Losing Weight

The Food Doctor diet is a low carb diet based on the premise that eating little and often and concentrating on high protein and fat content instead of carbohydrates for your energy intake means that your overall calorie intake will be low, but you will not feel hungry. Stimulants like coffee and tea are almost completely excluded from this diet. Flavourings are a strong part of the diet so that the dieter doesn't find the food tasteless.

The first week is different from subsequent weeks in that its object is to cleanse the body of toxins that the body has accumulated from the normal diet of processed food. Following weeks are not as severe. This first week is the hardest, as the portions are small and the carbohydrate content is nil. We found that we still felt some hunger at first because our bodies were used to larger portions but by the end the week, we were getting used to the portion sizes and were no longer feeling hungry between the 3 small meals and 2 snacks. Losing 5 and 6 pounds respectively in that week was a great incentive.

The diet book gives a set of meals for each of the seven days. These meals are designed to give all the essential vitamins in a balanced way. Nuts and seeds are a large part of the diet as these release their energy more slowly than carbohydrates do. We were surprised to find that Olive oil was included in many recipes, often in surprising quantities. This is because oil, as a fat, has to be broken down by the body before it can be utilised and is, therefore, another slow energy release food item.

In addition to the diet plan for the first week, the books give guidance on the basic principles behind the diet, so that, by following these basic principles going forward, you can continue to lose weight in a controlled and steady manner. Below you will see a graph that plots our weight loss over a period of 40 days. In that time, we both lost 16lbs in weight. We did continue with the diet after the 40 days that are graphed with each of us losing around two stone before our weights stabilised.