Shangri La Diet: Day Nine
Weight: 257.4
Now that I’m taking larger amounts of ELOO and SW I’ve noticed a real difference. Yesterday I had no snacks, deserts or soft drinks, I ate two small meals and one average dinner and never felt really hungry or deprived. I’m eating about 700 flavorless calories a day but I have to be taking in at least 1000 calories less per day compared to my pre-SLD habits.
The Seth Roberts episode of the Glenn and Helen Show podcast was ok but I don’t think he really conveyed what the diet is and how it works. What I find interesting is the immediate negative comments that were posted at the Dr. Helen blog. People seem to take great pleasure in pointing out that diets don’t work and the only way to lose weight is eat less and exercise more. What they don’t seem to understand is that the Shangri-La Diet helps you do exactly that and explains why eating certain foods will actually make you hungrier and more likely to continue eating the worst kind of foods.
I’m a smart guy, I know you need to eat less to lose weight and I sure as hell tried. I lost 15 pounds by eating less and working out more but then I hit a plateau and became frustrated and slipped back into eating poorly. My downfall was always the same: I would get so hungry by lunchtime that I would make poor choices and eat fast food. After thinking about this destructive cycle I realized that people who are naturally thin can’t possibly be feeling this kind of hunger. Sure, everyone gets hungry but this kind of deep, overpowering hunger must be something that only fat people feel. Is it psychological? Physical? A learned response? I could never figure it out. Then I read about the Shangri-La Diet and it made sense. This business about the set point would explain why some people just don’t get as hungry as others.
But what really makes sense to me is the theory that eating things like processed foods and fast foods, what Seth Roberts calls “ditto foods”, foods that taste the same every time, lead to increased hunger. My diet consisted almost entirely of ditto foods and I experienced really strong hunger throughout the day. Since I’ve tried the Shangri-La Diet it’s been fairly easy to avoid those kind of foods and my hunger has been greatly reduced. For me to go an entire workday on a small breakfast and a small salad and not feel hungry when I leave at 6pm is nothing short of a miracle.
Update 1:20pm: Breakfast today was a banana and OJ shake, about 18 ounces. I found myself getting hungry at 11, unlike yesterday when I had solid food for breakfast. Could the high sugar content of the juice have contributed? Tomorrow I’ll eat a real breakfast and see how it compares. I ate a small salad again at 11 and it didn’t seem to satisfy the hunger I was feeling but then about 10 minutes later I started feeling full. When I took my lunch break at 1 I wasn’t hungry at all. Lately I’ve been noticing that I want to eat at my normal times, even when I’m not hungry. It’s not hard to resist the urge since I’m not hungry but it’s interesting to see that it’s not just hunger that drives the urge to eat.
May 18th, 2006 at 11:50 am
Yay! Keep up the good work. I will be watching you
Actually, I found your blog looking for Shangri-la dieters because I want to compare my own experience to someone else’s. I have about 20 pounds to lose.
I agree with you on the loss of hunger. My problem with food is that when I’m hungry, I feel like I’m actually STARVING and then I make horrible food choices and eat way too much - much like you. And my sense of ravenous hunger thwarts my ability to say ‘enough already, you can stop eating.’ So, even when I do really good most days, I have just a few days that ruin all progress because I will eat junk.
…now if I could only exercise more regularly…
I hope you keep up the regular posts and I look forward to reading more about your experience.
May 19th, 2006 at 5:58 am
I have the same effects you do: diminished appetite, but not dramatically. More of an ability to just quit when I realize I’ve had enough, and yet still feel satisfied.
I am tracking my calories, mostly to see how this compares to pre-SLD, and while I can tell I’m eating less food, I didn’t realize how much difference there was in the number of calories I take in now vs. previously.
Interesting to see that someone else has the same experience I do regarding the hunger.