Hey everyone! Just wanted to let you all know that I had my 6th weigh-in yesterday and thank goodness I lost 2.4 pounds! Woohoo! :broc: I am now only .6 pounds away from my goal. Today I start phase 2 and I'm so happy. Hopefully I continue to lose on phase 2 which is 2 weeks long. :D I did the math and I have lost 16.75 inches in measurements too.

The past 2 weeks I have lost less than 3 pounds a week- 2.2 and 2.4. But it all adds up. So anyone who has lost more than that- such as 3 pounds, feel happy! Sam0617- 3.5 pounds lost! Congratulations!! :) I think your weight loss is right on plan. 3-5 pounds a week is the average for a female. We all expect big losses every week but there's so many factors at work in our bodies and lives. It's funny how our expectations are so high for IP.

TexasSweetie- are you keeping a food journal? I wanted to eat something not on plan so bad last week but knowing I had to write it down stopped me. Also, don't beat yourself up over it. Drink a big glass of water and put yourself back on plan directly after a slip-up. It's ok! Don't stress because stress releases cortisol which can halt your weight loss. Take some deep breaths and think of something happy! Take a bath at night. Give yourself a non-food treat. I just bought some new make-up and face lotion. It's a little thing, but you deserve a reward for even being on IP. Not everyone cares enough about their body to go on a healthful eating protocol. :hug: Hang in there! Do you like coffee? I really enjoy my morning coffee and I just started drinking decaf coffee throughout the rest of the day- 2-3 cups total. I get a flavored coffee so it's a little sweet and fragrant. It makes me feel happy! Herbal tea is nice too. :coffee:

One suggestion about the constipation-
eat a handful of lettuce at lunch and dinner and eat your veggies raw. When I don't eat the lettuce and at least 2 cups of veggies raw (for the day), I notice things aren't moving as smoothly. Raw vegetables have enzymes in them that help your digestion. When you cook vegetables, those enzymes are removed and then your body has to use its own enzymes to digest the vegetable, essentially working twice as hard. Does anyone take the IP Enzymes as a supplement? Does it help? I know everyone's bodies are different, and I feel for anyone who has constipation. It's the worst! They tried to sell me the Enzymes at my clinic, but luckily it was just a one day problem. Raw veggies and lots of water solved it for me. They also said that coffee helps since it's a diuretic. :coffee2:

Cinnamon OMG - you're only .6 lbs away from your goal!! CONGRATULATIONS!!:bravo::cheer3::cheer2::cheer3:
:congrat:
:broc::cheer::broc::cheer:

I AM A CHEATER!!!!!!! Last night I had some mixed nuts. I talked myself into it when I was too hungry to wait for dinner and saw that the carb count is really not the high. The calorie count is, though. Oh, well. First real slip up in three weeks and at least it wasn't a cupcake, or something that would knock me out of ketosis. Thank you for listening to my confession. :)

Brenda, you didn't cheat bad! You needed a snack and really thought well when choosing something. Way to go on cheating with a healthy, high-protein cheat!!!

2nd Day
 

I got through my first day with few bumps! I did get a little hungry and had a headache. I have been splitting my 2 cups of veggies into 1 cup mid morning and then 1 cup at lunch and the same for mid afternoon and dinner. It helps me get through the hunger. I have liked all the food so far. I am using a lemon wedge in my water, per my coach.

Also as I am limited on my coffee, she suggested just drinking hot water in the afternoon. I can use the hot tap at my work and it is surprisingly satisfying.

Hang in there ladies. (no men that I can see!) Also tomorrow I think I have to be out of town for dinner and will have to eat at a restaurant. Any good ideas? I was thinking of Appelbees or Ruby Tuesdays for a small steak, steamed broccoli and a plain dinner salad.

way to go Yinyang, the first few days are the toughest! It gets easier and easier as time goes on :)

Make sure they don't put butter on the broccoli. It may sound crazy, but when I went to a restaurant and asked for just steamed broccolli, they were like "no butter either?"

And say you have a carrot allergy. Because they usually serve the steamed veges with carrots, and the steamed veges are prepackaged side dishes they microwave. Try to have some extra veges at lunch, for some reason, restaurants cheat you out of veges and it always seems like they gave you 1/2 a cup

Hello everyone, I was traveling in the last couple weeks and I really missed reading the posts here. Don't really write much but I'm here....;) lurking around.

Talking about being bad... Last week I was in Orlando on a business trip and I have no idea what got into me :devil: but I just fell off the wagon. Lasted 5 days and now I feel terrible. As soon as I got back home, kicked my rear end back on the wagon and going to meet my coach tonight. I'm scared to face the scale...
Sooooo, I wanted to send positive energy to everyone. Please don't give up just because you had a slip up for a day, or two, or five. Keep fighting!

Applebee's was my first restaurant meal when I started IP. I suggest the sirloin steak (7 ounces so you will have to cut off 2 ounces) and they will substitute the starch (potato?) with a serving of steamed veggies. So you get 2 servings of steamed veggies. You will have to "pick out" the carrot slivers, though.

