The Virgin Diet (13 page)

Xylitol can actually help you lose weight.

If you’re used to the overstimulation of diet sodas and sugar-free treats, how can you appreciate the subtle taste of berries, almonds or cinnamon? These other foods could potentially satisfy a sweet tooth, but only one that hasn’t been overstimulated by the supersweetness of aspartame or sucralose. Let go of the artificial stuff and let Mother Nature show you just how sweet she can be.

Even if a diet soda has zero calories, it is a nightmare in so many different ways. Besides the problems with artificial sweeteners, the phosphoric acid in sodas can actually leach the calcium from your bones. Switch to water, please. Squeeze in some lemon or lime or throw in some cucumbers or maybe a packet of Emergen-C lite. Your bones will be happier, and so will you.

But the real reason to dump the diet soda is that it could actually cause you to
gain
weight. Findings from 8 years of data collected by Sharon Fowler, MPH, and her colleagues at the University of Texas Health Science Center, San Antonio, were presented at the 2005 American Diabetes Association meeting. Fowler was quoted on WebMD: “What
was surprising was when we looked at people only drinking diet soft drinks, their risk of obesity was even higher” than those drinking regular sodas. She added, “There was a 41 percent increase in risk of being overweight for every can or bottle of diet soft drink a person consumes each day.” In fact, she and her colleagues found that there was more of a risk of gaining weight from drinking diet soda than from regular soda.
25
I think you get the message.

WHERE ARTIFICIAL SWEETENERS HIDE

Sugar is not the only sweetener that goes by many names. If you see a label that includes any item on this list, put the food down and find something that has not been artificially sweetened.

Acesulfame potassium

Alitame

Aspartame

Aspartame-acesulfame salt

Cyclamate

NutraSweet

Saccharin

Splenda

Sucralose

Lisa was thrilled with her weight loss, but she was even more delighted to finally feel that she had let go of her sugar cravings. Yes, sometimes
she still wanted to eat sweet things, but the berries, dark chocolate and almonds she snacked on didn’t set up the same round of craving, bingeing and frustration that she had experienced when she indulged in candy bars and baked goods.

“I never thought I wouldn’t miss dessert,” Lisa told me, “but I actually don’t. I still loooooove my dark chocolate, and if I didn’t have a square of
that
every night, I would definitely miss it. But that’s it, you know? I have it, it tastes delicious, and then I’m satisfied.” She sighed happily and added, “It’s a good feeling.”

Before JJ, I could eat sugar, carbs, dairy and gluten with the worst of ‘em. Sure, I ate my veggies and protein, but I also put some au gratin or garlic mashed potatoes on the side. Over time I became unhappy with my weight and fat level. And more important, I was feeling less energetic and more anxious. Getting only 4 to 6 hours of nightly sleep was taking a huge toll on my endurance and motivation level at work.

Then I discovered the Virgin Diet.

The first thing that sparked my interest in JJ’s approach was how commonsense it all seemed. In spite of what I would have to eliminate, I could retain a lot of what I had already been eating. In addition to replacing a meal with a Virgin Diet Shake, I tossed out the gluten, dairy and sugar. Cold turkey. I started journaling. I concentrated on eating the right veggies and proteins. And
I learned about healthy fats. An apple with a tablespoon of almond butter became my dessert staple.

Thinking back on it, I see two aspects of JJ’s approach as key to my success: the one-a-day Virgin Diet Shake to replace 1 meal and the journaling. Even though there was no sugar in the smoothies, they satisfied that craving in a very healthy way. And the journaling helped me stay on task by making me accountable for everything I ate.

Obviously, I loved the result. I don’t even have chocolate cravings anymore. JJ’s approach gives me two things I can depend on: I know that it works for me, and I know that I can do it. Now I’m doing it for life.

So now you’re ready to begin 21 days of the Virgin Diet. Congratulations! The commitment you’re making to your health and well-being is enormous. Your rewards will be enormous, too.

Just follow these 7 steps to losing 7 pounds in 7 days:

1. Drop the top 7 high-FI foods.
   For 21 days, let go of the foods that are most likely to cause food intolerance, inflammation and unbalanced blood sugar.
   
2. Eat from the Virgin Diet Plate.
   Assemble your meals from clean, lean proteins; healthy fats; high-fiber, low-glycemic carbs; and nonstarchy vegetables.
   
3. Drink Virgin Diet Shakes.
   Replace 1 or 2 meals per day with my shakes, which will help restore your digestive system and repair the damage done by the high-FI foods.
   
4. Follow the golden rules of meal timing.
   Eat every 4 to 6 hours. Make sure you eat within an hour of waking up and don’t eat anything for the last 2 to 3 hours before bed.
   
5. Stay hydrated.
   Follow my Virgin Diet water guidelines.
   
6. Load up on healing foods.
   They’ll satisfy your hunger while healing your body.
   
7. Eat plenty of fabulous fiber.
   Fiber will satisfy your hunger, lower your cholesterol and streamline your digestion.
   

