The End of the Dukan Diet - Consolidation Phase Week 14

It's been months since I last updated on the progress of the diet. The good thing is, I have not put back on the weight. My current weight now hovers around 56-57kg. I have not been a good girl last week. Did not go gym at all. So maybe I am 58kg now. Scary to think how the weight creeps back on without you realising it.

I love being a size small/medium. Without sounding boastful hopefully, I think I now look good in almost everything I wear. Well, at least better than before.

I am into the LAST WEEK of the dukan diet. It has been a 6-month journey and I am amazed at how well I have grown accustomed to it. But that's really because this diet is wonderfully designed to make it achievable. By the time I reach the consolidation phase, I could start to eat the foods I craved albeit once a week. That and the pasta servings increase to twice a week by the half-way mark in this third phase. This diet is now easy to maintain as part of a normal lifestyle. Being weight conscious now has also made me observe women on the streets - and I am starting to see a pattern of overweight women. At any one time, walking down Robinson Road (the business district of Singapore with large concentration of office workers) during lunch time, I would see at least 2 - 3 Large to X-Large women. It is difficult to be a Small to Medium size here in Singapore. Almost every mall now has a basement food hall. Ice cream, donuts, confectionaries have set up shop here. Walking through the food hall, you will be attacked by tempting smells of freshly baked breads, waffles, pancakes and other gluttonous sins.

It is with certainty that I will put back on weight once the consolidation phase is over. So I have decided that the consolidation phase is what I will do for life. There will be no Phase 4 where I eat "normally" for 6 days and eat pure protein low-fat for one day a week. "Normal" in Singapore is way too high in calories. And I am not about to work-out 6 days a week at a gym. Especially not when I have cancelled my gym membership as part of my save-money drive (that's another story for another time). Having some food rules would help. That's essentially what the consolidation phase is: two celebration meals and two servings of pasta/carbs (preferable whole grain). Do I feel like popping one of those lemon cream cupcakes into my mouth? Sure. After all, I wasn't super sized before for no reason. Super size people like me are generally foodies. But on some days, I am not allowed to eat the cupcake. Every Wednesday and Sunday now, I have a celebration meal. On these occasions, I can eat a cupcake, or two...

"Food economy", as I would like to call it, has also helped me instill discipline in the consumption of other things. I now take bus/train instead of cabs and cut back on excessive clothing shopping. It's a powerful thing when you realize the level of determination you are capable of. I even took my success in keeping food away and applied to my bad smoking habit. Haven't touched a stick in three weeks now :)

Product in Review - Bare Escentuals Mineral Veil powder SUCKS

I have decided to start a new section on this blog dedicated to products which I feel are worth every penny spent and those which I fucking hated buying. Ok, you can tell in that sentence this would be more to slam the products I hate.

I will start with the product that inspired this new blog. The Bare Escentuals Mineral Veil face powder. I cannot believe that this product actually gets good reviews. On what type of skin will it go on well? It's the worst face powder I have ever used. The only reason I picked this up at Sephora was because I wanted to save money by going for a cheaper powder when my Urban Decay Razor Sharp Ultra Definition Finishing Powder ran out.

 

The bareMinerals Mineral Veil finishing powder by Bare Escentuals is a really bad powder. Usually I am not fussy on finishing or loose powder because most brands do a good one. So I got this brand thinking, I have heard good reviews about Bare Escentuals and loose powder is all the same. Well, I learnt that loose powder isn't all the same. The fineness of the powder actually differs from brand to brand. 

The Mineral Veil powder is coarse. When I put it on, it makes my skin look blotchy and by 6pm, the powder has worn off on my T-zone. When I touch my face, it feels "sandy".  It was horrible. I tried to put up with it but there is nothing I hate more than a bad foundation make-up. Pants can be held up with safety pins (I have to do that now since I have lost a lot of weight through the diet) but bad make-up you cannot do anything with it. And people look at your face when they talk to you. They don't always check out your pants.

A good loose powder should give your foundation a nice silky finish, and should last for at least till 6pm. Which is everything that the product below is - Urban Decay's Razor Sharp Ultra Definition Finishing Powder. It's more expensive than Mineral Veil. S$52 versus S$36. In fact, Urban Decay is really a good make-up brand. I also really like their make-up setting sprays. I use the De-Slick and my make-up stays put the entire day to nighttime. And my usual oily T-zone isn't so oily now that I use De-Slick. The "but" about the Razor finishing powder is the sponge applicator. It's hard to control the amount of powder that comes out through the sponge so there is a fair bit of wastage; and it is hard to remove to wash.

 Being budget-conscious however, I did not want to spend S$52 on another powder. so I went to Tangs, where I have some points accumulated on my Citi Tangs card and a $20 voucher redeemed from my Standard Chartered card, and got myself a Shu Uemura colourless matte face powder (S$68). In the end I paid only about $26!! I like that it comes with a velour puff applicator and there is a sieve-like cover that helps control the amount of powder so minimizing wastage. It's 3pm now and my face is still matt-looking. My skin also doesn't feel dry like when I used Mineral Veil. The coverage is sheer, which should be the way for loose powder and my make-up looks good, not blotchy. So I am back to happy on my make-up.

