The carbohydrate dilemma...

So when I met with Maeli yesterday I asked her what everyone else has been asking me. Why is it that I'm allowed to have carbs on maintenance but other people have been told they can't? Here is what she told me. If you deprive your body of carbs for a long period of time and then suddenly down a muffin or a bagel or a plate of pasta...your body won't know what the hell to do with it and go into shock in a way. It will store it and you will gain weight because it doesn't know what else to do with it. However, if you VERY slowly start to work carbs like whole wheat bread back into your diet over the course of maintenance, your body can adjust more easily. And then after you're done with maintenance...if you eat a muffin or bagel (though they're still not the healthiest options mind you), your body will handle it the way its meant to and won't go all crazy on you.

So my first week of maintenance I was only allowed carbs at breakfast. It had to be 100% whole wheat bread and the kind I had was Sara Lee's 45 calorie-a-slice bread. So I got 2 slices for my morning carbohydrate. Now for my second week, I've been able to have that same serving with lunch. So I can have sandwiches, which is nice. Next week for my third week, IF I want to...I can then add them in with my dinner, though I don't have to. She said if my body feels too heavy or it's just too much, to just not have it with that third meal. But this way, my body is being retrained how to eat properly without throwing it into shock when I finally re-introduce carbs. Because lets face it...who wants to live their whole life with ZERO carbs. Not me, thank you very much!

So Maeli did another pinch test yesterday and my body fat % is exactly where it was a week ago which is great news. She was impressed that I didn't have more of a problem with weight gain on my vacation. So yay me for not gaining body fat! My first day back home I did a steak day just to kinda cleanse myself after my vacation before jumping back into my 6 meal a day/exercise plan. For those of you wondering what the hell a steak day is...I basically had a protein shake for breakfast, one for lunch and then as much steak as I wanted for dinner with a big apple. It was pretty good! And I didn't weigh myself this morning, as promised, so I am not even worrying about whether or not it reset my weight a bit or even made me gain. I don't care. I feel great today and have already had my cottage cheese/fruit and done my 40 mins on the elliptical and taken down our Christmas tree! So my scale can kiss my ass (sorry mom haha).

I have another week and a half of maintenance left then I think I may just jump right back into another cycle and try to lose another 20 lbs. Taking a week off to just relax on my diet sounds enticing, but I know if I do that, I'll have less will power to get back into the 500 calorie thing all over again and I still have a long way to go.

So here I go to make me some carbs! YAY!

Throwing the scale away...

...well not literally. But after gaining another 1.6 lbs on my trip (which puts me up 6 lbs total during maintenance), I've decided I'm tired of stressing myself out over a damn number. I had to weigh myself this morning for my meeting with Maeli this afternoon but I'm not going to weigh again until I start my next round of drops. I'm tired of the rollercoaster over my pounds, when I know I'm doing the best I can.

Florida was so great. Other than that fact that there were actual snowflakes on the way to my parents house from the airport, it was such a great vacation. My family is so much fun when we're all together. We laugh non-stop and it all reminds me how truly blessed I've been my entire life to have such a wonderful family. Spoiled even. I have parents who love eachother and love me and they support me no matter what stupid decision I may make. They're also SO supportive about this weight loss thing..it makes it infinitely easier to keep going when it gets hard.

I thought it would be harder than it was to keep my diet in check while I was there, but it wasn't bad at all. I did allow myself a little sugar as I'd planned, but I didn't go overboard like I normally would and when we went out to eat, I ordered healthy things instead of my usual favorites. I even went to the gym with my mom on Tuesday morning and got in a 45 minute workout on the elliptical. I was totally a "big lady" as my family puts it. My body didn't seem to like something I put in it though, I'm still trying to hash out what it was. Cause I had my first "icky stomach" in weeks yesterday and it's still kinda fizzling out. But today it's back to the grind now that I'm home.

I'm just glad to be done with the stupid plane rides. Sitting on a plane smooshed up next to someone for 6 hours (delays and weather conditions once we landed) and having a seatbelt that cuts into your body cause it doesn't fit you right..is NOT enjoyable. I'm just glad to be home and to know that the next time I get on a plane...I shouldn't have that problem anymore. I got tired of apologizing to whoever I was sitting next to.

So no more weighing for a while (unless I have to for a meeting with Maeli) and a lot less stress from here on out. Time to just enjoy this new me...the me who can resist the bag of m&m's her dad has sitting out on the table and the Reisen's her brother-in-law and sister are munching on. The me who has started to ENJOY working out...and the me who is still on the inside fighting her way out!!

Note to self...don't weigh on Christmas

So I told myself I wasn't going to weigh the past few days to avoid stress and just weigh myself today before my trip and then again when I get back. Yeah I wish I just hadn't bothered. I was up another 1.6 lbs. after following this diet as closely as I can. Yeah I'm still struggling with eating enough calories but I'm not eating BAD calories either. I'm getting so sick of being stressed out over this diet. I feel like I'm going to gain back all the weight I lost, go back on the drops...lose it again...then gain it back again on maintenance. To me that's just not worth it. I'd rather stay at 330 the rest of my life than work my ass off to exercise and eat healthy and STILL gain weight back up to 330.

I'm really just venting, there's still a part of me that thinks this will level off or it's just a phase or whatever..but I'd be lying if I said there wasn't some small part of me that really thinks I'm going to tip the scales at 330 again before I know it...and without doing a damn thing wrong.

We made Christmas cookies yesterday and I think I licked maybe 1/16th of a tsp. of frosting off my finger but I didn't touch a single cookie and I haven't eaten any candy today. Every Christmas we have "McDaddy's" or when Nathan makes them it's "McNathy's". Basically egg mcmuffins but way better than McDonalds. I didn't want to miss out on the tradition so I bought 100% whole wheat english muffins and turkey bacon for mine. Not the best thing in the world but I still got to feel like it was Christmas for a few minutes. I don't really WANT the candy stuff but man those sugar cookies are tempting.

I've started packing for my trip. I leave tonight from SLC at about 12:50am and hopefully everything goes as planned. Apparently Atlanta, where my layover is, is in the middle of a storm. So here's hoping I make it to Florida and don't end up spending my vacation in an airport in Atlanta by myself. I'm trying not to let myself get stressed out and worried about how much weight I'm going to gain on this trip but it's hard not to. I meet with Maeli again on Thursday and I swear if I'm up anymore weight I will cry right there in front of her. I thought everyone says "if you just eat right and exercise you'll lose weight!" Then why the crap am I GAINING IT! I don't buy into 5 lbs of "water retention", sorry.

Okay, I need to go do something Christmasy so this doesn't take over my whole day. Merry Christmas everyone!

An Elephant Never Forgets....but I do.

So yesterday I was so preoccupied with stuff all day long that I completely forgot all about lunch. I had my morning snack, worked out, had breakfast....then my mid-afternoon snack then dinner and around 6:30 was like, "wow, I finished eating all my food pretty early today...." Then I thought back and realized I completely missed a meal! *sighs* I added up my calories for the day and was WAY under. I wasn't even hungry. I gotta tell ya, it is so hard to eat this much stuff. I'm just not hungry for it! But I know if I don't, my body will start storing fat all over again at the wrong times of day and this will have all been pointless. UGH!

