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I’m still shooting in auto with my Canon Rebel, but I’m trying to learn. I love the photos it takes but the majority of my picture-taking happens with my iPhone. Obviously, what you can do with a phone camera is pretty limited, but I saw this wide angle/macro lens attachment on Photojojo and I WANT!
Isn’t that cool? It’s only $20 and it’s on its way to my house! I’ll be posting my daily progress under the title HCG Diet Update so you can blow right past it if you aren’t interested in whether this so-called “weight loss cure” works for me. My goal is to lose 28 pounds in 26 days and reach 132 pounds, what I weighed for years eating normally until I begin taking a migraine preventative medication in October of 2009. My husband and I are doing the diet together. After bingeing like a fiend on Friday, I started the 500 calorie diet on Saturday. Jack started on Friday. Eating was a breeze because I had prepared all of Jack’s food for him on Friday and knew exactly what to expect. I had grilled several chicken breasts and separated them into 3.5 ounce portions so it would be easy to pack in his lunch or add to a salad for dinner. The most difficult thing for me, by far, on my first day of dieting was giving up half and half in my coffee. You are only allowed 1 tablespoon of milk, so blech. I ate my breadstick and apple for breakfast/mid-morning snack and had the grilled chicken over 3.5 ounces of salad greens splashed with balsamic vinegar. Three and a half ounces of salad greens is a surprising amount of lettuce, and I had to push myself to finish because I wasn’t hungry in the slightest. I also felt very full for a long time after I finished. For dinner Saturday night I brined and roasted a Fresh Market turkey breast seasoned with just salt and pepper. It was delicious and I had plenty left over for lunches this week. I used my scale again and made 3.5 ounce packets of leftovers. We also had broccoli and asparagus. Once again I felt very full and had to work to finish. We had been told we wouldn’t be hungry because of the HCG, but it was still a surprise that such a small amount of food would be totally satisfying. During the day I had the impulse to reach for something to eat several times, especially when I was making lunch and snacks for the kids. I realized that I wasn’t hungry, it was just habit. This habit was probably giving me a huge amount of extra calories every day before the diet. Sunday lunch was sliced chicken over salad greens with balsamic and dinner was sauteed shrimp in lemon juice with sliced tomatoes, cucumber and celery. We had also been warned to expect headaches, particularly if we had been big processed sugar eaters. Yeah. That happened. Jack had a mild headache on Friday and Saturday, but my headaches started Saturday afternoon and were pretty bad. I actually took one of my migraine interruptors on both Saturday and Sunday. I woke up with a mild headache this morning, but it’s mostly gone. Hope the worst of that is behind me. Update: It’s baaaaaaack. Please let this be the last day! I know my decorated sugar cookie obsession over the past couple of months is what I’m paying for and I’M SO SORRY OMG! Make it stop! These are my early morning weights so far: Laurin: Morning of binge day: Day 1 Day 2 Day 3 (Today) Products update: Jack is using the shampoo and toothpaste, but is sticking with his regular deodorant. I guess time will tell if it affects his losses. I’m using baby oil for moisturizing my body and cuticles. I’m also using my home-brewed deodorant, the toothpaste and the Carmex. I haven’t washed my hair since Friday because my Deva Curl products let me go so long with fresh hair. I’m going to wash my hair tomorrow and see if it has an impact on my weight loss. I’ll just have to suffer with frizzy hair if I’m not losing weight after using my regular stuff. Overall mood: Wanting to punt kittens over these headaches, but really happy not being hungry and with the loss. I’ll admit that I had not given much thought to the idea that the products you use on your face and body can wreck your HCG diet. Surely that was just a quaint notion from Dr. Simeons who, let’s face it, used phrases like “confinement” to describe a pregnant woman’s labor time. But I wanted to be thorough and decided that if I was going to go almost 30 days eating only 500 calories per day I’ll be damned if I’m going to be tripped up by my deodorant or lip gloss. After researching acceptable products for a while last night, I had to break the news to Jack that we probably should change our products for the month. I laid out the science for him and explained why his shampoo, bar soap, deodorant, and toothpaste would have to go. They all contain fats and oils which can be used by the body for fuel instead of liberating the abnormal fat and you might not lose as much weight as you want. Allegedly. But I think it’s better to be safe than sorry when there’s no down side to using oil-free products. I helpfully offered to find new products for him today at the health food store, to which he said, You just love buying stuff, don’t you? Fucking men. I was the most worried about the deodorant. I had no idea deodorant contained so much oil. The articles I read all recommended that crystal rock thing, which has always seemed way too bizarre to me, or all-natural deodorants which I’ve never liked. Then I found an article about making your own deodorant. The author swore up and down that it worked even better for her than regular antiperspirants and deodorants that contain aluminum, and it only had two ingredients, baking soda and cornstarch, which I already had. Product testing time! I whipped up a tiny batch following the directions and put it in an unused spice bottle with a shaker top – I had one left over from the snow globe project. I sprinkled a little on a cotton round and “powdered” each pit. Easy enough, but would it work? Even if it did, would Jack use it?
At the end of the day, I evaluated whether it had worked. It’s hot again here in Florida, so there were definitely a few times today I got a little sweaty. A thorough inspection of myself revealed no smell, no white residue and no horrible sticky feeling. I am now an enthusiastic baking soda and cornstarch deodorant user, even when the diet is over. I’m not going to discuss the mountains of information about whether regular antiperspirant/deodorant causes cancer or Alzheimer’s because this isn’t that kind of blog. You can read about antiperspirant and deodorant dangers here. Here are some of the other HCG-approved products we are using. Shampoo: Jason Kids Only I can’t wait to show Jack the deodorant I lovingly made for him. I’ll be posting my daily progress under the title HCG Diet Update so you can blow right past it if you aren’t interested in whether this so-called “weight loss cure” works for me. My goal is to lose 28 pounds in 26 days and reach 132 pounds, what I weighed for years eating normally until I begin taking a migraine preventative medication in October of 2009. My husband and I are doing the diet together. Abort! Abort! Today was to be the start of the diet, with the first morning HCG injection. Jack and I both had an injection yesterday at the clinic, sort of a champagne bottle smash to the prow to officially launch the diet! Not really. It wasn’t that exciting. I think it was just to make sure we both knew how to inject the HCG solution into a pudgy section of our bellies. Ha! Could have done that blindfolded. Just so you know, the needle is the teensiest ever. It’s a 5/16th inch ultra-fine insulin needle. I barely feel it. My beginning stats: Weight: 160 We both did our injections this morning before Jack left for work. I weighed in at 159 pounds. We were supposed to start the first of two days of the loading phase, also known as eat as much fatty food as you can for two days while the HCG gets cranked up in your system, except that I didn’t get to begin today because I got a visitor. That’s right, I had no idea when my period was going to start and yes, they asked me. Helpful comment from the husband: How can you not know when your period is supposed to start? You aren’t supposed to take HCG while you are menstruating, so I have to wait it out and start when it’s over. I anticipate that my first morning injection will now be in three to four days. I know this might sound incredible, but I wasn’t hungry today at any time and was full of energy for the first time in ages. Placebo effect? Maybe, but if this is an early indication of how I’m going to feel on the diet, I’m pretty excited. The most amazing part is that I did not have sugar cravings for the first time in over a year. The only problem I see is that the two loading days of eating are going to be hard because I didn’t even think about food today. Sorry for the false alarm. And yes, Dad, I just told the Internet I’m on the rag. |
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