Day 1 of the new plan

We ate the last of the food we'd brought for the 1000 plan last night. That makes it sound as though we had a huge blow out, but we both consumed just a little over 900 calories for the entire day - it was very disappointing if we were under the false impression that we'd have pie and chips for dinner.
Anyway, today marks the start of the 810 plan. My house mate and I will consume our three shakes throughout the day and then when I get home from work (at around midnight) tonight I'll have a plate of tofu and vegetables to look forward to. I can't pretend to be excited about it, but its better than what we've been eating so I shan't complain.
So here's to doing this thing properly and (more importantly) keeping on plan *raises coffee mug*

Bye bye 1000, hello 810

After a short discussion with my house mate this morning, we made the decision to ditch the 1000 plan and to go onto the 810 plan instead. After we've eaten the food we'd brought for the 1000 plan. Our decision to do so was based on one simple thing; neither of us can be bothered to eat breakfast and drinking a shake is quicker and easier than weighing cereal, bolting it and then washing the bowl at 2.30am. If truth be told, we find it easier to do this diet with the food option taken out than to suffer the monotony of the same food for such an extended period of time - I can handle the two weeks when moving up the plan, but not months of rotating porridge, with muesli, with shredded wheat.
So, the next few months will be fun. Three shakes (we've so far only managed to get two down our throats per day, or even just one, which is really crap). No more Coke, bread rolls, fruit juice, snack pots or tinned soup. Joy.

And now for our allowed foods:
Protein
350g Steamed Tofu
80g red lentils, dried
225g Chickpeas, canned, drained
80g Chickpeas, dried weight
70g Soya beans, dried weight

Plus three tablespoons of any of the following:
Vegetables
Asparagus
Broccoli
Cabbage (inc pickled)
Cauliflower
Celeriac
Pak choi
Courgette
Cucumber
Fennel
Green Peppers
Green salad leaves
Kale
Leeks
Marrow
Mushroom
Red radishes
Spinach
Spring onions
Watercress

It now falls to me to come up with an interesting way to combine these items. I have never used most of these items in my cooking. And my favourite way of marinating tofu (with Tamari) is not allowed because of its salt content, which sucks. It used to be so much easier when we used to eat meat, eggs and cottage cheese. Oh well. I guess that it shouldn't hurt too much to eat the pre-marinated tofu until I've found a decent way to marinate the other stuff and find an interesting thing to do with the lentils, chickpeas and soya beans. If we could eat chilli and onion, I'd happily make lentil soup.
Well I'm not going to worry about it now; tonight is not the time to look up recipes. I can worry about that tomorrow.

The Past Success, turned Failure Story

I think it might be important for anybody who read my first post and saw that I'd admitted to being successful on the Cambridge Weight Plan before, to understand why I am back at stage 1 all over again. Actually, people probably won't give a flying f*ck, but I'm going to put it here if only to remind myself not to do it again. Back in September 2008, my house mate and I started (after many false starts) the plan on Sole Source. I stayed on this part of the plan for 10 weeks until I lost over 40lbs and reached a healthy BMI. I remember how important it was that my house mate and I be allowed to enjoy Christmas. I remember that we'd talked to our CDW councillor and we moved onto the 810 plan for two weeks, then the 1000 plan, and the 1200 plan, each for two weeks. We only managed a few days of 1500 before Christmas, but it didn't matter because we were still losing weight! We managed to be healthy over Christmas. We should have been happy with ourselves, but I wanted to lose more weight - I wanted to reach my lowest healthy weight and I was still about a stone and a half away from that. After Christmas we consumed all of the stuff we'd brought for the holiday and had a last hurrah (the last blow out meal) before the restart. Except we failed to get back into the habit of limiting our food intake. A pattern quickly emerged where we'd decide to restart the diet and have a last hurrah before failing to get back on the wagon. It seemed to take no time at all to regain everything, although my house mate has managed to keep 20lbs off from her original starting weight. I'm back at my largest with a vengeance. We thought that going vegan would help us to lose weight, but apparently replacing meat with meat replacements and cheese with soya cheese isn't the way to do it - who knew? We also discovered a lot of food that is actually vegan, and we found some places that made vegan cake! It's amazing how I can walk past chocolate bars, sweets and all manner of foods that I used to love, with my nose turned up, simply because it isn't vegan. I wish there was the same urge with foods that aren't healthy.
Anyway, understand that this diet isn't about just giving up cake - this diet is about giving up everything but protein and vegetables. My food addiction is bread and potatoes; I absolutely love them. I don't need to butter my bread roll and eat them with a filling - I am happier having it completely plain. And I love jacket potatoes (HUGE ones that have been in the oven for hours so that the skin is really thick and hard to eat, but even better for it, and the flesh is fluffy and mixed with huge amounts of margarine) or mash (mixed with just margarine and not milk so that it tastes coarse on the tongue). I haven't eaten potatoes in 12 days. I have, however, eaten bread rolls. Bread rolls are my comfort food, even though I know that they're against the plan. When I did this diet before, I didn't eat bread. I didn't even have milk in my coffee (I am currently taking soya milk). I can't remember what week it was, but the one thing I fantasised about was a plain and simple apple. All I wanted to do was flick my tongue against the skin of a juicy, sweet apple, and then feel my teeth break the surface as the juice erupted over my tongue. I wouldn't eat an apple until I reached the 1000 plan, but it was something I started fantasising about quite early on.
I also didn't touch alcohol. I had my first drink on Christmas Day. I missed being able to enjoy a drink when I came home from work, or when I socialised (which wasn't often thanks to my job). I haven't drunk in 12 days - I don't miss it, surprisingly.

