Minimize Me: 10 Diets to Lose 25 Lbs in 50 Days (7 page)

Up until now, I had been weighing myself
every day to try to get an idea as to how I was doing day by day, but going
into the juice diet I decided to stop the daily weighing because it was taking
the excitement and anticipation away from weigh-in day. So, having not weighed
myself for five days, I’m pleased to announce that even after chocolate and
pasta the night before, I still managed a 5lb loss.

Summary:

While I clearly struggled on the juice
diet, there is no getting away from the fact that it works. The diet is
designed to be a short term measure and is not a long term solution to weight
loss. If people look at it this way and are fully prepared (perhaps taking time
off work to do it) then I would actually recommend it. It’s the perfect diet to
go on leading up to a holiday as it has the dual benefit of helping you fit
into that bikini while flooding your body with all of the vitamins and minerals
you’ll be lacking when you start the slightly different kind of liquid diet the
following week. All of that said, although I lost weight, the diet didn’t
really work for me and I found it extremely stressful, both in terms of finding
the time to make the juices and in having to physically drink them.

Starting Weight: 15 stone 0 lbs

Finishing Weight: 14 stone 9 lbs

Weight loss: 5 lbs

% of body weight lost: 2.4 %

Faffiness: 10/10

Difficulty: 8/10

Would I do it again? No

Total weight lost: 19 lbs

Sunday 9th November to Thursday 13th
November

Weight: 14 Stone 9 lbs

The Atkins diet was originally devised
by Dr Robert Atkins after he read a research paper, published in The Journal of
the American Medical Association in 1958. Atkins used the study in order to
lose weight himself, and was so impressed with the results that he decided to
popularise the method in a book titled
Dr Atkins’ Diet Revolution
. The
idea behind the Atkins diet is that you drastically reduce your intake of
carbohydrates (e.g. pasta, potato, bread and sweets) in an effort to switch the
body’s metabolism from metabolising glucose as energy to converting stored body
fat into energy. To put it simply, you trick your body into eating itself.
That’s right, in this diet I will be unleashing the cannibal in me. I hope I
taste good because I’m still able to taste that last juice I drank.

Louis explained that when the body
starts to burn fat it produces ketones, whereby the body enters a stage called
'ketosis' (using ketone bodies in the blood rather than the standard process of
glycolysis, where blood glucose provides the body’s energy).

He goes on to warn that this process has
a lengthy list of side effects including bad breath, tiredness, weakness,
dizziness, insomnia, nausea and constipation. The list worried me a little
because having suffered each of the side effects in the four previous diets, I
had yet to suffer them all at the same time. I have to say that tiredness AND
insomnia is a particularly unlucky double-whammy. And I’ve often found that
when I struggle to sleep a visit to the bathroom is the perfect antidote, but
with constipation on the list of side effects, what would be the point? I
suppose I could at least brush my teeth and sort out my bad breath while I was
in there.

It has been argued that over a prolonged
period of time, the Atkins diet may increase the risk of heart disease and
cause nutritional deficiencies. There is a study which suggests that the lack
of calcium may cause osteoporosis and the lack of antioxidants, found mainly in
fruit and veg, is linked with a whole host of diseases. I could argue that this
is proof once again that my idea of trying out different diets over a short
period is a good one, as it not only staves off boredom, it reduces the health
risks too. I’m not going to argue that point too strongly however, as I’m only
too aware that by changing my diet every few days, I’m giving each diet less
chance of success and I may well be doing more damage to my body than if I were
to stick to just one. My health screening at the end of this process might just
have to be the judge of that.

There are various stages of the Atkins
diet that you can move into, depending on how long you have been on the diet
and at what point of the journey you are. The initial phase is the induction
phase, and this is where I shall stay for the five days that I’ll be trying it
out. There are various rules that you have to stick to on the induction phase,
but the main points are as follows.

1) Eat three meals and two snacks a day.

2) Consume an average of only 20g of net
carbs a day - 12 to 15g of that from foundation vegetables.

3) Eat sufficient protein at every meal.

4) Do not restrict fats.

5) Drink eight eight-ounce glasses of
water a day (just under two litres in total).

