Healthworx

Look at me - I can’t even commit to writing a blog - no wonder my diet and exercise efforts to date have failed.

But I have to say this one is going very well so far. I’ve got my appointment with my counsellor again today - we decided on 2 week intervals, and my sclaes are showing a loss of 11pounds, which I don’t think is bad. I know there are people on minimins who lose that in the first week and average 3-4 pouns a week thereafter, but most of them are on Sole Source, whereas I’m really enjoying my one meal a day.

The two really important things are firstly that I’ve been able to break out some size 14s, which always makes me feel good, and secondly my hubby thinks I look great and is seriously considering joining me on the diet.

And to be honest, if I maintain a weight loss of about 2 1/2 pounds a week, it sits better with my notion gained from the fitness industry that any more than 2 pounds a week loss is unhealthy. I’m keeping a close eye on the lean to fat percentage and so far the majority of the loss is fat.

I’m going to start to do a bit of exercise this week. Will let you know how I get on.

Woke up on Wednesday with that feeling that I had a furry tongue and/or that something had died in the back of my mouth. Ususally this would be a cause for concern (or maybe a hangover) but I recognised it from my atkins days as the onset of ketosis.

I’m not sure whether its good or bad that I am able to get into ketosis within 48 hours of starting the diet, but whatever it is its very welcome. The gnawing hunger all day has greatly reduced.

I can’t say I feel the euphoria that some people report, but I certainly had a bit more energy yesterday than on Tuesday. And the splitting headache was gone - hurrah!

Mind you I did find it hard this morning when my 3 year old woke me up at 4.30 and kept me awake till morning. I did feel very weak and empty when I finally was able to have my shake at 7 (I’ve set myself set ‘mealtimes’ otherwise I’m not sure I’ll get through the day.

Another hard moment was when I realised that I really do not like the broccoli and cheese soup. I thought it sounded nice but it really wasn’t and after I’d got it down it was a real hardship to know that I couldn’t eat anything else for another 4 hours. Oh well I live and learn - shan’t be buying those next week.

I’m really looking forward to the bars - I’m sure they will help. But I’m loving what I see on the scales - 5 pounds in 3 days not bad at all. I know its only water weight but its very encouraging nonetheless.

Today is the official start day, so I am trying desperately to be good. I’ve met my counsellor, got my packs and I’m on the way.

I was fine up till about 30 minutes ago. My 11am pack lasted me till about 2.00. 1 hour to go till I have the next one. But as yesterday I suddenly feel starving and weak, with the start of a headache.

This is the bad stuff - just got to push on through it.

On the good side, the scales showed 1.5 pound drop today already. This is definitely worth it….

I thought I would allow myself a couple of small treats today as my appointment with my counsellor is not until tomorrow, so today hasn’t been a real day at all, just a practice.

The hardest part was cooking my children’s tea at 5pm. I can’t deny them carbs - they are essential for growing people. So I had to cook pasta and yet not nibble it - this was a lot harder than I expected and to be honest I failed a bit.

They also had fresh fruit & cream for dessert, which was left over from my mother-in-law’s visit last week. Had to be eaten or it will go off. There was a bit too much for them so I helped along the way there too.

And my own 200 calorie meal was a little bit over the odds, and contained bacon (leftovers again) which is certainly not in the permitted list.

I realise that I am going to have to strengthen my resolve if this is going to work. Hopefully once I get into ketosis I won’t mind preparing food for other people so much. And I’ll make sure to buy treats and puddings for the children that they like and I don’t particularly. No more clotted cream - that’s for sure.

Today I’ve been so hungry at times I could have eaten my own fist. Not all day though, only in brief intervals, and not as much as I thought. Imanaged to get the water down me quite happily and used coffee to quell the worst of my cravings. A detox diet that includes coffee is my idea of perfection….

I sailed along quite happily until about 1.30. Thought about food quite a lot, but didn’t feel particularly hard done by.

I didn’t find the soup particularly satisfying at 11.00 but I kept topped up with water & coffee and that was OK.

Then at 1.30 my stomach started to growl. Big time. I can’t remember the last time I felt so hungry. More water, more coffee and I managed to distract myself till my next shake was due at 3.30. Nothing has ever tasted so good as that strawberry shake, blended to bubbles with some ice in it. It was divine.

And it has filled me up - kind of. Well I suppose its only been 25 minutes…. I am really looking forward to my meat and veg tonight though

So here I am finally making a start. I’ve taken a few weeks to get my head straight - also to get the Easter holidays out of the way - I can’t do anything as extreme as this while the children are tearing each other apart at home.

So I’ve downed my first shake, my first half litre of water and I’m currently working my way through my first coffee. I feel hungry already and its only 9.30 - I’ve promised myself soup at 11am and 3pm then my main meal (all 200 calories worth!) between 6 and 7.

I weighed and measured myself this morning and was totally disgusted with what I saw. I’ve even put on some extra pounds over Easter so will probably add an extra few weeks to my plan. But I’m off and running and doing something about it now. Wish me luck.

As part of my research into this diet, I’ve been looking at success stories, failure stories, bad press from people who have never tried it, and any medical research good or bad that I can get my hands on.

The main conclusion that I have come to is that those people who knock the Cambridge diet just aren’t understanding the whole package of it. It is more than just a starvation plan. Looking at the success stories (and by success I mean those people who have lost the weight, gone through the maintenance program and kept the weight off even after the maintenance program have finished I can see plenty of things to learn from.

