My Best Me

152.8 lb

It's been a year since I last posted, and in that time my weight has very slowly crept up by10lbs. 

I first heard of the Dukan diet in January last year while in England. I read the book and decided to give it a try. I weighed 159 lbs then, and I had a goal of losing 15lb. I ended up losing 16, but gaining back 12 actually because truthfully I've been hovering around 155.

It could have been worse though, because the pattern with most diets is to gain back what you lose and more. I think the fact that I haven't done that so far is due to the fact that I start every day still with one of Dr. Dukan's galattes and a yogurt, and generally I aim for protein and fruits and vegetables. 

But...and it's a big "but"(in more ways than one!) I have been lax with snacking and "over celebrating" daily.

I walked down a city street this week in the hot summer sun, and thought of how much better I would feel if I wasn't just treading water with my weight, but trimming down forever to 147 lb--the best weight I can be realistic about maintaining.

The choices are all mine; one at a time they lead in one direction or another--up; down; or straight ahead. My rational decisions though--my wish to be trim and my preference for the way I look when on the other side of 150 lb,, is not enough to compete with the immediate gratification of fat and sugar and the carbohydrate laden food I reach for at a time of day when I am tired, and feeling "deserving," or at a special meal, the other time I overindulge.

Dr. Dukan's rule for special meals--"celebration meals" as he calls them, is to have whatever you wish--twice a week, but no second  helpings. Such a meal will not sabotage a week of healthy eating.

I have done this before and this simple rule of no second helpings and stopping at two celebration meals a week, epitomizes moderation as well as celebration and enjoyment.

The weak time of day for me; evening; is another minefield to navigate. Navigating it is probably tied in with being more aware of what I am really reaching for when I open the cupboard door--and finding it in a way that will help me reach and maintain my "best me."

I'm aiming for 147 again, and it is, after all, just 6 lb away.

What I want is simply to be my "best me."

By Belinda


142.8--and feeling grateful. A few people have told me that I'm looking fit lately. I feel like I have a whole new relationship with food.

It was January 30 when I checked in here at 159 pounds. I've lost 16 pounds since then. When I search for words to describe the way I feel physically, the word "calm" comes to mind. My body has calmed down and feels peaceful.


Thank you God and thank you Dr. Dukan

The Scoop So Far

By Belinda


143 lb at the start of this week. I'm just checking in quickly to say what is working.


My weight is the lowest it has been in a long time and I am so grateful to have found a way of eating where I can enjoy food, never feel hungry and have cracked the cravings I used to live with.


What is working is following the Dukan Diet in its main elements. I am in the Consolidation Phase.


The Dukan Galattes have been a key to my success. I make a big batch once a week, enough to last eight days. I toast one for breakfast every morning and have it usually with a 0 fat yogurt and sometimes with an egg.


Every day I have one Nitropro 32 protein bar. I get them from Costco where they cost just under $20.00 for 12 bars. Both the galattes and the protein bars are filling. 


Around these core food items I add lots of salad, with my favourite vinaigrette mayo dressing from the Dukan Diet book. I eat lots of salmon, sometimes an ounce and a half of cheese and sometimes 3 Ryvita or a couple of slices of bread. I'm not a big bread eater.


At the moment the only fruit I'm eating is an orange, apple or grapefruit--no bananas yet. No nuts yet.


I'm allowed a celebration meal each week--sometimes I've had two. I'm not rigid about it. But it's working. 


I am grateful. Did I already say that? It bears saying again. I am where I want to be and I could live like this forever.


The protein bars give me the taste of something sweet that breaks the monotony that could set in if I only ate vegetables and protein, but they don't set up a vicious cycle of blood sugar spikes and lows in the way that other sweet snacks do.


That's it for now. Just wanted to post an update!

Back into Cruise

145.6

I've been doing okay in Consolidation, holding the line around 146-ish, but as I looked in the mirror I still saw a little more blubber than I really want to hang around! I decided to hop out of Consolidation and keep working for a few more weeks on the last 3 pounds. I'm aiming for 143lb, which isn't too far off to be radical.

