Waist Not, Want Not

Day 10 - June 23, 2010

For the faithful readers of this blog series, you have probably wondered why I have not posted my daily weight.  I have never been one to wait with baited breath while the digital numbers flash and then appear on the scale.  Too much like a verdict, in my opinion!  Much better to wait and weigh in once a week.  (Take Shape for Life recommends following the same regimen you had before you started the program).

So, after ten days of eating healthy, I figured it was finally time to find out the results - how much weight have I lost?

Well, today I discovered something unusual.  The weight loss was not quite what I expected (4 pounds) but I can tell that I have lost inches.  My clothes fit better, I feel slimmer and more fit.  What I was most thrilled about is that the rolls of fat around my waist have all but disappeared!

How could this be?

Dr. A's Habits of Health explained what has happened to my body.  The Take Shape for Life program is designed to use food intake as a stable energy source, a process that taps into 2 core principles of how our body stores energy:

• Controlling your energy intake (i.e., food energy)
• Managing your insulin pump

The simple answer to why I have not lost pounds but I have lost inches is that my body on Medifast has turned into a fat burning machine! Because I am eating 6 small meals a day, my body does not go into starvation mode and horde calories.  Since I am only eating low-glycemic food (which is much closer to the ancient diet followed by our ancestors 10,000 years ago), my blood sugar is controlled and the insulin pump turned off.  The end result is that my body has begun to turn loose of the fat it had stored up.

Contrast the Medifast lifestyle with how I was eating before.  My diet was full of highly processed, high-glycemic foods (soft drinks, candy bars, etc.) that caused my blood sugar to dramatically rise.  The insulin level also rose, which caused the blood sugar to drop below normal.   An alarm would go off in my brain that caused cravings for anything sweet and full of calories.  This pattern continued through out the day as my blood sugar would spike, decline, then spike again.

The end result of maintaining elevated insulin levels is that my body was constantly using glucose for fuel, instead of both glucose and fat.  And when ingested fat is not used for fuel - guess where it goes? It gets laid down in fat cells and I became a fat storage factory!

What would you rather be - a fat storage warehouse or a fat burning machine? 

If your answer is that you want to become a fat burning machine, then join me!  For more information, go to Empowered Weigh.  And be sure to send me an email or call me if you are ready to get started.

Living well, beautifully!