I can't believe it's already Christmas eve! We're going to make cookies today and I purposely bought the store bought sugar cookie recipe cause I know it'll be easier to resist than the one my mom uses haha. I can go through a dozen of those in a day easily. I really am trying so hard to stick to this diet, but at the same time I don't want to overdo the stress and be miserable over the holidays because of it. I need to realize that I'm not going to undo 20 lbs. of weight loss with one unhealthy thing. No, I haven't cracked yet, but I leave for vacation tomorrow and damned if I'm going to spend the entire time eating celery. I'm going to put what I've learned into practice and eat GOOD food without going outside my guidelines and if I do have a piece of fudge, it's not the end of the world. Right?

My biggest insecurity right now is knowing I may very well have to go through one of those body scanners or get a pat down at the airport tomorrow night when I head out to Florida. Those close to me know I'm smaller than I was a month ago, but to those stupid airport people I'm still just "that big fat lady" and I'm not thrilled about my entire body image being displayed up on some screen for them to see. I am curious though to see how my weight loss affects my comfort in those tiny airplane seats. I'm curious to see how my seatbelt fits and if the person next to me is constantly shifting to try and make more room for themselves. I lost 15 inches alone in my shoulders so I know they'll have more room there at least! I hate flying, I really do. I get so self conscious about it all. At least it's a red-eye and most everyone will be trying to sleep. And hopefully since its a red-eye on Christmas night...it won't be very full. Here's hopin.

I hope you all have a wonderful holiday!! Just remember...the holidays aren't all about food, they're about family, and giving...and most importantly about our savior, Jesus Christ. Merry Christmas!

No scale for me today!

So after my little freakout, I went to see Maeli yesterday and she did a pinch test just to make sure I was still losing fat and not gaining it back. I was down .3% body fat from my last visit so that's what matters, even if my scale is being a !$@#%. We went over what I'd been eating while on maintenance and she said that if anything, I'm not eating ENOUGH. Holy crap, I don't know how to eat MORE. I'm going to try, but man it's a lot of food. She also said that while I'll no longer know which day and which foods are affecting my weight...if it's making me this crazy to weigh myself every day, I should stop doing it. So I'm not going to weigh myself again until Christmas morning and then again when I get home from my trip to Florida. She said even just stressing over what the scale says can make me gain weight, so no scale today!

More and more of my old clothes are starting to fit me. It's such a great feeling and what I really should be focusing on more than the numbers on my scale. My shirts are looser over my breasts, my pants have more room in them...especially in the thighs. All my pants seem so baggy in the thighs now it's crazy! It really is like having a new wardrobe when I go through my older clothes and find that they fit again. And there's still more of them waiting as I lose more and more. I can't wait till the day I actually need to SHOP for clothes that fit!

Well, it's elliptical time for me. I got off to a bit of a late start this morning so I had to eat my cottage cheese w/ fruit while writing this. I'd rather just go crawl back in bed. It's too bad sleepwalking doesn't count as exercise!

I just want to cry...

It really took everything I had not to just burst into tears when I got on the scale this morning. I gained another 1.4 lbs for a total of 3 since I started maintenance and while I was told weight can fluctuate between 1-4 lbs, this doesn't feel like freaking fluctuation to me. I literally feel like without the hcg in my body, it's just taking everything I put into it and saving it for a rainy day in the form of pounds. I'm terrified that after 21 days of maintenance, I will have gained back 21 lbs and be right back where I started.

Nothing is more frustrating than taking 30 years to find will power deep inside myself that allows me to FINALLY do what I've needed to do for more than 10 years now....and to do it to perfection...only to have it backfire on me. Maybe I'm overreacting too soon but it's hard not to.

I've been following the meal plan Maeli gave me as closely as I can, give or take a gram of something here and there. As I'm writing this I'm eating my breakfast, which is supposed to be the biggest meal of my day to get me started. 2 whole eggs and 3 more whites with a little sprinkling of mozzerella cheese, salt & pepper....1/2 a banana...1 container of Light Yoplait Yogurt and 1 piece of Sara Lee 45 Calorie 100% whole wheat toast with a tsp. of I can't believe it's not butter. The eggs are the hardest to eat...it's a lot, but I know the protein is important to get my day going and to keep burning fat.

The only area I failed in yesterday was with my water intake. My mind was just kept so occupied that I kept spacing refilling my bottle and only drank about 40 oz. However, I spent 45 mins. on my elliptical machine the past two mornings and burned almost 400 calories each time. So what the crap is the deal with my body!! My intake is barely around 17-1800 calories, I'm burning 400 exercising, I'm not eating any refined sugars and just sitting here doing nothing all day, at my weight..my body burns like 2600 calories just existing! SO WHAT THE HELL!

I guess all I can do is keep doing the best I can and keep working out and hope that my body adjusts and that the weight starts coming back off, because if I go back up to 330 lbs, while eating a HEALTHY diet AND exercising...I'm pretty sure I'll just say screw it and stop bothering.

So come on stupid body! DO YOUR JOB!

(added note: Maeli just called and I'm going to go in for another pinch test to see what's really going on instead of going by the scale. I know I put too much weight (pun intended) on what those numbers read. Maeli says if anything, I'm not eating ENOUGH. GAH!)

Oops...

I nearly forgot to write this today. I didn't really want to I suppose, since when I stepped on my scale this morning I'd gained 1.6 lbs. I didn't know whether to scream or cry. I was told that it's normal for weight to fluctuate from 1-4 lbs on maintenance though so I'm trying not to freak out...but this definitely puts a damper on my "lose 7 more lbs by Christmas" goal. Now it's lose NINE! Ugh!

So I did everything I could to make today a good day so I can lose tomorrow, hopefully. 45 mins on the elliptical (390 calories burnt) and lots of healthy foods. So I guess we just wait and see what tomorrow brings! Okay I'm tired...short blog tonight. More tomorrow! :)

Oh man I'm full....did I just say that?

Maeli was right. After my breakfast this morning I felt like I was going to be sick! But lets back up a bit.

I got myself a bowl of cottage cheese & mixed fruit at 9am and then filled up my water bottle and hopped on the elliptical. I worked my ass off!! I was so proud of myself. After not working out during the hcg drops part of the diet, I was sure today would kill me, but I did 45 minutes on the elliptical and then some free weights and crunches. I'm tired but I feel great and I'm so glad I did it.

THEN! 15 mins after my workout, I had to have a protein shake to replace all the protein I'd just burned off. An hour later I had to have my real breakfast (since my snack and breakfast get switched on the days I workout) and I could barely get it all down but it was soooooooooooooooo good. The whole meal itself was less than 500 calories but it felt like a lot more. I got...

2 pieces Sara Lee 45 calorie whole wheat bread w/honey...2 tsp.'s I can't believe it's not butter and sugar free syrup (which was actually really good)
6 eggs (2 yolks, 6 whites) scrambled w/ salt & pepper
1/2 a banana
1 cup 1% milk

2 hours later I had to have my afternoon snack (since it's switched with lunch today) and I swear I had to force it down my throat. 1 cup baby carrots & 1 light string cheese.

Now I should be thinking about eating some lunch here pretty soon and I don't know how I'm gonna do it!! It's pretty amazing to realize my stomach truly has shrunk and I can get full and satisfied on so much less and on so few calories.

I didn't gain or lose any weight today, which I guess is normal considering I just changed my diet. But I'm nervous about tomorrow. I hope I don't just start gaining it all back because I'm eating. I'm eating healthy and exercising, so hopefully I'll still keep losing and get as close to 300 as I can by Saturday!

