[kpw]

My personal experience: My husband and I started the diet 12 days ago and both lost significant amounts in the first 5 days (me 5 lbs, he 8). Then, we stalled. Not a thing for the next 6. Not a problem, since our weight loss goals are pretty modest (me, 10 lbs, he 15-20). So, we decided to switch to phase II early, since I really was missing fruit (and my glass of wine with dinner!). In addition to -not- having headaches and weird cravings for the past 2 days, I feel really energetic since introducing moderate amounts of fruits and starches (high fiber cereal with blueberries in the morning, one small wheat flour tortilla with lunch, a pear and a glass of wine with dinner), and no more headaches. and, so far, my weight has been stable. I hope to lose weight in a gradual way over the next several weeks on phase II, but honestly, the flushing of my system of the junk has been great! Not likely to go back to phase I (ever), but I can live with the phase II plan for quite a while.

Just thought I'd share my $.02.

[clovey]

That is good to hear kpw. I am only losing about half a pound a week on phase two, so it seems, but I am ok with it (excpet when I am not ). I have loads to lose, nearly 100lbs, but it took me more than four years to get there, so I am happy (usually) to let it take four years to go again. The way I see it is that if I eat this way for four years, I will have found ways of doing it that I can live with for forty years. And when I am over eighty then I shall revert to chocolate and muffins....!!

[chick_on_the_beach]

I am far too impatient for that. I was going to stick with phase one for much longer but doing a sorta phase 1.5 atm. I am losing about 2kg (4.5 pounds) a week and have reintroduced fruit yogurt and have the odd slice of brown bread or piece of fruit from time to time. I intend to keep this up for another five weeks (or until I lose another 9kg whichever comes first) then add a bit more fruit to my diet.

[pebbles396]

I think that adding dairy back to my diet significantly helped. I was following the an older version of the book and found that adding FF milk, and Carb Control Yogurt back into my diet seemed to really boost things.

Good luck to everyone!

[kpw]

clovey - my parents went on the diet ~ 8 years ago and have been on ever since. they lost about 20-30 lbs each and this diet has become their lifestyle becasue it's something they can live with. if they go out to eat and they'll occasionally splurge, but for the most part, the diet in maintenance phase is pretty easy to stick to for them. they're now in their 70's and probably in the best shape of their life since hitting 50.

hang in there girl!