7 days - 7 pounds

I think I'm beginning to understand how Mark Haub, a professor of human nutrition at Kansas State University, lost 27 pounds in two months. His "Twinkie diet" consisted of eating nothing but snack cakes during the day and a can of vegetables at the dinner table in front of his kids. Why did he choose Twinkies? Prepackaged foods, especially those that do not vary in weight or nutritional make-up from one package to the next, are very easy to log if you are keeping a food journal as your dieting strategy.

I decided that the week with the kids away in Utah would be the perfect time for me to try out the Twinkie diet. I'd already lost a lot of weight on my calorie logging diet -- 10 pounds over 3 months, yea! -- so I wasn't expecting any huge acceleration in weight loss from switching from "normal" food to Twinkies.

But that's where I was wrong.

I have lost 7 pounds over the past 7 days, and I did it by eating fruit pies, Pop Tarts, and Twinkies. Okay, I drank a protein shake in the morning, and had some fruits and veggies (all weighed out to the fraction of an ounce), but it was mostly "junk" food. I don't think those 7 pounds are just water weight because I have made a point to drink plenty of liquids--mostly water. There were a few days when my caloric intake was lower than the 1800 calories that signify my daily budget, but that was because I wasn't hungry!

I'm curious now to see what happens to my weight loss trend as I start eating "normal" foods again now that the kids will be at my meals with me.