Guess I should go shove some more food down my throat!

What to eat...what to eat...

It's like counting down to Christmas, but instead there's food at the end. I get a real dinner tonight (minus the carbs...only get those for breakfast for week 1 of maintenance) and I'm so excited!! Part of me is scared though that if I eat that much I'm going to gain 24 lbs. back over night. Tonight I get to eat 6 oz. of protein (lean meat..any kind i want really), 2 cups raw or 1 cup cooked veggies...again any kind i want (mixed even!), and 1 tbsp of fat whether it be salad dressing or mayo with some tuna or whatever. That actually doesn't sound like too much to worry about now that I'm writing it out. But breakfast tomorrow will be a lot different!

I was down another whole pound today which I was really excited about after almost a week of .2's and .4's. It surprised me that it was that much now that I'm not on the drops. I still have 7 lbs to go to hit my Christmas goal. That's a lot in one week without the drops and with an 1800 calorie diet but I'm going to get as close as I can. No breaking away from this meal plan Maeli gave me...and exercise at LEAST 3 days this week, if not 5. I can do it!

Elliptical machine...here I come!

Not dyin yet!

So when I woke up this morning, I was terrified that I was immediately going to feel like I was dying of starvation. However, I still feel great! So far haha. I had to remind myself this morning NOT to take my drops. I've gotten so used to it, it's just habit now. I definitely don't miss them.

I was down another .6 today which is good news :) I was afraid that going off the drops would mean the end of my weight loss but nope! I am determined!!! I pulled out another shirt from the back of my closet just to see how it'd fit. It was a 22/24 size button down blouse...and IT CLOSED OVER MY BOOBS! Yes I said boobs, I don't care..that's how excited I was. I can't remember the last time most of my shirts actually buttoned up. Also slipped into another pair of old jeans. It's like having a whole new wardrobe!

Today I'm going to write up my grocery list so that I can get everything I'll need for my new meal plan this week. It's sad how excited I am to get to buy bread I can eat...and cottage cheese..and regular cheese!! I'll get to double my protein and mix my veggies again. It's making me full just thinking about it.

I am still not supposed to have sugar for the next 3 weeks, which I'm okay with...cause I couldn't give it up forever. But I'll tell you right now, I'm going to have some of my mom's fudge/toffee next week. I will work it off walking on the beach or something. But it's a sacrifice I'm willing to make. It's Christmas, and I've worked my ass off. One piece won't matter *knock on wood*

Last Day of Drops!!

I can't believe it. 3 more doses of hcg and I don't have to take them again for a month! (When I'm ready to do another cycle). I definitely won't miss having to set my alarm 4 times a day to take them or their nasty taste under my tongue. I'm excited to jump head first into my maintenance phase on Sunday night and start eating real food again!

Despite going off the drops after tonight, I still have to stay on the 500-calorie diet until Sunday night to get the hcg out of my system. I'm nervous that it will be a torturous two days, but Maeli told me that when I start to feel REALLY hungry again, I'll know the hcg is out of my system. I'm excited to have my first real meal Sunday night! I can't wait to re-train my body HOW and WHEN and especially WHAT to eat. I'll get more into the details of my meal plan given to me when I start it full swing on Monday..for those of you who are curious...but it's only the plan for my first week. It will be tweaked for week two.

I was only down .6 today but it doesn't bother as much..after seeing how many inches I've lost. I'm going to work my butt off this week to get down to 300 like I originally wanted to by Christmas, but I don't honestly expect it and I won't be crushed if it doesn't happen because I realize how just how much I HAVE lost. And like I said...this is just the beginning of a long journey for me. I still have half a person to lose! And I intend on doing it :)

Holy Inches Batman!!!

I'm still trying to wrap my head around these numbers, even hours after Maeli took my measurements. It seems impossible!! But here they are. Since I started this diet right after thanksgiving I have lost the following inches in the following areas:

Shoulders - 15"
Bust/Chest - 4"
Waist - 6"
Butt/hips - 6"
Thighs - 6"
Calves - 1"
Biceps - 3"
Neck - 2"

TOTAL = 43 FREAKING INCHES!!!

She even measured around my shoulders twice cause she didn't believe the # she saw. No wonder I had to do my bras up a bit tighter this week! WOOHOOO! I only lost 1.2 lbs today for a total of 21.2 lbs, but the amount of inches I've lost makes me completely forget all about that number. I feel incredible and I can't wait for those numbers to just keep climbing.

She wrote out my VERY specific meal plan for when I start maintenance this sunday night. I still can't have sugar *whines*, but I get to slowly start adding back in other things that I love. I only get carbs with breakfast for the first week but that's still better than nothing..even if it is wheat toast! I get to add in some cheese and double my protein with my meals...I'm so excited! Though she swears after my first "normal" meal, I'm going to feel like exploding because my stomach has shrunk due to the 500 calorie diet I've been on for the past 3 weeks. I'm sure I'll survive. Just gimmie food!

Man I'm in such a great mood. This has been hard as hell, but so worth it. Though my freaking wedding ring keeps slipping around on my finger and is bound to fall off soon. But that's good right? :D

The Big 2-0!

So I finally hit the 20 lb. mark today. Exactly. Which means I only lost .2 *sighs* I'd give anything to see 1.something on my scale again. It's been a while. But I'm pretty excited to have lost 20 lbs, that's a lot! It just means I won't make 30 by Christmas which was my original goal (and supposedly reachable on this diet). But I feel pretty good today. I got into an entire outfit that I haven't worn in years. I can feel a difference in my body. So even if I am still retaining water, I know I'm losing pounds of fat anyway...I can feel it. So yay for 20 lbs!

Another great thing about this diet is that it has cured some things that were wrong with my body. Like my father and other family members, I had been getting a lot of bad heartburn...especially over the past year. I was also diagnosed with IBS (irritable bowel syndrome) nearly 10 years ago that seemed to be triggered by certain foods and stress. Since day 1 of this diet, I haven't had a single incident of either! Not one! And I didn't even realize it until yesterday. And then I was like HOLY CRAP! I couldn't believe it. Maeli told me that once I start maintenance I'll just re-add foods back into my diet SLOWLY so that I can watch and keep track of what's affecting my body..my stomach..and of course my weight. I'm hoping I don't find out that I've been lactose intolerant all this time. I swear I'd cry. But it's been nice not to have a horrible stomach ache every other day and to go through a bottle of tums every few weeks!

5 more days of 500 calories!! Is it sad that I'm so excited to be done with cycle 1? I can't help it! I CAN'T WAIT!

SO CLOSE!

Okay this is just pissing me off now! It's taken me several days to lose 2 pounds and now I'm .2 away from having lost 20! That's bullcrap! I just keep telling myself I'm retaining water on my period blah blah whatever, but it's been a while now since I had a loss of more than 1 lb. and I don't get why. I have been PERFECT about sticking to this diet, so it's hard to watch my weight go down .6 and then .4 at a time.

I meet with Maeli for my final consultation on Thursday morning at 9am. She'll do my measurements (which I can't wait to see) and then work up a very specific maintenance plan for me. Apparently I was wrong about when I get to eat normal foods *sighs* Friday is my last day of taking drops but I have to stay on the 500 calorie diet until Sunday night until the hcg is out of my system. I shouldn't complain though I guess. Those who do injections have to wait 2 weeks to get the hcg out of their systems! That's nuts! I just want some bread!

