I must admit that I have become a blogging addict! How did I get here? Maybe it is initial gra gra, or just the hyperstuffaemia that is worrying me. Whatever it is, as hard as I am trying not to blog daily, it is seemingly difficult to slow down on sharing my lessons learned on how I lost weight. Besides, if I share everything on  a daily basis, I will run out of ideas pretty soon. Considering that every single report card I took home after each term in primary school always read “Olufunke is very good, hardworking, intelligent, but she is a talkative child” (*ouch*), I doubt that I will run out of things to say so soon. LOL!

Today’s topic is a very serious topic as I am about to give the ‘X’ rules of Mind your food, like Mind your language, Mind your mouth, Mind your eyes, Mind your everything series. If you want to lose weight, the first thing you have to tackle is the food intake. It is straightforward.

Simple equation: If I>O, then W= W1 + (I-O), where I is intake, O is output, W is New Weight and W1 is previous weight. I can see some people struggling to assimilate this very simple equation, no vex, na too much book cause am. We have to speak in mathematical language to break things down. To translate my equation to English language,  If your intake is greater than your output, which is a function of your metablism and the use of energy by your body, then your body converts the remnant of the intake into storage which ends up being fat. Do you gerrit now? The more you eat, the more you increase your chances of tilting the balance in favour of storage in the form of fat.

Of course, there are a number of factors that pre-determine how much this equation plays out in your body e.g. Genetic composition, which is why there are some extremely skinny people that can eat from now until tomorrow and still not gain any weight. I really wonder what specific genes are responsible for this one. Secondly, the type of intake also determines how much storage your body accumulates over a short period of time. So if you are stuffing up on certain types of food and things, the effect will also differ from other types of food and things. Therefore, what to do? (sic). It is on this basis that many diet programs tend to prescribe all kinds of caloric calculations for potential clients, and come up with various  formulae for how to diet effectively. It is always so amusing to me how Americans, in particular, are very critical of caloric contents of the foods they eat, but the US still has the highest prevalence of obesity. I really wonder, and will be happy to get postulations as to what may be the explanation behind this phenomenon. In my own case, I recognized after five years of trying, that a very big part of my problem and my struggle to shed the weight was my food intake.

In minding your food, you have to mind the type of food and the quantity of food. Like I told one of my nieces a few weeks ago (she was my first experiment on sharing my weight loss experience – don’t ask me the final outcome, it is still work in progress), eating less food and avoiding some foods altogether, will NOT KILL YOU! If you are not in the age bracket 6months – 13 years of age, you probably do not need to load up on so much food. There are many things we eat, loads of junk, that we can actually do away with.

My first rule of weight loss is you need to cut down on the food.

This is inevitable. You have to let go of some, albeit plenty, types of food, and you have to reduce the portion of food intake. Don’t get it twisted, weight loss is a beautiful thing, but iyanga comes with its own pain. This is where the whole cut-the-carbs theory comes in. At the very beginning of a proper weight loss program, some specific food items have to go. Please see my own list below, feel free to add on to yours. These are the items that I cut:

1. Processed/refined sugars – St. Louis sugar cubes and others MUST GO! Jam must go.
2. Processed foods, flour-based – Emi ni Cake, Emi ni meat pie, Emi ni Apple pie, Emi ni Crepe, Emi ni Pancake, Emi ni Chocolate biscuit and company, MUST GO!
3. Heavily-based Starchy foods, which are very common in Nigeria and amongst Nigerians abroad, MUST GO! These include your pounded yam, and boiled yam, Cassava/Garri, Starch, Semovita, Tuwo of anything e.t.c
4. Processed drinks and Sodas MUST GO! Sorry CocaCola and Pepsi, but people need to take you out completely. This also includes processed fruit juices (not the freshly squeezed juices).
5. White bread, Rice & Pasta MUST GO! This one I know people are going to almost crucify me, but believe me, at the beginning of your weight loss program, you just have to let go of these folks. They were also the most difficult for me to release since most of the time they are the easiest foods to prepare. One of my friends attempted this one day, but according to him, after he saw the special Jollof Rice his wife prepared, he and weight loss went their separate ways. LMAO! My brother freed the J. Rice. I hope he finds his way back.
6. Most of our Nigerian Soups MUST GO! You see that your Egusi, Banga, White Soup, Ground nut soup, all the heavy oil-based foods? They just have to go.
7. Fried foods MUST GO! Dodo, fried meat, puff puff, samosa, they have to go.
8. Fatty Meat MUST GO! Beef, Cow tail, Assorted, they have to go.
9. Other fatty foods such as Butter, Mayonnaise, Margarine, Salad Cream/Dressings (most, not all) MUST GO!
10. Alcohol especially Lager & Stout MUST GO! Did I hear someone say Gerrarahia? Abeg, no vex, but my brother, that your booze needs to go.

