Hi Betty, stripped down to the basics, this diet consists of three very low calorie meals per day (meals = shakes of either vanilla, chocolate or strawberry flavour OR chicken soup OR a flapjack either peanut or coconut flavour). You can pick any combination as long as you have three of those per day. You're allowed to drink plain or sparkling water (not flavoured) and/or black coffee. Leaf teas are also fine to drink, but NOT fruit teas.
Some people make the mistake of thinking they don't have to have the three meals/shakes and maybe if they only have two it will speed up their weight loss - this is not the case. You must make sure you have all three every day as they contain the nutrients your body needs and which you are no longer getting from food, and if you don't have all three your body will go into starvation mode and start holding on to your fat reserves rather than burning them. The calorie intake on this diet is roughly 450 cals per day, which is why it's in the category of a Very Low Calorie diet (VLC). You have a weigh in once a week with your pharmacist where they record your losses and give you a week's supply of the shakes/soup/flapjacks each time. Unfortunately some chemists don't stock all of the varieties.
You can add tablet sweeteners to the drinks and a small amount of black pepper to the chicken soup if you wish. Chewing gum is not allowed, even the sugar free version, but you can use Listerine strips (they are minty strips that melt on your tongue). There are lots of suggestions around the forum for how to make the shakes more interesting, e.g. adding the mint strips to the chocolate shake to make it mint chocolate, adding lots of crushed ice to the drinks or adding coffee to the vanilla shake to make a latte, etc. The important thing is not to stray from the rules.
After a few days of being on the diet, you will enter ketosis, which is a state where your body takes it main source of energy from your fat. The slightest bit of food can knock you out of ketosis which is why the diet is so strict.
The average loss per week is 4 to 5lbs, though the first week is often very high (sometimes people lose a stone or more in the first week) due to the fact that you lose a lot of water weight in that first week. Most people who are on the diet for a while do experiences the odd 'bad' week where they either have a very low loss / stay the same or even gain a pound or two for no apparent reason. It's nothing to worry about and usually the losses go back to normal the following week. It's important not to get disheartened if / when that happens.
The first few days are the hardest but once you get past that, and some possible initial side effects (e.g. headaches) the hunger pangs really do start to die down. The temptation and cravings do seem to remain throughout but when you see the weight dropping off and start to see a change in yourself it really does motivate you to keep going. Remember all of us here are in the same boat and everyone here is so lovely and supportive - keep yourself at this forum to distract yourself from food and keep yourself busy.
When you are nearing your goal weight, you will want to enter the refeed stage, which is where you start to introduce foods back into your diet again - but this must be done in a strict way and there are threads in the refeed section of the forum which detail what foods you are allowed and when. Most people still lose a few pounds whilst in the refeed stage, hence starting it a little bit before your goal weight is reached. There is basically a 'menu' of what you are allowed to eat each day on refeed. The refeed stage usually is for a week, but some people like to extend it to two weeks or occasionally even longer. After that, it's all up to you and you enter the "maintenance" phase, where you can basically carry on eating as you wish but obviously you will need to be more aware of your calorie intake in order to maintain your loss - the 'maintenance' shakes/meals (which are different flavours to these ones, e.g. summer fruits, orange creme, caramel bar) can help you during the refeed / maintenance stages if you still want to replace some meals with Lipotrim stuff.
I hope this helps
Kozza xxx
