Today was weigh-in #3, and I lost 3 lbs. but got no measurements as neither Jo-Ann or Jane were there. (As I understand it, Jo-Ann was at a conference and Jane told me last week she is changing jobs, to a managerial nurse position. Congrats to her.)
I was a bit disappointed by the loss being just three. I understood that after the first big loss, the pace would settle down some, but they tell me on average it's 3-5 lbs. per week for women, and my plan has been to be on the upper end, i.e. five per week. That would get me to my goal by Sept. 1.
But I also had been expecting it to be more because of how I now look. I have begun to love seeing myself in the mirror. My hair looks more luxuriant, I think because it frames my face more thickly since there is less face to make it fade to insignificance. My face looks younger, because it's harking back to years ago when I weighed less. My shoulders are more square. It's like watching myself grow more attractive. It's the most incredible thing. I also feel lighter, and that it is easier to move, and move fast, but I had already noticed that, the first week.
So are my eyes deceiving me? Is it all IP-style placebo effect? Measurements would tell, but that wasn't happening this week. The three-pound loss made me think I was cheating more than I knew at the trade show and caused me to make myself wrong in all sorts of ways. But at the same time I hadn't lost that much, I was noticeably more slender. How was that possible?
I was stymied, and telling myself nasty things about myself, until I remembered something that happened with Melissa in the beginning few weeks.
Her and Marv's coach is rather more technologically-advanced than mine. She has machines. All manner of gizmos, no doubt costing astronomical numbers of dollars, that measure all sorts of internal things, somehow. Including your muscle mass.
What happened with Melissa was: in the first week she lost both fat and muscle. But in the next week or two, she began to gain the muscle back, and in fact her muscle-mass began to exceed the baseline after that, due to the huge intake of protein.
Now if you know about dieting, or about how a fat person swims as opposed to a muscular person, you know that muscle weighs more than fat. Thus if you lose fat and gain muscle, you will lose weight, but more slowly, and you will gain svelte disproportionate to the small poundage you're shedding.
So I think that must be what happened to me this week. I can't think of any other explanation.
Another fantastic thing that has happened since I started the diet, and, I think, because of the diet, at least in part: every now and then I get hit with the most positive, happy, everything-is-going-wonderfully mood. I feel inspired, expansive, free, capable... amazing. I can't say I've never had this before, as I have in recent years, but now it is more intense and much, much more frequent. In fact this morning, or maybe it was yesterday, I was in a funk, thinking about how my Google Analytics are sucking and how I'll never get a readership and so on, when I whined via IM for a bit with a dear reader/friend, and suddenly I just flipped over into that incredible positive. It was like a switch. I've never felt anything like it in my life.
Again, not something I expected.
--
Thursday, April 26, 2012
Fly the IP skies (Day 15)
I am writing in the air, though of course I won’t be able to post until I’m back on the ground. I’m on my way to Vancouver for a trade show, this weekend.
But before I get to that, I’ll make up the gap a little bit. I recovered from the stomach flu fine, though it seemed like forever until I got there. Last Saturday (Day 8) I could stomach absolutely nothing but half a double chocolate protein bar. Jo-Ann told me that I should log “everything that went into my mouth” on my journal, so I naturally felt that should include everything that came back out, being a cheese and spice omelet and a peace mango drink, not necessarily in that order. (I know, TMI, I am a homeopath and so have a strong stomach.) Sunday I gradually began to gain my strength back, but still only managed a little lettuce and one protein package.
Monday morning… I have to make a confession. I cheated. I ate an avocado. I take full responsibility for that action. I make no excuses. Well, all right, I make one excuse: I’d hardly had anything to eat the entire weekend. Two excuses. It was going to go bad if I didn’t eat it.
With all that privation and only a small cheat, I figured that my weight would drop another substantial amount on my Thursday weigh-in, and actually feared that somewhat; it would mean I had lost muscle. There was no way I didn’t on the weekend, the only mercy being that I knew it was probably not very much as the almost-fast had been only two days. The most interesting thing is that Jane (who has been coaching me in Jo-Ann's absence) told me I didn't lose weight because I wasn't taking in enough water. Not taking in enough water influences how fast you lose? I had no idea.
Alas… or perhaps to my relief… my weight dropped only two pounds. A bit of a bubble-burst, but I could still say I dropped 14 in two weeks—a pound a day—which still sounds impressive. It also was a short week, six days.
The reason for that, of course, is that I couldn’t come for weigh-in on Friday because I’d be travelling. Leading to the whole thorny question of, how to manage the Ideal Protein diet while on a trip?
Jewel, the receptionist at Medi-Spa, when she found out I was going back on my first consult, actually suggested that I not start until after I came back. I brushed that off. “I’m going to go on other trips while I’m doing this,” I told her. “I have to learn to manage these things.”
So, I am in the air, and blessed with a very decent excuse to turn down anything that resembles airplane food, which, as all you flyers out there know, barely resembles food.
What I did was think out carefully where I’d be for each meal, and plan/purchase IP and other foods that would be possible. On the plane, for instance, I can do no preparation at all and couldn’t bring liquids either, so I’ve got several bars in my laptop case, which is my carry-on bag. At the hotel I am assuming there’s no microwave, so I will be able to do cold mixing only, with the shaker that I stuffed into my suitcase. For the dinners, I will negotiate with the waiter. “Two cups veggies and eight ounces of meat only.” I expect that is going to be tough, as I’ll have to look at the whole menu to find the IP-compliant stuff on it.
--
I was too busy during the weekend to blog more, sorry. Now back and into the regular routine. About travelling during IP Phase One, I have learned:
1) For lunch, it's really hard to find two cups of compliant cooked veggies as a dish on a restaurant menu. However there are lots of Greek salads. Practice saying it with me: "Hold the feta and the balsamic." Olive oil, of course, is cool as long as it's not too much.
2) Dinner is easier. "Hold the potatoes/rice/pasta." Or combine a salad and a meat appetizer. Because it was a coastal city I kept ordering seafood as my meat portion, and in a little Greek restaurant called Maria's I had a garlic kalamari dish that was to die for. I mean, it melted in your mouth, and the sauce was awesome.
3) You have to carry bottled water to keep track of how much.
4) Getting your daily salt is easy--you just carry it with--oil not so much.
5) In the whirlwind of travel, you'll lose track of all the pieces and forget things. It's a PITA, really. So it goes, compensate and go on.
I had one thing happen on the weekend that was very heartening... for the first time, I saw my weight loss. I was walking past the mirror in the hotel room when I noticed I was narrower front-to-back in the tummy. Then I went into the bathroom and looked at my face in the bathroom mirror, and saw it there, too. My eyes and cheekbones and mouth were just ever-so-slightly more prominent.
Instantly it all became worthwhile.
--
I was too busy during the weekend to blog more, sorry. Now back and into the regular routine. About travelling during IP Phase One, I have learned:
1) For lunch, it's really hard to find two cups of compliant cooked veggies as a dish on a restaurant menu. However there are lots of Greek salads. Practice saying it with me: "Hold the feta and the balsamic." Olive oil, of course, is cool as long as it's not too much.
2) Dinner is easier. "Hold the potatoes/rice/pasta." Or combine a salad and a meat appetizer. Because it was a coastal city I kept ordering seafood as my meat portion, and in a little Greek restaurant called Maria's I had a garlic kalamari dish that was to die for. I mean, it melted in your mouth, and the sauce was awesome.
3) You have to carry bottled water to keep track of how much.
4) Getting your daily salt is easy--you just carry it with--oil not so much.
5) In the whirlwind of travel, you'll lose track of all the pieces and forget things. It's a PITA, really. So it goes, compensate and go on.
I had one thing happen on the weekend that was very heartening... for the first time, I saw my weight loss. I was walking past the mirror in the hotel room when I noticed I was narrower front-to-back in the tummy. Then I went into the bathroom and looked at my face in the bathroom mirror, and saw it there, too. My eyes and cheekbones and mouth were just ever-so-slightly more prominent.
Instantly it all became worthwhile.
Sunday, April 15, 2012
Stomach flu (Day Eight)
Uuuuuuuuugggggghhhhh
Errrrrrrrrgggggghhhhhhh
Blecccccccchhhhhhhhhh
That about sums it up. Nuff said.
Errrrrrrrrgggggghhhhhhh
Blecccccccchhhhhhhhhh
That about sums it up. Nuff said.
Friday, April 13, 2012
Results (Day Seven)
Today was my first weigh-in.
But before we get to that... another keeper! This time using one of the IP protein-pack foods.
Karen's IP Plain Omelet with Mushrooms and Green Pepper
(All my recipes are for single servings, as you might have gathered; multiply them to serve more.)
