Everyone, Back on the Bus

Willpower I may have in ample supply, but my reserve of patience runs at a constant, unerring deficiency. This would be why I had to step away from the Science Experiment. To recap, I lost 8 pounds in the first four protocol days. I lost 3 pounds in the second six protocol days. And, 0 pounds in the third six days following the protocol. This disappointment sent me into a tailspin of aggravation. For the next week, while waiting on a response from the protocol's designer, I ate as I typically would and did Crossfit exercises and maintained the expected 2 pound gain.

I never did receive an answer from the protocol's designer. He passed the girl off onto his community, which seems to be littered with people who either don't read, or don't pay attention to the situation as it was described. Finally a shining light shown in the darkness, expressed his own experiences with the protocol, and restored hope that the science project would not be a bust.

As of Monday, I re-donned the lab coat and got back to work. Following some of Mr. Shining Light's suggestions, I'm fully back to ingesting white, off white, and yellow pills. And, come this next Eat Day, I will be consuming far more carbohydrate calories. As it was explained to me, I would pretty much need to make eating my "job" for Sunday. Again, this worries me. But I have to give it an honest shot to see this Science Experiment to its end. Thirty days in and I do not see that end. At this point I should have lost 30 some odd pounds. That simply is not the case. We will have to see how this slightly altered direction shifts the experiment. Let's cross our slide rules as a demonstration of hope.

Day thirty of 90. I would guess less than half the expected result.

Adjusting Parameters

After the net zero loss of day 18, I began day nineteen completely defeated. I went through most of the day before having a discussion with the girl that ended with me moving away from the experiment.

The plan is to step away only briefly. We've sent my exact schedule to the designer of the Bulletproof fat burning protocol to get his input on what could be going wrong. I personally think that, due to the amount of time I spent each day feeling hungry, I wasn't consuming enough to keep my body from moving into "starvation mode". That would completely shut my metabolism down and run counter to the point of the protocol. When Mr. Bulletproof gets back to us, I'll likely go back on the plan.

But rest assured, if you prefer to do so,  that I'm not just taking it easy on myself in the downtime. I'm eating healthy and doing Workout of the Day exercises from Crossfit.Com until we wait to hear back from Mr. Bulletproof.

Day twenty-two of 90. My arms and legs feel a bit like jelly.

Bulletproof?

The ideology behind this experiment is considered "bulletproof". That is to say, the expected result is indicated to be a pound per day on average. I was discouraged by last weeks result as it only yielded a 3 pound loss. Again, this is not a diet. But there has to be a quantifiable method of determining success. Total weight lost is that quantifiable determinant.

So I came into this week with an eye toward toughing it out. Peaks and valleys in the flow chart are to be expected. I stepped onto the scale to find a zero net loss for the week. I was, in a word, irate. After the minimal loss last week we cut some fats in the form of coconut milk from my daily intake. The result was that, for the first time in two weeks, I was feeling actual hunger from time to time.

My conclusion about why there was zero net loss this week was three fold. Hunger in this system is not ideal as a hungry body holds onto fat when it fears starvation. I consumed too much on my Eat Day. Though that is expressly detailed as the point of Eat Day. I consumed two cans of Mountain Dew throwback during our weekly gaming session (which is also my Eat Day). Those calories are empty. And though it's Natural Sugar, it's still a "Frankenfood". I knew better. But my craving for a flavored drink with my meal outweighed my over all sense of will. Each of those three issues could have impacted my body's ability to cope with this plan. But a net zero loss is still completely unacceptable.

Now, the designer of the plan says not to weigh yourself. Rather, he suggests, let the mirror be your scale. Well, this is a Science Experiment for me, quantifiable blah blah blah and all that. So the scale is part of the experiment. But I chose only to weigh myself first thing in the morning on Eat Day before breaking my fast. This week though, with the zero net loss, the amount I weighed after my Eat Day was also a valuable piece of information. How much of a weigh deficit and I working with. My assumption was "no more than the total weight of food I consumed" because, in a day, your body can't really process and store the food in a long term way. Therefore, I guestimated one maybe two pounds. The scale this morning bore that out. I hopped on and found myself to weight two pounds more than the day before. Now we know. It's unlikely I will conduct that particular sub-experiment again.


Despite my jaw clenching anger, I'm back on schedule while we discuss the problem with the plan's designer. His input should be invaluable; so, I'm willing to tough it out until he responds.


Day nineteen of 90. Discouragement is not valuable to the process.