Quarantine Vibes; Does the Egg Diet Actually Work?

Last week, I tried something that has been recently trending on all social media platforms; yet another diet appraised for helping all clear their digestive systems and lose some stubborn fat...the classic. On a normal day, I would never have given this diet a second glance however, it's quarantine and to avoid snacking and binge eating, I decided to give this egg thing a go. The results...surprisingly shocking and disappointingly good.

Explanation

If you haven't yet heard of the egg diet, here's a brief rundown of it;

Breakfast: 3 eggs and green tea

Lunch: 3 eggs, green tea and an apple

Snack: green tea and an apple

Dinner: Oatmeal (1/2 cup of milk, 1/2 cup of water, 1/2 cup of oats with some fruits and some honey) and green tea

This is what I ate for 8 days. Some incorporate this meal plan for 7 days, 10 day, 14 days, however because this diet involves a very unbalanced carb/protein/fat ratio, I would not do this for longer than 2 weeks.

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Notes before we get any further along with this blog;

1. In order to give credit where its due before getting any further into this review, I believe the diet itself was created by a YouTuber who goes by the name of Versatile Vichy. She promotes this diet as being a means of losing "10 kg in 10 days".

2. Prior to getting into the nitty-gritties of the diet and the results that I achieved, I wanted to mention that I am in no way a professional or a doctor or a nutritionist therefore please take everything written here with a pinch of salt and do your research/talk to a professional if you're interested in doing this diet yourself.

3. Finally, though the diet did work for me and does work for many others, it is very harsh and could be dangerous if caution is not taken. Though I did experience many physical results, those were not the ones that I particularly enjoyed. The takeaways that I'm glad I got from this diet are the reason that I am glad I did it HOWEVER you do not have to do this diet or any diet as a matter of fact to achieve them! When discussing takeaways and results, I have listed all the takeaways that I felt I gained from this diet but I also give suggestions as to how to achieve them without having to limit yourself to such a strict and rigid dietary plan. As well, I have provided you with an empty version of the exact same tracking sheet that I used during this challenge that you can fill out if you do decide to implement any of the SUGGESTIONS that I give into your daily routine. These trackers really do help you remain motivated and positive when changing something that is regularly in your routine.

With these out of the way, let’s get to the fun stuff.

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BEFORE DIET;

Prior to doing the diet, I purchased all the ingredients that I would need for the entire week and, on the first day of the diet, I weighed myself and took down all my specific body measurements to ensure that the 'results' were as accurate as possible.

DURING DIET;

The first 2 days of the diet were surprisingly not challenging as all. I wasn’t really ever hungry or craving other foods however, I did notice that I had a weird drive to exercise, I was feeling super good and I had become I very aware of the lack of water that I was consuming on a day to day basis prior of the diet.

By day 3, physically again, I was feeling really good. I was getting used to the portions and even noticing that sometimes I simply could not eat 3 eggs in one meal. If you look at my day to day notes down below, you will notice that I often resorted to preparing 2 eggs instead of 3 because I was feeling full pretty quick. Other than that, I think this was probably one of my most active days of the week and I never got dizzy or dehydrated even when running a 10k which is usually the biggest complaint or side effect of any diet. In addition, I found myself getting very creative with the way that I was preparing my eggs. Jokes aside, I felt that I was learning a lot about the actual food portions I needed to feel 'full' which didn’t involve the full plate of food and all the snacking that’s usually done on a day to day basis. It’s weird writing about this but it makes more sense if you're actually doing it.

Day 4 was probably one of the harder days of the diet. I guess this is expected considering the high's that I was feeling the day before however, after pushing myself to go workout in the morning as usual and after getting some school work done, I realized probably one of my biggest takeaways of this challenge; the importance of discipline. This is so underrated but so extremely crucial. I could’ve given up and done what I do on a normal day basis on a day like this; something along the lines of lie in bed all die, try to drown myself in coffee hoping to get some sort of energy, resorting to mid-day naps thinking that I'll wake up in a completely different mood etc. By sticking with this diet and simply eating every meal in a certain quantity at a certain time, I realized the half the time we eat, we don’t actually need to be eating. We eat simply out of boredom or pity and then try to convince ourselves that we'll be super healthy tomorrow. It's a cycle that never ends but that could simply be fixed by staying on top of healthy and disciplined eating. Obviously this diet is in no way a representation of 'healthy' however it definitely teaches discipline in the hardest way possible.

By day 5, I woke up feeling light. It was weird because for the first time in a while, I didn’t feel bloated or just kind of gross. I felt good and I even saw some results. Even though I knew that the diet would soon be over and that it was probably unhealthy for me mentally to be associating the feelings I was experiencing with this diet, I was very grateful for the routine that it had helped me establish as a result of the specific meal times. I think the eggs made me smarter as well but only for that one week ;D!

Day 6 and 7, I felt pretty amazing, but I was really craving chocolate and pastries. I just wanted something...anything sweet. As sad as it sounds, throughout the entire day I was looking forward to having oatmeal as a little honey was involved.

Day 8 was a breeze. I had gotten so used to the diet and had benefited from it in so many ways that I was upset that it would be over soon. I had built a routine around this diet which is a routine that I've been trying to maintain since. I'm so grateful that the diet had helped me do so because of the lack of productivity/motivation that I was feeling leading into this diet...quarantine, online classes and the fear of corona definitely hadn't been benefiting me at all.

