The Twelve Days of Adkins

Reflections on My ongoing Adkins Experience. A Dieter's Diary and attempt to twist reality to fit a theme...more or less.

Day 1 On the first day of Adkins, here's what I had to eat...well, it wasn't a partridge in a pear tree, but it was chicken and salad. Yum. Yum. Telling myself not to eat a Dove Bar, french fries, strawberries or ice cream all the time. By the end of the day, I’m snappish, Husband asks about biology. Snarl “No” and go to fume while munching a piece of cheddar. I feel stale already.

Day 2 Huzzah, I lost three pounds. By my calculations, I’ll be at my desired weight at current course and speed in ten days. Bring on those two turtle doves! Suddenly, No Carb conversion diet seems completely reasonable and of course I’ll stick with it.

Day 3 What gives? I only lost a pound? Did I eat any carbs yesterday? Okay, I forgot and drank six ounces of milk but that’s not like seriously going to keep me from losing is it? That’s so unfair. Resolve to stick with it, after all, I’m on day 3 and I’ve lost four, so I’m one up on the day. Three French hens please. Begin to see how ubiquitous carbo snacks have become in everyday life. I can’t buy a stamp without passing a candy bar!

Day 4 Now taking to weighing twice a day. Did I lose weight yet? Did I lose weight yet? Severe frustration at self for accidentally popping a strawberry, I actually spit it out. Baked four calling birds yesterday to allow for easy snacks today. Wonder if it is worth it.

Day 5 Five pounds are gone! But the days of meats greens…meat…greens…switching to seafood to have variety. Had to order at the golden arches today...that was...difficult. Desperately want to break a new barrier but have stopped talking about diet for fear someone will ask “How much did you lose?” and begin telling me how they dropped 25 the first week. Lost one more pound, somehow feel cheated.

Day 6 I miss orange juice. Very tired of the six geese a laying eggs for breakfast. Reflect on reality that if I had lost one pound each day, I would have been far more satisfied with the diet than losing three, one and then nothing and then one again. Also worry about catching scurvy. Consider branding the diet man a hack, but afraid to stop for fear five pounds are just waiting to hop back on my hips.

Day 7 Breath smells permanently faintly of cheese. Burps have a meaty aftertaste. Now brushing teeth after every meal and snack. Ate the swimming swans today..well not really, but man oh man am I sick of chicken and tuna salad. Staring longingly at children’s lunches, a carb fest of refined sugar –an apple, white bread peanut butter and jelly sandwich and chocolate milk. Begin trolling diet aisles for the pseudo chocolate bars that will substitute for Chocolate. Can’t find any that fit in the diet in this part of the regimen. Nuts.

Day 8 Okay. Seem to have plateaued diet wise. Now considering the radical concept of going to the gym. The gym had an ocatave of women from the La Leche league holding a get in shape membership drive for post partum women. I had actually packed gym clothes in a tote and put them in the back of the car, complete with walkman, but I didn't want to run the gauntlet of eight maids a miling with my crew toting bottles. Went home and did push ups.

Day 9 Considering switching to South beach. Diet Coke isn't even sending me anymore. Even forbidden grapefruit looks so good, it’s scary. Lost one pound. Becoming annoyed. This diet feels dial up, not broadband. Unfortunately, I have trained family to squawk if I weaken, so nine pipers pipe up if I try to cheat.

Day 10 Have decided Low Carb plans are Man diets. Begin promising God to stick to exercise regimen if someone will give me half a blueberry. What’s for breakfast? Eggs. What’s for lunch? Salad and Meat. What’s for dinner, Salad and More Meat. Log on to website for testimonials to keep me in lockstep with the routine. Ten emails later, I'm sufficiently bolstered to march on. Ten drummers keeping me in lock step.

Day 11 Reflecting on the diet rules and their implications. What exactly is a carb? I mean how is it defined –how are foods divided such that one can portion a candy bar in small pieces and get only seven carbs as versus the entire 17 in the goodie. How many carbs in an onz of milk? Some french bread? Banannas? Maple Syrup? Chocolate Five Star Bars? Ice Cream? Pasta Alfredo? Salt and Vinegar Chips, cold cereal for crying out loud!

Not that I’m considering eating any of these things.

They’re for a friend. This lady's dancing with the idea of reintroducing carbs, but my brain has already figured out how I could eat the bad stuff...nah nah nah...can't hear me..not listening...going to stay on the diet...where's my cheese stick. I love cheese sticks....and shrimp coctail at ten in the morning...wondering if we can fiscally afford to keep me on a diet.

Day 12 What?
It's just steak for breakfast.
I couldn't take one more day of eggs. No I will not share.
You guys get to eat pancakes and toast and bagels and oatmeal and cantelope and blackberries, milk, doughnuts and apple juice.