I am so close and the Cruise part of the Dukan Diet is not painful, hard or unpleasant at all. I am never 100% rigid, but just try to follow the principles in general--and I am getting there. I am so grateful that back in January, God led me to the book on the shelf in Sainsbury's. I keep it close and read parts of it over again regularly. I love the galattes, and I love the vinaigrette mayo and the salmon en papillae from the recipe section. I feel as though my eating patterns have permanently been re-educated. I hope they have. Time will tell, but so far, it's going so well.

In Consolidation!

By Belinda


145.8


On Sunday, at 146.6 I decided to listen to Dr. Dukan's advice that my True Weight is 147 and begin Consolidation. Since I have lost 11 pounds since starting the Dukan Diet, and Consolidation is 5 days for every pound lost, this means 55 days in this two part phase. You break it into two parts (27 each in my case.) In the first half you can have one Celebration Meal a week, and in the second, two.


My first half will be reached May 10, and on June 7 I will begin Stabilization--which lasts for the rest of my life. I'm up for it. I can't quite believe I'm here but it feels so good.

By Belinda


149.4 1b


I haven't written for a while because I've been so busy since last I posted, but I want to check in to say that I am still pressing on with the Dukan Diet! I am not perfect in following it but it is working for me, slowly but surely!


I have also joined our local fitness and recreation complex with the rest of our household: Husband Paul, daughter Brenda and son-in-law Kevin. I work out several times a week now, often on my way home from work or on the weekend with Brenda or Paul.


People have commented that I'm looking good. This is very nice!


I am also wearing clothes that haven't fitted for a long time.


I still have between 4-7 pounds to go. I'm working on it--but meanwhile I am so happy to have got to this place.

By Belinda


Yesterday, the day I usually record my weight here at the start of a new week, I was 152.4. We had a big family dinner with prime rib, Yorkshire Pudding yesterday, but I also served roasted vegetables (onions, mushrooms, sweet peppers & zucchini,) which I was going to roast for myself the night before, but suddenly had the brainwave of roasting them just before our dinner and sharing them. The family LOVED them--and there was still some left for me! :)


Yesterday I pulled a dress from the depths of my closet that I haven't worn for a year--in fact I hardly wore it at all. It felt SO GOOD to put on something feminine and "new to me again." I haven't been motivated to go shopping really for a long time, because I didn't like  how I felt and looked and hoped I could reverse the trend at some time in the near future before buying more clothes.


Oh, and on Saturday I joined our beautiful, new recreation and fitness centre in Bradford and tonight I go for my orientation and health assessment!

Happy!

By Belinda
153.2 


I just had to share--I'm back into my jeans for the first time in a LONG time! I've been living in my stretchy yoga pants because wearing any of my pants with actual zippers in them felt like being in an all day Heimlich Maneuver! 


I've still got a way to go, but I have the hang of the Cruise Phase of the Dukan Diet now and it isn't hard. I'm doing two Attack Days a week, on Mondays and Fridays and for special meals, such as cell group or family dinners, I am making exceptions and eating normally--just obeying the rule not to have second helpings. 


This morning my work team and I had a breakfast meeting at an all day breakfast restaurant with a not especially healthy menu. Before leaving home I had a galette, and then at the restaurant I asked if I could order a la carte. I ordered two poached eggs and peameal bacon, as it is Friday, Attack Day. Two of my colleagues ordered the same thing! It was so filling I ended up with two slices left over to package up for lunch. 


On my way home from work, I stopped at our shiny new recreation centre to check out the gym memberships and discovered that being over 60 has a discount. Bonus!!! I took the information home to consider, but I think I'm signing up this weekend as I pass by it on the way home and it would be a perfect ending to my day to pop in and get in 25 minutes or so of walking on the track or treadmill. They have exercise classes too, and all included in the membership.


Happy? Yes! Hopeful? You bet!

Dukan Diet End of Week 4

By Belinda
154.8
Last week was a "celebratory week." I had a granddaughter's 14th birthday dinner out in a restaurant, and cooked an appreciation lunch for an Events Committee at work. The Events Committee are all people who love hospitality and they all insist on bringing food, even though I am trying to lavish appreciation on THEM! Long story short--it was a small miracle that on Sunday morning when I weighed in I was only a pound and a half more than the week before. 


