Day 3 of Low Carb diet...

I woke up this morning feeling fresh and excited! Which I never do. Not at 6 a.m., at least. But today I did! I got up, had a shower, dressed, ate my breakfast and danced around while putting on my make-up. I tell ya, it's hard to do a good make-up look while dancing!

Anyways, the morning was full of hope, I rushed off to work and still felt marvelous! I did begin to feel tired as the day went on, but I'm still amazed at how cheerful and energetic I was so early in the morning! I even thought about doing a little work out, but decided not to, since I didn't want to be late for work.

My food diary for today is rather similar as before, so I won't bother putting it on here, but my nutritional spectre is as follows: 25% protein, 54% fat and 21% carbs.

The site where I keep my food diary has these four balls that tell you whether you've

1. had enough of vegetables
2. if your energy intake is okay
3. if you'd have too many sweets and
4. if you've had enough fibers

I'm glad to say that since I've started eating low carb food I've noticed that getting these balls green is really easy! Before I had to struggle, especially with the fiber ball. Now, it's no struggle, I usually get all the balls to turn green by my lunch time!

The reason I've resisted doing this before was that I was afraid that eating low carb would mean eating only animal fats and giving up veggies. Now I realise that it actually means eating MORE veggies and just giving up sugar, bread and starch. I feel great and I intend to keep on with this to see if I'd be able to fit into that size 46 EU (18 UK, 16 US) dress by this summer!

Oh, and here's the dress I want to wear at my friends wedding this summer (in purple though), and it's from Halens:

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Day 2 of Low Carb diet...

So far so good! I stuck to my plan last night, and I even managed to resist the oh-so delicious chocolates some evil spirits had brought to my office. Damn those evil spirits... But I'm so proud of myself!

So, today is another day, and I've already been planning what to eat. I've realised that that is one of the most important thing about losing weight: planning! I always fill my diary after breakfast for the rest of the day, so I know what to expect. Sometimes I do change it afterwards, and that's okay, but most of the time I do go by what I've planned.

If I stick to my plan today, I will get 1870 kcal's and of those 35% will be protein, 32% will be fat (of which 32% will be good ones) so that leaves 33% for carbs. I'm still happy with that, so I think that'll be fine for today!

On a side note, I havent heard from Jim since last Sunday. I think it's fair to assume, that he's just not that into me. A couple of other guys have contacted me, but quite frankly, they didn't seem to be that bright. I can live with just about anything else, but a man who seems illiterate and unintelligent.

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Day 1 of Low Carb diet...

Okay, so I'm going ahead with this low carb thing. I'm not going to start drinking cream or eating bacon and eggs each morning, I just won't believe that that's healthy, no way, nu-huh... Instead I'm going to be cutting out bread, pasta, sugar and starch rich vegetables (potatoes etc.)

So here's how I'm starting my first day:

Breakfast:
Quark with berries and sweetener, coffee and a handful of plain peanuts
(320 kcal)

Lunch:
A cheese salad with two slices of rye bread (12% fiber) and butter
(590 kcal)

Snack:
An orange
(90 kcal)

Dinner:
A chicken-mozzarella salad with mayo
(630 kcal)

Snack:
Quark with berries and sweetener with some vegetable oil (since otherwise I won't get enough good fats)
(365 kcal)

Total: ~2000 kcal

I'm pretty happy with my plan for today, I'll be getting 30% of my nutrition from protein and 44% from fat (and 33% of those are good fats), which leaves 26% for carbs. I think that sounds about right!

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Freebie!

Yesterday was my Freebie day! It means that once every four weeks I have a day when I don't have to do my food diary. It means that once every four weeks I can go nuts! I know it sounds silly for a person on a diet to have that, but when my goal is to lose about 32 kg's more, it makes sense that I need to have some days off as well. I can't make my life solely about losing weight.

Now when I say I can go nuts, it doesn't mean I eat like I used to. It just means that I can have what I want, but always there's this little thought in my brain asking me is this really what I want?

On this Freebie day I had lots of stuff I wouldn't normally have. Like chocolate, a doughnut, cupcakes, some pizza etc... I didn't have as much of them as I would have in the old days. And what's more important, I won't be having them today. I think it's okay to let loose every now and again, just as long as you make sure you stop the next day.

So today I had a breakfast of two slices of rye bread, ham and butter with coffee. My lunch was tuna salad, my snack will be a banana with some hot chocolate and for dinner I'm gonna have a chicken salad.

My cycle of keeping the food diary is now on it's fourth week (all and all it's the 12th week), wich means that on Sunday I can go and buy something nice for me. I'm thinking of MAC's paintpot in artifact, or blackground. Don't know which one yet, but that's the fun part, planning and thinking about ways to reward myself! :o)

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Alli, My Ally...

I started using these new weightloss pills called Alli about a month ago after my doctor suggested I'd try them. At first I had a prescribtion for another stronger (and more expensive) brand, but after those ran out, I switched to Alli.

Now to those of you who don't know what Alli is, it's a drug that prevents 25% of the fat you eat from absorbing, thus you get less calories and you lose weight. It doesn't affect your psyche or your cravings in any way.

All you have to do is eat like you'd normally eat on a diet and then take 1-3 pills per day with your meals. If you eat something high-fat (like a pizza or a hamburger) you'll get cramps and diarrhea. I once had a rather greasy wok, and the next night I had horrible cramps. It's not unbareble, but it's no fun either, so I learned my lesson and I'm eating right now.

What I find is the greatest upside of Alli is that it makes me work harder. Somehow the idea that I'm eating these pills makes me want to make sure that it also pays off. I guess I just want to make sure I get my money's worth.

I use Alli as a bonus, but the main thing I do is keep a food diary online. I found a website http://www.kiloklubi.fi/ (its in finnish), where I enter everything I eat and it tells me how well I'm doing.

I find keeping a food diary is important but very, very boring, so to keep me at it, I have a reward system: if I keep a food diary every day for 4 weeks, I get a present! Last time I bought two MAC eyeshaddows. Bribary, works everytime! ;o)

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So to give you an idea about how I do this, I thought I'd show you what I ate yesterday.

Breakfast:
Two slices of whole grain bread, two slices of ham, one table spoon of margarine (321 kcal) +Alli

Lunch:
Tunasalad and two slices of rye bread, one table spoon of margarine (549 kcal) +Alli

Snack:
A cookie (24 kcal)

Dinner:
Fiesta salad at McDonald's (770 kcal) +Alli

Evening snack:
Two slices of rye bread, two slices of ham, one table spoon of margarine (312 kcal)

Total of 1976 kcal (recomended amount would have been 1958 kcal, so close enough!)

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I don't normally eat so many salads, just happened to last night... But this is how I roll, and it has been going pretty great for now! Hope it will keep on going as well!

BTW, I calculated that before Christmas I lost 2,5kg's in 7 weeks. Since I started using Alli I lost 2,5kg's in 4 weeks. So it does work, at least for me.

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