway as we are selling the house in town and I have to downsize all of this stuff. Perfect timing IMO. I think if anyone is planning on doing this diet it is a good tip. Keeping busy keeps my mind off my hunger.

Currently I have no hunger. Yesterday was very mild, I did have a few minutes of low hunger and mild stomach growling. Not anything that caused me any concern. I have no cravings, and my 452 calories consumed yesterday were plenty satisfying. I must have loaded correctly because everything is going as declared by Dr. Simeons in his book.

Mild hunger, what exactly does that mean? This is a question I asked myself before starting his vlcd. I read blogs of other HCG'rs and they would describe the hunger as mild. I thought, yeah what is their definition of mild?  To me it's like you know your stomach feels light and you could eat and not be uncomfortable eating, but have no real desire to do so. There are no cravings and it feels good to know that I am making progress toward my goals. There is no sick feeling or sense of urgency to get food in my stomach. It's very easy to ignore and within 15 minutes the small twinge of growl goes away and a satisfaction that I would get from eating a small meal sets in.

Now the tale of the scale. I was hoping to get a pound loss this morning. Remember I was thinking that I may see the calories from loading sneak up on me like the turtle did the hare. I did eat six thousand calories over maintenance on my two days of loading. In all actuality I should have gained 2 pounds during loading. So when I stepped on the scale it read 174.2. YIPPEEE!!! My weight at Day 1 loading was 177.6 and stayed that way until this morning. That ladies and gentlemen is a 3.4 pound weight loss in one day. A good bit of it is water weight, of which I am well aware. The water weight has to come off first and the fat loss will follow, but it is an amazing start IMHO.

Day 1 Starting weight:  177.6
Day 2 Current weight:  174.2
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Total loss in 1 day =       3.4 lbs

Oil Free Cosmetics

Today was the first day I used the newly purchased oil free cosmetics. Of course it is Day 1 of VLCD. I washed my hair and did not use any conditioner. Needless to say my hair felt like straw. Dr. Simeon's allows mineral oil so I took about a dime size in my palm, rubbed my hands together and worked it through my hair. I had purchased mousse that is oil free and used two palm size areas of it. At first my hair felt heavy and it took twice the time to dry as it does when I use my conditioner and skinny. After an hour or so I was really liking my hair. It's shiny and holds it's volume well. So I'm happy, I was really worried about how my hair was going to fair. We'll see how it does as the days go on with this VLCD.

I also bought some powder foundation. It is in a shaker jar and I bought a very fine brush to use with it. I'm pleased at how well it does. I put some of the organic coconut oil on my face right before I brushed the powder on, I put both on all over my face just as I would liquid foundation. Dr. Simeons does not say anything about coconut oil so I'm going to fore-go it for the duration of this diet. I'll stick with the mineral oil as it is on his approved list. I used my powder eye shadow, blush and mascara as usual as it contains no oils. My makeup looked just the way it would have if I would have used the cream foundation. That is a really big relief. I work in a professional building and need to look decent. LOL

This evening we went to the movies. I didn't want to sit around in front of the TV thinking about eating and snacking. Popcorn has to be eaten at the movies with a great big diet coke and at least a box of Mike and Ikes, or does it? I can successfully say NO it does not.

Before leaving the house I cut up an apple in sections removing the core and seeds, took one wedge of lemon and sqeezed it all over. I wrapped it in foil and put it in my purse. While my son and hubby were munching on popcorn and candy bars I was enjoying my delicious apple. It was the perfect mix of sweet and sour, and crunchy like the popcorn. I was surprised at how it satisfied me. I got a large cup of water, they charged me $2.40 for the cup filled 1/4 way up with ice. They offered me a courtesy cup but it was so small and I felt I needed to get in another 32 oz of water.

I asked for the large cup and told them I would pay for the cup and ice but was surprised that they charged me full soft drink price for it. I had to go to the water fountain to get my water to boot. Anyway, we saw "Just Go with It" with Adam Sandler and Jennifer Aniston and it was really funny. The night was fun and kept my mind off mindless snacking.

Measurements

Today is the first day of my VLCD, Measurements were taken first thing this morning. They are as followes

Bust 44
Waist 37.75
Waist at navel 38
R Leg 25
L Leg 24.5
R Knee 15.5
L Knee 15.5
R Arm 12.5
L Arm 13.25

My weight this morning was the same as day one of loading 177.6.
Usually breakfast is 8:30 a.m like clockwork. This morning I pushed it to 10 am. Hunger was a mild growl. I had half a grapefruit 30 minutes ago and my hunger is still a mild growl. I'm hoping to be able to push lunch to 2 p.m.