I also order a green salad (tell them to hold the croutons and cheese.)

Add an iced tea and a glass of water with lemon and you will feel like Royalty! LOL.

My coach says cheating with a few nuts or an ounce of cheese is better than eating a carb. Also, a boiled egg will stop hunger in its tracks. Way to go! You chose well!

Funny you should mention these two restaurants. 2 weeks ago my daughter was in a play at school so I was out a lot during the week so needed to eat out. We went to both Applebee's and Ruby Tuesday! At Applebee's I got the small steak (I think it's listed at 7 oz. but it didn't look that big) and got double broccoli. At Ruby Tuesdays I was hoping for their old Atkin's menu but I guess they don't offer that anymore so I was stuck with salad bar. No other options from what I could see maybe you'll find something. I don't love the salad bar at Ruby's and they didn't have many protein options to choose from, just some really old looking egg bits which I did have but it wasn't enough (I had to boil another egg when I got home and I'm still not sure I had enough protein for that night). The funny thing is, both dinners were exactly the same price - $22.00 for 2 people (DD had similar items). Isn't that weird? But the Applebee's meal was much more satisfying - the steak was good, it was hot and hearty and I didn't have to make it myself!

Just my 2 cents.

Now I'm craving Applebee's....

Hi Texas Sweetie,

A post where I shared what I ate one day is here.

One thing I think is very important is that you know what you're eating -- that you have a good idea of the calories, protein, carbs, fiber, and fat in the food you choose. Not the exact numbers, but a good approximation. And a good idea of the glycemic load as well. That way you can make good choices.

I have a good internal sense of this without having to track it, because I have lots of past experience in tracking. Heck, I was tracking my nutrient levels 20 years ago on a DOS program! Hence, I don't need to track very often anymore. However, if you don't feel confident that you have a good sense of the nutrient profile of your foods, I would highly recommend detailed tracking for a while. Knowledge is power. I use a program called Weight by Date Pro because it automatically tells me the net carbs, and I'm to lazy to do the math myself. However, there are lots of free online sources that work fine.

Regarding tracking: Back when I was a financial advisor I found that some clients had a very clear idea of where their money went, whereas other people had no idea. This really made a huge difference in their financial well-being. Like I had a 32 year old client who earned $350,000 per year and was always broke and way in debt, whereas another 32 year old client who earned $20,000 per year had one house paid off and owned 3 rental houses with manageable mortgages. That comes from the choices one makes, and knowing where your money is going. My husband and I are opposites this way. He ALWAYS knows where his money is going -- he has a good internal sense of it. However, I don't. Unless I track it in Quicken, I don't have a clue. And it shows in our results.

In quantum physics, the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle states that you can never know the exact position and the exact momentum of an electron at the same time. You can know one or the other, but not both. That's because the act of observing the system changes it. Well, I think that's true for a lot of things -- the act of observing something changes it. For me, that is certainly true when I track what I eat, or track where my money goes. When I had financial clients with poor spending habits I would put them on Quicken tracking for 6 months. I would even go to their houses several times to get it set up for them, and to help them with maintenance until they got the hang of it. Once they started to actually SEE where they heck their money went, they automatically made choices that were more in line with the results they wanted.

The nice thing about the IP product system is that there are very few choices one has to make. You get packets, supplements, a list of veggies, and that's pretty well it. It's simple, and it works great for a lot of people. For others who want to branch out more, ya need to be more knowledgeable. I happen to be very analytical, so for me, looking up the nutrient profile of foods and making choices is fun. It's not for everyone though.

Thanks everyone for the ideas for my first meal out. I thought along similar lines too. The carrot allergy was a good idea.

I think I must have ruined my tastebuds from my past eating experiences! Most people have some likes and dislikes in the IP food, but so far I like everything okay. Granted, this is only my second day. The women I work with have always said they can't believe the crummy food that I am able to tolerate. Like the diet soft drinks, spray butter, no fat, no sugar etc. It just seems like a normal way of eating for me now.

I was able to order from Walden Foods and get the five free items. Thanks for that idea also. My coach said that she had clients that just ate the fruit spreads or applebutter in a spoon and not on any food! Hah! Who would have thought we'd get to that.

I have been out to eat three times since I started a week ago. The first time I was at Ruby Tuesday and loaded up on greens and veggies at the salad bar - twice. They only had Balsamic Vinegar so I did olive oil and lemon slices. I had an IP smoothie before I went.

The second time was at a Sports Bar. I ordered a big salad that only ended up having one slice of egg, so I ordered another egg. Again, olive oil and lemon slices for dressing.

Today I went to Ruby Tuesday. Did one trip to the salad bar. Used BBQ Soy Puffs in place of croutons and had just bought some packets of Walden Farms Creamy Bacon dressing. It felt like such a splurge ;)