The 3 week challenge starts tomorrow!

[BecauseImWorthIt]

Right. It seems that most of us are going to be low carbing. However, please join us, even if you're following some other kind of plan!

From tomorrow, there are three clear weeks until the end of January, and the aim is to lose half a stone. Some of us may lose more, especially if we have a lot to lose, but half a stone is a good - and safe - amount of weight to lose in three weeks.

If you're low carbing, there are plenty of different plans around that you can follow. The three that I'm most familiar with are Atkins (of course), Charles Clark and India Knight/Neris Thomas. All of these books are definitely worth a read.

If you're thinking of starting off with two weeks of induction, Atkins-style, I thought the following might be useful, just in case you haven't got the book. This is a list of foods that are allowed during induction. (It's from the original Atkins, apparently, and I think things have changed somewhat, but this will give you a good guide for it; you might find it useful to print off and take with you when you're shopping:

"In addition to your proteins which are the focus of this diet you eat NO MORE THAN 20 GRAMS OF CARBOHYDRATE PER DAY. Your diet will consist of mainly pure proteins and pure fats and limited amounts of vegetables.

Eat liberally during Induction:

All fish
All fowl
All shellfish
All meat
All eggs

Mayo, vegetable and olive oils, butter, lard, dripping, poultry skin and meat fat

*Cheese (more recently limited to 100g per day)
Any full-fat, firm, cream, hard, soft or semisoft aged cheeses

*Fresh Double Cream (more recently limited to 3 tbsp a day)

*Nuts (more recently removed from allowable induction foods)
Almond, brazil, macademia, pistachio, pecan, walnuts.

*Count carbs from nuts, cream and cheese (if applicable) into your daily maximum of 20 carbs a day

Vegetables

You can have two/three cups(1.5lbs) per day of the following

sprouts
mushrooms
bok choy
peppers
celery
radishes
lettuce
romaine lettuce
cucumber
artichoke
celery
pumpkin
rhubarb (no more than 8ozs)
asparagus (no more than 8ozs)
chard
sauerkraut
bamboo shoots
collard greens
spring onions (no more than 8ozs)
snow peas (no more than 8ozs)
bean sprouts
spaghetti squash
eggplant
spinach
broccoli
hearts of palm
string or wax beans
broccoli rabe
kale
summer squash
brussels
kohlrabi
tomato (no more than 8ozs)
bean sprouts
leeks
turnips
cabbage
okra
water chestnuts
cauliflower
onion (no more than 8ozs)
zucchini

If a vegetable, such as spinach, tomato or onion cooks down significantly, it must be measured raw so as not to underestimate its carb count.

Salad Garnishes
crumbled crisp bacon
grated cheese
minced hard-boiled egg
sautéed mushrooms
sour cream
mayo
lemon/lime juice

Spices
All spices to taste, but make sure none contain added sugar.

Herbs
basil
garlic
rosemary
cayenne pepper
ginger
sage
cilantro
oregano
tarragon
dill
pepper
thyme

For salad dressings, use mayo or oil and vinegar (but not balsamic vinegar, which contains sugar) or lemon juice and herbs and spices. Prepared salad dressings without added sugar and no more than two carbs per tablespoon serving are also fine.

Artificial Sweeteners
sucralose (marketed as Splenda?)
saccharin
cyclamate and acesulfame-K
aspartame (in moderation)
certain sugar alcohols, such as maltitol, do not affect blood sugar and are acceptable.

Acceptable Beverages
Be sure to drink a minimum of 3 litres of water each day, including:

Filtered water
Mineral water
Spring water
Tap water

Additionally, you can have the following:

Clear broth/bouillon (not all brands; read the label)
Club soda
Coffee or tea
Diet soda
Essence-flavored seltzer (must say "no calories")
Herb tea (without barley or any fruit sugar added)
Lemon juice or lime juice (note that each contains 2.8 grams carb per ounce); limit to two to three tablespoons

Grain beverages (coffee substitutes) are not allowed.
Alcoholic beverages are also not permitted during Induction; those low in carbohydrates are an option, in later phases.

