By Rob Goss
A Reason to DietThe scales said it all; it was time to go on a diet.
After an autumn and winter of consuming just about anything I felt like with complete disregard for my physique, my stomach was bulging over my belt and I knew I had to lose the ten kilos that had added themselves to me.
A look around at the options and a bit of research into what kind of diet would best suit my lifestyle, especially the working part of it, and I had made a decision. I had decided to start The South Beach Diet.
Whatever your reason for dieting, I hope reading about my experience preparing for the South Beach Diet will in some small way help you to achieve your weight loss goals.
Building up to The South Beach Diet
A delivery from Amazon brought me face to face with the book that would eventually help me shed ten kilos. I put a new cover on the front to hide my shame at being seen reading a diet book on the train (men just don’t diet where I’m from) and over the next day or so I read the first 100 pages.
Digesting the first 12 chapters and not jumping into the diet too quickly was good for me and I’d recommend you do the same. Why? Well, it gave me an understanding of how different foods, and different combinations of food, affect the body. The preparation also made me more determined; I had psyched myself up for a challenge and made the diet something positive. Any form of self-improvement surely stands a greater chance of success if the motivation for it is positive.
Not Just a Diet Book
As well as containing a great deal of inspirational weight loss stories, the chapters building up to the actual diet are very educational. You will read about bad carbs and good carbs, bad fats and good fats. You will get some information about cardiology and diabetes, and you will read about how eating can make you hungry and learn about the glycemic index, a great tool to help you pick and choose food without having to rely on the set meal plans.
Purging the Refrigerator
The South Beach Diet doesn’t say anything about clearing your fridge of any food that might lead you astray, but I knew that some things had to go or I would crumble under temptation. With the zeal of a loyal Stalinist and the South Beach Diet’s list of acceptable food for phase one of the diet, I set about purging anything inedible during phase one as if it were a dissident. The margarine went, along with it the full fat milk. My in-laws got a gift of marmalade and jam while the beer was buried deep in a cupboard where it would wait for me to come and rescue it later (men just don’t waste beer where I’m from), but too warm to drink as an impulse.
The Pre-Diet Shopping Trip: Stock up on Diet Food
When my purge was over the fridge was ready for restocking. I went to the supermarket and stocked up on everything I would need for the first few days of the diet. This way there could be no excuses about not making a packed lunch or not having time to shop after a busy day.
The shopping wasn’t expensive and the shopping cart had a very healthy, but good tasting, look about. I had some salmon to be grilled with rosemary for the first night’s dinner and plenty of eggs and vegetable juice for breakfasts. Additionally, the cart was full of chicken breast and salad stuff, plus a fine piece of sirloin steak for dinner on day three.
You should also buy the snack food recommended in the book as it keeps the hunger pangs at bay. I went for cheese wedges and pistachio nuts, albeit warily (snack food on a diet?), and found the two daily snacks before and after lunch really important. Prepare Your Schedule for Phase One
The first two weeks of the South Beach Diet are quite strict, which makes temptation all the more dangerous. For these two weeks only I made a choice to give the South Beach Diet priority over everything else except work.
I didn’t make any dinner engagements, nor did I go out drinking after work; I figured there was to great a chance of me breaking the diet. Basically, I decided that the best way to resist the temptation of beer or food not allowed during phase one was to avoid situations were temptations were present. For two weeks my social calendar was dull, but it was a small price to pay to get the diet off the best possible start and a decision I didn’t regret when I shed 11 pounds in the first two weeks.
Fortunately, phase two of the South Beach Diet is much less restrictive; in fact it doesn’t feel like a diet, so you need not worry about your social life going up in smoke. If anything you might feel more confident about getting out meeting people after you’ve lost a little weight.
The Diet Begins
After all the build up you are left with one more thing to do; you actually have to start the South Beach Diet. Imagine the situation: You have more knowledge of what to eat and what not to eat, and importantly why that’s so. Thanks to your steady preparation you have also proved that you are serious about weight loss and you are not just jumping into another fad. Your fridge has been purged of all temptations and stocked with the food you will need for the first few days of the diet. Maybe, like I did, you have cleared your schedule of anything that may lead you into temptation.
As the book says, you can expect to lose somewhere between 8 and 13 pounds during phase one of the diet; with a day or two of good preparation you will increase your chances of doing this.
You are ready for weight loss and there is no reason why you cannot succeed.
© DoItYourself.com 2006
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