If you’re reading this then you must be in the same boat I was about 8 months ago. Back then, all I did was eat junk food. Packets of this and boxes of that. Bottles of coca-cola and chocolate milk, along with buckets of ice cream. I was on the fast track to diabetes, heart attacks and even death. But after I had a fling with a girl I decided I wanted more. I didn’t want to be the rebound guy or someone people only talk to too either make themselves feel better or because they felt sorry for me. I wanted to stand out from the crowd, I wanted to turn heads. But the only way I could do that is if I wasn’t fat. Now if you’re anything like me, you have a long list of failed diets under your belt. I bet this leaves you feeling pretty discouraged, I know I was. But then I decided it was time to break free of the flabby shackles that had held me back for years. So the next day I went to the chemist and looked through their range of dietary aids. I know what you’re thinking, sounds like the start of another failed weight loss program. But you’d be wrong, just like I was. So while I was there, I came across a meal replacement shake. Of course I was sceptical at first, but after reading the back of the box and remembering the commercials on TV I decided it was worth a shot. So I bought it. Now, if you’ve seen the commercials on TV that promise “You can lose all the weight you want while still eating all your favourite foods.” You’re probably thinking “That sounds too good to be true.” Well the sad fact is, it is too good to be true. Eating all our favourite food is how we got to the point we’re at. So after a month on this diet I wasn’t noticing any results at all. The scales weren’t moving and I didn’t notice any changes about myself. I was about to quit but then I decided to get serious and do some research. I discovered that the bare minimum amount of calories a person can eat before their body goes into “Starvation mode” is 1200. This would be the key to the success of my diet. So after I discovered this I went out and bought some digital scales so I could precisely track my progress and I also bought some more shakes. Then I began to focus on everything, I measured my food and counted every calorie. But all of the hard work paid off now that I’ve lost 35 KG or 77 Lbs and my Dietician is telling me that losing any more weight/fat can pose health risks since there isn’t enough fat left to use and my body will start converting my muscles to energy. This is a very bad thing because we want to keep the muscle, but also because your heart is a muscle and your body will burn through heart muscle for energy. The funny thing is, with the diet I’m about to show you, you even burn fat while you’re sleeping. Sounds too good to be true doesn’t it. But guess what, I’m telling the truth. So let’s get down to business.
I’m adding an information page just to clarify a few things before we get started. 1. Fiber: Soluble and insoluble fiber both have great effects. But the main ones are that it attracts water and turns to gel during digestion, traps carbohydrates and slows the absorption of glucose, lowers total and LDL cholesterol, regulates blood sugar and reduces risk of heart disease. So for just those reasons you can see why this is important. The fact that it turns to gel during digestion is the reason why fiber helps you to feel full. Also, trapping the carbohydrates and slowing the absorption of glucose means you’ll stay full for longer and you’ll have a steady source of energy. Regulating blood sugar also helps to keep your insulin levels stable. If your insulin levels become high, your metabolism slows down. 2. Water: Health care professionals say that you need to drink at least 2 Litres or half a Gallon of water each day. But for this diet, we’re not just going to be drinking it because it makes us healthy. We’re going to be drinking it for 2 main reasons. The first being that it helps to make you feel full. This is going to be a life saver in the early stages of the diet. And the second reason is that it boosts your metabolism. Another bonus is that when you finish your diet, you won’t be craving the drinks that are full of sugar anymore. You’ll be so used to water that you won’t want to drink anything else. 3. Metabolism: It’s important to understand that your metabolism is responsible for burning fat and using energy. When your metabolism is high, you burn more energy/fat doing the things you normally would. That’s why, if your metabolism is low, you won’t lose weight and you could potentially put some on. So we want to keep it elevated. Water speeds up the metabolism and it has no calories. Eating does also, but we need to pace ourselves. I’ll go more into that later. 4. Exercise: I know I said you don’t have to. But if you want to start walking, or doing some other kind of light cardio it will help you to get to where you want to be. Since doing exercise of any kind burns calories it will add to the total amount of calories you’ve burned off for the week. But don’t push yourself; if it’s too hard you won’t want to keep doing it. Just walking or something you don’t mind doing would be fine. 5. Goals: Be realistic. I started with a goal of wanting to get to 80 KG from 115 KG by the end of the year. It’s a 35 KG difference. I got to it, but I thought I needed to go further. Turned out I was wrong. So once you think you’re about finished, go see a Dietician and find out how much more, if any, weight you need to lose. When I went, I fully expected to be told to lose more weight. But because I have broad shoulders I was told that it was time to maintain the weight I’m at now.
