There seem to be a lot of people on the V-Diet at the moment, so I thought I’d start a thread to see what people’s top tips are for getting through it.
Obviously, having will-power is the most important thing, but if anyone has any other tips for people either on the diet or about to embark upon it, then post here.
I’ll start the ball rolling:
Try starting the diet mid-week - this means you have two short term targets to achieve each week (i.e. “I can keep going till the weekend” quickly followed by “I’ve nearly finished two weeks of this”). You’ll always feel like you’re nearly at the next milestone in the diet, which is pretty motivating.
Download all three series and holiday specials of the Ricky Gervais podcasts for your morning walk.
Make sure you use scales if you’re fiddling around with the amount of protein powder in each drink: 1.75 or 1.5 scoops is pretty difficult to measure with accuracy.
Get a variety of Metabolic Drive flavors and mix them up to create some combinations (choco-banana, strawberry cream, etc). They’re all good (with the possible exception of orange, I’m not a fan), so don’t be afraid to buy something other than chocolate. Having some options will make it easier to stomach those shakes after you’ve had about 80 of them.
I thought I’d be “smart” and follow the diet but use one scoop MD and one scoop whey to save $. I couldn’t make it through a day without thinking I was starving. So, three unsuccessful attempts later, I switched to all MD protein.
Now, it’s day three. I’m full, or at least satisfied, and have no urges to stop.
While I have seen many variations on here of the diet, I didn’t think mine was so far off. I was wrong.
Just follow it. Turn your brain off, have some blind faith and do it. Don’t try and reinvent the wheel.
I’ll add one that was actually in the interview with Dan John after he finished the V-Diet:
Put all your tablets (HOT-ROX, BCAAs, vitamins, fat capsules etc.) in freezer bags and have them at the places you’ll be taking them from the beginning of the diet (e.g. by your bed for morning/in a drawer at work for afternoon).
It’s just another way to turn your brain off and get on with it.
If you have not worked out in awhile, make sure you do so for a week or two before starting the vdiet. Recovery is slightly slower and well, you don’t want to miss any workouts while on the diet because you’re too sore.
do not premix flax into your shakes if you’re going to it for the day… it spoils in a matter of hours… ewww…
buy a few different flavors of md, you’ll be thankful after your 50th banana shake
you can never be drinking too much water on this diet, the diet along with bcaas made me constantly thirsty
Tell everyone around you that you’re doing this diet. That way, if you feel like pulling the plug or cheating, you have to explain why you were such a heartless pu***y to each and every one of those people…
[quote]bitenose wrote:
Tell everyone around you that you’re doing this diet. That way, if you feel like pulling the plug or cheating, you have to explain why you were such a heartless pu**y to each and every one of those people… [/quote]
I think that’s a good tip, except for telling people who’ll tell you not to do it because it’s not a “normal” diet.
I’ve had to lie to people to avoid this, telling them I’m eating plenty of whole foods as well as protein shakes to get them off my back. Some people just won’t get it and won’t stop hounding you to stop it.
This could either make you more determined to prove them wrong or suffocate your will to carry on with the diet. Depends what kind of a person you are. This goes back to will-power being a given for this thread.
Personally, I can’t be bothered with people who are unwilling to let others experiment with their own diet, so I just avoid telling them the details.
As someone who has done this and loss 26 pounds in 26 days, and who is currently doing it, I would highly recommend pickle juice. I prefer Clausen because of the added garlic.
I know this may sound weird, but my wife and I got the tip from one of the authors here. After a while you just get tired of all the sweet from the shakes. A small sip of pickle juice every few days seemed to help me stop the cravings for something not sweet.
It sounded weird when I read it, but it really worked well for us.
Try to avoid television that first week. I found the more television I watched the worse cravings I was having due to the food porn commercials (even taped stuff since you still see it fly by the screen).
The worst for me was how many times I cheated in that first week - in my dreams. I swear I would wake up, and be gnawing my pillow thinking it was KFC or Burger King or whatever commercial I had accidentally seen while the wife was cruelly watching TV. My wife even claims that I tried to bite her when she kissed me goodnight, and I was already asleep!
Start a V-Diet support thread. But if you do, it would be good if a group of you started on the same day.
The last support threads were informative, but the problem was that people were starting on different times, so it didn’t really feel that supportive. Because when you’re on the 4th day, you’re pretty grumpy…
Not so much a tip for doing the diet, but preparing for it. To figure out the number of tubs of protein powder to order, take your bodyweight in pounds and multiply it by 28, then divide by 20, divide by 31, and round that up to the nearest whole number.
If you’ve got a copy of Excel, open up a new sheet, put your weight in cell A1, and enter =CEILING(A128/(2031),1) in A2. The value in A2 is the number of tubs of protein that you’ll need to get through the diet.
[quote]monkey_space wrote:
As someone who has done this and loss 26 pounds in 26 days, and who is currently doing it, I would highly recommend pickle juice. I prefer Clausen because of the added garlic.
I know this may sound weird, but my wife and I got the tip from one of the authors here. After a while you just get tired of all the sweet from the shakes. A small sip of pickle juice every few days seemed to help me stop the cravings for something not sweet.
It sounded weird when I read it, but it really worked well for us.
Christopher[/quote]
I did the exact same thing. I actually like pickle juice anyway, so it was nice.
One thing you may want to check out is your local dollar store… I picked up 6 shaker containers for 6 bucks and they are holding up better then the ones i was getting at dpsnutrition.com for 3.95.
[quote]monkey_space wrote:
As someone who has done this and loss 26 pounds in 26 days, and who is currently doing it, I would highly recommend pickle juice. […]
I know this may sound weird…[/quote]
It doesn’t. Day 7 here, and just before I clicked on this article I was considering having a drink of the water in an olive jar in the fridge.
Here’s something not to do: Don’t, however much you might need to chew, munch down 4 tablets of Fiber Choice in one go. Chewing 'em might be great as you’re doing it, but about 3-4 hours later you’ll regret it. Have you ever had a tornado come out your arse…?
When/If I do it again, I’d change my thoughts to less concentration on the diet itself: Dont think of it as a diet. In fact, dont think of it. Do your shakes, do your four weeks, then do something else. Dont treat it as something special or something that is revolutionary for you. Its alot easier to do something that requires LESS conscious effort. Treat it as something normal for four weeks, and succeed.
