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Friday, July 12, 2013

A (Giant) Bump on the Road

I made a big mistake when I started the Dukan Diet: I did not weigh myself. I had just started reading the book and jumped right in, so I didn't know you could track your progress daily - I've always known that to be a bad move. 

I know that, roughly, I weighed 125lb around that time. So when I first weighed myself on Monday, 122lb didn't feel like a significant loss. Then 121 on Tuesday which, again, was blah but about 1lb a day on PP is not bad. 

I skipped the gym (and weighing in) on Wednesday, so Thursday weigh in was... 123lb! What?! Not cool, PP. It sucks not only because of the face value of not losing weight, but mostly because I've been so dedicated and so on point with this diet - I really should be seeing results! 

Instead, I see lots of bloating, although I can tell I'm losing fat - you can tell by limbs and face, whereas bloating usually shows up on the tummy and sometimes hands and feet. 

So of course I did some googling on Dukan weight stagnation, and it looks like the culprit was... My own skimming of the rules. Here is a mea culpa:

1) Cheese: but it's protein, right? Well, apparently if it's not fat free cottage/ricotta, I shouldn't be eating it. And I doused cheddar, jarlsberg, and asiago on so many of my meals... 

2) Oils: I noticed this earlier, and corrected it, but a lot of my meals were made with oil - healthy evoo and coconut oil, but I had completely overlooked the part where no oil is allowed. 

3) Fat-free everything: I'm not big on fatty stuff anyway, but I just tried my best with cuts of beef - the butcher seriously suggested filet mignon as the leanest cut, but I went with a more modestly priced (and more marbled = fatty) cut. I also got low sodium ham, but didn't ask for low fat. I may have had some chicken skin, I may have bought full-fat ricotta, I wasn't paying that much attention. This wasn't as bad as the cheese - I really overdid the cheese! - but it must have piled some calories I don't need, and hindered my weight loss. 

After all my "research", I came up with the following fixes:

1) More oat bran: I upped my intake to 2.5 tbsp a day, making it a meal for dinner, because I need...

2) Fiber supplement: Skip to #3 if you're squeamish or don't need the TMI. Constipation is a problem in the Dukan diet, and it's been especially problematic for me. None of the usual fixes has worked, including a mild laxative. I drink all the water I should, religiously, so I know that's not it either. So I got a fiber supplement - one of them said "made with real sugar!" so I checked the label before buying it. 

3) White Protein Day: when I realized I had made so many mistakes, my first impulse was to go back to the attack phase and start it all again. Then I realized it was a bit silly, and that giving up and restarting from scratch might make me less enthusiastic. I'm looking forward to being done with the cruise phase at the end of the month, and there is a good chance my mind will be done with it, so I better get the most out of July. 
I read that some people go for a white protein day - chicken breast, white fish, and FF ricotta, cottage cheese and yogurt - which I'm not 100% sure I can endure, but I will try to have fish for lunch and chicken breast for dinner for the next 3 days. 

4) Green tea: This is from the horse's mouth: drink only green tea for 3 days. I don't know that I'm able to substitute all water for green tea, but I'm trying to drink as much of it as I can. 

 And bonus:

5) Shirataki noodles: I have been skeptical of those since I've heard of them. Once I asserted myself that they didn't taste completely gross, I kept thinking they were some weird, overly processed food akin to eating a zero-cal hot dog. But then I found out the konjac root is dubbed "the broom of the intestines". So I will stop seeing it as "weird American zero-calorie over-processed non-food" and start looking at it as "ancient Japanese root of well being." Lol

I also can't wait till Monday (when I'm done with PP and get to PV) so I can have some big salads and other fiber rich foods! 

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