I'm really curious to see my measurements on thursday for the main reason that I can't really feel the weight loss in one specific area. I haven't even fully gone down a pants size, though the thighs in some of them feel looser. I think the weight loss is just so evenly spread out that I can't really tell where I'm losing it. I suppose that's a good thing right? I just want to fit into some of my older clothes! It will be like having a whole new wardrobe almost haha. You'd think that having lost almost 20 lbs...I'd be down a size or two. So it's a bit baffling. But I'm not giving up.

This is just the beginning of a very very long road!

Possible TMI situation...

If you're squeamish about girlie stuff then don't read this haha.

So, I've read in a few different places that being on hcg when you get your period...sucks. I didn't think it would be a big deal because for the last four years I've had an IUD (Intra-uterine device aka. birth control device) and my periods have been far between and VERY light. They have literally not lasted more than a day. I think it's now safe to say that the hcg definitely has an effect on that.

I got mine yesterday...still have it today...and it's the heaviest I've had in years. No, it's not abnormally heavy like OMG GO SEE A DOCTOR! It's just....normal. Just not normal for me. I can say that I do not miss days like this! I'm going to stay on the hcg through it since I only have 4 days left (YAY!), but I'm going to complain! I feel a bit hungrier and my cramps SUCK. But I'll live.

Most things I read said that while on your period, you're most likely to have a stall or not lose much weight. I was still down .8 lbs today so that's not bad, but I'm really straining to reach the 20 lb. mark. I'm having a hard time understanding why my first week on this diet was so great and I lost so much. And over the past 7 days I've only lost about 5.8 lbs. I know, I know....5.8 lbs in one week is nothing to sneeze at. Maybe I just had unrealistic expectations when I decided to lose 30 lbs on my first cycle. But I'm still determined to get as close to breaking that 300 lb. mark by Christmas dammit!

In my efforts to beat this thing, I even caved to my dislike for seafood and ate the tilapia last night! It wasn't the best thing in the world but it didn't make me want to vomit as seafood usually does. I'll have to play with the seasonings a bit next time, but I'm trying to have less red meat for the rest of this week.

I have another meeting with Maeli today. I'm excited to see the changes in my body fat percentage over this week and hopefully she'll measure me today, although she may wait until I'm completely done with my cycle. I am so excited to start maintenance on Saturday and eat some real food!! Well...more of it anyway. I really do like Maeli a lot and she's helped me to lose almost 20 lbs, that's pretty huge. But for a few reasons, I won't be going back to her wellness center when I'm ready to do round two of this diet. I've learned a lot about it and I've learned I CAN DO IT! I know the diet and I know how to handle the cravings and what not to do. So next time I'm just going to get the drops and do it on my own. I'm also going to walk Nathan through a cycle after Christmas so I'm excited to see how he does :) I know that if we make this change in both our lives it will be a lot easier to support eachother and have a healthier family.

Whew, that was a long rant, but I needed it. Sorry for the TMI :P

Weird or freakin cool....

So I was up WAY too late last night and I've definitely decided it's got a negative effect on my hcg diet cause I was feeling hungry pretty bad by the time I went to bed. Not to mention I ended up sleeping in to a time I won't even admit here. But I have discovered something that's pretty freakin cool...at least I think so. I'm just not sure why it does it.

I set my alarm for 8am to take my first dose this morning and took it ..then weighed myself. My weight was up again from yesterday and I wanted to scream. Up like..1 1/2 lbs. So all upset I just went back to bed and said "screw it". I woke up a few hours later and went to go take a shower...weighed myself again. And I was DOWN .6 from what I'd been the day before. What the crap!! I did it 3 times just to be sure I read it right. But man...losing that much weight just sleeping for a few hours...felt pretty damn cool. It had happened a couple days before too but I figured it was just some weird fluke, but now I'm starting to think it's a great way to lose weight haha. Take the drops then sleep immediately! Who knows.

Only problem is now I have a really late start on my 500 calories today, but I'm planning to be in bed by 11 tonight, so I'll just squish my meals a bit closer together I guess. Not likin this low bloodsugar feeling though from having not eaten since yesterday evening.

This is the best apple I've ever eaten!

Soooo tired...

So does staying up too late have any sort of effect on this diet? Cause it seems like the nights I'm bad and stay up past midnight..I have less of a weight change in the morning. Not to mention horrible headache when I do finally get out of bed. I was only down .2 today but I guess it's better than gaining.

I feel like such a whiner when I say "I only lost .2 lbs today", but when you spend 2 weeks losing 1-3 lbs. every single day you start to wonder what you're suddenly doing wrong. I'm starting to worry I won't hit that 300 mark and I really really want to. I'm not sure what more I can do though when I'm already following this diet to the letter.

I am running out of hcg drops and I know I don't have enough to finish my cycle..however I don't want to spend another $165 to get a bottle from Maeli, much as I love her. Where can I get them online for cheap but still make sure they're legitimate drops? There are SO MANY online places selling them. Hell even the corner gas station by my house is selling them for $40, but how do I know it's the real deal and not just a bottle of water with a few drops of alcohol in it? If anyone knows a good place to get them I'm open to suggestions.

At least I hit my 150 oz. water mark again yesterday. Hopefully that's helping me in some way. I don't mind retaining some water and not losing as much on the scale as long as I'm still losing the fat % and can feel the difference myself.

Oh...I also got some of my blood test results back from the lab yesterday. My cholesterol is in normal levels...right where the dr. wants it to be, they said. And my thyroid is normal. So good news there :) It's a relief to hear that I'm physically in great shape other than all this weight I'm carrying around. So now I just need to really focus on getting rid of it before it DOES cause a problem!

Heading back in the right direction.

I'm down 1.8 today. Not quite as much as Maeli was telling me I should have lost but it's still all the weight I gained plus a tiny bit more...so that makes me feel slightly better. Just hoping I can still break 300 by Christmas. That's my only goal for now.

Today is Day 14 and it feels like it's been the longest 14 days of my life. Other than maybe the last 14 of my pregnancies! The days do go a bit faster and more smoothly now that I'm not feeling the hunger pains though and I am so grateful for that. I fit into a pair of jeans this morning that I haven't been able to wear "comfortably" pretty much since I bought them. It was one of those "I'm in a hurry, this looks like my size, I'll try it on when I get home" kinda purchases. And then when they were too tight I said, "Eh, I'll lose weight and they'll fit." Well...now they do! Yay for an extra pair of jeans!

I finally hit the 150 oz. water mark yesterday for the first time. It only took two weeks of gradual build up but I did it! I found me a second 24 oz. water bottle and would just fill one up and put it in the freezer to cool it while I drank the other one and kept switching. Still not a fan of having to pee more often than a 9 months pregnant woman but I am a fan of losing weight every day so I'll keep trying to do it.

Hmm...I wonder what else I fit into now.

Okay that can't be right...

So down 2.something yesterday and today I'm UP 1.2? I texted Maeli about it because that seems like more than water retention. She says if I don't lose more than 2 lbs tomorrow to call her. But I cannot for the life of me figure out how I gained 1.2 lbs. I had about 502 calories...all things on my approved list and things I've had before. I even managed to get down about 125 oz. of water.

