A 7 day challenge

lina1131

I am challenging myself for 7 days to cut out all bread, pasta, rice, and anything processed. This really isn't really about seeing the pounds on the scale go down, it's more about eating whole and fresh foods to see how different my body will feel. I'm really curious. I have done really well making a lifestyle for myself, now I want to experiment and see what works, what doesn't, what makes me feel good, what doesn't. I'll be getting plenty of calories from fruits and veggies and protein from lean meats. The ONLY exception I have made is my coffee creamer in one cup of coffee in the morning. I'm trying to experiment, not kill someone. :bigsmile:

I will document how it goes here :bigsmile:

(Again, losing weight would be nice but isn't the main goal here, but still want to document the weightloss so...)

Starting weight - 176.6 this morning.

Does anyone want to join me?

shanerylee

I would love to join you this sounds great. does cottage cheese count as processed? Thats what I packed for breakfast. Maybe I need to get clear on what is clean and what isnt.

lina1131

You know, this is going to be a learning experience for us. I'm not sure about cottage cheese. I need to find out about Feta cheese because that's usually what I have on my salad.

Does anyone know?

I'll try to find out.

lina1131

Okay, I am pretty sure we are both okay with having cottage and feta cheese.

shanerylee

good cuz Im eating it now
ill friend request you if thats okay, it will be easy to keep track of it instead of coming back to the post? Okay with you?

lina1131

Yes, absolutely. I'm still going to post in here once a day to update.

lina1131

I normally have a sandwich thin, 2 teaspoons of peanut butter, and a banana for breakfast. This morning I had a banana and some chicken (lol). I feel full.

shanerylee

well good for you, thats awesome. I screwed up already. I was hungry at work and grabbed a soy joy bar........ugh. But im staying aware.

lina1131

Aww, that's okay. Just pick right back up!

For lunch I had a greek salad and rotisserie chicken. I just came back from my workout and did 4.25 miles outside and burned 566 calories. I need to add some raw almonds and something else to bump my calories for the day. Day one so far has been good. I don't feel the need to have any of the stuff that i'm cutting out.

I hope I feel the same way tomorrow. :bigsmile:

cutmd

I did a similar challenge before. I encourage you ladies to read Michael Pollan, he is a great enemy of processed foods that has changed the way I eat and think about eating. I followed principally 3 rules

1. Don't eat anything your great grandmother wouldn't recognize as food
2. Avoid food products containing ingredients that are a) unfamiliar, b) unpronounceable c) more than five in number -- or that contain high-fructose corn syrup. No more than 1/3rd of your intake should involve such "food" (this one is TOUGH in our society).
3. Eat organic and home cooked food as much as possible

Here is a link to a long but great article he wrote. I highly recommend his books, "in defense of food", "omnivore's dilemma", and "food rules"

http://www.michaelpollan.com/article.php?id=87

In short, his credo is "eat food, not too much, mainly plants"

While not a weight loss plan, it is easy to stick to your calorie limit eating as Pollan does. Keep it up and you will feel so good! Happy eating!

lina1131

Cutmd, I have read his book and I loved it.

lina1131

Day 2 - 175.2

Down - 1.2 lbs

I did not find yesterday to be too difficult. The only remotely hard part was watching my husband and daughter shove pasta in their face while I ate chicken and carrots. I liked the chicken and carrots though, they were tasty.

Today's menu looks something like this:

Breakfast - coffee and 4 hardboiled egg whites. 1 tomato diced. 1 teaspoon of olive oil.
Snack - a handful of raw almonds
Lunch - Greek salad with shredded chicken
Snack - Banana and orange
Snack - ?? Not sure but need to add something to up my calories here
Dinner - Chicken and Veggie stirfry!

Workout will be light today since I had a pretty intense 3 days of jogging this week. I'll do some weights and abs today!

lina1131

Halfway through day two. I am a little hungrier than yesterday, but I did do weight training today. I am snacking on raw almonds right now. I feel good. Kind of tired.

lina1131

Day 3

175.4 - No loss No gain (but my special friend showed up this morning)

I know I ate really well yesterday so i'm thinking the no gain on first day of said friend really equals a loss. We'll see lol. Yesterday was harder than the first day. Toward the end of the day I got really drained. Hopefully today will be a good day.

My arms, under my arm pits and my chest area are so sore today like someone beat the **** out of me.

I hope you all have a lovely day!

Reign

I did a similar challenge before. I encourage you ladies to read Michael Pollan, he is a great enemy of processed foods that has changed the way I eat and think about eating. I followed principally 3 rules

1. Don't eat anything your great grandmother wouldn't recognize as food
2. Avoid food products containing ingredients that are a) unfamiliar, b) unpronounceable c) more than five in number -- or that contain high-fructose corn syrup. No more than 1/3rd of your intake should involve such "food" (this one is TOUGH in our society).
3. Eat organic and home cooked food as much as possible

Here is a link to a long but great article he wrote. I highly recommend his books, "in defense of food", "omnivore's dilemma", and "food rules"

http://www.michaelpollan.com/article.php?id=87

In short, his credo is "eat food, not too much, mainly plants"

While not a weight loss plan, it is easy to stick to your calorie limit eating as Pollan does. Keep it up and you will feel so good! Happy eating!

OMG, my mom tried doing this on the Daniel Fast. It is sad how hard it was to find foods with five ingredients of less.

cutmd

Hi Lina:
I am enjoying your updates. I'm glad you read Pollan, he's great! Re: watching others eat, I have the same problem. I am such a "me too" iguana, I see someone eating something, and even if it's something I don't care for and/or know will make me feel badly, I want it too. Thus that has been the only hard part about eating clean.

Re: the five ingredients, I'm surprised how well I have that down now. It really cuts out most processed foods. Only trouble is falling too behind on your calories is easy to do if you're filling up on veggies, fruits, and the like.

lina1131

Cutmd, thanks for reading my updates.

lina1131

Day 4

Weight - 174.4

Total loss - 2.2 lbs

I am usually an early riser, but I have noticed these past couple of days I am getting up a lot earlier than normal. I have no idea if it has anything to do with no processed foods or not, but I sure don't enjoy waking up at 5am. What the hell?

It usually takes me close to a month to lose 2 lbs, seriously, I can't believe I dropped that in 2 days. It's true though, it's very hard to reach 1200 calories when you cut out all that processed stuff. I've been trying to add in some raw almonds and stuff to bump my calorie count up. I have been feeling full, though not over satisfied lately.

I was thinking this morning on whether I was going to try to do this for longer than 7 days once day 7 is up. I don't know. A part of me wants to because it's nice to see the numbers drop, but a part of me wonders if once I stop all this weight is going to just come right back on? I mean realistically, I know for a fact I cannot live without bread, rice and pasta. Okay, I probably can, but I don't want to. I enjoy those foods way too much and have kept them in my foods the entire time I was losing weight (even though the loss was really slow). I do feel a lot cleaner inside (if you know what I mean) and totally lighter.

I hope you all have a lovely day!

Jessica68

You are doing great! even with TOM around..imagine when he leaves the results you might see! Keep up the good work!

fearlessfatty

i'm really enjoying reading your posts - great job and keep us updated!!

cutmd

Obviously some of the weight will be water weight, so that part may return. Some people are sensitive to certain grains. Why don't you try phased adding, like rice for one week, then bread, etc, to see if that applies to you, choosing the least processed of the bunch?

I think shunning processed food gives you a weird energy, that's probably what's waking you up. It fades.