Yesterday (day 14) I went to the Brighton party, and as I had a feeling might happen, the lure of drinks and birthday cake was too much, and I ended up having three or four drinks, and several pieces of birthday cake

So, I officially ended up failing the diet on day 14.  But, never fear, I’m going to continue to press on.  I made it almost 14 days without breaking the diet, and if I can go on the next 14 without making a mistake, then I’ll still feel like a success.

Drinking these protein drinks after having yummy chocolate and carrot cake is really hard, and once again, I feel a bit like being sick.

Day 15 (Sunday) I didn’t do a lot, I made sure I got my walk in but silly me forgot to restart my stopwatch after stopping to tie my shoes, silly me, so I don’t know how fast I was walking.

Today I’ll walk the long way home from work as my walk.  Then I have to do weights… I hate doing weights on Monday (I hate doing anything on Monday) but I will persevere.

Hooray!  Halfway through the main part of the diet!

I just did the V-Burn challenge (see here for week 1′s challenge) and this time I was aiming for under 30 minutes.  It took me 29m 22s!  That’s 2 mins and 35s better than last time, so I’m pretty happy about that.

I’m no less knackered at the end of it than last time, but this time I took asprin before I started because those Pike Push-ups give me a headache.  Plus I got a splinter in my hand from the wooden floors on the Hand Walkout.

But… I get my HSM (healthy solid meal) for my next meal!  I’ve got a Marks and Spencer chicken and lentil salad, and I’m going to add brown rice and broccoli to it and then have strawberries for dessert.  Oh man I can’t wait.

I’m going to Brighton for a 30th tonight, and I vow to drink nothing but Diet Coke and I’m only allowed to add Bacardi to two drinks.  Cheating a bit I know, but I can’t just sit locked inside the house for 4 weeks.

Today I spent my lunch break reflecting what it was like when I was able to eat food… ah those were the good ol’ days.  I wrote down everything that I’d eat if it were the day after the end of the diet and then I got very hungry.  I couldn’t stop thinking about food.

It’s okay though because I was hungry anyway, someone was having a birthday and as is the tradition here at work, they got a 24 pack of Krispy Kreme donuts.  Gahh, that’s twice this week I’ve had to resist work donuts!!  Oh man.

Not much happening the first half of this week. 

Yesterday (day 11) I was so tired and just couldn’t be bothered doing weights, luckily I pulled through and did them anyway, however I just really didn’t put the effort in and I feel quite bad about it today.  If I don’t do the weights properly then I feel like all this protein I’m drinking is just money down the drain.

The worst bit is I weighed myself on day 10 and I was only 0.1kg lighter than the first day of the diet.  That was a bit of a low point.  The instructions say not to weigh yourself every day, and now I see why.  But I’ve been weighing myself every day for the last 2 years, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to stop now.

Today I had to do the “v-burn challenge”, a day late due to being slack on Friday.  What it involves is doing 10 of each of these, then repeating the whole thing 5 times.

A1 Body-Weight Squat
A2 Hand Walkout – from knees
A3 Single-Leg Deadlift
A4 Push-Up
A5 Jumping Jack
A6 Reverse Lunge – overhead reach
A7 Pike Push-Up
A8 Mountain Climber

I really thought it would be easy.  Jumping Jacks?  How hard can that be!

Boy I was wrong.  After doing 10 of each of these 3 times, I wasn’t sure where I would get the energy from to go on.  After the 4th time, I thought I was going to collapse.  But I went on, and got through all 5 sets in 31m 57s.  I’ll be doing it again in a week’s time and hoping to get a better time.

If any of you have a half-hour spare, and a death wish, I’d love to see you try and do it, and tell me your time.  If you want to see the exercises in more detail, including a video, go here, click “Beginner Program” followed by “Sat / Sun” followed by “Workout Video” then “Play Video”.

Wow, I got to eat something today.  I had couscous with grilled chicken and some berries for dessert.  Normally that would have been barely edible, but today it was great.

I also did the weights I didn’t do yesterday, and I went out for a coffee with a friend.

Friday was day 6 in the diet.  It was the hardest so far.

My sister told me to ensure that my social life doesn’t suffer because of the diet, so I went out for a drink with a friend tonight.  I only drank black coffee and diet coke, and had no food.

It was REALLY HARD. The first cafe I had to they had pear cake and chocolate cake and all sorts of great stuff.  The bar we then went to had Belgian Beer which my friend had and it smelled awesome.  On the way home we passed a few kebab places and my god I just about caved.  But I didn’t.

Even when my cousin stayed with me and had curry in my living room that was no problem to ignore.  But I don’t know how I got through it today.

I was supposed to do weights today, but because of all the difficulty and the fact that I had no energy at the end of the day, I didn’t do them.  My first slip-up so far.

It’s amazing how I take food for granted!  Wow I can’t wait until tomorrow when I can have some solid food!

Thursday was day 5.  No weights!  Woo.

I’ve been starting to feel like all this liquid food is making me feel a bit nauseous.  If I don’t throw up once in these 28 days it will be a miracle.

My cousin came to stay with me this evening, and I permitted her to have Lamb Korma in my living room.  Surprisingly, I didn’t crave it at all, not even a bit (but then, I don’t like Lamb).  I did have my eye on the garlic naan at one point, but it was no problem.

Ow ow ow ow.  Some more new exercises like the Romanian deadlift.  Ouch.

Yay, no more weights until Friday.

I measured myself two days ago, and to be honest it’s the first time ever, and the V-Diet instructions don’t tell exactly how you should measure yourself so I don’t know if these are right or wildly out.  But here’s what I got:

Neck: 38cm / 15in
Chest: 95cm / 37.5in
Waist: 92.5cm / 36.5in
Calves left: 38.5cm / 15in right: 40cm / 15.5in (how odd, my right calf is half an inch bigger than my left)
Thighs left: 55.5cm / 22in right: 56.5cm / 22in
Body fat: 13.5%

Still too scared to post “before” photos.
14% of the way through. 20 meals down 120 to go.

I can still say I feel great, I’ve never felt hungry despite having no more than 1,500 calories per day (1,800 calories on days where I do weights).  I kind of miss running a bit – but it says “Don’t run!” on the training plan.  Oh well.

I am looking forward to the HSM (healthy solid meal) on Saturday where you get to eat whatever you want (as long as it’s healthy).  I never thought I’d look so forward to vegetables and brown rice.

I didn’t do my weights yesterday because I was still recovering from the weights from day 1.  Luckily I thought this might happen and accounted for it, it means I’m going to do weights Sunday Wednesday and Friday instead of Sun Tue and Thu.

Not much else to report today!