Special Category Foods
To add variety, each day you can also eat 10 to 20 olives, an avocado, sour cream or double cream, as well as two to three tablespoons of lemon juice or lime juice. But be aware that these foods occasionally slow down weight loss in some people, and may need to be avoided in the first two weeks. If you seem to be losing slowly, moderate your intake of these foods.

Convenience Foods
Although it is important that you eat primarily unprocessed foods, some controlled carb food products can come in handy when you are unable to find appropriate food, can?t take time for a meal or need a quick snack. More and more companies are creating healthy food products that can be eaten during the Induction phase of Atkins. Just remember two things:

Not all convenience food products are the same, so check labels and carbohydrate content.While any of these foods can make doing Atkins easier, don?t overdo it. Remember, you must always follow The Rules of Induction.

ENSURE YOU EAT LESS THAN 20 GRAMS OF CARBS A DAY ON FOODS LIKE NUTS, SEEDS, AVOCADOS, SOFT CHEESES, CREAM AND SOUR CREAM, LEMON AND LIME JUICES AND LOW CARB DIET FOODS. CAREFULLY MEASURE YOUR PORTIONS!"

Hope this helps, and good luck to us all!

Pixi - I really do sympathise, I know exactly how you feel. I am the same - my life revolves around continuously thinking about food. I am constantly dieting from one day to the next losing and then putting back on. I know this is not healthy, and last month I finally admitted I have a big problem. I decided to get some help and visited my GP - she was amazing and referred me for CBT, but my self esteem was so low, and I felt I was going it alone that I didn't go. (I know what people will say to that, you can't help someone who won't help themself), so here I am again in the vicious circle. Perhaps one day I will have the confidence to go for the therapy as it may help, in the meantime I will carry on with WW. I wish you every happiness and hope together on this thread we will get the support we need to get through this. X

P.s. Pixi - You are not whining. If you need to chat I am hear to listen. Believe me in a few days I will probably be right there with you. Heres to day three

The whole point of this thread is to let us all have a good whine, pixi!!

And the thing is, if we told Sal she was allowed as many apples as she liked, then she wouldn't crave them. She'd want bacon. Or bread. Or anything else she'd been told she couldn't have.

Well done for not giving into the cake your mum offered you.

I think you also have to question why those you love are trying go offer you food. That's a problem that they have, not you. I think you should call them on it as well. Say to them "You know that I am on a diet. You know that the GP has told me that I have to lose weight, so I must diet. So why are you offering me food that you know I should not eat?"

Being on a diet can mean being tough on other people as well as yourself. I am always amazed by the efforts of those who supposedly love us to sabotage what we're trying to do.

My mum always dismissed my attempts to lose weight (not as explicitly as that sounds!), because she had a real weight problem; if I lost weight it exposed the fact that she wasn't/couldn't.

I made my own pork scratchings the other day Sal - it's really easy! We had roast pork for dinner (Sainsbury have pork joints for half price at the moment, so I bought a piece that cost me £4 which was enough for four of us for a meal and enough left over for a couple more portions/meals).

The secret for good crackling (and therefore pork scratchings) is to get the skin really dry. So if you're cooking it in the evening, take it out of the plastic in the morning. Dry it thoroughly with kitchen paper and then leave it out, uncovered, all day. (You can leave it in the fridge if you have room - but the way the weather is at the moment, leaving it out in a cool place should be fine!)

Before you're going to cook it, salt the skin (try and get it to stick to the skin rather than fall into the oven tray, as you don't want to end up with overly salty meat juices).

When you've roasted the pork until it's cooked, you should have lovely, crispy crackling, which you can remove in one piece.

I then put the crackling, fatty side down/skin side up back into the oven and left it on a very low heat for another 45 minutes - there's a lot of fat underneath that will run off. Keep checking it and tipping too much fat away.

When you've removed as much of the soft fat under the skin as you want, remove from the oven, cut into slices/chunks as you like and voila!