1 packet Ideal Protein Plain Omelet
chopped white or brown mushrooms \
chopped green pepper / totalling 1/4 cup
1/2 tsp olive oil
1/2 tsp chopped fresh rosemary
1 tsp chopped garlic
sea salt & pepper to taste
Saute the mushrooms and green pepper in the oil till lightly cooked in a small frying pan. Add garlic and pepper and saute a little more, just enough to cook the garlic and activate the pepper. Mix IP omelet in your shaker as per the instructions, adding salt. If you can pull off an omelet, sprinkle the rosemary evenly around after you've poured the omelet mix into the pan and before folding over. If you just scramble, as I do, just throw in the rosemary and scramble.
This recipe would work with eggs as well. I switched from IP Cheese and Spice Omelet to Plain for two reasons: 1) that left me more free to spice it up my own way and 2) it's fewer grams of carbs, 3 as opposed to 7. What I find is that the plain one is so similar to real beaten egg that with seasonings, it's hard to tell the difference. Take a bow, Ideal Protein food designers.
I actually went to the weigh-in before I came up with this omelet, because I had to fast for the bloodwork, which I did on the same trip into town. The lab opens up nice and early, so I took advantage of that. The only hard part was being somewhat ditzy due to low blood sugar and lack of sleep. I floated into Medispa early and made my best attempt to grok their recipe books, memorizing recipes because their recipe books are expensive as everything else, as I waited. And then came... The Big Moment.
Baseline, remember, was 243 lbs.
Today the scale tipped at 231.
I was gobsmacked. I knew I felt a little lighter on my feet; I knew also that I was wearing a ring on a finger where it hadn't fit last week. I had tried not to have a figure in mind, to make a prediction, of how many pounds I'd shed... but I guess you can't help it. I had expected to lose five... maybe eight. I was afraid I'd fine it was all for nought and I'd lost hardly any, maybe two or three. Twelve, I did not expect.
I know a lot of it is the water weight that always sloughs off at the outset of any diet. I know that my tummy measurement did not change, though I lost an inch around the chest... though that sameness might be because my period is coming up, and I usually bloat somewhat, perhaps offsetting the loss. I know I know. I don't care. I am triumphant. It takes all the edge off the cravings, even though they were baddish again today, forcing me to wolf romaine lettuce.
I am ecstatic. I knew this thing worked. Now I really know, as only living something can make you know.
This was also the day we took my "before" picture. "After" one coming once I've attained my 100-lb. goal. So this isn't a true "before" pic, it's "before minus 12 lbs."... but at this weight it's not that much of a difference. I purposely got her to take it in front of the shelf of IP foods.
--
But before we get to that... another keeper! This time using one of the IP protein-pack foods.
Karen's IP Plain Omelet with Mushrooms and Green Pepper
(All my recipes are for single servings, as you might have gathered; multiply them to serve more.)
1 packet Ideal Protein Plain Omelet
chopped white or brown mushrooms \
chopped green pepper / totalling 1/4 cup
1/2 tsp olive oil
1/2 tsp chopped fresh rosemary
1 tsp chopped garlic
sea salt & pepper to taste
Saute the mushrooms and green pepper in the oil till lightly cooked in a small frying pan. Add garlic and pepper and saute a little more, just enough to cook the garlic and activate the pepper. Mix IP omelet in your shaker as per the instructions, adding salt. If you can pull off an omelet, sprinkle the rosemary evenly around after you've poured the omelet mix into the pan and before folding over. If you just scramble, as I do, just throw in the rosemary and scramble.
This recipe would work with eggs as well. I switched from IP Cheese and Spice Omelet to Plain for two reasons: 1) that left me more free to spice it up my own way and 2) it's fewer grams of carbs, 3 as opposed to 7. What I find is that the plain one is so similar to real beaten egg that with seasonings, it's hard to tell the difference. Take a bow, Ideal Protein food designers.
I actually went to the weigh-in before I came up with this omelet, because I had to fast for the bloodwork, which I did on the same trip into town. The lab opens up nice and early, so I took advantage of that. The only hard part was being somewhat ditzy due to low blood sugar and lack of sleep. I floated into Medispa early and made my best attempt to grok their recipe books, memorizing recipes because their recipe books are expensive as everything else, as I waited. And then came... The Big Moment.
Baseline, remember, was 243 lbs.
Today the scale tipped at 231.
I was gobsmacked. I knew I felt a little lighter on my feet; I knew also that I was wearing a ring on a finger where it hadn't fit last week. I had tried not to have a figure in mind, to make a prediction, of how many pounds I'd shed... but I guess you can't help it. I had expected to lose five... maybe eight. I was afraid I'd fine it was all for nought and I'd lost hardly any, maybe two or three. Twelve, I did not expect.
I know a lot of it is the water weight that always sloughs off at the outset of any diet. I know that my tummy measurement did not change, though I lost an inch around the chest... though that sameness might be because my period is coming up, and I usually bloat somewhat, perhaps offsetting the loss. I know I know. I don't care. I am triumphant. It takes all the edge off the cravings, even though they were baddish again today, forcing me to wolf romaine lettuce.
I am ecstatic. I knew this thing worked. Now I really know, as only living something can make you know.
This was also the day we took my "before" picture. "After" one coming once I've attained my 100-lb. goal. So this isn't a true "before" pic, it's "before minus 12 lbs."... but at this weight it's not that much of a difference. I purposely got her to take it in front of the shelf of IP foods.
 |
| April 13, 2012 - down 12 lbs. |
--
Let's get serious (Day Six)
I guess I couldn't post this yesterday. I got through Days 3-5 okay, but Day 6, it was as if my body was saying to me, "Okay... this has been a nice little departure... can we get back to normal now? Let's get serious... I WANT SOME BREAD."
Maybe I am a carb addict after all.
The worst times are from about two hours after breakfast until lunch, and about two hours after lunch until dinner. It comes up fast; one moment I'm fine, the next I have a thought of eating, and there it is. Previous to Day Six it was momentary and I could dispel it with a cup of tea or another spate of work. Yesterday it didn't go away, and it became a matter of toughing it out, focussing on work so as not to think about food, then eating the subsequent meal desperately.
I really hope this goes away. I don't want to get into that whole cycle of fear and desperation that I have before with other diets. I guess I have to nip it in the bud mentally with some effective self-talk, if it does.
I know something that will help: RESULTS. I have been feeling a little lighter on my feet... or at least I have been imagining I do. Not sure whether it's real, or wishful feeling. Today is the first weigh-in, so we'll see.
--
Maybe I am a carb addict after all.
The worst times are from about two hours after breakfast until lunch, and about two hours after lunch until dinner. It comes up fast; one moment I'm fine, the next I have a thought of eating, and there it is. Previous to Day Six it was momentary and I could dispel it with a cup of tea or another spate of work. Yesterday it didn't go away, and it became a matter of toughing it out, focussing on work so as not to think about food, then eating the subsequent meal desperately.
I really hope this goes away. I don't want to get into that whole cycle of fear and desperation that I have before with other diets. I guess I have to nip it in the bud mentally with some effective self-talk, if it does.
I know something that will help: RESULTS. I have been feeling a little lighter on my feet... or at least I have been imagining I do. Not sure whether it's real, or wishful feeling. Today is the first weigh-in, so we'll see.
--
Wednesday, April 11, 2012
The nature of the addiction (Day Five)
"9. Realize that you are addicted and once you quit ... You will hurt!"
That was the final point on a page sent to me by Melissa and Marv's Ideal Protein coach, on how to use visioning to succeed on the diet.
I liked the visioning part. I do have a vision, made up of a combination of how Melissa looks now, how I look in old photographs and how I remember feeling when I weighed less. I don't need to bring it to mind often, or put an image representing it up on my fridge, or repeat words expressing my commitment to it every day. It's just there, real and compelling.
I didn't like that last point. My life has had much too much of the negative in it. I am all too good at accepting the negative; the last thing I need is more training in that. I need training in accepting the positive.
Turns out it's wrong anyway, at least if it's true that Days 3-5 are the worst. Discomfort this is, yes. But it's not pain as I measure it. Not even compared to previous diets. I do not have any constant gnawing hunger distracting me from my work or other thoughts, as I've had previously. I get cravings, but it seems easy to dispel them either by taking a swig of tea or thinking about something else, or both. In fact, really, they go away of themselves. I've never felt like I had to really struggle to dispel or ignore one.
A change in emotional state? Maybe. Food and emotion are very bound up for me. There are some foods that are deeply comforting; I am sensitive to taste as a rule; I've always counted eating delicious things as one of the chief pleasures of life, and I have turned to that pleasure often when nervous. But then the last attempt was only three and some years ago, and I had made a lot of improvements in emotional state by then, so I don't think that's it. I think it's exactly what Dr. Tran says it is: insulin dysfunction being regulated.
And something else, which I think I'm putting together after creating two keeper recipes and having the same mood afterwards both times--a general sense of goodness and contentment, a strong feeling of "all is well."
