The proof is in the pudding...
I am nothing if not verbose. I'll try to be more succinct in future posts. Trust me, this will get to the more interesting parts about daily Keto dieting very soon. I just have to get all this off my chest before I start.
So, family crisis hit hard in 2008. After a death in the family and a long-distance move I was stuck in a foreign place with antagonistic relatives and devil's food doughnuts were my only source of comfort. From January 19 to February 25 I gained about 40 pounds. Yeah, 40 pounds in just about 5 weeks. One day I heard a radio DJ talking about a great diet he went on called Medifast and I thought I had to give it a try. I read and researched it for a couple weeks and convinced my husband (was my "new boyfriend" in the last post) that I should try it and he promised to help. Medifast is a low carb, low fat, low calorie diet made up mostly of meal replacement "shakes, soups, and bars". As I said, I was desperate and was willing to try anything.
Medifast was simple but definitely not easy. It was simple because it was just "open packet, mix with water, & eat" every two to three hours, then a lean meat and salad for dinner. It was not easy because I didn't like most of the meal replacement, freeze-dried "foods" Medifast sells but I found three or four things I liked enough to eat exclusively and I ate grilled chicken and salad every night for about 8 months.
It was also not easy getting used to the new food and it took about three weeks transitioning from carb burning energy to fat burning energy. I felt miserable with carb cravings, food cravings, exhaustion, and insane hunger during that time and all I had to keep me motivated was the incredible drop on the scale, but at the end of 30 days I had lost 30 pounds. I was also finally used to the taste of the food. After about 4 months my menstrual cycle even became regular for the first time in my life. After all the research I had done in previous years that shouldn't have come as much of a surprise to me but it did. I guess I was still skeptical because nothing I had tried had ever helped all the problems I had. By the time 8 months had passed I had lost 110 pounds and was in the best shape I had ever been in my life. I wasn't at goal yet but my blood pressure was doing really well, I had really great cardio stamina, and I felt fantastic both mentally and physically.
Ironically and joyously, shortly after reaching my 110 pound loss I got pregnant. I was 37, never been pregnant, never expected to get pregnant, and now I had to stop dieting. Needless to say I took pregnancy as the best excuse to get back to my bad, high-carb high-fat eating habits. By the time my daughter was born via c-section (due to my regained super-high blood pressure) I was back at 270, and then I went back up to 290-300 over the next couple of months. I am convinced that my daughter would never have been born if I hadn't gone on the low-carb Medifast diet, so I look at all of it, including regaining the weight, as the personal price I paid to have this wonderful girl in my life, but I have never been able to get back on the Medifast bandwagon for whatever reason and now having long-term success with Medifast just seems like a fantasy.
Now, this isn't the end of the story for me. Medifast isn't a long-term sustainable lifestyle anyway, it's definitely what I would call a quick fix, and after that experience and trying to get back on Medifast and failing several times it is clear to me that just my whole lifestyle and attitude towards food has to change because high-carb isn't sustainable for me either. But, I still know that the only way I will fix my blood pressure, blood sugar, insulin resistance, and hormone imbalances is to go back on low-carb. And that's where we are right now.
Tomorrow: My inner child loves doughnuts...
So, family crisis hit hard in 2008. After a death in the family and a long-distance move I was stuck in a foreign place with antagonistic relatives and devil's food doughnuts were my only source of comfort. From January 19 to February 25 I gained about 40 pounds. Yeah, 40 pounds in just about 5 weeks. One day I heard a radio DJ talking about a great diet he went on called Medifast and I thought I had to give it a try. I read and researched it for a couple weeks and convinced my husband (was my "new boyfriend" in the last post) that I should try it and he promised to help. Medifast is a low carb, low fat, low calorie diet made up mostly of meal replacement "shakes, soups, and bars". As I said, I was desperate and was willing to try anything.
Medifast was simple but definitely not easy. It was simple because it was just "open packet, mix with water, & eat" every two to three hours, then a lean meat and salad for dinner. It was not easy because I didn't like most of the meal replacement, freeze-dried "foods" Medifast sells but I found three or four things I liked enough to eat exclusively and I ate grilled chicken and salad every night for about 8 months.
It was also not easy getting used to the new food and it took about three weeks transitioning from carb burning energy to fat burning energy. I felt miserable with carb cravings, food cravings, exhaustion, and insane hunger during that time and all I had to keep me motivated was the incredible drop on the scale, but at the end of 30 days I had lost 30 pounds. I was also finally used to the taste of the food. After about 4 months my menstrual cycle even became regular for the first time in my life. After all the research I had done in previous years that shouldn't have come as much of a surprise to me but it did. I guess I was still skeptical because nothing I had tried had ever helped all the problems I had. By the time 8 months had passed I had lost 110 pounds and was in the best shape I had ever been in my life. I wasn't at goal yet but my blood pressure was doing really well, I had really great cardio stamina, and I felt fantastic both mentally and physically.
Ironically and joyously, shortly after reaching my 110 pound loss I got pregnant. I was 37, never been pregnant, never expected to get pregnant, and now I had to stop dieting. Needless to say I took pregnancy as the best excuse to get back to my bad, high-carb high-fat eating habits. By the time my daughter was born via c-section (due to my regained super-high blood pressure) I was back at 270, and then I went back up to 290-300 over the next couple of months. I am convinced that my daughter would never have been born if I hadn't gone on the low-carb Medifast diet, so I look at all of it, including regaining the weight, as the personal price I paid to have this wonderful girl in my life, but I have never been able to get back on the Medifast bandwagon for whatever reason and now having long-term success with Medifast just seems like a fantasy.
Now, this isn't the end of the story for me. Medifast isn't a long-term sustainable lifestyle anyway, it's definitely what I would call a quick fix, and after that experience and trying to get back on Medifast and failing several times it is clear to me that just my whole lifestyle and attitude towards food has to change because high-carb isn't sustainable for me either. But, I still know that the only way I will fix my blood pressure, blood sugar, insulin resistance, and hormone imbalances is to go back on low-carb. And that's where we are right now.
Tomorrow: My inner child loves doughnuts...
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