The only pattern I'm noticing is that when I have ground beef (the leanest kind you can buy)..I tend to lose less (or in this case gain some). Maybe my body just doesn't like it for this diet. Only problem is, that leaves me with Steak, Chicken....or seafood. I have yet to try the tilapia like my mom keeps insisting I'll like...but I HATE seafood. However, I know that if I just eat chicken and steak, I'm bound to stall and I'm already bored with it. *sighs*

I went to the Dr. this morning for a physical which I haven't done in years. My baby sister, who is in nursing school, insisted I go...especially now that I'm on this diet. She takes such good care of me hehe. No blood test results back yet but he said that everything looks great, which is good news. We talked about the hcg diet a bit and he kinda just smiled at me. I knew he wouldn't really care much for it but he did say this. He said that it's not dangerous and if it's working for me to go ahead and keep trying it if that's what I want. He said in his opinion its just a gimmick and that anyone will lose weight on just 500 calories...the hcg just makes you feel full. He said his only real concern with it is that people tend to not make a lifestyle change when they do it...and end up gaining ALL of the weight back when they go off the hcg. I told him I'm determined not to be one of those people. So he wished me luck and told me I was in great health (other than my weight obviously) and that was that!

So today I'm going to go super boring and hopefully lose a couple pounds by tomorrow. Steak and chicken here I come.

Past the halfway mark!

I wanted to lose 30 lbs. before I head to Florida for Christmas and after losing another 2.6 this morning, I'm more than halfway there! 17.2 lbs baby! WOOHOO! I can't even begin to express how excited that makes me. The weight loss seems to be pretty evenly spread over my body too cause I'm not feeling it all in one spot but my clothes are loosening slowly all over. I can't wait to have to buy new ones and throw away all these fat jeans!

My most immediate concern coming up with all this weight, however, was my flight to Florida. I have always HATED flying..especially alone. I hate feeling like I'm taking up so much room and pushing into another person's seat next to me. I don't mind it as much with kids cause they're so tiny I can just sit next to one of them and they have to love me anyway haha. The seatbelts have also been a problem...barely fitting even at the largest setting. So flying by myself in a few weeks has me a bit nervous. It's just not a fun feeling. I'm really hoping that these 30 lbs I will have lost will help a bit. I can't wait to be one of those girls who has to tighten their belt after putting it on...and can cross their legs in the seat! Although being tall kinda kills that one too haha. So many little things I'm excited about.

But even the little things count!

Another stall...blah

It's not as stressful this time, I guess to wake up and see my weight hasn't moved. But it's hard not to want to kick the scale. The only thing I could have done differently yesterday is drink more water. That's my daily problem I think. I cannot seem to get up to 150 oz...but yesterday I didn't even make it past 80 cause I just kept forgetting really. So I think maybe it's water retention? I don't know.

Instead of dwelling on that though, I'm trying to get excited about the things that will start to change as more time passes and I lose more of this crappy weight! One thing that I'm excited to do is stop shopping at freaking walmart for my clothes!! I miss the days when regular stores had clothes that fit me. Even when I was a size 16, I could still shop at Old Navy if I felt like it and it was great. I've never been one to give a crap about brand names, so it's not really that that bothers me. But I can't wait to just be able to go clothes shopping for the fun of it and be able to go anywhere I want. I want to be able to buy something because I LOVE it and not just because it will fit me. Of course, I'll have to have my sisters train me in clothing trends but it'll be fun haha.

So here's to another day of the same old foods and hopefully a lot more water. Day 11....you are goin' down!

Woohooo!

Another 2.4 lbs today! It feels SO good to have days like that, especially after a .4 gain yesterday, which know now was just water retention and doesn't mean I didn't still lose fat yesterday.

I met with Maeli today and did the oh so enjoyable pinch test. I swear nothing makes you feel fater than having another person pinch your fat between their fingers. But then she did my calculations and told me I'd lost 3.2% of my body fat. That's pretty awesome. I didn't hate her so much after that haha.

Yesterday was a hard day. Not physically...I still feel good and full and am not hurting anymore. But it was hard emotionally and mentally. After gaining weight in the morning..it was also our first grocery shopping trip since I'd started this diet. Can I just tell you that I HATE the grocery store now? Every single aisle was screaming at me with yummy things I can't have. The up side to this diet though is that I'm shopping healthier for Nathan and the kids too and not just myself (though they still got their chips ahoy and some mac n' cheese. I mean c'mon...they're kids, ya can't take away ALL the fun!) But as I told Maeli today, it's not the junk stuff I'm really craving anymore. I mean sure...a milky way bar would taste good but it's not what I WANT. What I really want...right now...is a couple pieces of whole wheat toast with some butter and strawberry jam on them. Is that too much to ask! haha.

Luckily when I'm done with the hcg drops I can have that stuff AND it's considered healthy! So at least I'm craving the healthy stuff more and more and not so much the junk food. Hopefully that makes Christmas easier when the fudge and toffee and cookies are around. I'm definitely eating them, but I think it'll be easier to do it in moderation this year. No one can pass up my mother's christmas goodies. You just can't.

Well..today is day 10 of this cycle. 11 more to go!! I am determined to break 300 before Florida. December 18th is when I'll start my maintenance cycle and have to be responsible for my own diet of eating healthy and exercise and bye bye drops. I'm excited to see how much I can lose by myself now that I'm feeling so much better about things and realizing that I really don't need all that crappy food I used to love so much. It will be nice to be able to eat a wider variety of things, that's for sure. I never thought I'd say this but I'm getting tired of steak!

Well hmmm...

Today was was up .4 lbs and the body fat % number on my scale jumped up..a lot. I'm a bit confused. Wondering if the scale is right. I'm looking back over yesterday trying to figure out where I went wrong. The only thing I can think of that I know I messed up a bit with was having a little more than 3 oz. of my lean ground beef for dinner. Would that really cause such a screw up? I didn't change anything else.

Strawberries at 10am
3 oz. steak & some summer squash around 2pm
Apple around 5pm
3.5 oz. hamburger (w/ onion salt that i've used a few times this week) and some steamed broccoli.
I also had 2 pieces of melba toast over the course of the day...12 calories each...and my days total for calories was only slightly over 500. I also didn't drink as much water as I should have...maybe only about 96 oz.

But still...how did I GAIN weight? I didn't have ANY sugar...I didn't even have the sugarless gum. Even without the hcg (as people keep pointing out to me)..if I only eat 500 calories i'm GOING to lose weight just because of how many calories my body burns on its own every day just by existing. So what the hell!

I guess I just try and mimic one of my better weight loss days today and see how it goes. Tomorrow afternoon I meet with Maeli, so I'll be sure to ask about it. Right now I'm just....baffled.

A sigh of relief...

Upping my dosage seems to have gotten rid of the problem of intense hunger pains...because yesterday was CAKE! I still had the occasional mild hunger pain but it wasn't anything more than you'd feel when you hadn't eaten for a few hours. It felt so great to not have this diet and my hunger take up my entire day and my every thought.

I did accidentally go over my 500 calorie limit when I ate an extra melba toast but those things are just so good...especially when you can't have bread or crackers. So I think I hit 534 calories..BUT...I still lost 1.4 lbs today so I'm not complaining! In fact, the night before when things were so bad, I had one of my protein shakes that I bought as a just in case for when I had a bad day. That took me to 612 calories I believe and I still lost 1 lb. So I'm not going to stress as much over hitting that 500 calorie mark exactly and if I need that extra cracker, I'm going to eat it. It's worth it if it keeps me from wanting to eat my arm.

