Congratulations sfwasabi for breaking your plateau! As I've said before, your progress is so inspiring. I've been in the Zone for 3 weeks and have lost 6 pounds. I've only been able to exercise a couple of times due to various nasty viruses the kids brought home and shared with me, so I am looking forward to getting back to the gym tomorrow and continuing my weight loss! Keep us posted!!!!

thanks!

congratulations to you, too. it's SO HARD to change your habits.

the bible says that it's easier for a leopard to change its spots than for a man to change.

it's truly remarkable to be able to make changes that last for life!

today has been a really good week. i did my 1/2 hr jog at 5 mph every day so far this week. I had about 2 night-time binges and I paid for them the next day by skipping breakfast - so i didn't gain any weight.

upping my excercise has really been amazing! when you excercise and step up your metabolism, then your body burns more fat all day because it iw working harder.

i've been working out with no weights (just my body weight). i just want to get strong and tone. muscle burns fat, so the more muscle you can build, the more fat you will lose.

here is a link to the workout i've been doing: http://exercise.about.com/library/bl...weight+workout

i've been about 157 and 12.5% body fat for the past two weeks. it's been great!

good luck and keep up the good work!

this was a tough week - but a good one.

i spent the entire week at seminars, meeting people and networking - trying to generate some business.

i jogged 4 days instead of 6 and worked out 2 days instead of 3 and boy did i feel it today! it was tough both excercising and getting through my jog, let me tell ya!

because of the hectic schedule, i didn't get a chance to eat well last week, but i think i'm ok. i probably gained a couple of pounds, so i have to be especially good this week.

I have a very good friend who found out she was insulin resistance. anyway she has tried the zone several times in her life but it never lasted. once the weight started to come off she seemed to have a hard time following it.

anyway I checked into maybe doing it myself and I found based on the book that it really is a low calorie diet. what it addresses or supposed to address is the severe hunger dieters suffer from when they eat less than they need whatever amount that is.

it is supposed to avoid the insulin spikes and insulin is said to be a fat storer hormone while glycagon is a fat burner hormone and is released when the blood sugar remains steady without the spikes.

But I find based on other things I have since learned is that this is trying to treat the symptom of obesity not the actual cause.

EVERY diet tries to deal with the symptom of obesity (changing your behavior to make you lose weight) and not the cause (the reason why you are overweight).

To this end, every diet is flawed, since every diet deals with changing your habits, and not with changing your psychology and emotions.

We overeat for many reasons: we're accustomed to, it makes us feel good, we take comfort in food, we love the taste and texture in our mouths, we love feeling full, etc.

If you are looking for a diet that will deal with the symptom of obesity, you are going to be searching for a long time. Only YOU can change your mind towards the habits that make you overweight. Diet buddies such as you will find here, and the support of family and friends, help a lot!!!

As for the Zone being just another low calorie diet - NOTHING CAN BE FURTHER FROM THE TRUTH!!!

The Zone works not because you are restricting calories, but because you are eating protein, carbs and fats in the right proportions, so that you are not creating and storing fat.

If you look at it superficially, you can say "Oh, you're losing weight because you are only eating 1500 calories, or because you are only eating 1900 calories".

But not all calories have the same effect on your body. If you eat 1500 calories as Carbs, YOU WILL GAIN WEIGHT EVEN EATING A LOW AMOUNT OF CALORIES!!!

The Zone is not about low cal, it's about a high volume of healthy food in proportions that control your insulin levels, keeping you from gaining additional fat and helping you to lose the fat that you have. If you follow the Zone as it's meant to be followed, you will feel full all the time, even if you are eating less calories than you are accustomed to.

The difference that makes the difference is results:

In February 2003 my wife and I were OBESE - I was at 30% body fat, she was at 50% body fat. By 7 months later, I had lost over 60 lbs and was at a healthy weight (about 12-15% body fat). My wife is still overweight, but she has lost almost 60 lbs to date.

We lost it because we followed the Zone diet. My wife followed no excercise, but I started excercising regularly.

I actually had to GAIN weight a couple of weeks ago, because I had lost so much weight and so much body fat in such a short time that there was a LOT of extra skin around my belly. I decided to binge a little and fill it up some, so that it can shrink more slowly as my stomach gets tighter from my excercises.

We still follow the Zone. My wife is still losing weight. I'm more in maintenance mode. I'm excercising and letting my body get more fit and tone and let my skin shrink naturally.

So, if you are looking for a reason why it wont work, then it will never work, because your mind is already convinced that it wont work, but I know that it works because it has completely transformed and changed our lives, and that in less than one year.

I am thinking about starting The Zone next week....would love your thoughts on what books to buy by Dr. Sears that would help me through this process. I am better at reading a book then trying to figure stuff out on the internet....so any help would be greatly appreciated!