I am offered every possible carb sin, as half the family still likes the idea of being food police, and the other half is ready to sell out for a few pieces of sirloin. There are Lords a leaping as a I cut up my breakfast and portion it out to the assorted heathens. Pieces of appeasement to achieve morning peace. Guess I'll have some more eggs.

There is a dietary mutiny afoot.
Shouldn't have lorded that fact over them.(Sigh).

I made it.

I'm not sure what was harder, sticking to the diet the first three weeks or sticking all of this into my preselected format.

Tune in next time when I try once more to mix two or even three improbable things, from History, Philosophy, English Literature and domestic family life, politics and religion, all for the sole purpose of creating humor and insight...alright, and maybe losing a few more pounds.

X Box Live or The Real Game Boy Advanced

Monday, my morning routine was going well. I had made the lunches and started to wash clothes that had been piled on top of the machine. Then my son came down the stairs.

"Did you wash my gym uniform?" The very tension in his voice betrayed his hopes, that I had somehow found his shorts and shirt after 9 pm Sunday and in a fit of motherly devotion, done a wash.

"Where were they?" I asked.

"I stuck them on top of the washing machine last night. Along with my other things."

Racing to the laundry room, I fished his sopping wet things out of the machine and flung them in the dryer. "Get yourself some other shorts and a shirt for p.e. because they won't be ready. You'll be out of uniform for today."

Grumbling, he marches off to find gym clothes for the day.

Looking at the machine I start to wonder, "Why can't he do this? If he can work a game console, he can do this."

My son returns with a bag of shorts and a t-shirt.

"Look. Pretend this is a video game."
He gives me a Mom-you-have-just-officially-lost-it face.

"No, I'm serious. Take your bag and go on a quest. A magic quest to find all the hidden socks and shorts and stinky things that your evil Twin has strewn all about the house. When your bag is full, come back to this room to save the game." I thrust the bag in his hands.

Returning with a bag half full, I explain, "The Troll Mom will not let you use the machine unless you have a full load. I know there are more things to find, behind your bed, in the closet on the floor..." he goes off to get them. Returning with a full bag, I continue my attempt at educating him about laundry.

"Then, we'll use some magic potion or powder to transform these useless pieces of cloth into useful things for waging war at school against looking and smelling bad."

"Mom..."

"I'm not finished. You'll have target practice. Put all the clothing in the hole. See the hole? Any shots that miss must be retaken, you cannot advance until all items have been loaded."

I'm drawing a crowd, as my two daughters and other son have come to watch, so I keep going.

"Then, you get to push buttons. I know all of you like to push buttons. You even fight for the privilege of pushing the buttons in public. Here we have a button and a lever you can use anytime! Push!"

"I don't know what to push."My son tried playing dumb. Admittedly, he did sound a bit like me whenever I would join in the Smackdown frenzy of a melee game session.

"Think of it as xxYZ down toggle B and you won't have a problem."

He pushed the button.

"See? You did it! Very good." I said in my kindergarten teacher voice. "Now, this game is played in real time. You let this sit for a while, maybe two levels worth of playing and then come back when the loud buzzer goes off. Transfering the wet items to the dryer may be tricky."

Eyes rolled.

"You should have a basket in case there are things in the dryer. If you don't unload the dryer first, the machine shrinks the clothing and that favorite shirt of yours becomes a hand-me-down."

My daughter starts to laugh.

"Bon, what's your favorite game?"

Startled to see I have changed focus, she stammers "Legend of Zelda."

"Good. Good. And you have to equip and unequip in that game right?"

"Yes."

"Well you have to unequip the dryer before you can equip it with new wet things. Once you've loaded the dryer, you have a secret move that makes everything else more effective. Think of this as a cheat code."

I hold up a dryer sheet for all to see, as even the babies are coming to watch, wondering why everyone else is crowded in the laundry room. Seizing the moment, I allow my five-year-old to place it in the dryer.

Now it's filter time and button pushing again. I remove the filter and have each of them remove some of the lint. There are lots of "ew!s" and one attempt to wear the blue fuzz as a beard but everyone eventually touches the lint. Replacing the filter, I allow the oldest girl to "push the buttons." Then the toddler cries to do it too, so I make them all take turns, even those who don't want to.

"This concludes our tutorial of Laundry machine Live! Come back this afternoon to learn about folding and actually putting away."

Lecture over, the crowd disperses and I begin wondering if I could come up with a metaphor to get the kids to wash the dishes.

*In loving tribute to the great one, Erma Bombeck who first tried to teach her children domestic skills via a manual.