So it's now officially the start of my second week on phase 2. 14 days to go. In those first 7 days, I lost 12.6 lbs. I was hoping to average 2 lbs a day but almost 13 lbs in one week is HUGE! I know people are skeptical about how fast the weight comes off while on the hcg saying it's impossible to keep it off...but it's not. You're weened off it slowly and put on a meal plan to ease you back up in calories and if done right...I'll keep losing weight with a healthier diet and exercise. You know...the NORMAL way (as I keep getting told). Yes, if I go back to eating crap, I will gain it back..so it's up to me. But it is possible for me to keep losing weight even after going off the drops. A girlfriend of mine lost 50 on her 40 day hcg cycle and ANOTHER 20 on her own during the maintenance period! She is my inspiration and I know I can do this.

So thank you to all of you who have given me your support, it really is what keeps me going. To those of you who think I am just crazy and hurting my body on this diet then I'm sorry you feel that way but I am not giving this up. I was hurting my body more by weighing 330 lbs. to begin with and I don't see how shedding that weight is a bad thing.

Nearly threw the towel in...

Yesterday was by far the hardest day of this diet for me. It was day 6 and instead of getting easier to handle it was a million times harder. The stomach pains were so bad it drove me to tears and near vomiting, though I managed not to. I tried everything I could to rid myself of the pains aside from just shoving a pb&j sandwich down my throat and nothing worked. Not the gum, not the diet coke and not the L-glutamine I bought. I really was ready to just say screw it and give up.

Luckily, Maeli finally got my voicemail last night and called me back. I told her what was going on and she said it's possible that my body is just rejecting the drops..which some people do. Since I wasn't straying from the diet and eating sugar, it wasn't something I was doing...which was nice to hear. So she had me up my dosage a bit. If that doesn't work, my only other option is to do the injections so that my body produces enough hcg to handle this diet. I'd rather not have to shove a needle in my arm every day for 2 weeks but if it will make this bearable, I'm willing to do it.

So I upped my dosage starting before bed and *knock on wood* I feel a lot better today. I slept great and was down another 1.1 lbs this morning! Morning's have never been very hard though so it's hard to gauge if the dosage will help. Night time is by far the hardest and part of me is honestly frightened to find out. If tonight turns out just as miserable ast last night, I'll just go for the shots. Only problem is that means forking over more dough.

So keep your fingers crossed. I really don't want to be in that 1% of people whose bodies just can't do this diet. I need it more than most of the rest!

10 lbs. baby!!

I finally hit the 10 pound mark today! I can't even begin to express how exciting that is! 320.5. I don't remember the last time the scale read that much. And it's the last time it ever will. It feels SO good to know that.

I slept a lot better last night. I think having a diet coke and munching on some celery before bed helped my stomach to feel more full cause I didn't have to spend 2 hours tossing and turning. I'm still going to try and find that L-glutamine stuff today to see if that helps with the hunger pains throughout the day. Anything to make this easier.

I can make it through this first cycle, I know I can. The problem is trying to make it less hateful so that in another month or two I can do another round and lose even more. So I'm trying to find out all the tricks I can. If all I can think about is the headaches and the stomach pains, it's going to be really hard to get up the will power to do this a second time.

So now it's off to Walmart to find me a new scale (one that goes by the 1/10th of a pound instead of 1/2) and some L-glutamine and maybe do a little Christmas shopping while I'm at it.

It's gonna be a good day...I can tell.

Does this get any easier??

I always weigh myself a few times in the morning just to make sure the # is right. There's a reason I'm buying a new scale tomorrow. I got 4 diff. numbers today so I'm going by the middle one and saying I lost 1 more pound. Not great, but better than nothing.

But today, that's not my biggest complaint. I feel like this diet nearly killed me yesterday! The first half of the day was fine...even up until dinnertime it was fine. But last night after dinner and through to about 2am when my body finally gave in to the tiredness, I literally felt like I was starving to death. I've felt hunger pains since going on the 500 calories, but last night it HURT. I don't know why last night was so much worse but it was so bad that I felt I was going to lose my mind. I couldn't sleep because of it and I couldn't stop thinking about it.

I thought this was supposed to get easier after the first few days!!! Not harder! I can do 21 days of anything, but I honestly don't know if I can do another 17 days of what I felt last night. I hope I don't have to. So I started doing some research and today I'm going to call Maeli for suggestions. I want to try and fix this without having to up my calories with a protein shake if I can help it.

One thing I read somewhere is that you're supposed to keep your hcg refrigerated to keep the solution well mixed, but on my bottle it says room temperature away from light. I have no idea which is better or if that's one of my problems. I also ready about something called L-glutamine which supposedly helps with your blood sugar levels and a lot of women said helped to stop their hunger pains between meals. So I'm going to ask her about taking that. I need SOMETHING...or I am going to shovel a whole loaf of bread in my mouth.

I keep telling myself that I'm not going to change anything until I've survived a full week of 500 calories and I have 3 more days to go for that..but man is it getting harder. I'm open to any suggestions or ideas from any of you who have done this diet...I feel very desperate right now and I do NOT want to mess this diet up. But the pains are so bad that I cannot think about anything else but the pain and the fact that I have food right in front of me I could eat to make it stop. I even dream about this damn diet. I want to lose this weight...but not at the expense of my sanity.

Make it stop!

A little more encouraged

So I'm another 2.5 lbs lighter today. That's 7.5 in total. Yay! Yesterday was really hard, however, and I'm really praying that today is the day this gets easier.

Sunday was the massive migraine day..and yesterday was "I feel like a starving person who hasn't eaten in months" day. It's kind of hard to describe the feeling really. I felt like I had to force myself to finish my dinner because it really is a lot of veggies and it's filling. BUT! I still felt like I was starving afterward. Does that even make sense? Starving but can't eat anymore? It's a horrible feeling and I really want that day to come when I feel full.

Maeli gave me some appetite suppressants yesterday, ironically, that really didn't seem to help at all. I found it kind of depressing that I actually felt the complete opposite. Maybe they just take time to work like everything else. I'm trying to be patient. Hopefully today will be a bit easier. The 2.5 lb. loss definitely perks my mood for the day and helps with everything else.

The other thing that's making this harder is that I keep feeling a tickle in my throat that's threatening to explode into something worse. I keep thinking it's gone away and feel fine and then last night it was cough-up-a-lung city around here. Nathan was very sweet and went to buy me some sugar free cough drops at like 11pm last night but for now I'm just keeping them on hand and refuse to use anything that could throw off this diet. They still have sugar alcohols in them, which are known to be hcg diet stallers and in this first round it's the most important time NOT to stray from the diet. Yes I know, I need to take care of myself and if this does turn into a full blown illness I'll have no choice. But I'm hoping and praying that it goes away instead.

Speaking of praying. I hadn't in a long time. My faith is something that I've been confused about for a long time...but I've finally found this will power in me that I didn't even know I had and I want this so badly...that I actually prayed last night. Does that make me greedy? To pray after so long because of how badly I want this...want to improve my health and essentially save my own life? I felt guilty doing it, but I had to. I'm crying just typing this, that's how emotional a deal this is for me. I don't just "want" to lose weight. I need to. I have to. And I am GOING TO. But I can't do this alone and I can't do it sick. So I prayed to my heavenly father for some help. I asked him to keep me healthy and to help me keep this desire I have so that I can make it through the hard days. And what started out as a prayer about me...turned into long long talk with someone I haven't talked to in a long time. Who knows. Maybe this diet will save me in more ways than I thought.

