So why am I'm doing so well?

Things have changed. Losing weight is easier now, much easier than I can ever recall in the last 10 years of attempting to lose weight (and failing half the time). I'm not saying that this system is perfect, and I won't ever rebound, but now after 9 successive weekly losses in a row, what's going on?

I'm eating exactly the same thing every day.

I have to say that this has been far easier than I thought it would be. I thought that I'd get bored. That hasn't happened. Ok, it's only been a couple of months so far, so eventually I'd get bored, maybe after a year. In which case, I would change what I'm eating, then carry on. By then anyway I'd be at goal (I know that I'm breaking a major weight loss rule here by assuming that I will be at goal at a specific date, something that hasn't happened in the last 11 years).

By exactly, I mean exactly. The only exception are bananas: because they come with their own packaging, are a bit messy out of their packaging, so I buy a bunch of middle sized bananas.

Here's what I'm eating:

Special K (I know that this is full of sugar, but it's the only sugar I'm having at the moment, excluding rewards)

Eggs

Meat patties

Bananas

Apples

Frozen vegetables (the 5 vegetable variety)

Cheese

Whey protein powder

Added to that is a multivitamin/mineral tablet.

This totals almost exactly 6,000kj/day (and this includes a reward meal every kilogram). Protein is about 90g/day give or take a bit.

It took me about a 2-3 weeks to work out the details of the food that I enjoyed, wasn't too expensive and had enough protein.

Is it healthy? I know I'm bound to be missing out on certain minerals/vitamins, which is why I have a supplement tablet as well. In a couple of weeks I'll be heading off to a dietitian to see if there are any things that I am missing out on, and what to substitute.

The plan is simple. If I eat exactly what I'm meant to (or less), I get a green square on my chart. Otherwise, it's red. That means if I have 61g of Special K, I get a red square. I use this method because it gives me no choice in the matter. After all, if I have 61g, why can't I have 65g? You get the idea.

I accept that this idea isn't for everybody. Some people love food. I am not one of those people. I love specific foods, and dislike others. Generally speaking, the simpler the food, the more I'll like it. I attribute this to my mother, who was fussy about food. She loved to cook, and was a good cook as well. When she died, there were at least 100 ingredients left in the kitchen, some of which I sampled the following year (my father doesn't seem to enjoy cooking, and as you can imagine from my eating list, I loath it).

Growing up, my mother would often make meals that I simply didn't like. I guess the fancier the meal, the greater the chance that I wouldn't like it. I much preferred to snack on an apple and maybe some vegetables than have some of her fancier meals. Anyway, when I told my brother of my new system, he said that my mother would be shocked if she were alive. That would be certainly true. In fact I wouldn't have told her.

Anyway, I'll tell you about this chart of mine. Because images are easier to process than words, I chose a rectangular chart where each day gets a square. A good day gets a green square, a bad day gets a red one. Here it is so far:

Each new day is added to the bottom, starting at the left. See those red squares on the 3rd and 4th bottom row? That's me having Coke (the real deal sugared thing, not that Diet or Zero cheap imitation) just before I gave up on it a couple of weeks ago. Caffeine cravings so far have been few and far between, and I haven't had any chocolate to stem the cravings so far. When I have a reward meal, it's not considered a 'red' day, just because I ate that reward.

Every time I get a reward meal, I do tend to splurge and eat more than that. Yesterday was an example, I was allowed a coffee and slice, and ended up having a 1,000kj chocolate bar as well, plus I was a bit disordered in the evening (I'm not crazy about whey powder, so I ended up having more cheese than I usually do).

Because I'm eating the same thing every day, I get a great insight into my body and how it functions in terms of hunger. So far, I have identified 5 different types of hunger. I'll post about that soon. But I now know my metabolic rate, which is (was) 8,500kj/day. I say was because in the last few weeks, my rate of losing has dropped somewhat, I figure that is because my metabolism has slowed. I'm still losing though. From this I can guesstimate that when I'm at goal, my metabolic rate will be about 8,000kj. This is without exercise. Realistically, exercise is one of those things that I do only to lose weigh, I don't see myself doing it daily (or even weekly) when I'm at goal. Monthly, maybe. I decided that I wanted to be in a state of fitness where I can swim for 30 minutes. How often that requires me to swim for 30 minutes, I have no idea (yet). I'll find out in the next year.

So all in all, I'm really pleased with my new system. I've been thinking about it for months now, but assumed that it would be too hard. Wrong. My cravings have reduced quite a bit too, which is great.