New Plan follow-up 9-26-11

So, a couple things:
Weight on Sunday morning (a more reasonable starting place after a big Friday--and big Friday weight):

2.5 pounds less, so one can say that most the difference is likely retained H2O. 228 is a reasonable starting point to see what effect this new diet has.

That means 19.5 pounds since I began--over 11 weeks that's one and 3/4 pounds per week . . . but most of that happened early on, with a huge slowdown and plateau in recent weeks. This new plan should change that.

Also, I've revamped my diet protocol. Given the relatively high calorie and fat count, I've modified so that I combine one scoop of Sisson's protein powder with one of Designer Protein (which is higher in protein, lower in fat and carbs). I also cut coconut oil to one tablespoon, calculated the egg yolk for only breakfast and dinner (lunch will be taken in a thermos, so I don't want a raw egg sitting around for several hours). Eliminated the BCCAs (not necessary, I think) and yoghurt. I'm also not counting the fish oil or SafSlim separately.

I've also added a cup of beef (or chicken) broth, mostly for the salt to help with the inevitable loss of salt with such low carbs. I'm not counting those calories, which are minimal.

This gives me a count of 1100 calories/day, with 90 grams of protein (plenty, I think, 33% of total calories); 25.5 grams of carbs (low, near induction levels, 9% of calories); and 72 grams of fat (almost all from the coconut oil--medium chain triglycerides, 58% of total calories).

Of course, I need to see what the result is (and how difficult it is to stick to this).

But I think it's a reasonable place to start.

I also need to start remembering to check blood sugar, to see where my fasting level is in the morning, and where the 1 hour post-prandial is most of the time.

Finally, I have been keeping up my exercise on a regular basis--keeping a complete log of exercises and how many sets and reps (I have missed almost no days, except Sunday, when the schedule is too tight to do this--also not bad to have one day off). It will be critical to see that I keep improving on this diet. Otherwise, it shows a loss of muscle, which I decidedly do not want! In the same way, I need to see that my energy stays high on this.

I should burn most of the MCT fats directly, so they should not be stored in my body (or more importantly, in my liver or pancreas). I will likely be in ketosis due to low carbs, which has a muscle-sparing effect, manufactures ketone bodies which can take the place of some of the glucose needed by my brain, and which should also repress appetite. I would say that this is lower carb than the Optifast used in the British study (despite the higher calories of my plan), and also more (and higher quality) protein. My hope is that I maintain more muscle mass (and in fact, want to increase it), while still burning lots of fat.

We'll see!