Now where did I put that blasted water bottle.

Ugh...

I stuck to my diet yesterday just as strictly as the first day. 6 oz. of strawberries for my mid-morning snack. 3 oz. broiled chicken in a bowl of lettuce with Walden Farms dressing for lunch. An orange for my afternoon snack and the same dinner as the night before. 3 oz. of steak and a whole ton of squash. I stepped on the scale this morning....

...and only lost ONE pound. I knew the weight loss would taper off but I didn't think it would be that quickly. I wanted to cry. Yeah..I know on any normal diet, losing 1 pound in a day is a huge deal, but on this one...and after losing 4 the day before..I just feel like I did something wrong.

The only thing that changed yesterday is that I had the mother of all migraines. So I took quite a bit of excedrine/excedrine PM over the course of the day. I think at one point Nathan gave me 2 ibuprofen as well. Maeli had told me that headache medicines were okay to take, but now I'm wondering if maybe they are the reason. What else could it be?

The headache seems to be gone this morning...fingers crossed. It was the worst one I'd had in ages and I'd rather not have a repeat today.

Yesterday I found myself feeling pretty hungry most of the day. I tried keeping my mind off food and ate slowly when it was time to do so. I suppose it didn't help that while I was taking a nap, Nathan made some blt's for the kids and the smell woke me up. He was so sweet, trying to make them while I was sleeping so that the bacon smell wouldn't bother me. But bacon lingers. I am thus banning it until my cycle is over haha. They can go without bacon for 3 weeks. It also didn't help that my children were gloating about their dessert last night and making "mmmm sounds". Silly monkeys. Nathan explained to them about mommy's diet and that it's not nice to make me feel that I'm missing out. So my sweet little Gregory takes another bite of his pie and says "It really wasn't very good mom". At least now all the thanksgiving desserts are out of my house.

Another stress relief is that today, after being off track for a whole month, my kids head back to school. Given..it's only a couple weeks before they're off again for Christmas break. It's been a mad house around here lately with all 3 of them home and the weather too cold for them to play outside for long. Also with Nathan working so much lately and never being home it's all just been a bit overwhelming. So today, I plan to enjoy the quiet!

Although...the quiet may make me just think more about food.

HOLY CRAP!!!

I know in most diets they tell you, "don't weigh yourself every day", but in the hcg diet you have to. Your progress is so fast and you need to keep track of it as well as what foods cause you to stall, should that happen. So I stepped on the scale this morning after my first 500 calorie day/night...and I lost....

.....wait for it......
.....FOUR POUNDS!!!!!!!!!!

Holy crap! I mean seriously. I was so shocked I weighed myself twice to be sure. 326.5 baby!! I was so pumped up I couldn't go back to sleep haha. Too much adrenaline. My friend Jen was right....I want to marry my scale today. Man, that feels so good. The question is though..is every day going to be like this or was the first one just a fluke to get me hyped up? Who cares, I lost four pounds!

The Christmas party last night was SO HARD..but I survived it! Everyone brought these homemade soups and chili that smelled SO GOOD I thought it was going to kill me! I mean c'mon...who doesn't like a hot bowl of chili with cheese and sour cream on top? *drools* And then...they had a dessert table. I stayed away from it until Emma needed help getting her cupcake but then I saw it...the pies..the chocolate peanut butter brownies. I wanted to cry. But somehow I managed to stay strong. Even when I got butter on my finger from buttering my daughter's roll, I wiped it back on her roll and didn't lick my finger! I'm a whole different person and it's kinda scary!

My mother-in-law saw me doing a word finder puzzle that they'd set out for all the kids to play and asked why I wasn't eating. So I got to explain the whole diet to her. She asked why in the world I'd start it that day of all days. I said well..I want to finish this cycle before Christmas and Thanksgiving was a perfect loading day! She felt bad eating in front of me. But I told her it was okay...I had steak at home waiting for me! I had decided to wait to eat dinner until after the party because we had to leave so early. I didn't want to come home and starve the rest of the night. Glad I did. Broiled steak and yellow summer squash....ohhhh man it was so good. Worth missing all the soups.

Luckily I don't feel like I'm starving, but I do feel hungry. I'm going to just deal with it though and trust that within a few days it will get to that point everyone tells me about where I'm having to force those 500 calories down my throat. The only thing I'm having trouble with is my water intake. Maeli told me to drink half my weight in ounces. That's 150 oz! I only got up to 80 oz. yesterday and I was still peeing constantly!!! It drove me crazy! Oh well, maybe today I can manage another 20 on top of that.

At this point, I feel like I can do anything. And I'm SO excited to see where this takes me. Now if only I could celebrate with a giant Milky Way bar......

Bye bye nummy foods!

I feel...so gross. I ate SO MUCH yesterday that I literally feel like I'm going to explode today. Our turkey dinner was so nummy and normally on Thanksgiving I can clean my plate with the best of them but I got full halfway through! I had to force myself to finish it off and then waited a while before savoring my very last piece of pie for the year. Oh it was so good. Chocolate...my friend..I shall miss you the most haha. So overall, I think my loading days went really well. I kept a food log and counted my calories to make sure that I was over the normal daily calorie amounts and I ate like a champ. My food log was telling me I was eating too much and was going to gain weight. I had to laugh at it. "Yes, I know you stupid thing. And tomorrow you'll tell me I need to eat more!"

So today starts my 500 calorie a day journey. I bought me a little food scale to weigh all my food and today I plan on cooking out lots of chicken and steak to use throughout the week so that I don't have to do it daily. My menu will be pretty boring for the next 3 weeks. Here's how it basically works:

NO BREAKFAST
Mid-morning fruit - 1 apple/orange or handful of strawberries (or grapefruit but grapefruit tastes like rubber bands so no thank you! haha)

Lunch - 3 oz. cooked chicken/steak/fish (i hate seafood so no) & 1 type of vegetable. Not all kinds are allowed. No carrots, corn, etc. I stocked up on broccoli, celery, squash, cucumbers and cherry tomatoes as well as some Walden Farms ranch dressing (it's the only kind I'm allowed..no fat no sugar, etc)

Mid-afternoon fruit - Same as before but it has to be a different one than was had in the morning.

Dinner - Same as lunch but it has to be a different meat and a different veggie than before.

Any remaining calories must be finished off with veggies. I also have to drink about 150 oz. of water a day. And that's it! That's all I get!

Of course it figures that on my very first day of doing this...we're going to a Tracy family Christmas party and we have to bring a big pot of soup and a big dessert..none of which I can partake in. So I'm going to eat before we go and then sit FAR AWAY from the food haha.

Unfortunately I gained back the pound I lost on my first day of loading. I knew I had though after all that I ate last night. But I know that tomorrow when I wake up it will go back down..and I'll never come near the 330 mark again. I can't even begin to express how excited and how serious I am about this. I AM GOING TO BREAK 300 BEFORE CHRISTMAS!!!

Time for my mid-morning fruit!!

Ugh, I have to load...again?