I purchased enough food for at least two weeks yesterday. I've added a photo of the items below. I'm a little disappointed in a book I bought to guide me along. It gave me shopping lists and had oranges listed as acceptable fruits, broccoli, cauliflower, green beans, and a few other items I can't remember at the moment. Dr. Simeon's specifically states in his original diet that you must follow his diet to the T in order to get the result most everyone wants. So I spent $6.00 on this book, plus the money for the unapproved oranges and vegetables. I have been reading Dr. Simeon's original book and had not come to the part where he talks about the most annoying people on his diet. They are the ones who think they can alter the food list and still get maximum results.

 The person who authored the book I purchased is one that Dr. Simeon's would find most irritating I'm sure, I do and I didn't spend my life researching and adjusting a reducing plan to get it just right. I don't have any results to compare to whether eating oranges or beans slows down the results, but I think I'll stick to the man who spent years developing, testing and seeing his diet work to maximum weight loss and seeing variations causing stalls.

Me again.

Lunch was miserable again today. I did the McDonald's thing. Basically because it is right on my way to and from work. I was going to go to Burger King but spent my lunch hour at Wal Mart picking up everything I needed for the diet. So I just ran through and picked up lunch.

Big Mac
Large Fries
Quarter Pounder w/cheese
Strawberry shake
Diet Coke
10 Piece Nugget w/mustard sauce

The quarter pounder went down ok, the Big Mac was not enjoyable at all. I stuffed it down. I can't image what the people driving by thought as I was gorging on all that food. Not pretty, is all I can imagine. The fries were popped into my mouth by sixes right before I swallowed the sandwich and then mixed it all up with the strawberry shake. I had to eat fast because there was no way I would have gotten it all down by eating slowly.
So today 3001 calories. I was not hungry at breakfast or lunch. Hopefully my first VLCD will be good. I must admit I am very nervous about tomorrow. Yikes 500 calories after binging like this for two days.

Day 2=Loading

Glad to get through day one of loading. I felt like a newly stuffed link pork sausage all day. After dinner the urge to purge was strong. It almost came up in spite of swallowing continually to keep it at bay. Yuck right?

Here's to hoping I'm doing this right!      * raises hashbrown dipped in gravy*

Bedtime was around 9 p.m. I felt really keyed up despite being very tired. The night before was not a good one, slept little and tossed a lot. Finally falling asleep around 10 p.m and sleeping completely through until 5 a.m. Not sure if this had anything to do with the HCG but more likely a direct result of not sleeping well the previous evening.

This morning I got on the scale, after peeing, dressed in pink and white lounge pants and a pink long sleeve cotton ribbed tee. The Simeon's diet says to weigh completely naked. Stripping of my clothes in the middle of winter just after climbing from a warm bed sounds like torture only imposed on traitors of war, so I figured I would just begin the weigh ins in pj's and use that as the starting point. They weigh about a pound.

My weight is holding steady. I'm still at 177.6. I did visit the john more times yesterday than I do in a week and had been constipated for the past few days. I figure the difference lies there. 4508 calories yesterday and my normal burn is around 1700 calories so I should have gained over half a pound. We will see what kind of difference I see tomorrow. Perhaps it will catch up to me like the tortoise did the hare, very slowly. *shrugs*

The injection today was even easier than yesterday. It was totally pain free, not even a sting from the alcohol. The difference today was the angle the needle went in. Instead of straight in I angled the tip upward. The dizzy feeling came on within 5 minutes and left within 45.
Breakfast today, same as yesterday. Sausage Egg Biscuit w/cheese, hashbrown, side of gravy and a diet coke.

Day One = Loading

In doing more research today about loading days it seems I started off slow. I had a McDonald's Sausage Egg and Cheese Biscuit, Hashbrown and side of Sausage Gravy and a diet Coke. This added up to 670 calories. The webpage I was reading suggested loading at 93% fat. Whoa I've got some catching up to do.

For lunch the menu was again McDonald's. One Big Mac, One Filet o' Fish with extra tartar sauce, a large fry, a 16 oz chocolate shake and a large diet coke. I ate this as fast as I could, I almost choked but kept going. If I stopped I knew I would not be able to get it all in. It took about 10 minutes. I could not finish the fries and I have half the chocolate shake to get down. I have a 10 piece chicken McNuggets to eat around 3 so I load correctly.