Ok, that's my first post on the products I have used or am using.
The conclusion: Mineral Veil sucks.

Rediscovery of the week: Elton John's I Want Love MTV With Robert Downey Jr

Because I am a million years old, I listen to Elton John (not like everyday, but once a year kind of thing). So I have been listening to the guy’s greatest hits. There is a song I really love called I Want Love. The MTV for this song is fucking cool, which I just watched again as I relived this song. One of my favourites (not like I have a lot of favourite MTVs in case you think I am “cool”). 

If you love Robert Downey Jr as much as I do, this kind of could make you sit up and feel a little like reaching into your monitor screen and touch Robbie’s tight bod! This is RDJ when he was still troubled with all sorts of sex, drugs and alcohol problems. So hot even when he was so fucked up. You gotta know this context before you watch the video. Then you can feel RDJ's soul. 

Elton John: I wanted to do a video that was mature. And [director] Sam Taylor-Wood said, “I’ve got an idea of just doing it very simply, one person, not you, lip-syncing to the song. An actor, maybe.” I came up with the idea of Robert. I thought, “God, the lyrics are very close to home. I wonder if he’ll do it?” He was very interested. It all came together in five or six days. We sent him the album, and he said, “Yes”…I love the fact that it is a one-shot video. He did 16 takes. They used the very last take because he was completely relaxed by then. ... It’s so pertinent to what he’s going through, and the way he underplays it is fantastic.

Other less meaningful thoughts that ran through my head as I watched this MTV again:

·         Robert Downey Jr was so gay looking in this mtv but so very ungay in real life. That's really hot. And was he on the road of rehab by the time he made this video? He looked in the pink of health!

·         His t-shirt was badly ironed at the back, like he scratched his back just before shooting the video. It really distracted me.

Dukan Diet Consolidation Phase Week 2 (12 - 18 March)

With the serving of bread and an apple everyday, it's plenty of things to eat actually! Sometimes I eat the bread with a slice of cheddar cheese for dinner or lunch, and have the food my mom packed for me for the other meal.

It's really great that now there is a celebration meal. And last week, I used it to celebrate the end of a very long and tedious project. We went to Wild Honey, an all-day breakfast place. I did not finish my food because I was genuinely full. But I was also conscious of not over-eating, which would have been the way I eat in the past.




Brioche toasts with Parma Ham and Scrambled Eggs


As I was quite pre-occupied with work, I only managed to work out at the gym over the weekends. This Without my trainer, I went back to an old Circuit Training routine which he did for me a few years ago when I first engaged him.

Saturday 17 March:
4 sets of Legs, 3 sets of Chest and 1 set of Triceps. That's a total of 8 sets and in between each set, I run for 2 mins on the treadmill at a speed of 9kmh. Ending off with 3 sets of abs. 

Sunday 18 March:
4 sets of Back, 4 sets of Shoulders/Biceps and 3 sets of abs. Run in-between sets. Because on Day 2 I work less of the legs, I increase the running speed to 10kmh.

I weighed myself at the gym too. Surprisingly, I was 58+ kg, as compared to my last weight check if 60.4kg. It could be water weight loss.

Dukan Diet Consolidation Phase Week 1

Week of 27 March was the last week of Cruise Phase 2. Here's some of what I ate that week. 

On 2 March, I went into the third phase of the diet. For the first time in 2 months, since January 1 2012, I ate a fruit and two slices of whole grain bread with a slice of cheddar cheese. Going into Phase 3 means I can now eat vegetables with the proteins everyday. This makes it a lot easier for my mom chef!

The book asks that 100% whole grain bread is eaten but it is difficult to find whole grain bread in Singapore. And even if they are available, it is sold only in places that are largely inaccessible by me. So I bought Sunshine Enriched Multi-Grain bread. I don't think this is 100%. I will attempt at finding a bread closer to the fit next week. 

On Saturday, I had my first Celebration Meal. We went to Everything With Fries. I start off on the wrong foot with a restaurant that serves french fries! I forgot that french fries was forbidden in the diet, for good! Luckily I was cautious about eating too much of the fries so I left most of it untouched at the end of the meal. I also had a bit more than 1 glass of wine! I missed the taste of alcohol so much!

The book was right to say that when you start the third phase, you will feel quite reluctant to start eating carbs. I am so afraid that the weight will start to pile back on. I think what is very important is to make sure exercise is also put in place. I haven't been good at keeping to that now that I have stopped my personal training. On thursday, I went back to weights training and now my butt is hurting. Good pain. Hope that I can get some exercise in today.

Grilled pork chop with fries. I did not take any of that salad dressing. 

So stay tuned as I move into the third phase. Let's see if I manage to stave off the weight.