Well miracles do happen. I've lost 10kg since the beginning of March. This is after years of trying diets and eating plans, even counterweight prescribed by my lifestyle advisor at the gp surgery. None of these worked for more than a few weeks.
So what did I do?
I did what I do best and struck out alone, reasearched food as molecular structures, how the body processes them and came up with the best diet plan for me. It's very basic, at times tedious, but it works for me.
I started with a week of detox. This was to get my body used to expelling waste that it likes to hang onto. It was tough with a feeling of weakness and headaches mid week, but this settled. This may be more severe if you have had a sugar rich diet. It takes a year for your body to adjust to a reduced sugar diet. I did this about 5 years ago.
Then I moved onto the Grapefruit diet. This is 1/2 grapefruit with each meal, although I do a whole grapefruit with the morning and evening meal. The first meal of the day is protien only, the other 2 are protien and vegetables. Snacks are vegetables. You can eat as much as you like of anything, and vegetables with high water content have precedence over carb laden winter root veg. You can also use small amounts of fats to cook with.
Raw veg and plain cooked protien are prefered over sauce laden dishes, which does take a bit of getting used to. The other thing you must do, is drink a lot of water. Tea asnd coffee are no nos but you can have herbal/fruit teas.
You do this for 12 days which gives you a weekend off every fortnight where you can eat what ever you want. I am careful to balance this with tiny portions, because the first weerkend off, I just ate and ate and put on 3 of the 5 kilos I had lost. You are expected to loose 1-2 kilos a week.
This diet works because you are getting the essential minirals and vitamins in their raw state, without alteration by cooking. The body finds it easier to absorb them. Grapefruit has enzymes that aid digestion, which means that your body processes food quicker, toxins are not being held onto which refuces the amount of water your body holds onto too. The body doesn't need extra water for flushing out the toxins. It teaches your body to use your fat stores for energy.
Over time, I've settled down to a nice routine, and actually eat a lot less than I did when I started out.
The weight loss is surprising and very welcome. Although I do now have more back pain. This is because my centre of gravity has changed. Even the slightest change from the norm is detected by my body and it's response it's to say I don't like it, and get into the pain cycle again.
The other reason is that I am loosing my internal corset. The layer of fat did a good job of holding things together, filling in the gaps. Now my loose SIJ joints are less supported internally. I have a weird sensation that my legs don't feel like they belong to me.
I do have a bit more to loose, so I'm expecting these symptoms to increase. I am doing more pilates, getting specific massage to certain muscle groups to counteract it.
If anyone wants to try the grapefruit diet, check with your gp first, it may not be compatible with some meds. Also the carbs and dairy food groups are excluded.