When I tried the Carbohydrate Addict's Diet, I was sure I was addicted to carbs. When Shirley said to me sharply once, "If you're addicted to anything, it's fats," I thought that might be true. When I have felt the need for that one little zap of chocolate late at night, I have wondered if I am addicted to chocolate. When I gulp one cup of tea after another, it's natural to think I'm addicted to tea... though there's no difference in the inclination whether it's caf or decaf.
But I don't feel carb cravings other than the ones from habit, 'I should be having bread/toast now'. I don't feel fat cravings except for particular, habitual fats. Others seem to think these things will oppress me, and I feared it somewhat myself; but they don't. And I'm not at the stage yet where the hunger is supposed to go away.
I think I get it: I am addicted to flavour. And texture. The sheer sensory pleasure of deliciousness. It's that I take emotional comfort from.
It explains it all: the way the addiction seemed variable or all-encompassing while I was eating what I wanted, the lack of severe cravings while dieting, the reason I am so desperately motivated to be creative with the diet... the feeling of contentment after I hit on a keeper recipe.
Oh and previous failures. You know what happens when you cut down the amount of food you eat? Everything tastes better and more intense. So you want to eat more of it! I struggled with that every time.
What is beautiful about this is: I don't have to give up this addiction to do the Ideal Protein diet. I just have to satisfy it within its restrictions. And the restrictions are very light when it comes to the tools of the craft of flavour: seasonings. Nor does an IP meal ever leave me feeling like it wasn't enough, which every meal did on past diets (except the Reward Meal in the CA diet).
Woo hoo! Off to allrecipes.com!
Ingredients
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/8 teaspoon paprika
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
1/8 teaspoon onion powder
1/4 teaspoon dried thyme
1/4 teaspoon dried parsley
4 boneless, skinless chicken breast halves
2 tablespoons butter
1 tablespoon1/2 tsp olive oil
2 teaspoons garlic powder
3 tablespoons lime juice
Easy peasy!
§
P.S. : MmmmmmmmmSMACK! Keeper!
--
Quest for flavour (Day Five)
I got hit with something of the nasties last night. My sons are home now... no longer may I eat IP in blessed isolation. They're home and they're eating bread and cereals and cookies and chocolate and all kinds of other things I like.
Last night it was burritos. I love burritos. All the ingredients were laid out as usual... the tortillas, the meat, the tomatoes, the grated cheese, the sour cream, the avocadoes, the salsa. They've been on a Mexican food kick for a few months, and I joined them in it, so I can imagine very vividly what all those things taste like. It was really hard to walk by without nibbling a pinch of cheese or a spoonful of avocado. I did it though.
"Stay away!" Jo-Ann told me firmly when I recounted this to her on the phone.
"I did!" I answered. "I'm just whining!"
"Whining is allowed," she reassured me. Good, because I imagine a fair amount of this blog is and will be exactly that. Karen's IP whine-and-dine blog.
Today's lunch was 50/50. The banana pudding, thumbs down... even with copious cinnamon and nutmeg added. I like sweetness at lunch but not quite that much and the texture is meh. Never was a big pudding fan.
However... another keeper! Would rosemary and sesame oil work together on delicate veggies, I wondered... only one way to find out.
Karen's IP-Compliant Rosemary Triple Veggies
Zucchini \
Eggplant |--- in whatever proportions you like to total 2 cups chopped
Cauliflower /
1/4 tsp olive oil
1/8 tsp sesame oil
1 tsp chopped garlic
2 tsp dried rosemary (though I think fresh would work better)
sea salt and fresh-ground black pepper to taste
Saute the veggies in the oil, searing, then add the seasonings and a little water to simmer down the cauliflower. (Or start it first). Serve when all is tender. I think this would be good with mushrooms, too.
Somewhere in my cupboards, long buried and forgotten... lies the Moosewood Cookbook. I might well hit that for further inspiration.
--
Last night it was burritos. I love burritos. All the ingredients were laid out as usual... the tortillas, the meat, the tomatoes, the grated cheese, the sour cream, the avocadoes, the salsa. They've been on a Mexican food kick for a few months, and I joined them in it, so I can imagine very vividly what all those things taste like. It was really hard to walk by without nibbling a pinch of cheese or a spoonful of avocado. I did it though.
"Stay away!" Jo-Ann told me firmly when I recounted this to her on the phone.
"I did!" I answered. "I'm just whining!"
"Whining is allowed," she reassured me. Good, because I imagine a fair amount of this blog is and will be exactly that. Karen's IP whine-and-dine blog.
Today's lunch was 50/50. The banana pudding, thumbs down... even with copious cinnamon and nutmeg added. I like sweetness at lunch but not quite that much and the texture is meh. Never was a big pudding fan.
However... another keeper! Would rosemary and sesame oil work together on delicate veggies, I wondered... only one way to find out.
Karen's IP-Compliant Rosemary Triple Veggies
Zucchini \
Eggplant |--- in whatever proportions you like to total 2 cups chopped
Cauliflower /
1/4 tsp olive oil
1/8 tsp sesame oil
1 tsp chopped garlic
2 tsp dried rosemary (though I think fresh would work better)
sea salt and fresh-ground black pepper to taste
Saute the veggies in the oil, searing, then add the seasonings and a little water to simmer down the cauliflower. (Or start it first). Serve when all is tender. I think this would be good with mushrooms, too.
Somewhere in my cupboards, long buried and forgotten... lies the Moosewood Cookbook. I might well hit that for further inspiration.
--
Tuesday, April 10, 2012
Not hungry...!? (Day Four)
Day 3-5 are supposed to be the worst part of the IP diet. I got that warning from Melissa and Jo-Ann both. But so far it's not any worse than Day 1 or 2. In fact this morning was weird.
I woke up at about 3:50 this a.m., with a sick son. I didn’t have the urge to consume anything except about 40% of my required daily water (I usually go over) then went back to bed until 7:17 or so, which is when I usually get up to make sure both sons get on the bus. The younger one I knew wouldn't be, but turned out the older one also is sick. So I phoned their respective schools, went back to bed and woke up again at 9 or so, and here’s the weird part… I wasn’t hungry.
Not at all, no bacon craving, no toast craving, nothing. I wasn’t averse to food, knowing I had to eat (IP requires breakfast)… I just felt like I could take it or leave it. This is not like me at all. I'm usually very eager for food by 8:30 at the latest. I made a bunch of work-related calls, then had my omelet at about 10:30. And I didn't find myself wolfing it like I usually do.
I woke up at about 3:50 this a.m., with a sick son. I didn’t have the urge to consume anything except about 40% of my required daily water (I usually go over) then went back to bed until 7:17 or so, which is when I usually get up to make sure both sons get on the bus. The younger one I knew wouldn't be, but turned out the older one also is sick. So I phoned their respective schools, went back to bed and woke up again at 9 or so, and here’s the weird part… I wasn’t hungry.
Not at all, no bacon craving, no toast craving, nothing. I wasn’t averse to food, knowing I had to eat (IP requires breakfast)… I just felt like I could take it or leave it. This is not like me at all. I'm usually very eager for food by 8:30 at the latest. I made a bunch of work-related calls, then had my omelet at about 10:30. And I didn't find myself wolfing it like I usually do.
This is the opposite of what I expected on Day 4. I thought I’d be a ravening, drooling bundle of carb cravings, fat yearnings and sweet lustings. (I do get cravings for the usual things at the usual times–the toast, the sandwiches–but they are momentary and I seem to be able to will them away. And I got them from the start.) I wonder if my liking for water and tea is standing me in good stead? The first thing I’ll do when I get carb craving is grab a cup of tea, then virtuously check off another water box in my journal–that seems to work. I think the feeling of virtuousness is crucial.
The only thing I’m having trouble with is making sure I get my full RDI of the sea salt (half a teaspoon, which doesn't sound like a lot, does it?) I realize that traditionally I use shaker salt very rarely; I was obviously getting some in the bacon and the luncheon meat, and then for dinner we’d do up a marinade or glaze, but usually use soy sauce. And I'd slather salted butter on my veggies, which of course I'm not doing now. Going through that half teaspoon a day without making things too salty, I'm finding tricky; I actually didn't eat the whole amount yesterday and now I'm trying to figure out how to catch up today. Not a problem I expected to have.
--
Sunday, April 8, 2012
First IP recipe (Day Two)
Today's goal: not think about food all the time, not spend a lot of time thinking about or doing diet-related stuff. Eating is normally just part of my daily routine, and I want it to become that again.
It's actually going better than it did yesterday. Part of it is that I have a day's more experience at IP food prep and eating, so it's starting to become more automatic. While I ate my breakfast omelet, I actually was reading newspapers on the internet, which is what I usually do while eating breakfast, but I certainly didn't do yesterday.
(TMI warning) First physiological sign of change from the diet: my poop this morning had a distinctly green tinge. The carb-loaded life I've lived until now has not been cleaned out of my whole body yet, but it has been purged from my digestive tract.
