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19
Big Lunch Diet
September 19, 2009 | Leave a Comment
Like many other people my weight had been creeping up over the years. For me it was only about a pound a year but over the decades that tends to add up.
Until age 47 I didn’t pay much attention. Back in 2003 some of my online friends had been posting in their journals about their desire to loose weight and I did a little research just to make sure they knew not to loose TOO MUCH weight.
I found that the Body Mass Index is the primary measure of a healthy weight. For adults (21 and up) the healthy range of BMI is 19 to 25. Unfortunately at 6 feet tall and 200 pounds I was at a BMI of 27.1… 23 pounds over the upper limit!
I was not alone, over half the male adult population is above the 25 mark. To get into the healthy range (BMI=25) I have to get down to 177. To get to the MIDDLE of the healthy range (BMI=21) I would have to get down to 160.
By accident I created a diet I call the Big Lunch Diet. This is the story of how I stumbled into it. NOTE: The Big Lunch Diet worked (eventually) for me but I have no idea if it is safe or effective for anyone else.
One Sunday I had a huge lunch. It was so large I wasn’t hungry till mid-day on Monday! On that Monday I had a fairly large slab of Prime Rib for lunch and again I wasn’t really hungry for the rest of the day.
I weighed myself on Tuesday morning and found that I weighed 194, less than at any time in the last few years. It wasn’t close to 177 (or 160) but it was a change for the better.
Of course I would exercise some. On nice days I would walk a mile or two after lunch. I would take the stairs to my 4th-floor office at least twice a day, sometimes two at a time, sometimes double-time.
The beauty of the Big Lunch Diet is that you get to pig-out one hour a day. You eat meats, vegetables, fruits, nuts and grains until you have no room for dessert… Then have NO calories (or at least VERY few) for the rest of the day.
If you get hungry in the morning just drink some water and anticipate the joys of a big lunch. If you get hungry at night just drink some water and remember how much you ate at lunch.
It took about eight months but I got my weight down to 161. After going back to three meals a day I was able to keep my weight well under 170 for several years, just by skipping an occasional meal if my weight got above 165.