My First NO S Diet Thanksgiving

The day began when we took our beautiful homemade pumpkin pies out of the refrigerator. After making them completely from scratch the night before, I must say we were pretty proud!

Next on the TO DO list ... walk over to Starbucks for a Triple Shot Grande Caramel Macchiato! Can you say YUM! YUM! Our neighborhood Starbucks was "in the season" and packed. The friendly staff put up festive decorations the night before and it looked like everyone within a five mile radius decided to start their Thanksgiving the same way we did. The line was long but everyone was friendly and in a good mood. Now it is time to go back home, turn on the stereo and fill the CD player with seasonal music and get to work.

Hmmm ... this turkey is taking longer than we thought it would to cook. GOODNESS we are hungry and doesn't that pie just look absolutely DELICIOUS! Yes, we had a delicious piece of our "Chai Pumpkin Pie" with plenty of whip cream for breakfast. You could just taste the fresh cinnamon that we wore our poor little fingers to a nub grating last night.

Ahhh.... Finally! The turkey is done. Let's do this in courses. Let's start with turkey, stuffing and plenty of turkey gravy.

OOPs! Now we are TOO FULL for the second course. Oh well, the sun is out and it's a beautiful day. Let's go and get some fresh air and walk back to get another coffee at Starbucks before they close. DARN! They are out of vanilla syrup for a Caramel Macchiato. Try one with sugar-free vanilla syrup. What a rotten aftertaste. How can anyone gag this stuff down? They remake us lattes with a swirl of caramel on top. I would have enjoyed a plain latte more. Note to self: Next time either a latte or a macchiato ... the twain don't mix. Enjoy a longer walk home.

Do the dishes. Clean the kitchen. Make the phone calls. Ahhhh ... a nice cup of licorice tea to settle the tummy and make room for ...

Yes, I did. I had two more pieces of pie. Each was just as yummy as the first. But I have to admit the second piece was eaten very SSSSLLLLOOOOWWWWLLLYYYY ... cause my tummy was a bit full.

It's getting late and I realize it just won't be THANKSGIVING without some sweet potatoes and cranberry sauce ... And now, this is exactly how we feel!

Hope that everyone had as HAPPY a THANKSGIVING as we did!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Photo: Fairy Tale Pumpkins bought at the local Farmer's Market

Eight Month Results

These are my eighth months results:

Pounds lost: 11.8 (from 134.6 to 122.8 - I am 5'3.5") (And remember, my original maintenance goal was 124.5 pounds)

Percent: 9%

BMI: 21.1 (was 23.7)

Current bodyfat: 19% (was 27.7% in December 2007) It looks like I am maintaining about 99 pounds of LBM (lean body mass.) That has been pretty consistent for several months. What I have been trying to do is peel off a little bit more fat ... which, honestly, for me has been quite challenging and slow. I have found "undereating" REALLY DOES pull off the muscle and overeating ... well, let's face it folks ... makes you "fluffy."

"Overtraining", especially long steady-state cardio sessions also don't seem to do much for me other than "costing" a lot of time AND then increasing appetite. Think I'll stay away from that.

What works best for me are weights and high intensity cardio sessions of about 20 minutes.

It has been really fun to use my own body as my own "laboratory" and test some of these conflicting "theories". I used to be a big walker. I walked almost everyday for about ten years. There are definitely "health benefits" especially as opposed to a completley sedentary lifestyle, but it appears that for me, short, intense cardio sessions are much more "mentally" and "physically" stimulating. That being said, we all have to start somewhere and walking is a great place to start.

As far as my eating goes, doing weights and HIT (high intensity cardio) seems to give me the best balance between hunger and activity. I eat less and do not feel "starved".

The No S Diet has been critical in achieving my current and what I consider "very mainatainable" success. By letting go of external guidelines stipulating what or how much to eat I have found a new found freedom and connection to my own body.

In the long run (and let's not forget "the long run" IS what we are talking about here) with all the stresses and strains of modern life, being able to simplify a weight maintenance program pays huge dividends in time and energy. I love having the excess time and energy that I used to spend meddling with my weight and eating issues to focus on other things.

All and all I have to continue my "rah rah" for the No S Diet. Its simple approach to moderation is sheer genius!

"the Moderation Revolution"

On the back cover of the NO S Diet is a blurb: Join the Moderation Revolution!

The question for most of us "what in the heck is moderation" and "how in the heck do we apply it in our daily lives"?

According to the dictionary moderate means things like: kept or keeping within reasonable or proper limits, not extreme, excessive or intense ... even :mediocre or fair. That being said why in the heck is it just so impossible for so many of us to practice "moderation" before we come to the No S Diet?