If you are interested in seeing what the day-to-day looked like, here's a little chart that I filled out to keep track of my meals and moods. I have also left an empty one for all the folks out there interested in tracking anything from moods to meals to daily productivity. I would not recommend this diet despite the positive effects that I was feeling as a result of it however I think that the takeaways of it are one’s worth sharing.

POST DIET;

Here is a little illustration of how my body looked before vs after the diet and the results that I achieved because of it. I definitely didn't lose ayhting near 10 kg or 22 lbs but still, it was something. Again, I do not want to promote this, and it is for this reason that we didn’t title this blog post the classic 'How to lose blah in blah' to catch your attention. The takeaways down below which were 'gained' from this diet are things that I think each and every single person should try to implement as best as possible into their lives just to feel better, live a little healthier and feel more productive however they are also ones that you can totally easily achieve without this diet. Suggestions of how to achieve and implement these takeaways.....

TAKEAWAYS;

1. ROUTINE;

When you know exactly what you will be eating at certain times during the day, you subconsciously start building a schedule around your meal plans. Instead of thinking about what food you’ll be preparing or about the fact that you so badly want to snack, you're thinking about what you’re going to do between meals or what work you need to accomplish. You're not distracting yourself with the daunting refrigerator!!!! Keeping yourself consistent establishes a productive lifestyle and therefore is key to any good routine. Keep it simple and incorporate things that you enjoy doing into your routine in order to prevent having it be associated with the many negative connotations that surround the word itself.

This diet really helped me find this consistency that I had been lacking however I think it was just the meal planning portion itself that was really the game changer for me. If you get up in the morning and write down the things that you're thinking of preparing for each meal or if you prepare meals a few days in advance to give yourself some freedom in the kitchen, this will definitely be much more useful and beneficial that the egg diet as it's sustainable and healthy.

2. LISTEN TO YOU GUT; avoid 'eating with your eyes' as the saying goes. Take your time when you are eating. Take a breath before each bite in order to make sure that you are not simply shoving everything down as fast as you can. Relax. Savor and enjoy your food. Eating is not a race. All of these are important as they allow you to listen to your body. When you're full, you will know rather than finding out that you overate after everything's already in there. Obviously implementing this into your daily routine does not require the egg diet. Whenever you eat anything, you should simply be conscious of your body in order to control your portions. You would be surprised at how fast you become full. It does not require the amount of food that you think it requires.

3. DRINK LOTS OF WATER; no need to explain because you have definitely heard this one before. Drinking 4 cups of tea a day + water makes you aware of the liquids coming in and out of your body however drinking water doesn’t at all require the egg diet. Some things that you can do to make sure you're reaching your daily water intake are have a glass of water or a cup of tea with every meal, prepare x amount of bottles in the morning and make sure that you’ve drank every last drop in those bottles by the end of the day, add some fruits into your water to make water more flavorful and more enjoyable etc. There are so many benefits to drinking water and I am sure that you have heard all of them already so just drink water!

4. Lastly, in general, productivity is obviously a direct result of good food intake. If you're feeding your body what it needs and taking care of it, it will help you in return. You will focus better, be more productive, feel good, gain inspiration, stay motivated throughout that day etc. Eggs does not fulfill this rather having balanced meals and organized meals does.

Now though all these things sound obvious because they’re told to us every single second of every single day, it's surprising how often we forget these 4 simple things. I want to challenge you today to accomplish at least one of those 4 steps. Eat a little slower, drink a little more water or simply make sure that you prepare some healthy meal for yourself...you can do it!! In order to motivate you and to help you out with this, I've left down below a template of the exact same tracking sheet that I used when completing this diet that you can use for literally any change that you're making in your life, any diet that you want to try out, any of the suggestions above that your willing to implement into your life, any workout plan that you decide to undertake etc. They're free and available for you to use however many times you want.

With all this being said, I wouldn’t recommend anyone to try this diet. Yes, weight was lost and, yes, it did feel good however it can be dangerous for numerous reasons that are not worth the 'results'. The diet isn't healthy, isn't sustainable, and isn't fun. It could however be quiet alluring despite the dangerous of it and the health risks that it could entail. The aspects of the diet that I enjoyed were not the ones that entailed the actual food that I was consuming; they were the mental challenges involved. For example, this diet forced me to establish a daily schedule of food consumption which I don’t normally follow (breakfast 7-9, lunch 11-1, snack 3-5 and dinner 6-8), it made me aware of the portions that I was consuming and it made me conscious of the liquid intake that I was having. All of these are beneficial and now that I am implementing these takeaways into my normal routine, I am glad that I did the egg diet however I do not think that limiting yourself to only eggs and apples is the way to go in order to achieve this. It is all about discipline; something so vital yet so often forgotten in today's society. I've done this diet and struggled because of it however I've listed everything I've learned from it and listed how you can implement those changes in your life without having to follow this unyielding diet...focus on those and I guarantee that your happiness, your health and your productivity will improve as a result!! Thank you for reading all the way up to here and I really do hope that you enjoyed this very honest review. Please remember to take everything that I've said with a grain of salt and be very careful with any kinds of 'promising' diets or workout plans out there...make sure that you're doing them for the right reasons and with the right attitude.