Turkey with Asparagus and Mushrooms
I am something of an epicurean. (This kind of thinking about food, I like.) Since my teen years I've been experimenting with cooking, trying different recipes and techniques, always in search of my favourite flavour: the one I have never tasted before. I haven't had the dedication that some people have, but it is an interest. Weight-wise, I can be my own worst enemy.
However, the days of merely casual dedication are over. The IP diet means a lot of food preparation, and I have taken it as a challenge to find ways to satisfy my easily-bored palate within the IP parameters. I'm going to be inventing recipes every day, until I have a sufficient selection of keepers to start repeating them.
With fats and carbs gone, many traditional ways of flavouring are out of the question. For instance, you cannot cook shrimp in butter, or sprinkle parmesan cheese over veggies, or marinate your daily portion of lean meat in wine, or use cooked onions (except green onions, which just don't do it), or make rich gravies. Blessedly, however, a great many seasonings are permitted. I just about fell over with relief when I learned that garlic is allowed, not to mention pepper. All herbs and spices are permitted. Hot peppers and ginger, too. You can throw in a dash of lemon juice or zest. (Limes, I have to ask Jo-Ann about; they're not on the list but Melissa and Marv use them.) Sweetening is permitted with sucralose, aka Splenda, the "left-handed sugar."
So as I go, I am basically creating at least one new concoction, and sometimes three, per day. I plan to write up the keepers as I usually do and sock them in my recipe folder.
I figured it would take at least a week or two to come up with the first keeper, but I hit it today... a meal that I enjoyed every bit as much as I would have if it had had That Other Stuff in it. (Of course, as they say, hunger is the best sauce and I'm definitely feeling a little hungry, so I may be biased. It also helps that I love turkey, asparagus and mushrooms.)
Without further ado:
Karen's IP-Compliant Turkey with Asparagus and Mushrooms
8 oz. turkey thigh (or breast if you prefer - I'm a dark meat person)
1 cup chopped asparagus
1 cup chopped mushrooms (I think any type would do)
1/4 tsp sea salt (that's half my daily allowance)
3/4 tbsp poultry seasoning
1 tsp paprika
2 tsp chopped garlic
1 tsp olive oil (half my daily allowance)
1/4 to 1/2 water or chicken broth (judge as you go)
(Hey... I didn't put any pepper in it! Could have, that would have worked. I think a squirt of lemon might have given it a little zing too. Experiments for next time.)
Remove skin from turkey cut if it has some. (Required under IP guidelines.) Whack off any fat too and give it to your dog. Combine sea salt, poultry seasoning and paprika into a dry rub and coat turkey with it. Oil a frying pan, brown turkey on both sides at medium-high heat. Add water and chopped garlic, mixing the garlic into the water, cover, lower heat and simmer until turkey is done. Add asparagus and mushrooms, and a little more water if necessary, cook until asparagus are that perfect intense green, and serve. Serves one; double, triple or multiply by 10 for IP dinner parties!
This dish goes perfectly with a nice delicate white wine. No! That was but a pleasant fantasy. IP requires you to be a complete teetotaler at least for Phase One.
--
It's actually going better than it did yesterday. Part of it is that I have a day's more experience at IP food prep and eating, so it's starting to become more automatic. While I ate my breakfast omelet, I actually was reading newspapers on the internet, which is what I usually do while eating breakfast, but I certainly didn't do yesterday.
(TMI warning) First physiological sign of change from the diet: my poop this morning had a distinctly green tinge. The carb-loaded life I've lived until now has not been cleaned out of my whole body yet, but it has been purged from my digestive tract.
§
Turkey with Asparagus and Mushrooms
I am something of an epicurean. (This kind of thinking about food, I like.) Since my teen years I've been experimenting with cooking, trying different recipes and techniques, always in search of my favourite flavour: the one I have never tasted before. I haven't had the dedication that some people have, but it is an interest. Weight-wise, I can be my own worst enemy.
However, the days of merely casual dedication are over. The IP diet means a lot of food preparation, and I have taken it as a challenge to find ways to satisfy my easily-bored palate within the IP parameters. I'm going to be inventing recipes every day, until I have a sufficient selection of keepers to start repeating them.
With fats and carbs gone, many traditional ways of flavouring are out of the question. For instance, you cannot cook shrimp in butter, or sprinkle parmesan cheese over veggies, or marinate your daily portion of lean meat in wine, or use cooked onions (except green onions, which just don't do it), or make rich gravies. Blessedly, however, a great many seasonings are permitted. I just about fell over with relief when I learned that garlic is allowed, not to mention pepper. All herbs and spices are permitted. Hot peppers and ginger, too. You can throw in a dash of lemon juice or zest. (Limes, I have to ask Jo-Ann about; they're not on the list but Melissa and Marv use them.) Sweetening is permitted with sucralose, aka Splenda, the "left-handed sugar."
So as I go, I am basically creating at least one new concoction, and sometimes three, per day. I plan to write up the keepers as I usually do and sock them in my recipe folder.
I figured it would take at least a week or two to come up with the first keeper, but I hit it today... a meal that I enjoyed every bit as much as I would have if it had had That Other Stuff in it. (Of course, as they say, hunger is the best sauce and I'm definitely feeling a little hungry, so I may be biased. It also helps that I love turkey, asparagus and mushrooms.)
Without further ado:
Karen's IP-Compliant Turkey with Asparagus and Mushrooms
8 oz. turkey thigh (or breast if you prefer - I'm a dark meat person)
1 cup chopped asparagus
1 cup chopped mushrooms (I think any type would do)
1/4 tsp sea salt (that's half my daily allowance)
3/4 tbsp poultry seasoning
1 tsp paprika
2 tsp chopped garlic
1 tsp olive oil (half my daily allowance)
1/4 to 1/2 water or chicken broth (judge as you go)
(Hey... I didn't put any pepper in it! Could have, that would have worked. I think a squirt of lemon might have given it a little zing too. Experiments for next time.)
Remove skin from turkey cut if it has some. (Required under IP guidelines.) Whack off any fat too and give it to your dog. Combine sea salt, poultry seasoning and paprika into a dry rub and coat turkey with it. Oil a frying pan, brown turkey on both sides at medium-high heat. Add water and chopped garlic, mixing the garlic into the water, cover, lower heat and simmer until turkey is done. Add asparagus and mushrooms, and a little more water if necessary, cook until asparagus are that perfect intense green, and serve. Serves one; double, triple or multiply by 10 for IP dinner parties!
This dish goes perfectly with a nice delicate white wine. No! That was but a pleasant fantasy. IP requires you to be a complete teetotaler at least for Phase One.
--
Saturday, April 7, 2012
Obsessing (Day One)
My start date is totally up to me, Jo-Ann tells me. I am thinking sometime after I get home on the weekend of April 7, so I don't have to deal with trying to do the diet at someone else's place (thought Melissa and Marv's place is perfect: they understand totally and are well-stocked with IP foods). As I'm paying, I mention that I am flying to a trade show in Vancouver in a couple of weeks, so the receptionist suggests that maybe I should start after that. I tell her, "No... I'm going to have to learn to manage these things anyway." I don't want to wait that long.
I set it in stone in my mind: Saturday, April 7. I'll be at home, in my own kitchen, with my sons absent (they're spending Easter weekend with the ex), during the time I will be orienting myself. The stores will be open, so I can get my veggies and salads, etc. And the dreaded Day 3--apparently the worst time is Days 3-5--will be a holiday.
I wake up at 5 a.m. I am thinking already about eating, though I am not hungry (I never am that early). I am thirsty, however. I drink three glasses of water, marking them all down dutifully on my journal. That's 30% of my RDI of water already.
I obsess. I cannot stop thinking about the diet. I do some work, writing and emails and so forth, as the sun comes up. I drink tea--no soy milk. I've had half my RDI of water by 8 a.m. "I'm acing this!" I tell myself.
Breakfast is an IP omelet--cheese & herb flavour. I realize afterwards I have made a mistake and should have got plain omelet. The taste is okay, but not outstanding; I know I could do better--Italian seasoning and soy sauce... curry... paprika-turmeric--and also by spicing it myself I could get more variety. The one I had at Melissa and Marv's, they chopped green pepper and mushrooms into, which apparently I'm not allowed. But after I add a goodly wad of pureed garlic and quite a lot of pepper, this is reasonably good, in fact has a nice burn on it. It, and two supplements, are breakfast. That's all.
My heart cries out for toast. "Toast, toast!" it cries. "It's morning, there's supposed to be toast!" I easily exercise my will. As I told Jo-Ann, when I want something I can be very disciplined. That's how I got the black belt and it's how I wrote 1.2 million words in three years (about 400,000 of them were already written and I just adapted them.) I'm done by 8; by 9:45 I am hungry again. I exercise my will. By 11 the hunger is gone, but by 11:30 I feel weird... a little low blood-sugar.