Interesting question.

Interestingly enough, the inability to eat moderately seems to "birth" the inablity to keep our "approach" to eating in moderation either. Ridiculous amounts of time, money and energy are spent TRYING to "CONTROL" a "perfect" food intake, whether its reaching that "perfect number of calories each day" or "perfectly avoiding offending food substances" our approach to eating is anything BUT moderate.

And this is where the No S Diet excels. No fancy calorie counting PDA required, no pre-packaged boil in the pouch meals, no points, nothing really at all required other than the plate that you put your food on.

Completely unobtrusive to the untrained eye, the NO S Diet is all about moderation.

I am starting to deeply suspect that "moderation" and the learning of it on just about all fronts of life is the only key to lasting, permanant weight loss and a peaceful and enjoyable relationship with food. VIVA LA REVOLUCION!

Too Little, Too Much

One if the things that I am loving about the No S Diet is my increasing ability to calibrate my meals according to my hunger on a daily and meal by meal basis. Since I don't work out or move the same amount every day, it would make sense that my needs for fuel would need to be modified accordingly.

Let's face it ... some days, Sundays, I am a slug and other days I am in high gear and hardly sitting down or still. With the only unit of measure on the No S Diet being one plate or one bowl, it has become a huge learning process to figure out how much I need to put on that one plate or in that one bowl.

Why has this been such a huge learning process? As an ex-dieter, binger, I was either relying on an external authority ... i.e. calories, menus, food plans, to define how much food I should eat or I was pretty much in binge mode. Now into my eighth month on the NO S Diet, I have shifted to the internal authority of my own daily cues of hunger to help me sort it all out.

This is something akin to finally growing up. And I love it. I love being physically aware of too little and too much. No other process or method or diet for that matter has gotten me this close to consistently listening to and learning to rely on the natural method of weight control ... my very own appestat.

Consistency is the Key to Results

Years ago I used to do the original Firm workout videos. They had an abs video with about five ab segments. There was an adorable italian guy in the videos who at the end of one of the segments said "Consistency is the key to results."

That particular phrase has struck with me through the years as the truth of it is proved over and over again in my life. And following the No S Diet it has been proved true once again.

Consistently keeping my N days green, pretty much no matter what I eat or how much I eat on my S/NWS days has been the key to my results on the No S diet. Consistently eating only three one plate/bowl meals every N day and not eating snacks, sweets or seconds has paid huge dividends for me.

Sometimes I fret that I "ate too much" on an S/NWS day. But the truth really is "consistency is the key to results." As long as I have kept my N days green, the weight has slowly but steadily come off and now it is staying off.

Once again I am truly learning, it is consistency over the long term that is the key to permanent and lasting results.

... Nothing You Can't Comfortably Do Without

By cutting out [snacks, sweets, and seconds] during the week, you cut out plenty, but nothing you can't comfortably do without.

p.5 The No S Diet by Reinhard Engels

The "nothing you can't comfortably do without" is probably what is debatable for some of us, especially at the beginning. In a culture, where "well-known" fitness gurus are telling us to eat every five minutes to keep our metabolism up and so ... god forbid, we won't get hungry ... many of, especially in the beginning wonder ... can we, in fact, comfortably do without snacks?

The truth of the matter is that in the first few weeks, it might not be so "comfortable" to forego snacking. But it is truly amazing how quickly our body adapts when we are strict with our N days.

Others, of us, sugar babies that we are, fret. No chocolate? No soda? No snagging a handful of jelly beans when we cruise by the receptionist's desk? And HOW WILL we say "no" to the rest of the ubiquitous sweets that are offered, pushed, insisted upon? Perhaps in the beginning we are not so comfortable with "no sweets" either.

Our "no thank you's" are rusty and flimsy, perhaps even a bit wimpy from atrophy and little use. But, once again, it is truly amazing how quickly we can adapt when we are strict on our N Days.

And let's not neglect "no seconds". In a world where our eyes are much bigger than our stomachs, the concept of "no more" may seem daunting. But, once again, by keeping those N days green, in what is almost no more than a blink of the eye, you just might learn that "hunger" actually feels good and "less really is more."

So that, in not too long, perhaps in just the amount of time it takes to join the "21 day club" we have arrived at a point, where No Snacks, No Sweets, and No Seconds are something we can comfortably do without on our N Days and look forward to on our S days.

Photo: Yummy Lunch of Grilled Albacore, Sauted Spinach with Loads of Garlic and EVOO and Spiced Yams

Hexagram 61: Limitation

Through the years I have dabbled in studying different religions and philosophies. One of my favorite "soothing" books is the I Ching. I am very fond of the "taoist" strain in its teachings, not so much the "confucianist."

