Just curious!

Probably the strangest diet I was ever on was my self-designed "Macaroni & Cheese and Chocolate Chip Cookie Diet". I know this is probably making a few of you chuckle!

Back in 2001, my Doctor gave me a 1 page handout on how to lose weight and one of the basic "tennents" was eat 1200 calories a day.

So I was trying to figure out something that I liked enough to eat every day but keep the total calories under 1200 calories.

So I came up with a basic meal of Annies Whole Wheat Macaroni and Cheese (out of a box), one 6.5 ounce can of tuna fish, 1/2 a can of sodium free diced tomotoes and some spinach leaves tossed in. As I recall that had about 800 calories and I would eat that around 4PM every day.

Then in the evening around 7 to 9PM ... I would eat half a box of 50/50 Fructose Sweetened Chocolate Chip Cookies. They supposedly were low glycemic and geared towards diabetics. That was my final 400 calories of the day.

From rising to 4PM I would fast completely (just a cup or morning decaf coffee sweetened with stevia).

I stuck with this diet for a year and lost 100 pounds!! However towards the end of that year, I felt like I was STARVING TO DEATH and just stopped the diet. Then, over the next year, I proceeded to gain the 100 pounds back when I went back to "not dieting".



I have a feeling that I lost a lot of muscle on that diet, as I wasnt getting enough protein, and I am sure that contributed to my rapid weight gain.

Certainly the IP diet is a lot healthier!!! And honestly much easier to stick to.

Just curious what other "war stories" you all might have!

I once went five months (Jan-May) without eating a single ounce of junk food (candy, chips, chocolate, etc). Didn't lose a pound!

I was a Jennie Craig guy for awhile. It worked fairly well, easy to follow but would never get me to my weight goal of 150lbs, ever. IP is it, period. Got me to goal in ten week, simply amazing. It's this whole maintenance phase thingy...

But I do like the sounds of the Mac n' Cheese/Chocolate Chip Cookie diet too, wait... that's been my maintenance phase, forget it.

I did the HGC diet (some hgc drops and 500 calories/day) a year ago or so. I lost about 35 lbs.- but WOW were the side effects crazy! my joints hurt and I could not think, persistent stomach pain.

I developed food allergies like CRAZY afterwards (seafood/nuts/ lactose intolerance/wine/I would break out in hives at the drop of a hat. The allergies have mostly gone away I'm still too scared to even try seafood though. (I'm not claiming a connection between the diet and the allergies, just that it was miserable) it was bad.

I managed to keep that weight off (my highest recorded weight is 346) but it was scary and just painful. Won't be doing that again! I'm very happy with IP so far.

Definitely hcg. It was so bad I didn't poop for 6 weeks!!

I have tried so many diets, I can't remember them all. I know my first real serious one was when I was in high school . . . Weight Watchers. After that, NutriSystem, Atkins, HCG, Mayo Clinic diet, TOPS . . . I tried Weight Watchers several times over the years . . . I have dieted most of my life. IP has been the one that has worked!!

I did that one too! Didn't tell anyone, not even DH at the time but gave myself stomach shots in the pantry with the door closed. Lost about 30 pounds, gained back 40...

Weirdest one was in high school (I cannot remember the name!!) but for the first three weeks I only ate guavas, mangos and pineapple. I had to stop when I started passing out!!

It's amazing the stuff we resort to in an attempt to lose weight. Gosh that HGC diet sounds awful, but only slightly worse than my Mac n' Cheese + Chocolate Chip Cookie diet (at least I never passed out on the latter).

OK - I totally have to cop to having been on diets that I didn't discuss with my DH. I have come to the conclusion that hiding a diet is on par with hiding over eating. We (by that I mostly mean myself) can really convince ourselves of some weird things when it comes to food, can't we? smh

The Master Cleanse. Omg was that disgusting. I still gag a little at lemonade!

When I was 18 and weighed the grand total of 105 pounds, I was determined to lose 5 pounds and be 100 pounds. I came up with this "great" diet (it was mostly laziness and living on campus) which involved me eating nothing until about three and then having a grilled cheese or some sort of noodle dish and then something really small (like rice cakes) for dinner around 7. And I drank about 8 diet cokes a day. And I worked out for at least an hour a day.

I didn't lose a pound.

At the time, I knew nothing about nutrition and couldn't believe that the scale wouldn't budge.

Today, I can only wish I was 105 lbs. (actually, I know I'll never see 105 again and I'm fine with that - I just want to be a healthy weight).

Senior year of college, lost 10 lbs (from 125 to 115, sigh). Weekly intake (no joke) 2-3 bags of microwave popcorn, 1 large Italian hoagie, 1 chicken cheesesteak hoagie, 7 apples and beer, LOTS of beer. I wasn't trying to diet.

I did HCG too (the shots)...3 times! Each time I would feel lightheaded, and became a raving lunatic. My friends and coworkers have begged me never to do the diet again! I would lose 15-20 pounds in the 28 days, but never went to the next phases, I was so hungry I just wanted to EAT again, so gained most of it back, but never all.
South Beach worked well for me and I liked it, I just have a huge weakness for carbs and once I started eating them I coudn't stop
KC

HA! That is too funny...sad but funny. See guys can cut one thing out of their diet and drop like 20lbs in a heart beat we cut out damn near everything and loose 1lb!

Talk abt unfair LOL.

I did the "3 Day Military Diet" at some point last fall. I don't think I lost 1 lb., and let's put it this way... there were hot dogs and ice cream involved. By the last day, I was so sick that I was in bed with a fever all weekend.

3 Day Diet
DAY 1:
Breakfast--1/2 Grapefruit, 1 Slice of Toast, 2 Tablespoons of Peanut Butter, and Coffee or Tea
Lunch--1/2 Cup of Tuna, 1 Slice of Toast, and Coffee or Tea (any brew, as long as it's caffeinated)
Dinner--3 ounces of any type of meat, 1 Cup of Green Beans, 1/2 Banana, 1 Small Apple, and 1 Cup of Vanilla Ice Cream (YUM)!!!

DAY 2:
Breakfast--1 egg, 1 Slice of Toast, and 1/2 Banana
Lunch--1 Cup of Cottage Cheese (Or 1 Slice of Cheddar Cheese), 1 Hard Boiled Egg, and 5 Saltine Crackers
Dinner--2 Hot Dogs, (no buns), 1 Cup of Broccoli, 1/2 Cup of Carrots, 1/2 Banana, and 1/2 Cup of Vanilla Ice Cream

DAY 3:
Breakfast--5 Saltine Crackers, 1 Slice of Cheddar Cheese, and 1 Small Apple
Lunch-1 Hard-Boiled Egg, and 1 Slice of Toast
Dinner--1 Cup of Tuna, 1/2 of a Banana, and 1 Cup of Vanilla Ice Cream