After I forced lunch down my throat yesterday I thought to myself, "I cannot possibly get enough calories today...I'm so freaking full!" I don't normally eat breakfast anyway (which yes, I know is bad...and I'm trying to retrain my body) so after I'd had a full breakfast, the idea of eating a ham sandwich, a handful of grapes, a handful of cheetos and a glass of milk made me want to vomit. But I managed it. Even after all of that I was still only halfway through the calories I'm supposed to be consuming on my loading days. So I went all out for dinner. Made my mom's Venetian Noodles recipe with TONS of cheese (since I'll be missing that for the next 21 days) and made a chocolate cake for dessert. Oh how I will miss chocolate.

Another important thing on this diet is fluid intake. Not only does it help keep you full but it cleans out your system. Maeli told me, "You're going to hate me when you're getting up to pee every 2 hours at night but drink LOTS of water!! When you start to say "I hate Maeli for this!" remember...you're peeing fat! So...you can go to the bathroom and then say "YAY! I just lost another pound!" hahaha. I really like Maeli, she cracks me up.

So today is our Thanksgiving dinner (since Nathan had to work all day yesterday). Hopefully loading will be easier today because I know all that good Turkey and potatoes will have plenty of calories. Loaded with gravy of course. I'm getting nervous about tomorrow though. I have to go out (on black friday of all days) and get me a food scale today so that I can measure all my food from now on. Portion size is critical during phase 2 (the 21 day 500 calorie part). I'll get more into that tomorrow when I start it.

So this morning I stepped on my scale expecting to have gained a pound or two after all that I ate yesterday and I was still down a pound! As nervous as I am about the drop in calories tomorrow, it makes me SO excited to see how many pounds start to come off and how quickly. I am determined to get below 300 lbs before I fly to Florida on Christmas night to see my family. Of course, while I'm there I'll probably eat terribly with all that yummy Christmas fudge and toffee my mother is famous for but hopefully by then I will have learned some restraint haha.

I want to thank my friend, Christina, for telling me all about hcg back when she started it. I wish I could have gotten into it sooner but I'm excited to finally start. You're an inspiration to me girly and I'm so proud of you! I hope to have as much success as you.

Well, I've downed my huge bowl of raisin bran and peach yogurt..now I've gotta go find me some more almonds to shove down my throat. I never thought being forced to eat this much would be so hard! Wish me luck!

The beginning of the end...I hope.

I've always watched my friends and family try out this blog thing...I've seen it on movies...and always said, "That's something I could never do." Even sitting here at my computer typing, I'm wondering if this is such a great idea. But I think the reason this will work is that this time I'm doing it for me. If no one else reads it that's fine, but I need to be held accountable to myself at the very least.

"Accountable for what?" you ask. Well..today is officially day 1 of my hcg diet. Basically what hcg does is reset the way you've trained your mind to work over the course of your life. You've taught it your eating habits and patterns and it can make it difficult to lose weight. When hcg is in your system, it causes the fat cells to open and release the contained fat..forcing your body to burn up that stored fat for energy instead of whatever it is you're eating. So on a restricted calorie diet, you end up burning 1-2 lbs of fat A DAY! Obviously this isn't something that you can do every day for the rest of your life. It's done in cycles. So here's what I'm about to embark on!

I started taking the hcg drops (15 drops under the tongue 4 times a day...as opposed to getting daily injections) last night before bed. Today (Thanksgiving) and tomorrow are what are called my "loading days". Basically they're conditioning days to prepare my body for the drop in calories and to let the hcg adjust and begin working within my body. Loading is exactly what it sounds like. I get to eat....a lot. My nutritionist, Maeli, who will be walking me through this whole process...says that if I really want to, I can eat burgers and fries for two days. But...for the next few days when I've dropped to 500 calories and the hcg is working in high gear..I'm going to FEEL like burgers..and fries haha. So I have to eat a lot, but I'm trying not to make it all junk food. But hey, a girls got to have a little fun. It is Thanksgiving afterall.

We're actually having our Thanksgiving meal tomorrow (friday), so I'll load up plenty on turkey and stuffing and potatoes...all the good stuff. Loading is harder than I thought. Already I'm feeling like I'm not very hungry and I'm having to force things down my throat. For breakfast I fried 2 eggs and sprinkled a little cheddar cheese on them. Had two pieces of whole wheat toast with "I can't believe it's not butter" and some strawberry jelly. A big glass of milk and a handful of almonds. I'm supposed to eat all day long and I don't want to anymore haha.

The 500 calorie-a-day cycle lasts 21 days. So for 21 days I can't have ANY sugar, fats, carbs...basically anything really nummy haha. But I can do anything for 21 days. I can. Especially if it means when it's over with I will have lost around 30 lbs. I'll have to do a lot of cycles, but it will be worth it. After the 21 days of hcg, I go into a maintenance period where I slowly work foods back into my diet and go off the hcg. At this point my body has basically reset it's way of thinking and I can re-train it with a healthier diet and not gain back anything I lost. Then after a few weeks of maintenance I can go for cycle 2. The other downside to all this is the cost. It ain't cheap. I'm blessed to have a supportive family to help me manage it.

So why did I name my blog what I did? Well...I've tried everything when it comes to dieting. And frankly, I'm sick of dieting. I'm like my mother. If I don't see results quickly I get frustrated and lose hope and give up. I realize that doing this diet will still require a lifestyle change but it will allow me to see results quickly and to realize that yes...I CAN lose weight and I don't have to be afraid of doing so. This time, I mean business! I've done Jenny Craig and Weight Watchers and eat right and exercise. I've tried slim fast and all those diet pills out there. I even did the Richard Simmons diet once. I've done the gym membership/personal trainer thing and even have an elliptical machine in my own home now, which actually has helped me to lose some weight already. But I'm tired of being fat. Yes..I said fat. I am 5'10" and weigh 330 lbs. Any dr. will tell you that is in the "dangerously obese" zone.

I haven't always been this big, but I have always been biggER. My whole life I've been "the chubby girl" in my family. No, they never called me that nor did they ever make me feel like I was any less loved or special. That is, however, how I felt on the inside. I have 3 younger sisters..all who are tall, skinny and gorgeous. Most of their lives (I know they workout more now) they lived off fast metabolism and could eat what they wanted and not gain a pound. Tiffany used to go to Wendy's daily and it never touched her. Can we say unfair!! Now I know they're human and they all have their own self image issues but I've always been the only one in my family who was ever fat. I weighed about 180 lbs. through high school and then once I had kids..I blew up. In pictures, I'm the fat one...on airplanes, I'm the one no one wants to sit next to...I can't even think about taking my kids on amusement park rides and on the beach or at the pool in the summer I'm always the one who wore t-shirts or wraps around my swim suits. I'M TIRED OF BEING THAT PERSON!!!

So this time...I mean freaking business. (In my head that f word was more vulgar but I'll try to keep this blog tame so I don't get yelled at haha!) I am ready to be skinny. I am ready to look like I belong in family pictures and I'm ready to play with my kids and not get worn out within 5 minutes. I'm ready to buy a whole new wardrobe of outfits that I LIKE! I'm ready to get a social life and stop hiding inside my house because then no one has to look at me or feel uncomfortable around me. I'm ready to shed this outter ickiness and find the Jill that's hiding inside just aching to get out. I want to thank my mother for trying this diet herself and helping me to get started on it myself. I feel very blessed to have parents and sisters who support and encourage me. I'm also grateful for my wonderful hubby (soon-to-be-again?) Nathan for putting up with years of dieting nonsense. I promise you, things are about to change.

So today...is the beginning of the end. I hope. Wish me luck!