All morning, however, I have been thinking about the diet and food, rather than the writing projects I had planned for today. I had to blog about it to get it out of my system, and have been doing that all morning. I hope it works. Lunch--two cups of broccoli, brought to a burn with pepper and Greek spice that Melissa gave me, saying it's much of what got her and Marv through the diet, and an IP pina colada protein drink, which is delicious--hits my mouth at 12 noon almost exactly. I have oversalted the broccoli with the compulsory sea salt, however. 1/2 tsp is required over the course of the day, and I should have saved more of it for dinner, when I will have actual meat.
When I get up to get something... I feel oddly full, for such a small meal. Melissa told me that a meal of pure veggies fills you up, but you don't quite believe something like that completely until you try it. The pina colada seems rich enough that I sip it slowly, using it as my required oral stimulation rather than tea.
"Well," my body thinks, "that was a nice start to lunch, I'm going to have a sandwich." I exercise my will. I wish I had lettuce, because I am allowed unlimited amounts of that. I didn't think I'd get the nap urge, but I do, and have a feeling it's my body wanting to pass the time. When's dinner...?
Dinner is about 7, after I've done a little work, had a lengthy, apparently-needed, afternoon nap, and done my first IP grocery shopping trip. I loaded up my cart with IP-approved veggies, including three heads of romaine lettuce, because for lunch and dinner I can have "unlimited" lettuce. Lucky for me, the only food you can have as much of as you want on this diet is one I love. I figure I will become a rabbit, munching lettuce every time I get a hunger pang.
Dinner involves no IP foods--just max 8 oz. of meat or seafood and two cups max. veggies. A question I must ask Jo-Ann: is that two cups before you cook it, or after? That makes a huge difference, especially with ones like spinach and swiss chard. I put together a broccoli, mushroom and green onion stir-fry, adding garlic, sea salt, pepper and Greek spice, and slice up some of my leftover smoked turkey, my former sandwich staple. I have to get rid of it. With sea salt on top of the salt already in it, it's too salty. But I am thinking that it, or another meat, would be just delightful with a big daub of Walden Farms' "jam" - a zero-fat, zero-carbs, zero-calorie product that is sweet, but not too sweet, and has a nice tang. This might be the centrepiece of my first IP recipe.
I feel quite full when I'm done, but my tongue itches once more for carbs. I nibble lettuce and tell myself that in a week or two that craving will be gone.
I have been noticing that I've been energetic today, but I suspect it's adrenaline.
[Random thought of the day: I can't drop what I'm snacking on any more. The dog won't snork it up.]
Night-time snack: two Cal-Mag horse-pills and one Peanut Butter Crunch bar. I told Jo-Ann I love peanut butter, and I also like a little shot of sweetness sometime after dinner plus a late-night snack that has some crunch. This bar provides all three. It's delicious. The only way it could be better is if it had chocolate. They have those too, but Jo-Ann didn't slam-dunk one of them into my bag, and it would put my IP food carb gram total on the day to 26 anyway, which is 1 gram too many.
Like I said, I can be very disciplined.
--
I set it in stone in my mind: Saturday, April 7. I'll be at home, in my own kitchen, with my sons absent (they're spending Easter weekend with the ex), during the time I will be orienting myself. The stores will be open, so I can get my veggies and salads, etc. And the dreaded Day 3--apparently the worst time is Days 3-5--will be a holiday.
I wake up at 5 a.m. I am thinking already about eating, though I am not hungry (I never am that early). I am thirsty, however. I drink three glasses of water, marking them all down dutifully on my journal. That's 30% of my RDI of water already.
I obsess. I cannot stop thinking about the diet. I do some work, writing and emails and so forth, as the sun comes up. I drink tea--no soy milk. I've had half my RDI of water by 8 a.m. "I'm acing this!" I tell myself.
Breakfast is an IP omelet--cheese & herb flavour. I realize afterwards I have made a mistake and should have got plain omelet. The taste is okay, but not outstanding; I know I could do better--Italian seasoning and soy sauce... curry... paprika-turmeric--and also by spicing it myself I could get more variety. The one I had at Melissa and Marv's, they chopped green pepper and mushrooms into, which apparently I'm not allowed. But after I add a goodly wad of pureed garlic and quite a lot of pepper, this is reasonably good, in fact has a nice burn on it. It, and two supplements, are breakfast. That's all.
My heart cries out for toast. "Toast, toast!" it cries. "It's morning, there's supposed to be toast!" I easily exercise my will. As I told Jo-Ann, when I want something I can be very disciplined. That's how I got the black belt and it's how I wrote 1.2 million words in three years (about 400,000 of them were already written and I just adapted them.) I'm done by 8; by 9:45 I am hungry again. I exercise my will. By 11 the hunger is gone, but by 11:30 I feel weird... a little low blood-sugar.
All morning, however, I have been thinking about the diet and food, rather than the writing projects I had planned for today. I had to blog about it to get it out of my system, and have been doing that all morning. I hope it works. Lunch--two cups of broccoli, brought to a burn with pepper and Greek spice that Melissa gave me, saying it's much of what got her and Marv through the diet, and an IP pina colada protein drink, which is delicious--hits my mouth at 12 noon almost exactly. I have oversalted the broccoli with the compulsory sea salt, however. 1/2 tsp is required over the course of the day, and I should have saved more of it for dinner, when I will have actual meat.
When I get up to get something... I feel oddly full, for such a small meal. Melissa told me that a meal of pure veggies fills you up, but you don't quite believe something like that completely until you try it. The pina colada seems rich enough that I sip it slowly, using it as my required oral stimulation rather than tea.
"Well," my body thinks, "that was a nice start to lunch, I'm going to have a sandwich." I exercise my will. I wish I had lettuce, because I am allowed unlimited amounts of that. I didn't think I'd get the nap urge, but I do, and have a feeling it's my body wanting to pass the time. When's dinner...?
§
Dinner is about 7, after I've done a little work, had a lengthy, apparently-needed, afternoon nap, and done my first IP grocery shopping trip. I loaded up my cart with IP-approved veggies, including three heads of romaine lettuce, because for lunch and dinner I can have "unlimited" lettuce. Lucky for me, the only food you can have as much of as you want on this diet is one I love. I figure I will become a rabbit, munching lettuce every time I get a hunger pang.
Dinner involves no IP foods--just max 8 oz. of meat or seafood and two cups max. veggies. A question I must ask Jo-Ann: is that two cups before you cook it, or after? That makes a huge difference, especially with ones like spinach and swiss chard. I put together a broccoli, mushroom and green onion stir-fry, adding garlic, sea salt, pepper and Greek spice, and slice up some of my leftover smoked turkey, my former sandwich staple. I have to get rid of it. With sea salt on top of the salt already in it, it's too salty. But I am thinking that it, or another meat, would be just delightful with a big daub of Walden Farms' "jam" - a zero-fat, zero-carbs, zero-calorie product that is sweet, but not too sweet, and has a nice tang. This might be the centrepiece of my first IP recipe.
I feel quite full when I'm done, but my tongue itches once more for carbs. I nibble lettuce and tell myself that in a week or two that craving will be gone.
I have been noticing that I've been energetic today, but I suspect it's adrenaline.
[Random thought of the day: I can't drop what I'm snacking on any more. The dog won't snork it up.]
Night-time snack: two Cal-Mag horse-pills and one Peanut Butter Crunch bar. I told Jo-Ann I love peanut butter, and I also like a little shot of sweetness sometime after dinner plus a late-night snack that has some crunch. This bar provides all three. It's delicious. The only way it could be better is if it had chocolate. They have those too, but Jo-Ann didn't slam-dunk one of them into my bag, and it would put my IP food carb gram total on the day to 26 anyway, which is 1 gram too many.
Like I said, I can be very disciplined.
--
A hundred pounds of freedom (first weigh-in)
Muskoka Medispa is in a brick office block on Huntsville's Main Street. There's a small Ideal Protein sign on the door. My first visit there is to pick up a form I have to fill out. I'm enveloped in an immediate atmosphere of positivity. Everyone in the office has done the program, a curvacious, dark-haired aesthetician tells me. (They also do various other cosmetic things.)
I return home and complete the form, which asks me whether I have a number of conditions including diabetes, kidney, heart or thyroid disease (no across the board, blessedly), when my last period was, what I tend to eat on a typical day, and what I weigh. That's not so easy to answer, as I have not stepped on the scale in literally years. I haul it out, find some of the bars on its digital display are missing, so that I can't tell whether I weigh 233 lbs., or 223. (The difference seems hugely important, somehow.)
It also asks how important the diet is to me, on a scale of 1 to 10. I mark 9, figuring that 10 is only for things that are ultimately important to me--my writing, my sons, life-and-death things.