Personally, I cut out all these food stuff from my diet from day one. It also has to be a one-time decision to take them out. Of course, I know that you will crave these foods a lot at the beginning, it is only natural, but remember your motivation and why you need to let go. If you want that body like Serena Williams’ or you want that body like Agbani Darego’s, and God blessed you with rapid food conversion genes like me, my brother, my sister, you must let go of these foods. No amount of fasting and starvation can give you the expected results if you end up going back to these foods without regulation.

So I guess the next question will be, what then will one eat? I shall tell you, for man shall not live by bread and rice alone, but by common sense and a desire for long life. (insert my smiling face here). OK, to be honest, maybe I was too harsh, right? Yeah,kind of. Numbers 1 – 10 are non-negotiable, they must go! LOL! You thought I was going to change policy?……hahahaha, my ribs hurt.

On a more serious note, for the first 4 weeks, I strongly suggest you take these off your diet. If you can’t hold yourself for that long, then limit the intake of items 3,5,6,8 & 10 to once every two weeks, and you should only take a third  of the quantity you used to eat before you started the weight loss journey. The rest (items 1,2,4,7,9)  are not your friends, just let them go permanently. As for replacement options, please see suggestions below:

1. Processed/refined sugars – Natural Honey
2. Processed foods, flour-based – Nuts; Peanuts, Cashew Nuts, Almonds, Pistachio
3. Heavily-based Starchy foods – Salads, not purely greek alone, but do more vegetables
4. Processed drinks and Sodas – Water (infused with Lemon) & Lots of fruits e.g. Water melon, Mangoes, Apples, Grapes , Smoothies, Fresh fruit juice
5. White bread, Rice & Pasta – More legume based foods, Beans, Moin-moin, Eggs
6. Most of our Nigerian Soups – Pepper soup, Vegetable-based soups (with reduced oil) – preferably without any accompanying swallow
7. Fried foods – Grilled foods, Stir fry veggies
8. Fatty Meat – Chicken
9. Other fatty foods – Peanut butter (very good!), boiled eggs
10. Alcohol – Water

As mentioned in an earlier post, the first day is the hardest, but it is doable. Once you can cut down on some of these, especially the sugars, sodas, and processed foods, you will start to notice a significant change in your metabolism and your body. Try it one day at a time, but make up your mind to see this through the first month. What I experienced after the first month was that I became conditioned not to think too highly of these foods considering that I survived the first month without them, at least not in the same quantity as I used to eat them. There will be a lot of hunger pangs at the beginning;some nights, you will feel like the cross is too much to bear. On such nights, if you cannot hold bodi, grab your bottle of nuts, and a big bottle of water to drink. If it is still too hard, poach two eggs on a slice of toast. This is not a license to do it every night. Probably one night the whole month. I am only being real because there were nights when I was so hungry, I stole a Sneakers bar from my fridge and ate, but I knew that I was going to pay for it the next day! Now almost four months into my weight loss and lifestyle change, I no longer crave these foods. I actually find it very difficult to finish the standard wrap of swallow (I honestly can’t remember when last I had any swallow), and if I must eat rice at a party, because all African parties must have rice, I can do with 4/5 tablespoons of rice. In fact, if I eat more than a slice of yam these days (which is few and far between), I will be constipated. This is just to let you know that after a while, your stomach adjusts, your GIT adjusts, and so does your brain.

Will you take up this challenge and let me know how it does in a month from now? Thanks for reading and see ya larer……