It was disappointing though and I didn't want to post 154.8. I tried to convince myself it was (don't laugh) because I hadn't produced any waste products to speak of since last Thursday (trying to put it delicately!) Talk about rationalization. :)


I have been following the easiest path in Dr. Dukan's book (for those who have only a little weight to lose--two protein days, with eating normally (but not extremes) in between. Even at 154.8 I was down 7lb from my highest weight in January, but I could see that the progress this way was going to be slow. One pound a week is not bad at all, but a week with a few extras can thwart progress towards my goal.


What encouraged me was my friend Susan entering the fray as well. On Sunday I decided, after a protein day on Saturday, to do a vegetable and protein day (for the first time) in solidarity with her because we had a fundraising soup and sandwich lunch at church and I didn't want her to feel left out. It ended up that I did myself a big favour because this morning I weighed in at a respectable 153 1b. 


As a result I decided today to follow the plan where you do two protein days (mine will be Monday and Saturday) and vegetables and proteins for five days. I may make an exception for special meals, but still this form of the Cruise phase of the diet will get me to my goal weight more quickly.


Susan has enthusiastically improved on the galette recipe by adding baking soda to make them more fluffy, and adding spices and flavourings to zip them up. These are her recipes for 4 galattes:

       8 tablespoons oat bran

8 tablespoons plain yogurt

4 eggs (or equivalent in egg whites)

1 level teaspoon baking soda

For sweet:  2 tablespoons splenda, 1 level teaspoon cinnamon (more to taste if you like)

For savoury:  2 teaspoons onion powder (or cut up some fresh onions and throw them in), pepper, salt  (or any other kind of spices which suit your fancy - italian spice, roasted red peppers, garlic, etc, etc)

Cool on a baking rack.  

I continue to have so much hope that this way of eating; this plan; is something I can use to get where I long to be and stay there for life.

Dukan Diet End of Week 3

By Belinda


153.2 1b


I read a lot this week about the Dukan diet. I discovered that it's the diet Kate Middleton and Pippa, as well as their mother, used to get in shape for the wedding. 


I also read some success stories on the Dukan web site and watched a video clip on Dr. Oz, where one of the people whose blog address I have in the side bar here, ("How the Dukan Diet Works") was on the show. He had regained 25 of the 50 he lost on the diet but was back on track again, following the rules he had relaxed. He also said that now he knows how to lose it and he was still looking much better than he did at his original weight.


I read a diet review that raised a red flag about the lack of some essential nutrients at the beginning of the diet in the Attack Phase and Cruise Phase where only certain vegetables, and no fruit are allowed as well as no whole grains. 


The fact is that does seem worth paying attention to. Carrying excess weight and eating a typical high fat, high sugar diet is also not healthy and the Dukan diet does help to break that cycle.


The worries about nutritional balance are not an issue in the way I am choosing to follow the diet though since I am doing two Attack Days followed by five days of eating normally. If I lose weight more slowly this way that is okay. 


What I am finding is that the Attack Days, when you eat only protein and an oat bran gelatte, seem to have broken my craving for junk food and sweets. 


When you are eating only protein, you really only want to eat to satisfy your hunger and although you can eat as much protein as you want, you don't need much to feel full. I have become more in tune with when to eat and how much to eat.


I have also found that coming off the Attack Days, the increased sensitivity to true hunger carries over, and I am eating less.


I can eat anything I want to, but I don't want junk food snacks. I can see how having one Attack Day on the same day every week for life would have many benefits. 


Paul noticed a difference in my weight yesterday and commented on it! Encouraging!


Exercise is one part of the diet that I have to incorporate more of. Generating "heat" is an important part of heating up the metabolism andburning calories. Yesterday, for the first time in ages I put on a Lesley Sansome, Walk Away the Pounds DVD and did 21/2 miles,  (about half an hour,) which got my heart rate up to 120 beats and really gave my body an overdue shock! I bought one of her newer sets of DVDs to work in some variety and plan to use them in between regular outdoor walks. First though my calf muscles have to recover from the unaccustomed exercise they got yesterday!