Returning for my appointment, I am ushered into an elegant, dimly-lit waiting room, handed a folder full of information and told my coach will be busy for a few. What's in the folder very much matches what I've already learned from Melissa. Basically, for the first phase of the diet, you cut carbs massively so as to lose fat, but eat a lot of low-fat/low-carb protein to retain muscle--and in the process re-program your pancreas.
Quoting Dr. Tran Tien Chanh, who originated the program: "The cause of most weight issues in a modern society is insulin dysfunction. A diet grossly disproportionate in its share of saturated fats and sugars, such as in breads, cereals, muffins, cakes, pastries, pasta, pizza, rice, corn--very much like the North American diet--causes the pancreas to produce an overabundance of insulin, which stays in the system and puts the blood sugar level in a negative balance."
This over-production leads to low blood sugar, which produces sugar cravings and weight gain. But insulin is not only the sugar-regulating hormone. I quote further: "It is also the hormone that facilitates the transport of fat into the fat cells. Even worse, it locks the fat in the fat cell, preventing it from being used as a source of energy." In other words, you get trapped in a vicious circle that spirals your weight upwards.
From this, I understand how the diet works. But there is another blessing in it for me too. I can let go the idea that I had got to the weight I had by piggishness, laziness, selfishness or lack of will-power, and even less condemnatory reasons such as low self-esteem, insecurity or stress. I was simply raised to eat like a typical North American. My diet as an adult is essentially no different from my diet as a child: carbs for breakfast in the form of toast or porridge or pancakes, carbs for lunch in the form of sandwiches and fruit, and carbs for dinner as the rice or potato or corn that came with the meat and veg. It's just that, unlike some people, I didn't have the metabolism to not fall into the vicious circle. Comfort eating I could have done with lettuce.
They say a diet makes you feel better about yourself. This one's making me feel better about myself already, and I'm not even on it.
Jo-Ann, my coach, comes in and greets me after I've waited 20 minutes. She is whipcord slender with long copper-brown hair in enhanced waves, dark eyes and a cheerily professional manner. I tell her that I must go by 3:15 so as to be home before my sons are. She says, "No problem, I'll get you out of here by three."
Thus she must go through all the information at lightning speed. First thing she does is crosses out my "9" and replaces it with a "10". "What do you do with people who mark, say, 2 or 3?" I ask her, though I can't imagine it happens that often (why would they bother even filling out the form?) "Tell them they're not qualified for the program," she says. "They don't have to pay the consultation fee again. I tell them to come back when they're ready."
Jo-Ann whips down through my form, happy to see that I don't have the aforementioned conditions, and also that I drink 10-12 glasses of water a day (mostly in the form of mostly-decaf tea, gulped compulsively as I write). When she looks at my typical eating day, she does a graph, her artist's impression of my insulin level. "You're getting it up high in the morning, keeping it high all day and only letting it come down at night," she tells me. I will have to get some bloodwork done, she tells me, filling out and handing me a requisition form.
There is a weirdness or two. She personalizes insulin, talking about "him" creeping back up on you, "him" causing trouble, and so on. Also, when I look at the list of permitted meats and see lamb, which I love, is not on it, I ask her if it's allowed anyway, and she insists that veal is lamb, rather than the meat of young calves, as I am reasonably certain it is, and thus my question doesn't get answered. (Jo-Ann, if you're reading this, see here.) But these are trifling matters, nothing to throw me off.
After more rapid-fire education on how the diet works and how to work it, including Jo-Ann's own recipes for soups and other dishes, comes the most horrific moment: stepping on the weigh-scale. It shows 243. My home scale was flattering me, apparently worried that I might decide to go after it with a hammer in revenge. She also measures me around the chest, waist and hips, but doesn't tell me what those measurements are. Just as well; I don't want to know.
Then she asks me what my weight-loss goal is. "A hundred pounds," I tell her. I was originally thinking 80 or 90, but that was when I thought my scale was accurate.
"Whoa," she says. "Maybe we just want to make it getting you down to 200 first?"
"We'll get me down to 200, and then I'll just keep going," I said. "It's a hundred." I like big goals. I always have. They inspire me more than little ones. She accordingly marks it on my form.
At about three we head into Medispa's Ideal Protein pantry. Between her knowledge and my likes and dislikes, we pick out seven days' worth of supplies for me and slam-dunk them into an Ideal Protein shopping bag. Having told her I like a late-night snack with crunch, I gratefully receive a bag of IP cheesies and a bag of IP BBQ chips... not what I would consider typical diet foods. Liking eggs in the morning as a rule, I ask her to make it seven IP omelets, which she does. I also decide to try some soups and puddings and fruit drink mixes. From the supplement shelf she adds four bottles; you have to take them to replace the micronutrients you aren't going to get from the foods that are forbidden.
At 3:15, I am at Medispa's cash register. I get handed what is perhaps my most cogent motivator: a bill for $377.65.
I have, however, purposely recounted the appointment out of order, saving my favourite part for last.
When it comes time to set my goal, Jo-Ann asks me what my desired weight is, and I am not sure what to tell her. I weighed about 125 when I started studying karate in 1985, and almost instantly put on about 10 pounds of muscle, so I considered my "fighting weight" 135. Hence the hundred-pound goal. But I had not been quite svelte then.
"I wasn't even really slim when I was a teenager," I tell Jo-Ann. "I always had this little pot-belly. So I don't actually know what's possible."
She looks at me with a sparkle--or is it a spark?--in her eye.
"Anything is possible," she says.
--
I return home and complete the form, which asks me whether I have a number of conditions including diabetes, kidney, heart or thyroid disease (no across the board, blessedly), when my last period was, what I tend to eat on a typical day, and what I weigh. That's not so easy to answer, as I have not stepped on the scale in literally years. I haul it out, find some of the bars on its digital display are missing, so that I can't tell whether I weigh 233 lbs., or 223. (The difference seems hugely important, somehow.)
It also asks how important the diet is to me, on a scale of 1 to 10. I mark 9, figuring that 10 is only for things that are ultimately important to me--my writing, my sons, life-and-death things.
Returning for my appointment, I am ushered into an elegant, dimly-lit waiting room, handed a folder full of information and told my coach will be busy for a few. What's in the folder very much matches what I've already learned from Melissa. Basically, for the first phase of the diet, you cut carbs massively so as to lose fat, but eat a lot of low-fat/low-carb protein to retain muscle--and in the process re-program your pancreas.
Quoting Dr. Tran Tien Chanh, who originated the program: "The cause of most weight issues in a modern society is insulin dysfunction. A diet grossly disproportionate in its share of saturated fats and sugars, such as in breads, cereals, muffins, cakes, pastries, pasta, pizza, rice, corn--very much like the North American diet--causes the pancreas to produce an overabundance of insulin, which stays in the system and puts the blood sugar level in a negative balance."
This over-production leads to low blood sugar, which produces sugar cravings and weight gain. But insulin is not only the sugar-regulating hormone. I quote further: "It is also the hormone that facilitates the transport of fat into the fat cells. Even worse, it locks the fat in the fat cell, preventing it from being used as a source of energy." In other words, you get trapped in a vicious circle that spirals your weight upwards.
From this, I understand how the diet works. But there is another blessing in it for me too. I can let go the idea that I had got to the weight I had by piggishness, laziness, selfishness or lack of will-power, and even less condemnatory reasons such as low self-esteem, insecurity or stress. I was simply raised to eat like a typical North American. My diet as an adult is essentially no different from my diet as a child: carbs for breakfast in the form of toast or porridge or pancakes, carbs for lunch in the form of sandwiches and fruit, and carbs for dinner as the rice or potato or corn that came with the meat and veg. It's just that, unlike some people, I didn't have the metabolism to not fall into the vicious circle. Comfort eating I could have done with lettuce.
They say a diet makes you feel better about yourself. This one's making me feel better about myself already, and I'm not even on it.
§
Jo-Ann, my coach, comes in and greets me after I've waited 20 minutes. She is whipcord slender with long copper-brown hair in enhanced waves, dark eyes and a cheerily professional manner. I tell her that I must go by 3:15 so as to be home before my sons are. She says, "No problem, I'll get you out of here by three."
Thus she must go through all the information at lightning speed. First thing she does is crosses out my "9" and replaces it with a "10". "What do you do with people who mark, say, 2 or 3?" I ask her, though I can't imagine it happens that often (why would they bother even filling out the form?) "Tell them they're not qualified for the program," she says. "They don't have to pay the consultation fee again. I tell them to come back when they're ready."
Jo-Ann whips down through my form, happy to see that I don't have the aforementioned conditions, and also that I drink 10-12 glasses of water a day (mostly in the form of mostly-decaf tea, gulped compulsively as I write). When she looks at my typical eating day, she does a graph, her artist's impression of my insulin level. "You're getting it up high in the morning, keeping it high all day and only letting it come down at night," she tells me. I will have to get some bloodwork done, she tells me, filling out and handing me a requisition form.
