Introduction

Hello world! haha just kidding

I just wanted to take a minute to introduce myself and the reason behind this blog, so you know where I'm coming from and what to expect from me and from it.

I'm the mama of two amazing kids, Allen (6) and Alexa (2.5). I have a degree in elementary education, own and run the retail website Consultant Corner, am the webmaster/administrator for The Consciously Parenting Project, and do other various web design projects through My Web Makeover.

So I work from home, take care of and homeschool my kids, try to take care of the house and make food for my hard-working husband at least part of the time, and generally stay extremely busy.

One thing I am not so good at it taking care of myself. Everyone else comes first, and over the past 6 years since my son was born, I have not made the time to take care of myself. I was conscious to cook healthy foods for my kids, including options with veggies and other healthy things hidden inside as they have gone through their picky stages, but I was addicted to coca cola. I made amazing snacks and treats for them that I didn't mind them eating any time of day, but I was addicted to sugar and sweets myself. This ongoing problem, which went through both pregnancies, led to my being categorized by my Wii Fit as "obese" - ouch. I went from being in the lowest weight class on our high school girls' weight lifting team, to "obese" and that sucked.

I knew "the rules" about losing weight. "Eat right and exercise," and plan to lose a couple of pounds a week if you do it just right. Well I wanted to lose about 60 lbs. That would put me back to college weight - not ideal, but I couldn't imagine setting a goal of more than 60 lbs! At 2 lbs per week, that would take me two and a half years! Oh my gosh! It was too daunting to even begin. Not to mention that I had about zero spare minutes in my day to fit in any major exercise. Forget going to the gym - my kids won't do the childcare area, and I wasn't willing to give up the precious little time I have with my husband when he's home from work to go then. So there I was - stuck.

Then I learned about the HCG protocol. I remembered how I lost weight in the beginning of both of my pregnancies - 17lbs and 15lbs respectively. I've even joked about getting pregnant again just to lose weight, heh. Of course, I gained it all back plus 30 more each time. But the HCG plan made sense to me, and I decided to try it out, with homeopathic drops, just to see what would happen. I didn't really have anything to lose, besides the pesky 60 lbs I wanted off. With an average of half a pound per day for women, that could mean as few as four months. Wow, definitely worth a try.

So, to try to shorten this story, I started HCG at the beginning of December 2010, and here it is early February and I'm halfway there - 30 lbs gone, and 26 inches along with it (that I actually measured). That happened in two months. I feel amazing, am eating the healthiest I have ever eaten, and totally off of sugar, soda, everything. I am so glad I found this and gave it a try. It hasn't always been easy, don't get me wrong, but absolutely the best thing I've done for myself.

So if you're no familiar with the HCG protocol, you can check out the e-book "Pounds and Inches" by Dr. Simeons for the details (warning, it's old and was converted to pdf so there are about a gajillion typos), and you also might want to read my friend's blog about her journey with HCG.

For a quick reference:

Phase 1 is LOADING. I won't have recipes for loading, specifically, as I trust we all know how to get that high-fat food in. ;)

Phase 2, or P2, is the time during which one takes the HCG supplement, and eats only 500 calories per day from the list of approved foods. P2 should be a minimum of 23 days.

Phase 3, or P3, is the time after P2, where calories are increased, but still no sugar or starch is consumed. P3 usually lasts about 3 weeks.

Phase 4, or P4, is after P3, and is the time in which you can slowly introduce some starch and sugar back in, being careful to weigh daily to make sure you don't have issues with the foods you reintroduce (causing you to gain).

On this site, I will be compiling the best recipes I have found on my hcg journey, for use by those doing hcg themselves, and also by anyone else interested in healthy, delicious recipes. They are sugar-free, many are gluten-free, sometimes dairy-free, sometimes egg-free, low carb, and, as mentioned, delicious. Half the time when I'm cooking my own food, my husband or a kid or two will ask me to make the same thing for them. In fact, I'm getting ready to make my son's birthday cake for tomorrow, which will be an amazing chocolate cake with chocolate icing, totally low carb, sugar-free and gluten-free. Yum!

Even if you don't need or aren't interested in the HCG protocol, stick around because as I mentioned, the non-dieters and even the picky kids in my house are loving some of these recipes, so you might get some ideas for yourself. :)

http://www.myhcgcooking.com