In this chapter, I give you the 7 steps to losing up to 7 pounds in 7 days. I also tell you everything else you need to know about eating and drinking on the Virgin Diet. In
Chapter 11
, I share with you The Ultimate Meal Assembly Guide, along with my favorite meal assemblies. And in
Chapter 12
, I include plenty of delicious (and easy to make) recipes to get you started.

Reading your way through these chapters might seem a bit overwhelming, and at times you might find yourself wishing for a weekly plan where I just walk you through each meal. I don’t want you to depend on me, however, and I don’t want to tie you down either. I want you to start assembling your own meals out of optimal foods because that’s what I want you to be doing for the rest of your life. This method works for my celebrity clients and for the thousands of students I’ve had in my weight-loss boot camps. I know it can work for you, too, so let’s get started.

For 21 days, let go of the foods that are most likely to cause food intolerance, inflammation and unbalanced blood sugar:

Corn

Dairy

Eggs

Gluten

Peanuts

Soy

Sugar and artificial sweeteners

Use the Virgin Diet Plate to assemble your meals.

As you can see, the Virgin Diet Plate is made up of the following elements:

I want to teach you to live by the plate.

• Clean, lean proteins
  
• Healthy fats
  
• Nuts
  
• High-fiber, low-glycemic carbs
  
• Nonstarchy vegetables
  

I want to teach you to live by the plate. You start each meal with protein, healthy fats, lots of fiber and some slow low carbs, which gives you steady, sustained energy, helps you focus and turns your body into a fat-burning machine.

• The protein works with the fiber to slow down stomach emptying. That improves satiety.
  
• The fat triggers the small intestine to release chemicals to tell the brain that it’s full.
  
• You should have loads of nonstarchy vegetables for antioxidants and satiety.
  
• A small amount of a low-glycemic, high-fiber carbs, such as lentils or berries, slowly releases sugar to the brain for energy so you can continue to focus. That will keep your blood sugar stable and insulin low so you can use stored fat for fuel.
  

Food is information. We want to make sure that we’re telling our bodies to burn fat, build muscle and keep our energy steady and our focus spot-on.

Let’s take a closer look.

Protein provides amino acids, which are our bodies’ building blocks for muscle, hormones and neurotransmitters (the brain chemicals that we need for mood and focus). Protein is also what we need for great hair, skin and nails. When we consume carbs, we release insulin—and protein triggers the release of the key hormone glucagon, which helps balance out the effects of insulin, preventing insulin resistance and facilitating weight loss. The amino acids found in protein are critical for detoxification because they help escort the toxins out of our bodies. And, as we just saw, protein improves satiety. It’s hard to feel full if you haven’t had some protein. Protein can also lower sugar cravings.

Here are the proteins I want you to focus on:

Grass-fed beef

Hormone-free, free-range chicken and turkey

Pasture-fed lamb and pork

Pea–rice protein

Wild cold-water fish

Wild game

• Enjoy lean red meat 3 or 4 times per week,
  focusing on game and lamb. Get the rest of your protein from chicken, turkey, fish and my Virgin Diet Shakes.
  
• For all animal protein, you are what you eat—and you are what you eat, ate.
  That means if you’re eating a commercially grown animal, it has probably eaten corn, soy or both, which means that
  you
  are eating corn, soy or both. So stay away from commercially farmed animals and concentrate on grass-fed beef, pasture-fed lamb and pork, and free-range chicken and turkey.
  
• Game is a great choice because it hasn’t been commercialized.
  No hormones, no feed, no corn, no soy. You can feel pretty safe eating bison, elk, ostrich, wild venison and similar meats.
  
• Cold-water wild fish only, please.
  You don’t want to eat what farm-raised fish are eating. And eat fish only from the safe list; otherwise, you’re taking in mercury and other heavy metals that can create leaky gut, provoke inflammation and otherwise toxify your system. All three of those effects put weight on you that is nearly impossible to take off, so focus on safe fish.
  
• Acceptable vegetarian proteins include pea, rice and hemp.
  For more information on how to follow this program as a vegetarian or vegan, see the box below.
  

SEAFOOD: WHAT’S SAFE AND WHAT’S NOT

Highest Mercury Levels (avoid eating)

Grouper

Mackarel (king)

Marlin

Orange roughy

Shark

Swordfish

High Mercury (avoid eating or limit to one-two 6-oz servings a month)

Bass (saltwater)

Bluefish

Halibut (Atlantic)

Lobster (American, Maine)

Mahi mahi

Sea trout

Tuna (canned, white albacore)

Tuna (fresh bluefin, ahi)

Lower Mercury (eat no more than six 6-oz servings per month)

Cod

Crab (Dungeness, blue, snow)

Monkfish

Snapper

Tuna (canned, chunk light)

Tuna (fresh, Pacific albacore)

Lowest Mercury (enjoy two or three 6-oz servings per week)

Anchovies

Butterfish

Calamari (squid)

Catfish

Caviar (farmed)

Clams

Crab (king)

Crawfish/crayfish

Flounder

Halibut (Alaskan)

Herring

Lobster (spiny, rock)

Oysters

Pollock

Salmon

Sardines

Scallops

Shrimp

Sole

Tilapia

Trout (freshwater)

Whitefish

Data obtained from the websites of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

I’m going to be very straight with you: if I have a client eating a vegetarian or vegan diet for health reasons, I will encourage them to eat clean animal protein. Eating a vegetarian or vegan diet just is not as healthy as eating a more balanced, omnivorous diet. I know this from personal experience because I was a vegetarian for several years during my 20s. In that time, I had 10 percent higher body fat than I do now, despite the fact that I am 20 years older and work out about half as much now. Back then I also had cystic acne and low energy. So you do the math.