There is a weirdness or two. She personalizes insulin, talking about "him" creeping back up on you, "him" causing trouble, and so on. Also, when I look at the list of permitted meats and see lamb, which I love, is not on it, I ask her if it's allowed anyway, and she insists that veal is lamb, rather than the meat of young calves, as I am reasonably certain it is, and thus my question doesn't get answered. (Jo-Ann, if you're reading this, see here.) But these are trifling matters, nothing to throw me off.
After more rapid-fire education on how the diet works and how to work it, including Jo-Ann's own recipes for soups and other dishes, comes the most horrific moment: stepping on the weigh-scale. It shows 243. My home scale was flattering me, apparently worried that I might decide to go after it with a hammer in revenge. She also measures me around the chest, waist and hips, but doesn't tell me what those measurements are. Just as well; I don't want to know.
Then she asks me what my weight-loss goal is. "A hundred pounds," I tell her. I was originally thinking 80 or 90, but that was when I thought my scale was accurate.
"Whoa," she says. "Maybe we just want to make it getting you down to 200 first?"
"We'll get me down to 200, and then I'll just keep going," I said. "It's a hundred." I like big goals. I always have. They inspire me more than little ones. She accordingly marks it on my form.
At about three we head into Medispa's Ideal Protein pantry. Between her knowledge and my likes and dislikes, we pick out seven days' worth of supplies for me and slam-dunk them into an Ideal Protein shopping bag. Having told her I like a late-night snack with crunch, I gratefully receive a bag of IP cheesies and a bag of IP BBQ chips... not what I would consider typical diet foods. Liking eggs in the morning as a rule, I ask her to make it seven IP omelets, which she does. I also decide to try some soups and puddings and fruit drink mixes. From the supplement shelf she adds four bottles; you have to take them to replace the micronutrients you aren't going to get from the foods that are forbidden.
At 3:15, I am at Medispa's cash register. I get handed what is perhaps my most cogent motivator: a bill for $377.65.
§
I have, however, purposely recounted the appointment out of order, saving my favourite part for last.
When it comes time to set my goal, Jo-Ann asks me what my desired weight is, and I am not sure what to tell her. I weighed about 125 when I started studying karate in 1985, and almost instantly put on about 10 pounds of muscle, so I considered my "fighting weight" 135. Hence the hundred-pound goal. But I had not been quite svelte then.
"I wasn't even really slim when I was a teenager," I tell Jo-Ann. "I always had this little pot-belly. So I don't actually know what's possible."
She looks at me with a sparkle--or is it a spark?--in her eye.
"Anything is possible," she says.
--
My psychology of fat (background)
[under construction. I have to write this one carefully. But here's an IM conversation with Melissa from Apr. 5, after the first appointment.]
[1:53:22 PM] Karen Wehrstein: Looking at myself in the mirror is different now
[1:53:30 PM] Karen Wehrstein: Because - I feel more of a sense of control over it
[1:53:48 PM] Karen Wehrstein: Because of that I despise what I see more... I am refusing to be accepting of it...
[1:53:53 PM] Karen Wehrstein: but it is also liberating
[1:54:26 PM] Karen Wehrstein: It's this weird schizophrenic thing - feeling half as if the diet is a threat and half as if it's a huge liberation
[1:54:44 PM] Karen Wehrstein: Part of me feels like - ehh - this should be easy - why are people making a big deal about it?
[1:55:12 PM] Karen Wehrstein: But another part is terrified - my eating habits are so ingrained (the thought goes) that is it even possible to change them?
[1:55:20 PM] Karen Wehrstein: Can I handle it?
[1:55:37 PM] Karen Wehrstein: I have these routines, you know - the bacon & eggs, the PB sandwich - that I've had for decades
[1:55:59 PM] Karen Wehrstein: But another part of me says ehhh I'll just get used to it is all
[1:56:13 PM] Karen Wehrstein: If I'm not hungry for more than the first week, how can I be unable to get used to it?
[1:56:25 PM] Karen Wehrstein: I just have to find other pleasurable food habits inside of the IP protocol
[1:56:52 PM] Karen Wehrstein: That schizophrenia extends to deciding the start date too
[1:57:10 PM] Karen Wehrstein: I am planning for Saturday because that's when I'll be back from TO -
[1:57:36 PM] Karen Wehrstein: But part of me wanted to start THIS MORNING and only didn't because I didn't have enough veggies and had too much work on my plate to go shopping.
[1:57:58 PM] Karen Wehrstein: Approach/avoidance...
[1:58:16 PM] Karen Wehrstein: Want to get into it, get it moving, get the change that will make me ecstatic happening, get it over with
[1:58:26 PM] Karen Wehrstein: Wanting to run away from the whole thing...
[1:58:36 PM] Karen Wehrstein: But there is no way I could once I knew the potential
[1:58:39 PM] Karen Wehrstein: Even with the price
--
--
I knew I was ugly, but I was beautiful (background)
It was quite a few years ago that I looked in a mirror and admitted to myself, "Yes... I'm fat."
I can't say when. I never ballooned. It's taken me thirty years to put on the weight that I have. I remember noticing the double chin for the first time... remember being shocked at a photo that showed me with a belly. I remember realizing I had to buy old-lady underwear for the first time. I wanted to lose weight, but doubted I could.
My mother told me I was fat when I was 19 and weighed 120, and you believe your mother. Now, at age 51, I look at pictures of myself then and want to cry. I knew I was ugly; it had been ingrained into me. But I was beautiful.
I tend to fat, I guess, due to several factors:
- Genetics: my mother tended to fat, my father didn't. My sister was blessed with my father's fat gene and has been slender all her life. I, on the other hand, was blessed with my mother's. (Oh, incidentally: she was always "slimming". But never, as far as I could tell, lost an ounce while she was healthy.)
- Sedentary work: I'm a writer. It also does not help that I hate walking. My exercise of choice is swimming, and because I hate chlorine I tend to do it in the nearest lake, so it's only during summer.
- Comfort eating: I find eating settles nervousness.
- Carbohydrate cravings due to being an ugly fat useless slob of a person, just as my mother always told me. Or is that why? More on this later.
Previous attempts
I tried once when I was in my twenties. I was about 160 lbs and wanted to drop to 140. I did it by simply cutting down portions. Some success, but it was such hell I could not continue, so put whatever I lost back on and then some.
I tried again with the Carbohydrate Addicts diet in my early thirties. Their literature convinced me that I was a carb addict. The basic method of this diet is that you eat absolutely minimal carbs for 23 hours of the day, and whatever you want in the one remaining hour. Again, some success... if I recall rightly, I dropped about 20 pounds... but it was agony, so I quit and put it all back on, and then some.
My third attempt was in late 2008 and early 2009, and again, I just cut back, eating the same things I always ate but in lesser amounts. Again, success. I stay off weigh scales as a rule, but by the mirror and by the way my clothes fit (e.g., pants falling down if I didn't use a belt), I'll guess I lost about 30 lbs. Okay, I have another measure. It is whether I can see my pubic hair while I'm lying in the bath. (I'm like a man, putting it on on my tummy.) I could again, easily.
But then I began a killer writing schedule, producing this. I started Mar. 17, 2009, and since then have posted about 1.6 million words on there, and, if I may so myself, good ones. That's about 16 average-length novels. (If you like character-driven, gritty, realistic fantasy with lots of sword fights, give it a try.) It was stressful, and at first made me nervous. I fell off the wagon, put all the weight back on. And then some. Farewell again to my pubic hair. At that point I decided dieting was impossible, and essentially gave up.
Melissa, Landmark and Ideal Protein
My best friend Melissa Gold first introduced me to Landmark Education in 2006, when I took the first course. I've taken more courses since and had great results, which is a whole other story. Joining a volunteer team to help facilitate my favourite of them allowed me to burrow further into the Landmark community. In the meantime, Melissa, who had been part of it much longer, was hearing that many Landmark people were trying, and having great success with, losing weight through something called the Ideal Protein Diet. She and her husband Marv decided in late 2011.
Now if you go on the Ideal Protein website, you'll have the typical reaction. "A weight loss program that really works!" (Yeah right.) "Your last diet." (Uhhhh huh.) "Supports vitality and energy" (They all say that.) "I lost 53 lbs. in 90 days!" (I saw you in a supermarket tabloid.) Go through the testimonials, which are full of before-and-after pictures, and they are amazing, but it's natural to think that it's some kind of cheat.
However, when friends do it, and you see the results with your own eyes, you have to believe it. The first selling point that they shared with me was that they did not feel hungry on the diet. I never would have believed that on a website, which is probably why the Ideal Protein people don't put it there. Dieting without that constant gnawing feeling of deprivation? I almost said "Sign me up!" right there.
