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...?
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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.
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