95

Morning

Last night was not brilliant. Did really well, (I think), during the day, but in the evening, especially just before going to bed, I felt just like SuperSal wanting something to pick up and I had a couple of crackers with brie. Not ideal.

Oh well, just got to knuckle down and keep going. It's taken a while to get into these bad eating habits and it's silly to think they will change overnight. No eed to throw my hands up in the air and give up just yet.

Made a lovely thai beef salad for lunch today, so am looking forward to that.

Well done BecauseI'mWorthIt - that's amazing. 5lbs in two days! I'll be lucky if I lose that in a week.

I can't believe we're on day 3 and I haven't fallen off the wagon as yet. I think you must be having a positive influence.

Thank you for your kind words, it really helps, esp knowing I'm not crazy or alone. My dh is skinny as a rake, my mum (we all live together) has minor weight issues but is much taller and lighter than I am. I was really tough with her last night, she said she forgot and that's why she offered me the cake 3 times in about as many minutes . I pointed out that I'm not a few pounds over weight, I have serious issues that I'm trying to address. I can so relate to being stuck in a vicious circle, gp put me on ADs a few months ago without effect. It's my weight that's the problem, other areas of my life are great.

At the moment my mind is in the right place (for a change), I'm doing this for me and because I want to, so any cheating cheats only myself. Not sure how long this mood will last but I'll make the most of it. I'm determined that this year will be my last of being so unhappy and unhealthy.

I had Special K for breakfast, measured it out and my new portion is at least half what I would ordinarily have and that's if I stuck to just one bowl! Waiting for nap time so I can do some exercise.

The Quibbler - I doubt it's really 5lbs, as I think that's very unlikely in two days! More about the vagaries of the scales, as well as the fact that our body weight does fluctuate wildly.

One of the things they keep pointing out on the pig2twig site is that weight loss isn't linear. Even if you're being really good, sometimes your weight will go up for no obvious reason. Our menstrual cycles have a lot to do with it. (Although I appear to have lost mine somewhere - 59 days now since my last one!)

Pixi - great to hear that you've been so firm with your mum!

One piece of advice (sorry - don't mean to sound patronising) - don't let yourself get hungry, as that is when you get tempted. Make sure there's something acceptable for you to snack on easily. If you're calorie counting, things like carrot/cucumber/pepper batons with a low fat yoghurt dip, etc.

Is anyone watching "My Big Fat Diet"? One of the things I thought was really interesting last night was the piece about diet drinks, and how they prime your body to expect energy (i.e. food). There is also a theory - they didn't talk about this on the programme - that some people react to diet drinks in the same way that they react to sugary drinks - i.e. it produces an insulin surge, so fat loss can be inhibited.

I'll see if I can find a link to more info about this.

I felt very rough last night and first thing this morning.

Last night we had fillet steak, with spring greens and baked portobellini mushrooms. I knocked up a bit of a sauce from the pan with some cream.

It was nice but tbh I didn't really feel like it - general low-level nausea. And I deffo couldn't manage meat this morning so I cracked open the whey protein shake. I mixed it (according to I&N's IPD) with a touch more vanilla extract, a slug of cream and some ice-cubes and whizzed it with the hand blender.

It was quite pleasant in a sweetish synthetic tasting way. Certainly it seems to have done the trick and am not hungry. I haven't been actively hungry though since I started, which is a very weird and new feeling for me.

It has been feeling weird though - spacey and tired and crabby. I'm hoping this gets better. Do you get your appetite back on a low-carb diet or is the lack of appetite the point? I'm feeling a bit doubtful about it since I can't say I'm really enjoying my food. I have never liked to eat lots of meat particularly so am finding that a bit hard going. Are there any good vegetarian suggestions? I might go on the IPD site for a look...

Haven't weighed yet for reasons already mentioned but also, um, a bit backed up. Am going to take the psyllium husks to help that...