Of course, I completely respect if someone is vegetarian or vegan for spiritual reasons. So first, let me explain why I think animal protein is part of a healthy diet, and then I’ll give you some nutritional support if you decide to continue with your vegetarian or vegan diet.

As I pointed out earlier, protein has major benefits for your metabolism: it improves satiety, slows down stomach emptying and suppresses ghrelin, the hormone produced by your stomach to trigger hunger. Protein is also critical for great hair, skin and nails; maintaining hormones; and building muscles. Now, when I recommend animal protein, I’m talking about clean, lean animal protein. I can understand your health concerns about eating meat from a corn-fed cow that’s been stuck in a slaughterhouse covered in feces. I don’t recommend eating that meat either. But nutritionally speaking, you would do well to have 1 or 2 servings per week of meat from a grass-fed cow that’s been treated well, killed humanely and not choked with antibiotics and hormones. Other clean, lean proteins include wild salmon—not farm-raised fish!—other wild fish and free-range chicken. These are all healthy choices, and they’re a critical part of an optimal diet.

When you’re a vegetarian, you’re failing to get the same quality of protein, and you’re probably not getting the complete spectrum of all
the amino acids you need. Remember, we digest or break down protein into amino acids, the building blocks of our body. So on a vegetarian diet, you
have
to supplement, and although I’m a big believer in supplements generally, I’m suspicious of any diet that requires supplements just to get the basics.

Now let’s talk reactivity. Lacto-ovo vegetarians tend to eat a lot of dairy and eggs. What I see with most vegans is that they’re eating a lot of soy and gluten. Both groups are getting the same two to four reactive foods multiple times a day. If this is your diet, the likelihood that you will have food reactions is very high. Because you’re eating so many high-FI foods, you tend to have a higher risk for leaky gut. In addition, I see that many vegans have suppressed thyroid function because of their overconsumption of soy. Remember, thyroid is a key hormone for metabolism and weight loss.

Vegetarians and vegans are also eating lots of grains and legumes, foods that are high in lectins. We’ve already seen that lectins can challenge your immune system, interfere with your absorption of nutrients and perhaps create leptin resistance, which interferes with your hunger and full signals.

Another danger of eating a typical vegetarian diet that is rich in grains and legumes is phytates (or phytic acid), which
chelates,
or binds, with many key minerals, including calcium, iron, magnesium and zinc, making them virtually impossible for your body to absorb. Soy is especially rich in phytic acid, but you can find large amounts in corn, peanuts, whole wheat and rye as well.

Finally, a vegetarian/vegan diet is a high-carb diet. That can result in higher blood sugar and therefore higher insulin. Excess insulin can lead to insulin resistance, which in turn makes it hard to burn off fat and easy to store it, among other bad things that we will go into throughout the book.

So in a vegetarian/vegan diet, you’re already eating foods that will be lower in certain nutrients or perhaps devoid of them altogether. Plus, a mainstay of your diet is
antinutrients.
You are eating more reactive foods that might aggravate leaky gut. You might also be deficient in vitamin B12, calcium, iron, zinc, riboflavin, thiamin and DHA. DHA is an essential omega-3 fatty acid that is critical for brain health. The highest source of DHA is from fish, although you can also get it from algae. Otherwise, your body will have to make it from nuts and seeds, especially flaxseed meal and hemp, but you have to eat a
lot
of nuts and seeds to produce as much DHA as you need.

Another problem is iron. Animal products are the best source of this essential mineral. You can get iron from a vegetarian diet, but it’s not absorbed as well. On a vegetarian diet, it’s hard to get enough zinc and vitamin B12 also. So here’s another place that you have to supplement.

If you’re avoiding all meat, poultry and fish, make sure you’re supplementing with a good vegetarian multivitamin mineral formula that contains iron, zinc, calcium, magnesium and all the good B vitamins. Do a 25-hydroxy vitamin D test to evaluate your levels, and supplement with vitamin D3 to prevent a shortage. Vitamin D2 comes from plants, is not made by humans and is way less bioactive and stable than vitamin D3. Nearly all vitamin D3 comes from lanolin (i.e., sheep), but this is worth making the exception for, as vitamin D is a prohormone that is essential for strong bones and a healthy brain, heart and gastrointestinal tract. Also, be sure to take omega-3s from algae so you get enough DHA, and make sure you are taking extra vitamin B12. Check the Resources section on my website for recommendations on testing and supplements.