Since I have been on the NO S Diet, I have often thought of Hexagram 61: Limitation and how enlightening it was the first time I read it. In a culture where "more" is never enough and "too much" hardly seems like a respectable amount, the wisdom of "limitation" is like good medicine.

Let's look at some excerpts from the Wilhelm translation below:

The Judgement

Limitation. Success.
Galling limitation must not be persevered in.

The Image

A lake is something limited. Water is inexhaustible. A lake can only contain a definite amount of the infinite quantity of water; this is its peculiarity. In human life too the individual achieves signficance through the discrimination and setting of limits ... Unlimited possibilites are not suited to man; if they existed his life would only dissolve in the boundless. To become strong, a man's life needs the limitations ordained by duty and voluntarily accepted. The individual attains significance as a free spirit only by surrounding himself with these limitations and by determining for himself what his duty is.

To me traditional diets are a "galling limitation", i.e. limits that lead to the "misfortune" of failure if "persevered" in. The"diet backlash" or binge that follows every diet is a good example of such "misfortune". The No S Diet, on the other hand, gives us just enough limits to be appropriately discriminating in our daily eating lives.

The No S Diet is definitely NOT a "galling limitation." It is just the right amount of limits to help us acheive "success" and get on with the business of living our otherwise fascinating lives.

Anxiety

One of the many reasons I used to overeat and binge was to handle anxiety. I am not necessarily talking about huge or crippling anxiety, I am talking more about the "garden variety" kind of anxiety of living a "normal" life in the "modern world." The somewhat ongoing background tensions caused by interruptions, miscommunications, minor daily frustrations and obstructions.

This morning I accompanied a loved one to the hospital for an outpatient procedure. Hospitals, Parking Lots, Doctors, Consent Forms and basically the realm of the "unknown" loomed before me and my loved one. In the past, I might have been completely "unaware" of my anxiety, moving like shifting sands just below the surface of my consciousness, and used the experience to be "really hungry" all of a sudden.

But let's see, yesterday and today were N days. Hmmmmmmmm ... not a lot of room their for "food" subterfuge.

I began to realize last night that I was bit worried, just because anytime someone goes under anesthesia there is always THAT RISK. Small, but present. Curiously, I focused on how would I handle breakfast which was actually concrete and helpful. After much back and forth I decided the best bet would be to pack it and take it with me.

That is what I did this morning. Packed my healthy one bowl breakfast and threw it in my purse with a spoon. SO there I was in the waiting room ... tick tock tick tock ... the time was past when they were supposed to call me. Other patients "drivers" had already been called. I got to feel all my anxiety. Not mind bending. Not extremely high level. Just enough that prior to No S I might have ended up with some unwanted pastry from the coffee cart or some unsatisfying fare from the hospital cafe ... both reasons to indulge MORE when it was all over and I was free to leave the hospital, discharge my loved one, and then be free to ... well ... eat.

But that's just not how it went to day. I ate my one bowl. Satisfying as it always is. Lived through the anxiety. Tended to my loved one. Had a nice one plate lunch and got to work when it was all said and done. A "normal" day.

HALLELUJAH!

Who would have thought that I would have ever chosen anxiety over a donut?

Best Weekend Ever!

First of all, a housekeeping item.

After an emotionally tumultuous process I have decided to continue blogging about my No S Diet journey, however because of the time consuming nature of taking and preparing pictures I am going to start today, doing my week day posts without photos and save the pics for "weekend features". For right now this seems like a better balance than either continuing as I have been or totally stopping the blog. Okay. We shall see how it goes!

As far as being the "Best Weekend Ever!" this one was definitely it.

Why?

Simple reason.

I actually woke up grrrrrrrr .... HUNGRY this morning. "So what," you say. OH NO. This is the first Monday since I have been on the No S Diet that I actually woke up MONDAY MORNING - well, hungry.

What is the significance of that?

Well it means that I did not overeat this weekend. At all. AMAZING. I had my delicious caramel macchiatos, a dark chocolate/coffee bar from Starbucks, a lovely Italian meal and even ... GASP a peice of Von's birthday cake. What can I say, I was in the mood.

Anyway I also ate salmon, artichoke, healthy beans and lentils, an organic free range turkey burger, plain organic yogurt .... blah blah blah. BUT the thing is it is becoming more effortless and I am becoming more skillful at keeping to the right size portions for my body by "eyeballing" things and sensing how my body is "feeling."

Yes, I am somewhat delirious with this progress. I suppose you can tell!