As far as I can see these are the main objections to the Cambridge diet that are voiced on the internet, plus my own response to them:

1: It tastes disgusting. Well I’m not exactly expecting gourmet food, and I don’t expect its going to taste as good as the sweet sickly gunk that I’m eating at the moment, but it’s only for a short time & I know I can do it. Besides which, I quite like powdered milkshake, mousse, cup a soup, pot noodles and all kinds of chocolate covered candy bars, so I’m sure I can survive on this.

2: As soon as you finish you’ll just pile the weight back on because it hasn’t taught you a new way of eating. This one is all about mental attitude. If you do it for a few weeks than go back to eating exactly what you did before then you will regain the weight, and possibly more as your metabolism will have slowed down a bit. The whole idea of this diet is that you use the time off food to wean yourself off some of your previous vices, and when you do introcduce food again (in a slow and controlled manner) you start to relearn good habits and portion control.

I really think I need to break certain snacking habits - on previous diets I’ve allowed myself to have lots of little treats and counted them in, until eventually they just took over and I was back to square 1. This time I won’t have to negotiate with myself for treats - there will be none. If I was trying to give up smoking, I wouldn’t try to find a smaller cigarette or a different flavoured one - I would want to go away from the places I used to smoke and learn different ways to behave.
3: 400 calories is a ridiculous amount and not enough to live on. Reasonable point. So I’ve decided not to do the lowest level of the diet - after all I’m not chronically obese. So I’m going to start on the 700 calorie programme. Even that seems very low compared to other programmes I’ve been on & this has put me off in the past. I was sure that it had to be harmful to the body going into starvation like this

This is where the internet has been great - I’ve seen lots of stories of people who have done it successfully and suffered no ill effects. Most have experienced vast improvements in their health - blood pressure, cholesterol etc. When I tried to look for people who have ruined their health by doing it all the stories I found were from the 80s, when it was only 300 calories and less well researched than it is now. Now the medical consensus seems to be that 400 calories is the minimum for health and I am going to have nearly twice that.

For the most part people who are on the net saying that it doesn’t work either haven’t tried it, or have tried and failed to complete it. Anything works if you do it properly and I believe that Cambridge does have a good and proper way to reintroduce proper eating - you just have to follow it.

4: Its going to wreck my metabolism. This criticism comes mainly from me - from previous studies I have done in the area of health and fitness - including my personal trainer training. I realise that my metabolism will go down slightly and that when I have finished the diet I will have to eat less food than before if I keep my fitness at my current level. But I see Cambridge as the first step on my health and fitness programme. When I am on the 790 calories part of the diet I will not be able to exercise as regularly as I would like to nor at the intensity that I normally would. But as I start to increase the calories on the maintenance stages, there is nothing to stop me slow ly but surely ramping up the exercise. Once I am back to normal levels of eating, I can start a self-designed exercise programme to boost my metabolism back - I am a fitness professional after all. With the advantage that I will be starting to exercise without the 3 stone of surplus flab round my waist, which should allow me to do a bit more.

5: I’m going to feel hungry, grumpy and tired. Hell I already do feel hungry, grumpy and tired most of the time anyway. It’ll be worth it to just feel them a bit more acutely for a few weeks - then once I get properly into ketosis and the weight starts to come off I look forward to having more energy and feeling fabulous.

I’ll probably think of more stuff as I carry on preparing, and who knows what ugly thoughts will come into my head once I’m on the diet. But at least no-one can say that I went into this with my eyes closed.

Its time to start a new diet push. And this time - I’ve decided to try a new approach which I haven’t done before - the Cambridge Diet.

Up until a few months ago, I was definitely on the side of the people who think the Cambridge diet and other very low calorie diets (VLCDs) were a completely stupid crazy fad, possibly downright dangerous. But I’ve been coming round to them slowly, and done my research and I’m beginning to think it might be just what I need.

For anybody that doesn’t know the Cambridge Diet and other VLCDs work by asking you to replace all food with prepared powdered food sachets and chocolate covered bars. The total calorie intake on this regime is very low - hence the generic name of VLCDs.

The Cambridge diet was invented for people who were grossly obese to lose lots of weight before surgery. It’s been going for 25 years & has helped lots of people during that time. I don’t need to lose tons of weight, but I do want to burst through my previous hurdle weight of 12 stone, quickly and decisively, then leave it behind and never return to it again.

I’m going to start the diet on April 29th - I’ve got my appointment booked with a counsellor. Between now and then I’m going to spend some time getting my own head straight and logging a lot of thoughts on here. Then I’ll keep a detailed log while I’m on the diet, both on here and on minimins.

I’m fairly certain I’m doing this for all the right reasons and that it can work for me. I have nothing to lose but my surplus flesh.

….do some posts attract more spam than others? It isn’t the most recent one or the longest one, but one of my posts is hit with several spam comments every day. I just don’t get it - what’s so special about that one?

Yes you’ve guessed it - I fell off the wagon again. My ‘potty training’ week led to another week of somewhat less than 100% effort, and then suddenly - whoompf!

Three or four weeks have gone by, during which instead of losing 3 pounds I have gained 3 pounds. So suddenly I am 6 pounds adrift of my plan.

This is the point at which I usually give up - oh well - guess I’m just destined to be one of life’s fat people. This is the dilemma that I am desperately seeking a solution to.

I’m not quite there tonight. Just the fact that I have turned to the blog again shows that determination is returning, but there is still scope for wavering. And tomorrow I’ll be meeting up with my best buddy, whose wedding I’m supposed to be slimming for. She started off 2-3 stone heavier than me, and is now several pounds lighter. If she can’t kick me up the bum no-one can.

Points in my favour this week - yesterday I did go to the gym. I didn’t want to go cos it was raining (pathetic excuse I know) but I faced the demon down and went. Points against me - my Creme Egg fetish is getting a bit too strong at the moment. Every time I see those suckers I am powerless to resist!