I was interested to see what foods I
could eat on the diet, and there are too many to list here, but the main
components are essentially meat, fish, eggs, cheese and vegetables (but not all
vegetables). I’m going to let you into a little secret here and announce that I
don’t particularly care for fish and I detest cheese in its raw state (I can
just about stomach melted cheese in a lasagne or the like). Eagle-eyed readers
may wish to point out that I had fish and chips on a previous diet, and while
that’s true, I was only able to eat the fish due to it being covered in bread
crumbs and then smothered in ketchup, neither of which I am allowed on the
Atkins diet. I’ve never been a fan of cheese, and I remember eating out with my
family when I was young and saying to my brother that his pasta smelled of
feet. That was already enough to put me off it for life but then the waiter
added some grated Parmesan for good measure, in my mind adding the essence of
vomit to the mix. Any ingredient that can smell of both feet and vomit is
definitely off the menu for me. Being fussy about fish and cheese is definitely
a disadvantage on the Atkins diet as it essentially wipes out 40% of my
options, leaving me with just meat, eggs and vegetables, which is difficult
enough to try to make one meal out of, let alone three meals for five days
straight.

My first meal on the Atkins diet was
pure heaven. The days had fallen kindly and my first day on the Atkins diet was
a Sunday. We had nothing planned for the morning, so I took time to lovingly
prepare a breakfast consisting of three rashers of bacon, two poached eggs and
a huge flat mushroom. It was the first time for a long time that I could
prepare what I considered to be ‘naughty’ food and eat it without feeling
guilty. I even got adventurous and tried out a new technique that I’d seen on a
cooking show, cracking the eggs into some cling film and creating a little
bubble for them to cook in.

As much as I enjoyed that breakfast, I
couldn’t help but worry about how I would be able to prepare breakfast over the
coming four days. How would I be able to consume eggs and bacon on a work day,
when I get up at 6am and am out of the house by 6.30am? Firstly, it’s just not
practical to be cooking that kind of thing at that time in the morning, and
secondly, there’s no way I could stomach it. The rules clearly state that I
need to be eating three meals a day, so after a long time pondering what I
should do, I finally came up with the answer.

I decided that I’ll just skip breakfast.
I did say at the very beginning that I would be taking short cuts wherever
possible and even going as far as cheating if it was necessary. I’m able to
justify it because I’m not undertaking a academic study for a university or
reporting my findings to the British Nutrition Foundation, I’m simply trying
out a few different diets in order to see if I can actually lose weight and if
they are easier to stick to when rotated. For me, it’s further proof that most
diets are impractical and unsustainable not just in the long term, but the
short term too. The only diet that I’ve found simple and easy to follow so far
is the balanced diet, and I’m interested to see if it remains that way.

Lunch on the Sunday consisted of a
simple omelette and we had a roast dinner round my mother-in-law’s for dinner,
which for me consisted of a lot of meat and cauliflower and not a lot else. I
must admit that my first day on the Atkins diet went well – I felt pretty good
about it. While I didn’t have a dazzling array of ingredients at my disposal,
and after my initial doubts, I felt that I did in fact have plenty of options
to keep me interested over the five days. "Yes, this is going to be an
enjoyable diet," I thought to myself as I switched off the bedside lamp
and settled down for an early night.

It was around 4am that the pain woke me
from my early morning stupor. It felt like someone had been at my throat with a
razor and that I’d somehow swallowed a golf ball – a golf ball made of chorizo,
rolled in chilli flakes and dipped in wasabi. As chorizo is allowed on the
Atkins diet, I found myself questioning what I’d eaten the night before and
then feeling confused when the very few synapses that were functioning kept
firing back the words ‘chicken’ and ‘salad’. I’d eaten chicken thighs, so
perhaps I had a bone stuck in my throat? Perhaps there actually was a chorizo
golf ball stuck in there after all? But no amount of water could flush away the
burning, and I went to work happy, at least for now, that breakfast was off the
menu.