6. Shakes: Not only are they an easy way to get a meal while counting the calories. They also contain vitamins, minerals and nutrients that your body needs to function. It also boosts your metabolism which as you know by now is very important. The brand of shake I used was Celebrity slim: http://www.celebrityslim.com.au/ if you’re able to get that brand of shake you will be able to follow this diet to the letter. I haven’t been able to test any other kinds of shakes, but as long as you get meal replacement shakes that have about 300 – 400 calories per shake it should work about the same. Make sure to get meal replacement shakes, not protein shakes. Later on near the end of the diet, if you want to start building muscle, you can increase your protein intake by drinking the protein shakes. But I won’t be covering that. 7. BMR: BMR stands for Base Metabolic Rate; this is the max amount of calories you can eat without gaining any weight while not exercising. To lose weight without exercising, we’re going to need to eat less than that. That’s why 1200 Calories is all you’re going to be eating each day until you finish. 8. BMI: BMI stands for Body Mass Index. It is a scientific way of finding out if your weight is appropriate for your height. Unfortunately, the BMI does not measure muscle mass and bone density. So if you have wide shoulders it’s not an accurate test. Your Dietician can plot you onto a graph to see if your weight is appropriate for your height and shoulder width. 9. Calories: There are 3500 calories in 1 Pound of fat. So there are 7717 calories in 1 KG of fat. So each week, we need to burn off 7717 calories to lose 1 KG/2.2 Lbs in 1 week. So if your BMR is 1800 calories and you eat 1200 a day you will burn off about 4200 calories per week. You may notice that that’s not enough to equal 1 KG/2.2 Lbs of fat. But with all the food and supplements you’re taking, along with water and eating every 3 hours, your metabolism will be boosted enough to double or potentially triple that amount of calories burned. But most food is measured in “Kilojoules” so we need to know the conversion. For the rough guess just divide the Kilojoules by 4 to get the calories of something. The precise measurement is 1 calorie = 0.004184 kilojoules but there’s no need to be that precise. 10. Motivation: For the first 1 to 6 weeks this diet will be a challenge. Your body is going to be going from the high calorie, high carbohydrate diet, to one that’s teetering on the starvation line. You are going to feel hungry a lot after the first few days. The key in the initial stages is will power. You have to force yourself to ignore it, do not go and get a coke, or an ice cream. Don’t eat junk food at all. If you absolutely cannot stand the hunger, you can make a salad wrap. Not a sandwich, bread is high in calories and since it’s not much in substance it won’t keep you full for long. I recommend some kind of gluten free rice bread with salad.
Supplements/Supplies So to get through this without dying of a lack of iron or not getting the correct nutrients daily, we’re going to need to go out and buy a few things. All of these things should be easily bought and readily available from your local drugstore/chemist/pharmacist without a prescription. 1. A Good Multi Vitamin: I use Centrum multi vitamin. It works well and it’s easily available (In Australia at least.) You can find out more about this specific multi vitamin here: http://www.centrum.com/ 2. Iron Tablets: This one is the most important thing you need to get. Because on this diet you won’t be eating as much meat, if any, as you used to, you will have a high chance of depleting your iron stores and becoming anaemic. Find out more about anaemia here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anemia 3. Fish Oil Tablets: Not essential but they are a good source of Omega 3 and are good for helping to maintain normal brain growth and activity. 4. Fiber: This is going to be essential to keep everything moving smoothly. This will also help you to feel full for longer. The main benefits of fiber are keeping you full and scrubbing your insides. It will help to get rid of all the stuff that’s clogging your pipes and keep everything running nicely. Make sure to get both soluble and insoluble fiber. 5. Scales: Of course we’re going to need scales. A good set of digital scales is a must for this. Not only will scales boost your moral and let you know that you’re on the right track, you will get a precise measurement of how much weight you’ve lost. You have to weigh yourself when you start, then once a week from then until you finish. Following this eBook you should lose, on average, 1 KG or 2.2 Lbs per week.
