Diet Soda is fraudulent.

Diet soda is a fraud in many cases. It gives a false sense of virtue: 

If I swap out my sugared soda with this diet soda, then it's OK to eat this double-double cheese burger n' fries! 

You save a few hundred calories, and then you add on a thousand or so because you've given yourself permission to eat something that's not, say, a lean piece of chicken and some steamed string beans. I've known this, but I have never seen it brought to it's logical conclusion until an economist took a rational approach to losing weight. It all comes down to two choices, change or die (i.e. remain fat and unhealthy.) Those are the only two choices, in reality. Of course, the money is to be made in offering a third choice.

(A well respected economist) wanted to think of (smoking) as a battle with two choices — quit or die of cancer — but his nicotine-addled brain kept coming up with a third option: sneak one more cigarette and quit later. Of course, later never came. “I was quitting for 20 years,” he said.

Trying but not succeeding to lose weight is exactly the same thing. Quit all the food that is horrible for you.....after this one cheeseburger. I'll start eating right.... after I read that book, or join that gym, or start that program. Products that offer "magical solutions", or third options, are where the profit is. 

Weight Watchers and gyms make people sign up for recurring billing -- your credit card gets zapped every month whether you attend the meetings or go work out. And while it's possible to resign from these things, many people do not....because they'd have to admit failure. It's so much more comforting to take the 3rd option: "oh, I'll start working out next month" or "I'll hop back on the meetings when I'm less busy in a few weeks". In short, it's a fraud because gyms, weight watchers and diet soda's primary interest is NOT to make you lose weight and lose you as a customer. They are only interested in keeping you paying.

After switching to all diet soda, I feel so much better....that I can eat twice the kebobs and burgers!

I read this article while I was eating lunch on Tuesday: almond butter on whole wheat, some cabbage slaw, a bag of carrots and red peppers...and a 7oz can of diet coke. I've been taking advantage of the small cans the beverage industry has been forced into making due to political moves to limit the size of beverages. I've been able to restrict my consumption to 14oz daily (half caffeinated), down form 24-36 before I really started paying attention. Two 8 packs of the cans is $10 a week or so. 

Until recently, I considered it a relatively harmless indulgence thats a hold-over from my old way of eating. Until a month ago or so, I was hitting up McDonalds once a week. First I was doing quarter pounder meals with fries and a medium coke, then swapped out to double quarter pounders with a small diet cola -- less carbs, less cal, still satisfying. But I stopped, not because I had to struggle to get out from under or boo-hoo McDonalds is soooo evil, but because....I just didn't want it that much, it doesn't make me feel as full or as good as my home cooking.

So as I'm sitting at lunch, I realized I had eaten more than half my meal and had not cracked the diet coke open yet. I just...didn't want it that much. As I'm reading, the author speaks of cheesy "miracle" products, pills that promise the world, things that assure you it'll be "easy" and promoted by TV gurus, and I then read this:

There is another class of products, I noticed, that have a related business model. They were not preying on my impulses to find a third way, but they still made money whether I lost weight or not. All those Slim-Fast shakes, Atkins bars and meal replacements may help some people lose weight, but much of the companies’ revenue comes from people who try and fail continuously or people who only want to create the illusion they are dieting. My desk was filled with books written by experts from the Mayo Clinic and Harvard. They contained useful information, but, for me, they acted like a miracle totem. I felt good about myself for buying them, but I never lost a pound.

Practicing for college life.

Diet Coke makes money for the Coke corporation whether I lost weight or not, as long as I stayed on the treadmill. Diet Coke has been a crutch but it should be a stepping stone, a detox from full sugar soda. Like sugar, we do not need it survive, it is a man made thing. The science is not conclusive - even though there are no calories to make you fat, the reaction to the sweetness may be enough to give you metabolic syndrome. Not to mention cancer and the artificial sweeteners. I do believe diet sodas are relatively better for a person than full-sugar soda, but swapping out diet soda for water is infinitely better than that, too.

I don't want to be limping around in semi-fatass-land for the rest of my life. I hope this is a one way trip to thin fitness, and old habits do not have to be ripped out of my hands with lots of trauma and grief, but I do have to let go. Starting today (I'm writing this on Wednesday), I'm going to attempt to restrict all diet soda consumption to the wild n' woolly weekends, right where my McDonald's consumption lies. No, it's not total elimination, but going from 7 days a week to 2 days a week should be a good start. The $10 I give to the $21 billion diet soda industry every week will be much better spent on vegetables.