The web page also said to take fish oil, vitamin A, and vitamin E. I take those regularly so I have them on hand. As soon as my stomach settles a little I'll take those supplements.

This is harder than I thought. I'm feeling pretty sick but the rationale is that if you load correctly you will not be hungry the first few days until ketosis kicks in. The article also suggested to lather the body in oils for the load days. This evening I'll get out the baby oil and start that. If I would have known I would have brought some oil in at work and worked on that all day.

This evening I'm picking up some oil free foundation, blush and deodorant. I purchased organic coconut oil for dry skin 2 weeks ago so I'm ready to go with that. The hair products are going to be my downfall. I love my Matrix conditioning balm and Paul Mitchell skinny, but those are off limits. I purchased mousse to replace the skinny and am hoping the coconut oil helps with conditioning my hair.

I'm editing this post to include my afternoon and dinner. I was planning on eating the 10 piece nuggets at 3 but could not possibly stomach them, by 4:30 I was able to get 9 of them down. We went shoe shopping for the kids and stopped in a Garfield's for dinner. I had a bacon cheeseburger with 2 tbs of mayonaise and onion rings. I could only eat 3/4 of the burger and two of the rings. I estimate my calories for dinner at around 1000.

I want to keep my stats as much as possible so here is what I've got so far.
Doctor's Scales Yesterday:  181.5 ---fully dressed with boots
My digital scale Day 1 a.m: 177.6----in lounge pants and long sleeved shirt

My calories Day 1              :            4500
Carbs                                 :         344gm = 30.5%
Fat                                     :          251gm = 50.1.2%

I missed the fat content for the day, but I still think I did well at 251 grams of fat. It wasn't easy I can tell you, I felt really sick all day, One more day and I can start the VLCD

Stuff about me.

As a child I was never fat. I was always underweight for my height and didn't begin to gain weight until I met my husband. In the 3 years we lived together I gained 40 lbs. We had our first child together and I gained an additional 22 lbs. I was at my heaviest ever at 172. A local weight loss clinic popped up in our mall that sold Phen/Fhen, it was called the 3 o'clock diet. Doing that diet for 6 months I lost 52 lbs. I was almost at my high school weight. I was 118.

After the birth of my 4th child I went back on phentermine, without the Fhen, which was off the market by then. Back to 130 lbs I felt good and maintained this weight loss for a total of 5 years. PPD set in and I regained all that weight and all the way up to 212 lbs, my biggest yet. I was horrified, miserable and fat. Beginning my quest to get healthy again I started counting calories and lost 65 lbs. I thought I had finally figured out how to eat and how to listen to my body. Really I had, but I allowed boredom to get the best of me. In August of 2010 I was 147 and very muscular, this morning I weighed in at 177.6. So in six months I have gained 30 lbs. I could just kick myself. The alcohol I have been consuming is 75 percent of this gain. I have a taste for red wine. So I heard about the HCG diet last summer and have discovered that my ob/gyn runs a HCG program out of his wellness center. Yesterday I had my appointment.

I met with my doctor and he gave me an overview of the program. I have done my research and I knew I wanted to pursue this diet. Do I think this is a cure all? Not in the least. I am squeezing into my clothes, they are very uncomfortable and I have to get this weight off. I am losing sleep over the agony of gaining all this weight in such a short amount of time and I'm going to take it off in a short amount of time. Hell or high water, I'm going to do this. I know that after losing the 30 lbs I will need to stay away from alcohol on a daily basis and only indulge on special occasions. I have to stay away from processed foods and calorie count. I'm not in any denial that this is a cure for my yo-yo dieting. Maintenance is a life long struggle for me. I hope I never have to go through the pain of losing a lot of weight again only to gain it back over and over.

This morning I took my first injection. Filling the syringe to 14 cc was difficult at first, but I got it finally. Pinching my skin on my waist and looking at that needle I was cringing, but I thought you have to do this. I did and it was a breeze, it burned very little (due to the alcohol prep) and that was it. Nice to know they don't hurt at all and that part is all good ;o).

So the 1st and 2nd days are load days. I went to McDonald's this morning and placed an order for a sausage egg and cheese biscuit, hash brown, side of gravy and a diet coke. That is my favorite breakfast from there and I haven't had it in a while. It was good but a little sickening. I took the HGC right before I ate at 8:20 a.m. It is now 9:40 a.m and I have been light headed for about 40 minutes now. In all the research and blogs I have read about HGC never have I heard of being light headed with it. So I need to find out if this is normal.