Successful dieting

Nigeria on the whole is good for my waistline. Summers in the US are ... not. Despite every effort I can think of I tend to gain a pound a week* each summer I went back home. Simply returning to Nigeria this year took off 6-10 pounds in ONE week.**

Delicious camel eyes

To get the rest off, I set myself a goal to lose a pound a week. Any morning I was below my target I could eat whatever I wanted within reason. Any morning I was below I had egg and toast for breakfast and dinner and a great many fruits and vegetables for lunch at the cafeteria.

As of this week I've officially returned to my pre-summer weight and can now enjoy contemplating knocking it down another 5 pounds or so before I return for Christmas, potentially tying or surpassing my lowest recorded weight in the last 10 years. If I were to keep this up through next semester, I would be within 20 pounds of my ideal weight. Now that would be something!

The other great thing is that this is something I can keep up in the US.

This is also to say I've had a great many days of vegetarian eating, if not veganism.*** I picked eggs because they give me some proper protein, my body metabolizes cholesterol gloriously, they are cheap, and I really like eggs and toast. I haven't gotten tired of them yet. The lack of variety around here to begin with is quite helpful in sticking to it.









* - Oddly enough I prevented any gain at all last Christmas so there must be something I can do about it and it can't be entirely environmental.
** - Why are some people so very quick to claim every weight gain is "real" and any weight loss is "just water"? If you thought that just now, please scold yourself.
*** - Hipster/Contrarian Derrill would not have even considered doing this in Ithaca. Now that I'm well and truly away from the hippies, though, and surrounded by people who think food means meat and a boiled carb, I'm free to experiment without being too mainstream.