POSTSCRIPT:

Friday morning, I made a cake for some one's birthday and a small smidgen of batter got in my mouth. In the evening, after rewarding my daughter with 5 M&Ms (more on that below), I popped a few strays in my mouth rather than going back to the kitchen to put them away. Later in the evening, I was making frosting for the cake and I tasted it for texture and quality. Once the cake was done and everything was cleaned up, I had an overwhelming craving for sugar, my pump undoubtedly primed by the three separate tastes through the day. My first reaction was to go for a diet soda to get the sweetness without the calories...but decided not to as I didn't want to feel like a hypocrite. I broke down and helped myself to a bowl of &Ms around 11pm, then a large dish of homemade ice cream. Oof. I should have just had the damn diet soda. The goal is to eliminate the stuff, but until I am free of such strong cravings and compulsions to eat sweet, I must embrace the crutches and lesser-evil tools available to me. 

-----

My three and half year old daughter reached a major milestone in her bathroom habits ('nuff said), and we've been bribing her with the promise of gifts for a while now. I foolishly did not have any gifts on hand, so I asked her what she would like moments after her big success. The first thing out of her mouth: M&Ms. I think she had her first and only taste for them around Valentine's Day, when a parent supplied her and friends with pink ones. Though against my better judgement, it was more important to make the moment special and we packed up the baby and trudged around the corner to the drug store to get her a packet of M&Ms. She went for the 2-serving "jumbo" packet, though I only allowed her the slender single serving - if they had those tiny mini Halloween sizes, I probably would have gone for one or two of those.

She was over the moon, and watched a movie while working her way through the whole pack. I asked for one, and she happily gave it, but when she saw I wasn't eating it, she shouted, "EAT IT!" I told her I was saving it for later, because if I didn't eat it now, I could have M&Ms for tomorrow, not just today. So she took it back and ate it.

It took her 30 minutes or so to get through the whole pack, and when she was done, she asked for water. An hour later, around dinner time, she asked for more M&Ms. She literally said, without prompting, that "those were the best M&Ms in the world, and they make me want more and more!" Oy, sugar is such a nasty thing.

-----

WEEKLY AVERAGE: 2181

Despite blowing out early on Friday night, kept the eating tights and vegetable heavy. Got my first bike ride of the season in on Tuesday, slow and short, but hopefully the beginning of a powerful 7 months...

-----

MONDAY COUNT: 2135

Had a big eating weekend, but cut into my Sunday with a momma salad to just slow down the gobbling. Today, made 2nd Ave Deli's "health salad", basically shredded cabbage with vinegar, oil and sugar. I reduced the sugar in half, see how that goes. Had some serious sugar cravings after the salsa and chips in the evening, but they went away after 15 minutes or so. I imagine if I ate something tiny but sweet, that would have pushed me over the edge.

AM SNACK: 8:15am, iced green tea, 0 cal

BREAKFAST: 11am, Fage whole yogurt with almonds, agave and vanilla, 300 cal

Cut yogurt and agave in half, retained 28g of almonds, where the majority of calories come from, anyway. Still satisfying, as there is a lot of protein n' fat goin' on.

PM SNACK: 1pm, momma salad, 100 cal

LUNCH: 2pm, chicken meatballs, quinoa, steamed string beans, 7oz diet coke, 600cal

Adjusted my portions. Doubled string beans, reduced meatballs by 1/3. Kept grain to their small suggested serving (1/4 cup dry, a scant cup cooked) but jazzed it up with a tbsp o' butter.

PM SNACK: 5:45pm, apple/carrot/kale/beet/ginger juice, 150cal

DINNER: 8:45pm, stirfry with shrimp, mushrooms, brocolli, shirataki noodles, poppa salad,  7oz diet sprite, 685cal

Mixed it up a bit: added TWO veg instead of one, boiled & shocked brocolli along with sliced shitake mushrooms. Swapped out soy sauce for fermented black bean paste to go with my sauce of mirin wine, fish sauce and sesame oil -- came out much rounder and less salty. Was looking at other elements to through in (Hoisen, Oyster, Ponzu, etc) and they all seemed to be super loaded with sugar. The bean paste also has some added sugar, but it's relatively far down the list, not the 1st or second ingredient like some of the other sauces.

EVENING SNACK: 9:15pm, salsa and chips, 300cal

-----

BIKE CREDIT: 600 cal

TUESDAY COUNT: 2290

Did a loop around Manhattan on the road bike in the afternoon/early evening, started slow but picked up steam towards the end, felt good, haven't ridden properly since October. Making me think how I'm going to approach nutrition on the bike this season...

AM SNACK: 8am, iced green tea, 0 cal

BREAKFAST: 10:15am, steel cut oatmeal with butter, brown sugar, vanilla & salt, 250 cal

Rather than half the batch, I took care to measure out the batch into three.