Having suffered in the past from
everything from man flu to swine flu, it was obvious to me that my glands were
swollen and that I was suffering from a rather nasty throat infection. I was
frustrated, not that I had it, but that it had developed so quickly. It
normally starts with a sore neck or a scratchy throat at the very least, which then
gives me a couple of days to prepare for the oncoming illness. For men, the
days leading up to an illness play a crucial role as we find ourselves
confidently declaring that we are "coming down with something" and
that we are "unlikely to be able to make it", whether that be to
work, a social engagement or perhaps, if we’re really lucky, an anniversary
meal. The following few days allow us to let our wives /partners /children
/neighbours /colleagues /casual acquaintances know in microscopic detail how our
illness is developing, how badly we are coping and how sorry we are that we
missed that anniversary meal. Getting a throat infection and swollen glands
overnight is simply not fair. There has been absolutely no time to lay the
groundwork, and sympathy is virtually non-existent. By the time I convince
people that I am actually ill, I’ll be better again, and that’s just not how it
works if you’re a man.

The Atkins diet is yet another diet
which says you should control your caffeine intake, recommending that you
restrict yourself to just two cups of black coffee a day. In fact, it
recommends that if there is any danger of you being addicted to caffeine, then
you should avoid it altogether. Having already waved goodbye to carbs for the
next five days, and having made the decision to skip breakfast too, surely I
couldn’t give up coffee as well? I decided that I would stick to two coffees a
day, one in the morning and one in the evening, and if I craved more I would
make myself a de-caffeinated substitute.

The next few days passed without
incident as I got into a routine of skipping breakfast, having a ham, tuna or
chicken salad for lunch and then a dinner consisting of steak, chicken or lamb
with various vegetables. I found that without carbs I was often very hungry and
craving sugar, so I countered that by drinking lots of water and by having the
occasional sugar-free carbonated drink. Yes, it was more caffeine, but at least
it wasn’t a chocolate bar, so it was definitely the lesser of two evils.

On day five of the Atkins diet, my
throat was so sore that I asked to work from home. I had a nasty cough and at
times was struggling to breathe, but by working from home I was able to have an
extra hour in bed to rest and didn’t have to get involved in the daily grind of
the morning and evening commute. I am fully aware of how lucky I am to have
such a flexible working arrangement. I also know that without that flexibility,
it’s likely I would have thrown in the towel by now. So when this challenge is
over, I won’t just have my wife and children to thank for their support, I’ll
be indebted to the company I work for too. It goes to show that dieting isn’t
just about willpower or determination – there are other outside factors to
consider which could end up being your downfall.

I battled through day five of the Atkins
diet, longing for it to be over so I could get back to having bread, pasta and
potatoes. I found that I had missed carbohydrates so much that I started
concocting crazy recipes in my head featuring more than one source of carbs.
Jacket potato, filled with chicken pasta bake, topped with breadcrumbs... Yum!
After another carb-less meal, I stepped onto the scales the following morning
fully expecting to see a small amount of weight-loss. As good and as strict I
had been, everything I had read about the Atkins diet had made it clear that
the induction phase should be followed for around two weeks. Could five days
really make that much of a difference? Well, no, as it turns out. The scales
revealed that I had lost 1.5 lbs. I wasn’t too disappointed – I had managed a
huge amount of weight-loss in my first four diets, so I was expecting it to
slow down at some point. Whether this is my body clinging onto the fat in a
desperate bid to slow the weight-loss process, or whether it’s a slight failing
of the Atkins diet itself, I’m not exactly sure. For me, I suspect it’s a bit
of both.

Summary:

The Atkins diet is a diet which can
often sound appealing given the basic facts. I suspect that the idea you can
still lose weight while chowing down on bacon and eggs topped off with a
generous serving of cheese is an extremely appealing one to many. The reality
for me, however, is that once again by drastically limiting the food groups I
could consume I became bored, dejected and uninterested. The sheer lack of
sugar on this diet left me with major fruit cravings, so much so that I found
myself salivating whenever anyone at work made a fruit tea! If you happen to be
a big cheese, meat and fish lover then I would recommend the diet to get you on
the right track as there’s no doubt that it can work for a period of time. I
wouldn’t recommend doing it in the long-term though, as there seems to be a lot
of evidence to suggest that you could end up damaging your body.