I made chicken stir fry last night (I think this was good?) and had some for lunch today.
I also ate last night and this morning the rhubarb and total yoghurt suggesed by BIWI - totally delicious!! - and a bar.
Felt a bit sick all morning, don't know if it's the lo-carbing kicking in or what, still bunged up too ! (TMI)

Ah BIWI rhubarb and yoghurt sounds lovely but are they allowed yet on the IPD version, do you know? I think the phase 1 bit is hardcore!

I'm also confused about butternut squash and celeriac... both are suggested as OK in some places on the pig2twig site and not others.

I haven't gone down the 'splenda' route yet - want to see if I can wean myself off sweet things without it.

No idea about the rhubarb/yoghurt being allowed in IPD - although I would suspect not.

Re the lack of hunger, this is a sign that you are in ketosis, and is a great part of low carbing. It helps you to control food, rather than the other way round - which is usually what happens when you start to diet. It means that you will stop obsessing about food, what you're having to eat next, how many calories it has in it, when you can have it, can you fit in another snack, what shall I do with the left overs, oh no I've eaten them, well, I'll just take that off tomorrow's calorie allowance ....

I can understand you feeling a bit fed up with meat, and I think it is a harder aspect of the earlier stages of low carbing (if you're doing a harder core stage).

Can you try to move towards more main meal salads? For example, I sometimes have a salad with lots of leaves (whatever kind you like), topped with hot pan fried red peppers and spring onions, with grated parmesan. That's quite filling and satisfying.

Or fish? Fresh fish, or tinned - tuna mayonnaise is a good option. I make it a bit more interesting by adding a little tomato puree/ketchup (go easy on that), with some chilli powder and chopped raw red pepper.

There are some veggie low carb books - I have one by Rose Elliot called "The Vegetarian Low-Carb Diet Cookbook", although I have to confess I've never cooked anything from it. She also has three phases, with her first phase allowing 20g carbs per day, like Atkins.

It's telling that most of the recipes I looked at and liked were for phases 2 & 3!

What about trying something like the chicken curry recipe I posted on this thread - it's really low carb and I can vouch for it being delicious. You could serve it just with salad leaves, or other low carb veg - spinach would be very good.

Thanks for that: good pep talk!

So you do a more general low carb maintenance thing? I am determined to stick to the two week induction. It's only two weeks out of my fat life, isn't it? It is hard though [whine] though yes, as you say, the lack of appetite makes it easier.

Yes, I've never really done a proper plan. (although that's probably also why I've never reached my target )

BTW - have just realised, from coming across a CAT from you (sent ages ago re Twitter), just where you work! DS1 has put it as one of his uni choices, to do philosophy and history.

Woohoo. I hope he likes it (but I'll still talk to ya if he doesn't [wink - it isn't for everyone. Vair good people in phil and hist.

Am feeling a bit better this afternoon, though slightly nervous. According to India and Neris, day 5 is usually the worst. So am expecting to crash and burn.

We have a fridge full of salad but planning roast chicken and butternut squash tonight. I think the squash is a bit carby but I neeeeeeed it.

I think it's his 2 or 3 preference, Wilf.

Although I had better not get ahead of ourselves here - we still haven't received any offers, so let's wait and see ...!

I remember reading somewhere in IPD/on pig2twig about a major poo happening at some point too. That should help you!

You might find the boglog interesting!

Hope the link works, as I think you have to be registered to be able to read the forum ...

Yes I read the boglog!!

Weighed myself today, was really pleased to see that I have dropped 2lbs! Yay!
98

Lunch with friends tomorrow tho, gonna have to be very careful

Brilliant!

Do you know where you're going for lunch? Could you plan ahead and work out what you're going to eat? Some places have their menus online which would help you.

Thankyou!

Might be Pizza Express, in which case I could have the chicken and goats cheese salad which is ok as long as I don't have the dressing.
Will obv be my main meal and then I will have something very light in the evening.
Maybe I could offset it by going to the gym beforehand?

According to the wii today I've lost 3 lbs. I'm not convinced, but not going to argue .

pixi - 97