I'd recommend starting with "A Week in the Zone". It's a small, inexpensive paperback. It will tell you everything you need to get started on the Zone. Good luck!

Hey everybody - I'm back!

I wanted to share a little something and, hopefully, we'll start contributing again and sharing our progress.

When I was in college, I was heavily involved in a christian religious movement that taught that the Bible was the word of God and was all that you needed to have a relationship with your creator now and forever.

They taught that if it wasn't in the Bible, it wasn't meant in your life, but they also taught that you needed to obey your leaders and respect their authority - which meant that leaders in the group could tell you right from wrong - even if it wasn't in the Bible. This led to abuse and confusion, since a leader could give his opinion and you were expected to abide by it (or you would be disobeying God). Furthermore, they taught that problems should be shared upwards, not downwards, like soldiers to stone-faced military commanders, so if you were having a spiritual problem, you were expected to tell him, but he wouldn't share any weaknesses with you.

After a couple of years I felt that **** was better than living this way, and I left the organization. I have a hard enough time dealing with my problems and feeling that I'm ok and not alone. When the people that are supposed to help you are perfect and have no problems it is very difficult to feel good about yourself, even when you are making progress.

It is many years later, and it took me a long time to realize that the structure of that church was wrong, but I'm more content with my relationship with God than I have ever been. I'm a part of a beautiful congregation and, ever since those previous experiences, I share my problems because, even though they are embarrasing, they can encourage others going through the same thing because they know someone who has been there and overcome.

Oh, and that christian organization, which reached worldwide proportions, had a worldwide crumbling. Now some churches maitain membership while others don't and they've been trying to find their feet for years. It only goes to show that we are called to follow Christ. When man gets in the way of Christ, and puts himself in the position of having people rely on his leadership instead of Christ, people become co-dependant and Christ gets lost in the mess.

SO with that being said, I wanted to share about my life as of late, and my struggles.

I started the Zone diet February 2003. By October 2003 I had lost 60 lbs and went from being obese, to overweight, to a healthy weight for the first time in a decade.

But afterwards I became more lax on the diet. I still followed a Zone-like diet, but didn't watch myself as much. I would eat when I felt like it and justified that as long as I was eating protein and carbs at the same time it would be fine and I stopped exercising.

Then I went on a more Atkins induction kind of diet, with mostly protein. I would eat protein and carbs at the same time, but if I got hungry outside of mealtimes I would eat protein only, and I would eat as much protein as I wanted.

Then I started drinking cafe mochas (small) in the morning to give me a boost along with a hot dog or cold cuts. Then white chocolate mochas (small) along with a hot dog or cold cuts. Then white chocolate mochas with caramel sauce on top (small) along with a hot dog or cold cuts. Then I would get them large along with a hot dog or cold cuts. Then I would get them several times a day. Then we would go to pizza buffets and I'd eat whatever I wanted. Then we'd go to all you can eat buffets and I would load up on a plate of meat and some carrot cake and chocolate cake.

In the end, I felt totally out of control. I no longer had control over my cravings. I knew that I had gained some weight, but hadn't looked at a scale for about 6 months because I was afraid of what I would see and my meals were usually a white chocoloate cafe mocha with caramel sauce for carbs, and ham and cheese for protein - usually a couple of times a day.

It is scary knowing that you had it and you lost it. And knowing that you kicked an addiction and are right back addicted again. It seems even more helpless the second time around.

Then I read an article about how Robin Quivers (of the Howard Stern show-Not that I endorse the show, as it goes against my beliefs, but I used to listen to it a long time ago.) lost 70 lbs using the Master Cleanse. Now Robin was quite obese and trained as a nurse, so she knows about health and physiology, so I read into it.

I decided that I needed to detox and get rid of my addictions and get back on track, so I started the Master Cleanse 8 days ago. Master Cleanse flushes your body of all sorts of ailments and, since it is a liquid drink with the vitamins and minerals your body needs, it goes into the bloodstream without needing digestion, so you body can use the energy that it would have put into digesting food into healing your body. They say that 65% of your body's energy goes into digestion, so if you don't digest, your body can use that 65% to heal itself.

I have to say I feel really good. I feel clean. I've had no cravings, at all, for anything. No hunger at all. I've really learned a lot from it. It amazes me that an 8 oz drink can fill me for 2 hours. I'm wrapping it up in 2 days and will start STRICT on the Zone again on Sunday. I feel TOTALLY in control of my cravings.

One thing I do have to say, though. I am SO SICK of sweets that I can't imagine having them any time soon. I'm a chocolate addict, a cake addict, a Ben and Jerry's and Dairy Queen addict, but I can't imagine eating ANYTHING sweet right now. All I can think about is a nice, juicy steak. Let's hope my sugar addiction is gone!

I weighed myself today. The total damage: I gained 2.5 lbs. from last year. Thank goodness!

sfwasabi - Are you still lurking around the board? Are you still in the zone?