How I Safely Lost 23 Pounds in One Month (While Lazily Pigging Out!)

Thanks! By the way, re the question "but did you gain weight when you stopped?", well, I haven't "stopped". Recall this is a "lifelong diet", not a temporary "diet". In any case, I haven't regained any weight. In fact, I've gradually lost another 4 to 6 pounds (i.e., in past weeks my weight has fluctuated in a range between 165 and 168 pounds). I don't necessarily need to weigh less than about "the low 170's". Anyway, I no longer obsess about precisely how much I weigh nor what I eat, provided I stick with foods in the aforementioned categories and avoid all "bad" foods. It's actually very easy, now that I'm used to it. (Just replace your old menu items with new (healthier) ones, and allow time and habituation to do the rest.)

Very informative. I enjoyed reading this very much.

hey... that is seriously amazing!! but did you gain weight when you stopped??

But... Were you actually referring to an Intellivision when you spoke of the game "Moonsweep"? I'd never heard of that being an "Intellivision" title; perhaps you meant "Atari 2600"? BTW, I'd never heard of "Moonsweep" before, which goes to show that one learns something new every day. Perhaps you actually mean to say "MoonsweepER", which I likewise didn't recall. But I Google it and I see that it was a 1983 Imagic title. Interesting. Imagic also made several titles for my first Intellivision, including the rare "Dracula", BTW. Not to mention the fun "Beauty and the Beast".

OoOoO The hardest thing for me to give up has been... and is still a continuing battle would have to be hot wings and buffalo chicken pizza... which definetly helped aide me on my quest to gaining 20 pounds. I swear those 2 foods were my weakness... still are. But I know that they are smothered in fat. I havent touched a hot wing in nearly 2 months... but my gosh, if I smell a friggin wing, Im drooling. So long as I dont 'smell' it, I am okay. If anyone at home orders pizza (wings) I have to leave the house. The hardest part about my diet is watching others around me continue to eat fatty foods, and sweets. It would be a lot easier if everyone in my home ate healthy. Theyre all skinny though, and junk food has never been an issue. Me though, I inheretited grandmas fat gene. We smell a cookie and we gain a pound. I have to take extra special care and caution of what I eat because I have a super duper nearly non-working metabolism. Thats what happens when your a teen and you mess

LOL.... I think we had that exact console. My dad spilt rootbeer into it, and it was history after that. Remember those buttons... that perfect tight click it would make when you hit the numbers! I miss that sound/feeling. I remember playing moonsweep... it was one of my favorites. I thought that game was sooooo high tech when I was a kid. Man... moonsweep!

PART 4: Yesterday at Dillon's (supermarket) I noticed only a very faint glimmer of an residual attraction to all the freshly baked cookies, etc., that formerly would have had me grabbing and buying them. At that moment it felt a bit "boring" to just leave the store with nothing in hand, but I was later glad I did. After all, it's ALSO (eventually) "boring" to repeatedly give in to the "same old, same old" food addictions, is it not? Such pleasures are short-lived, but the consequences can be lasting. :-)

PART 3: As for Nutrisystem, it's about as I'd expected. Frankly (as you can tell from my above piece), I've pretty much lost all respect for ANY of those "processed-food" diet programs/products. Of course, I'm enough of a realist to accept that most of other folks won't agree with me. "Live and let," I say. Just as some people still smoke (not YOU, he he he!--OK, OK, I jest!), so also some people still eat crap. One acquires a taste for it, and it's darned hard to give it up.

PART 2: Later that year I got the Vectrex, Colecovision, and Atari 5200 (I also picked up a USED 2600 about that time). In 1983 I got the Bally/Astrocade, the Emerson Arcadia 2001, and still others. By early 1984 I owned every home-videogaming console (as we'd by then come to think of them) that had ever been made, with one obscure exception (that was no longer available). BTW, after Mattel dropped sold their rights in 1984, another company released the "INTV III", a real rarity. I actually saw one of those consoles once in a store.

PART 1: Melissa, isn't it cool that we both have a fondness for home-videogaming consoles/games?--including the "retro" ones? BTW, they did have an "Intellivision II". Did your know that? I originally owned the first Intellivsion, which was pretty much my very first home-videogaming system. [See a nice pic of that vintage console at: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellivision] I got that in January of 1982 (but had been window-shopping for it the prior year). That made me fall in love with home-videogaming, big time!

Mike.... I was not poking fun at your refrence to the Nintendo 2. I really thought you meant there was such a console. I think they should of called the wii the Nintendo 2. I also think they should of given it a more retro look, only more sleek. The nutrisystem is awful. I had no idea that the foods came packaged for shelf storing. I thought they came frozen. I had to go with the vegan 28 day plan. Everything looks so gross. I'll def try your approach as soon as I am done with this nutri thing. I should of just stuck to buying my lean cuisines... boring, but it did work. Im sure this nutrisystem will work too.... only the food is awful; and looks awful.

Melissa, thanks for your kind words. And good luck with "Nutrisystem". Methinks you'll NEED good luck, considering that that's the VERY sort of dietary crapola that I was referring to with my concluding paragraph! Oh well, what won't kill you will make you stronger... or will it? ;-) (LOL!) At very least it'll earn you another few bucks at AC via a review. :-) After you (eventually) kiss Nutrisystem bye-bye, do reconsider the approach that I wrote about above. As always, best wishes, my young friend! :-) Mike

This was a great piece Mike. I seen it the other day over at epiville. I am going on the nutrisystem diet. I'll see how it works for a month, review it, and most likely move on if it sucks. What stinks though is that I already place my 28 day order.... I should of read up on it more before so quickly coughing up my credit card number. After giving them my credit # I found a slew of not so wonderful reviews on how awful the food is. Ill have to wait and see for myself though.... Great piece again. ;)

Thanks, amigo! Good health and good luck to you! Mike

Nice to see/read ya here again! This is quite a thorough first person investigation, experiment and experience. Well told, as I would expect. I have printed it out to read pieces of it from time to time as I fluctuate between really caring and not really caring enough to effect change in my own life during the moments when I want to be less heavy. ***** David