But it got better... way better. Marv lost about 50 lbs in four months, and became more svelte, Melissa told me, than he was when they married over 30 years ago. Melissa I didn't think of as needing to lose much; she looked like a woman over 60 who'd basically kept her figure. But she felt she had a big butt, partly because she is naturally pear-shaped, and talked about how, as a teenager, she'd been criticized by her father for not having "snake hips." She also constantly claimed that she not was built to be an athlete, despite her participating yearly in the Ride to Conquer Cancer, which is a 200-kilometres-in-two-days bike ride, for which, of course, you have to train up. (Drop her some dollars.)
She lost about 30 lbs. Suddenly she had the shape of a teenager--square shoulders, nice definition on her arms, tight face. "OMG, Melissa!" I said, the first time I saw her after she'd hit her goal. "You've got snake hips!" Perhaps even better, she began talking about how the diet was releasing from within her "the athlete I really feel I am."
When I look back, I realize that it was pretty much inevitable that I would try it, at that point.
That was in February, if I recall rightly. Or maybe January. I do know that it took me a while to psyche myself up. I had two main objections:
1) Making such a huge change in my eating habits. Melissa gave me a good education on what it would entail: a complete overhaul. It would also be tougher for me in a way than it had been for her and Marv, because it's just them at home and so they could purge their cupboards of all forbidden foods. (They gave them, ironically, to me.) I, on the other hand, have two teenaged sons who love their tacos and their chips and their french fries. The look and the smell of everything they eat, I cannot banish.
and
2) The price. Ideal Protein is expensive, no two ways about it. You get one-on-one coaching, so you have to pay for that. You eat their protein foods, and they cost a lot. I calculated that if I went with the same person Marv and Melissa went to, it would cost me $600 a month, unless I could find some way to do it cheaper, like making my own protein products. Plus the gas to drive down to Toronto every week or two for weigh-ins (a 2 1/2 hour drive). I'm a single mom with a mortgage, and a writer whose name you probably don't know, so you can guess my income isn't exactly in Bill Gates territory.
Nonetheless, after psyching myself for a couple of months, in which I took one Landmark Course that helped a lot, I finally phoned their coach in late March. She told me there wasn't a way I could make the foods myself.
How you find out how badly you want something: have it taken away from you. I was crushed. I hadn't known I wanted it so badly.
But I wasn't entirely crushed, because through the IP website I had found that there was an IP location in Huntsville, Ontario, the town near which I live. I gave them a call, talked to a delightful nurse named Jo-Ann. She told me that the price if I went with them was more like $450 a month. And for convenience, of course, there was no comparison. After several days more psyching, I made the first appointment for April 5, 2012.
--
I can't say when. I never ballooned. It's taken me thirty years to put on the weight that I have. I remember noticing the double chin for the first time... remember being shocked at a photo that showed me with a belly. I remember realizing I had to buy old-lady underwear for the first time. I wanted to lose weight, but doubted I could.
My mother told me I was fat when I was 19 and weighed 120, and you believe your mother. Now, at age 51, I look at pictures of myself then and want to cry. I knew I was ugly; it had been ingrained into me. But I was beautiful.
I tend to fat, I guess, due to several factors:
- Genetics: my mother tended to fat, my father didn't. My sister was blessed with my father's fat gene and has been slender all her life. I, on the other hand, was blessed with my mother's. (Oh, incidentally: she was always "slimming". But never, as far as I could tell, lost an ounce while she was healthy.)
- Sedentary work: I'm a writer. It also does not help that I hate walking. My exercise of choice is swimming, and because I hate chlorine I tend to do it in the nearest lake, so it's only during summer.
- Comfort eating: I find eating settles nervousness.
- Carbohydrate cravings due to being an ugly fat useless slob of a person, just as my mother always told me. Or is that why? More on this later.
§
Previous attempts
I tried once when I was in my twenties. I was about 160 lbs and wanted to drop to 140. I did it by simply cutting down portions. Some success, but it was such hell I could not continue, so put whatever I lost back on and then some.
I tried again with the Carbohydrate Addicts diet in my early thirties. Their literature convinced me that I was a carb addict. The basic method of this diet is that you eat absolutely minimal carbs for 23 hours of the day, and whatever you want in the one remaining hour. Again, some success... if I recall rightly, I dropped about 20 pounds... but it was agony, so I quit and put it all back on, and then some.
My third attempt was in late 2008 and early 2009, and again, I just cut back, eating the same things I always ate but in lesser amounts. Again, success. I stay off weigh scales as a rule, but by the mirror and by the way my clothes fit (e.g., pants falling down if I didn't use a belt), I'll guess I lost about 30 lbs. Okay, I have another measure. It is whether I can see my pubic hair while I'm lying in the bath. (I'm like a man, putting it on on my tummy.) I could again, easily.
But then I began a killer writing schedule, producing this. I started Mar. 17, 2009, and since then have posted about 1.6 million words on there, and, if I may so myself, good ones. That's about 16 average-length novels. (If you like character-driven, gritty, realistic fantasy with lots of sword fights, give it a try.) It was stressful, and at first made me nervous. I fell off the wagon, put all the weight back on. And then some. Farewell again to my pubic hair. At that point I decided dieting was impossible, and essentially gave up.
§
Melissa, Landmark and Ideal Protein
My best friend Melissa Gold first introduced me to Landmark Education in 2006, when I took the first course. I've taken more courses since and had great results, which is a whole other story. Joining a volunteer team to help facilitate my favourite of them allowed me to burrow further into the Landmark community. In the meantime, Melissa, who had been part of it much longer, was hearing that many Landmark people were trying, and having great success with, losing weight through something called the Ideal Protein Diet. She and her husband Marv decided in late 2011.
Now if you go on the Ideal Protein website, you'll have the typical reaction. "A weight loss program that really works!" (Yeah right.) "Your last diet." (Uhhhh huh.) "Supports vitality and energy" (They all say that.) "I lost 53 lbs. in 90 days!" (I saw you in a supermarket tabloid.) Go through the testimonials, which are full of before-and-after pictures, and they are amazing, but it's natural to think that it's some kind of cheat.
However, when friends do it, and you see the results with your own eyes, you have to believe it. The first selling point that they shared with me was that they did not feel hungry on the diet. I never would have believed that on a website, which is probably why the Ideal Protein people don't put it there. Dieting without that constant gnawing feeling of deprivation? I almost said "Sign me up!" right there.
But it got better... way better. Marv lost about 50 lbs in four months, and became more svelte, Melissa told me, than he was when they married over 30 years ago. Melissa I didn't think of as needing to lose much; she looked like a woman over 60 who'd basically kept her figure. But she felt she had a big butt, partly because she is naturally pear-shaped, and talked about how, as a teenager, she'd been criticized by her father for not having "snake hips." She also constantly claimed that she not was built to be an athlete, despite her participating yearly in the Ride to Conquer Cancer, which is a 200-kilometres-in-two-days bike ride, for which, of course, you have to train up. (Drop her some dollars.)
She lost about 30 lbs. Suddenly she had the shape of a teenager--square shoulders, nice definition on her arms, tight face. "OMG, Melissa!" I said, the first time I saw her after she'd hit her goal. "You've got snake hips!" Perhaps even better, she began talking about how the diet was releasing from within her "the athlete I really feel I am."
When I look back, I realize that it was pretty much inevitable that I would try it, at that point.
That was in February, if I recall rightly. Or maybe January. I do know that it took me a while to psyche myself up. I had two main objections:
1) Making such a huge change in my eating habits. Melissa gave me a good education on what it would entail: a complete overhaul. It would also be tougher for me in a way than it had been for her and Marv, because it's just them at home and so they could purge their cupboards of all forbidden foods. (They gave them, ironically, to me.) I, on the other hand, have two teenaged sons who love their tacos and their chips and their french fries. The look and the smell of everything they eat, I cannot banish.
and
2) The price. Ideal Protein is expensive, no two ways about it. You get one-on-one coaching, so you have to pay for that. You eat their protein foods, and they cost a lot. I calculated that if I went with the same person Marv and Melissa went to, it would cost me $600 a month, unless I could find some way to do it cheaper, like making my own protein products. Plus the gas to drive down to Toronto every week or two for weigh-ins (a 2 1/2 hour drive). I'm a single mom with a mortgage, and a writer whose name you probably don't know, so you can guess my income isn't exactly in Bill Gates territory.
Nonetheless, after psyching myself for a couple of months, in which I took one Landmark Course that helped a lot, I finally phoned their coach in late March. She told me there wasn't a way I could make the foods myself.
How you find out how badly you want something: have it taken away from you. I was crushed. I hadn't known I wanted it so badly.
But I wasn't entirely crushed, because through the IP website I had found that there was an IP location in Huntsville, Ontario, the town near which I live. I gave them a call, talked to a delightful nurse named Jo-Ann. She told me that the price if I went with them was more like $450 a month. And for convenience, of course, there was no comparison. After several days more psyching, I made the first appointment for April 5, 2012.
--
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