Shakin' It In Florida

I'm in Florida visiting my family for a few weeks, and so far enjoying mornings of beautiful sunshine and catching up on reading during the stormy afternoons.

One of the greatest diet-related aspects of this trip is that I finally have a partner in crime: my mum!

So far, using the shakes plan, she has lost 27.5lbs in just 58 days! This was no quick-n-easy water weight drop by going suddenly super low on carbs. She had been low carbing on Phase 1 of the South Beach Diet since January and reached a frustrating plateau before I told her about the Protein Sparing Modified Fast. She had already lost 25 lbs before starting this, which only makes her speedy weight loss even more impressive.

I have to say, she looks absolutely fantastic. One of the things she's most excited about is that she bought her first dress with a belt! She also has TONS of energy, and as far as I can see, close to zero carb cravings. (She's cooking up a batch of cinnamon rolls for the rest of the family as I type.)

It's been awesome doing this together since I got here: making shakes for each other, sharing lovely low-carb meals and weighing in together in the morning. I think having a diet partner really helps my own accountability, and just being around someone who is so successful on this plan is very inspiring.

We decided to come up with some handy tips for anyone following this, based on our experiences with the plan. I'm getting tons and tons of emails asking questions about the best ways to do it, and reporting amazing results, so keep 'em coming!

Accept that you'll feel like crap for the first few days
Like the good old Atkins flu, starting this plan WILL leave a lot of people feeling tired, groggy, lethargic, slightly nauseous or spacey and out of it. This can depend on the person, and some people just breeze through it straight away. However, especially if you've been eating a high-carb diet previously, you will probably not feel very well as your body makes the switchover to getting energy from protein instead of carbs. Hang in there - your energy will return, and you'll be feeling fine in less than a week.

Weigh every day!
This flies in the face of a lot of weight loss advice, but both my mum and I have found it extremely motivating to get on the scales each morning and see what we've lost. Since weight loss on this plan is so consistent and fast, weighing in is rarely a disappointment.

Journal it
Write down your weigh-in number every day so you can track your loss. There's a great program to do this online - FitDay - where you can get a graph of your weight as it tumbles down. By doing this, you'll also be able to get a more accurate picture of your average weight loss week-by-week.  It's very typical to lose 8-10lbs the first week, and then average around 2-3lbs per week after that, but this will help you keep focused.

Get back on
If something happens and you do end up eating off plan, get right back on. This is easy to say, but the encouraging part about this diet is that anything you gain will drop right off...if you get back on plan immediately. You may experience the yuckiness of a carb hangover the following day, which is further motivation to stay away from the sugar!

Sugar-free gum
Bear in mind that you're eating real, solid food once a day, so it helps to occasionally give yourself something to chew. Sugar-free gum can also be a dietsaver in meetings where people are passing around sandwich plates and baked goods: if you pop a piece in right at the beginning, your mouth will be full of flavor and the treat will seem less tempting.

Shake doctoring
If you're not too thrilled with straight protein shakes, people have come up with a number of ways to doctor them up. Bear in mind that the original Thin So Fast plan as described by Dr. Mike Eades added all sorts of stuff to the protein shakes to make them palatable (this book was published back when protein powder tasted dreadful). Some variations to try:

- After you have your morning coffee, pour the rest of the pot into a pitcher and leave it in the fridge. Mix the cold coffee with protein powder for a delicious and energizing shake.

- Add a teaspoon of vanilla essence, or the sugar free syrup of your choice for different flavors.

- Mix the powder with diet soda - but be careful of the fizz! This makes for a float or creamsicle type drink, depending on the soda you use.

- Add cream! Some people like to add a couple of spoons of cream to the coffee version, and our latest treat is to squirt some whipped cream onto a chocolate shake and sprinkle a little unsweetened cocoa powder on top.

Treat yourself
Nope, not to sweet treats - to good quality tea and coffee. We are a Starbucks-loving house, especially the bold blends like Komodo Dragon and Arabian Mocha Sunani. I'm also a big fan of different teas: both Stash and Republic of Tea make some amazing flavors. (The Republic of Tea Ginger Peach flavor is lovely, and great if your stomach feels slightly off.) Drinking high quality tea and coffee fills your mouth with gorgeous tastes without adding hardly a carb or calorie, and the caffeine will rev you up too. 

Beware the side salad
One common fall down is ordering salads from fast food outlets or restaurants. Atkins and South Beach and Protein Power and even this fast encourage eating vegetables with your protein, so having a side salad often seems like a fairly safe option. Now, if you're at home, and sticking to the greens (romaine, iceberg, spinach, cucumbers, asparagus, broccoli, avocado) you'll be safe. Where people get into trouble is ordering something like Boston Market's chopped salad which weighs in at 12g carbs before adding dressing. Quizno's Black & Bleu salad might look like a low carb dream, sprinkled with beef and blue cheese, but clocks in at 27.9g carbs! Steamed vegetables are often a safer choice, or you can always stick with trusty old caesar, hold the croutons.

Double up on shakes
A lot of people have found they've been skipping shakes, either due to time, forgetfulness or lack of access to shake making materials. A simple solution is to drink double shakes. Say you're on four scoops of protein powder a day: just make a shake with two scoops in the morning, and two at night to ensure you get your protein requirements met for the day.

Enjoy your meals
This is obviously not very hard when you're eating once a day! But I think it helps to put in the effort to make delicious meals. I will post some sample menus in the days to come, and there are always the recipes here for more ideas. A huge part of sticking to any diet is finding it psychologically satisfying, and making yummy food and treating yourself to nice drinks and interesting shake variations will undoubtedly help you stay on plan and keep losing.

Get support
You can join the very small but very friendly group following this plan over at the Meat & Eggers Forum. Here's the thread link: Arckins Plan Challenge so stop on by and say hello. Or try doing it with a friend, partner or family member so you can help and motivate each other.

Good luck, and here's to your very great loss!

Comments

[Tess]

I have found this to be a very good way to lose. I bought the ultimate pp but found the scoop weighs in at almost double the grams stated on the side as the serving size.With out realizing it I was getting a double shake. I wasn't losing real well so I weighed the scoop and when I realized it was far more than the 19.6 grams recomended as serving size I cut back and the loss picked up again. Many congrats to our mom and you as well!