Last Sunday I started Medifast, something I swore I would never do. Being an extremely overweight person effects every aspect of my life. I tried Weight Watchers and had limited success, but didn't even scratch the type of losses I need to reach. With a big vacation looming and stories in the news about overweight passengers getting bumped from flights, my weight is doing nothing but stressing me out. Which if you didn't know, in my case, leads to more weight gain. Not acceptable! So I bit the bullet and made a move towards health. And trust me, some of these "meals" might as well be lead - they're just that awesome.
This week was not fun, period. If you've ever gone on a diet, you know the first week, aka the adjustment period, can be brutal. Any diet worth doing eliminates most of the food you normally eat. Medifast is similar, but takes dieting one step further by eliminating practically all food from your diet. Multiply the brutality of a regular diet, such as Weight Watchers, by about 100 and there your have Medifast. Going from eating 3-4 meals a day to 4 meal replacements (aka bars or shakes) and one "lean and green" each day was a huge paradigm shift for me.
I had high hopes for some of the "foods" available on the plan, but was sorely disappointed. Personally, I believe if you're advertising something as oatmeal, there should actually be oatmeal in it! Just me, call me crazy. One of the bars surprisingly had raisins in it. I thought it was bug parts or some other animal parts since I was eating a lemon meringue bar! Who the heck puts raisins in a lemon bar???? I almost barfed eating that one. I'm all for maximizing protein, I just would prefer to do it with something considered edible to most Americans.
That said, I did it. I never made it to the prescribed 5 meal replacements per day, but definitely kept my diet lean and green (L&G) for my one actual meal each day. I even managed to keep it L&G when eating out at two very tempting restaurants! And it paid off. This week I lost 11.2 lbs.
I can feel it, both positively and negatively. I definitely feel that there's less of me to lug around, but just as much feel how I am not eating enough. To say that I've been tired is an understatement, same goes for my behavior. Nothing makes a fat girl grumpier than taking away her food. Enough said.
Tomorrow I take on week two. With a lofty goal and only 7 weeks to get it done, its on bitches!