LUNCH: 12:45pm, almond butter & grape jelly on whole wheat, momma salad, health salad, 7oz diet coke, 710 cal

BIKE SNACK: 5:45pm, beef jerky, cheezits, 370 cal

DINNER: 8:15pm, Stouffers French Bread pizzas, poppa salad, 960 cal

When I got home, just did not feel like cooking, so I guess this is the equivalent of fast food at home. Hmmmm. Fast food at home.

EVENING SNACK: 8:30pm, Fritos, 300 cal

EVENING SNACK: 10pm, cheesy poofs, 300 cal

----

WEDNESDAY COUNT: 1960

Good eating day. Seems when I stick hardcore to lean protein/veg/legume combo, it's very filling and easier to stay below budget.

AM SNACK: 7:45am, iced green tea, 0 cal

BREAKFAST: 10:45am, fruit smoothie, 375 cal

LUNCH: 1pm, mahi mahi, channa masala, roasted asparagus, momma salad, water, 585 cal

Did 2 pieces of fish, only ate one - surprised how caloric the mahi is. Will do one piece next time. Hopefully it won't go too funky in the fridge.

PM SNACK: 4pm, apple/carrot/beet/kale/ginger juice, 130 cal

DINNER: 8:15pm, mahi mahi, sofrito black beans, steamed string beans, poppa salad with miso tahini dressing, kimchi, 570 cal

I usually don't eat the same protein 2x in a row, but since I started with a new fish, I made too much and B wasn't going to eat it, so I thought it was economical to just eat it now. Miso dressing was good, but needs a kick, perhaps lemon and garlic in the next batch. Still, half the calories of my Italian dressing, so that ain't bad. Got a jar of Mother's kimchi, full strength with anchovies & beef broth in it, really good n' strong and very low cal. This was a surprisingly large amount of food -- 75 cal of steamed string beans near half a dinner plate, and while I intended to serve myself 250g of beans (200 cal), as I'm dishing it out I saw it was going to be too much so I stopped at 200g. Crazy, I was aiming for 800 cal and came in more than 25% under while eating a tasty, big-ass meal. Did miss the diet sprite, think I may have to bust out the carbonator to get in some bubbles.

EVENING SNACK: 9pm, fritos, 300 cal

----

THURSDAY COUNT: 2005

Felt a bit down in the dumps this morning, so after frittering away a little time, decided to wallow after lifting. Upped the "dosage" to the next increment of weight and number of push ups, sit ups and pull up hangs and lowers. Indeed felt better after.

AM SNACK: 8am, iced green tea, 0 cal

BREAKFAST: 10:15am, steel cut oatmeal with butter, brown sugar, vanilla & salt, 250 cal

PM SNACK: 12:15pm, momma salad, 100 cal

LUNCH: 1:30pm, grilled chicken, black beans, broccoli, 640 cal

Again, made 2x two much chicken. When I did the count before eating, it was over 900. Looks like chicken fo' dinnah!

PM SNACK: 4pm, beef jerky, 160 cal

PM SNACK: 5:15pm, poppa salad, 100 cal

DINNER: 7:15pm, grilled chicken, lentils, health salad pickle,  525 cal

EVENING SNACK: 8:30pm, fritos & a piece of brown rice avocado sushi, +/-330 cal

----

FRIDAY COUNT: 2515

No time to get home to juice before dinner, which might of helped with the sugar cravings that knocked me off the wagon around 11pm with M&Ms and ice cream. I rationalized it by counting it towards my Saturday free-day, though I suspect juicing and a splurge on a diet soda might have rerouted it.

AM SNACK: 8am, iced green tea, 0 cal

BREAKFAST: 10am, whole Fage with agave, vanilla and almonds, 310 cal

LUNCH: 1:15pm, chicken sausage, sauteed spinach, black beans, pickle, water, 630 cal

Tried to grill some leeks and failed, wrong temp, wrong cut, not enough lubricant. 

PM SNACK: 6pm, poppa salad with miso tahini dressing, 100 cal

DINNER: 6:30pm, mahi mahi, brussel sprouts & mushrooms, whole wheat cous cous, butternut squash soup, poppa salad, water,875 cal

Sabbath dinner with the whole family, sitting down n' talking. Diet Sprite really calling to me when I was ready to sit down, urg. Should of probably skipped the cous cous, as I felt really full after eating everything.

EVENING SNACK: 8pm, cheesy poofs, 300

EVENING SNACK: 8:30pm, Fritos, 300

Trying to squash the sugar ravings rising up in me...