I looked at the information for the plans for the first time this evening. I am actually really surprised to find that I'm remembering doing the diet all wrong. The 1000 plan incorporates 2 Cambridge meal replacements, to be drunk alongside a normal-ish breakfast and lunch, followed by a healthy dinner. I think I've been doing a very, very bad version of the 810 plan. A shake for breakfast, one for lunch and then food in the evening, washed down with a litre of fruit juice. I'm gong to have to sit down with my house mate and re-evaluate what we're doing. It might be a good idea to call our diet counsellor for advice too. I'll worry about it in the morning.

Originally entitled 'The Beginning'

This is day 11 of my Cambridge Weight Plan diet. I'll admit, I'm not exactly sticking rigorously to plan - I've been eating foods that are definitely not in the plan, but am so far 8lbs down so can't complain too much. The last time I did this diet with any measure of success, I was a meat eating station assistant back in 2008. I was on Sole Source, which meant that I'd replaced all of my meals with shakes, the total of which brought my calorie count to a little over 400 per day. I'd arrange for my colleagues to do any of the jobs that didn't involve standing stationary on a gate line and as I was always surrounded by colleagues, it didn't matter if my cottage cheese brain was unable to come up with the name of a street that I sent passengers down all of the time. This time, I am a vegan train driver. I can't afford to have (vegan) cottage cheese brain because if the unthinkable happens, I need to not be sitting there in a blind panic unable to remember the safety procedures. Plus my equipment bag is heavy and the walk from the depot with that bag is a killer when I've been eating - I dread to think how bad it would be if I were empty. The foods I've been eating vary from a Holland & Barrett vegan sausage roll I took to my nans place (so she wouldn't harass me to go make a sandwich with the very vegan unfriendly contents of her fridge) to the plain bread roll and Uncle Ben's Chilli snack pot I ate when I got home from work at 02.40 this morning. The picture at the top is what I currently look like (in my wonderful work uniform - I know; it's THAT sexy, but do try to not fall over yourselves). I knew I was big and lumpy, and that my breasts resemble great sacks attached to my chest, but I didn't realise just how truly awful it was until I asked a colleague to take these photos for me. Just the kick start I needed to keep myself focused.

I'm publishing this here because I figure that it's all very well creating a blog in the Cambridge weight plan forum, where I'm surrounded by like-minded people who are used to people falling off the wagon and disappearing into the nether. Having this here means that I can't hide. It also means that I don't have to go hunting for my personal journal thread in a forum filled with hundreds of journals. A friend of mine has a lot of weight to lose, and he very bravely asked people to sponsor him; when he reaches goal, his charity is going to be flooded because this chap has so many people behind him, willing him to succeed. I uploaded my original success picture and he's promised that he will donate £25 to the charity of my choice (St Clare Hospice in Hastingwood) when I reach my goal. I started at 198.6lbs and my preliminary goal is 126lbs (I'm planning on getting a stone under my eventual goal weight so I can use that as a cushion when I finally come off the plan). Well, I think that's all for now. Enjoy a picture of me from when I managed to get slim before.