Alternate Day Dieting

Dear Shell,

Recently I read an article in Woman's World Magazine about the Alternate Day Diet, also known as the Johnson Up Day, Down Day Diet. My friend Melissa and I have been researching the diet for the past two days (yesterday and today) and discussing trying it out ourselves. We've read articles on the pros of the diet and how to do the diet, blogs and message boards of people trying it, articles on the cons of the diet, and watched Youtube videos of shows discussing the diet. One article promoting the cons of the diet, the author decided to try the diet but she went to the extremes, rather than eat like she normally would on Up Days which is the recommended way to do it, she gorged herself to the point of being sick every Up Day, eating stuff she normally wouldnt have and overdoing it. IMO, she lost a lot of credibility doing that, because she purposely went to the extremes to try to prove it as a bad diet, instead of actually following the diet as recommended.

The basics of the diet: You only diet every other day. The days you are dieting are called Down Days. The days you are not dieting are called Up Days.

On Down Days, you keep your caloric intake low. They recommend 500 calories on Down Days, but you can go up to 40% of your normal intake and still lose weight, it'll just be at a slower rate. (for example, for my height, weight and age, my normal caloric intake should be 2042 calories (which i've been below this amount while counting calories so I'm already doing good on that). So for a down day I would need to eat 817 calories or less to stick with the program and lose weight. That may not seem like a lot, and some experts say you miss out on nutrition on those days, but... you can have a LOT of veggies on a Down Day and still stay in your calorie range. Veggies are a great source of nutrition. Add in a little protein for energy.

I've actually had a few days while counting calories that are close to Down Day calories anyway and still felt fine throughout the whole day. I just wasnt that hungry and I made good choices on what I did eat. Such as: Last night for dinner I baked up chicken breasts, then I chopped it up into small chunks (ended up being 12 ounces of chicken = 560 calories) and put it in a large skillet pan with 1 tbsp of olive oil (120 cal). Cooked rice (1 cup dry = 2 cups cooked = 400 calories) added to the pan along with 1 bag of steamed SteamFresh Broccoli and Califlower (105 calories for full bag). The total calories for the WHOLE pan was 1185 calories. I had about 1/3 of the pan, which equaled 395 calories. And I was full before finishing my bowl of food. So I could have had less for dinner, still been full, and had even less calories going to dinner. So you can easily eat healthy and low-cal at the same time. We even had leftovers!

On Up Days, you can eat whatever you want. Note: This is NOT a license to eat everything and anything in sight, gorging yourself on food to the point of making yourself sick. What it means is, I can eat like I normally would. And if I want pizza for dinner, I can have pizza for dinner. My normal amount of pizza though, not the whole large pie! If I'm craving chocolate? I can have some chocolate. This does not mean run out and eat a whole box of chocolates. But a candy bar? No problem. 10 candy bars? Get serious, don't be stupid.

By now you're probably wondering, well where's the benefit in this diet? First off, you only have to diet every other day. Second, you can still have the foods you love and crave, just have them on your Up days. Third, because you're not putting your body into starvation mode by restricting caloric intake daily, you keep your metabolism high instead of it slowing down and getting sluggish because your body is trying to store fat. Fourth, health benefits of reduced asthma, more energy, lower cholesterol, and its been linked to longer life.

So today marks day one of the diet. Today for me is an Up Day. Melissa is starting today as well but hers is a Down Day. This should help us with encouragement, if one of us is having a bad Down Day, the other can say "I made it through mine yesterday, I'm still here, you can do it!"

The reason I decided to start today with an Up Day is because I looked at the calendar and the next few weeks are rather busy with birthdays and vacations, so I tried to find the best way to have Up Days on the special occasions, that way I'm not sitting there chowing on a carrot stick while everyone around me is eating cake, etc and tempting me to attack the table of food.

We'll see how this goes. My biggest concern is my blood sugar level and the Down Days. I'm not diabetic, but I am hypoglycemic. So I will keep a good eye on how my body feels on the Down Days to make sure I'm not risking more than I'm gaining.

Looking forward to seeing results,
Shell