@T3hPwnisher and @QuadQueen thank you.
Once upon a time, I did actually lean up.
Reading my old logs, it appears like I kind of knew what I was doing. The actual food choices were pretty bad, but the methods weren’t.
(I did it mostly with fast food because I was a workaholic, my girlfriend had moved across the country, and nutrition info and consistency was easy.)
Averaged 1lb loss a week, tracked calories, scale weight, and managed based on trends not daily fluctuations. Did it for 5 weeks. Strength went up, scale weight went down.
Don’t remember being hungry or anything else being negatively affected. Didn’t log it if I was.
This time, crash diet! significant hunger! headaches!
Yeah, I know better.
What I should have done (and still can do) is swap out a single serving of milk with a shake. Let that settle for some days. Then another, etc. Keep everything else the same.
Maybe even kept the energy drink in.
What I will probably do is the first morning shake with milk (or a mix of water/milk), as suggested. No other milk.
I’m not tracking it but my gut feeling says I won’t be getting enough protein in without the milk. Sure, my lunches and dinner are predominately protein, but I doubt it’s enough to limit muscle loss. That’s why MD seemed like a good swap. Same volume of liquid intake, same habits, but higher protein and lower calories.
As far as the V diet, I was trying to meet somewhere in the middle. Some resemblance on the surface, but a different thing altogether. 2 solid meals, comparable morning caffeine but without the sugar, and shakes mainly for the protein-sparing effect.