Carb Rehab

This year instead of fighting it, I've been relishing the annual winter weight gain. It's been so cold that I needed the extra 5 lbs of padding to stay warm. It's been a blissful winter, happily shoving cookies into my face while sprawled out on the couch. I didn't care a whit that I was not my usual svelte self. I just threw on a baggy sweater and some fat jeans and I was in business!

But now Spring has come, and with it my non-fat friendly Spring/Summer wardrobe. Alas, it's time to bid adieu to my lovely little pounds if I want to avoid looking like a sausage cased in capri pants.

This Sunday I started the South Beach Diet. I'm only doing the first 2 weeks - which promises to remove between 8-12 lbs (significantly more than I gained) - before I go back to my regular crap-based diet. The idea here is to quickly shed those winter pounds and then I can maintain pretty well with my regular routine of bad eating and sporadic exercising.

I rarely diet and it's clear that the thing I forget about this diet, and dieting in general, is how HARD it is! I've only been doing it for about 26 hours and already I'm ready to throw in the towel. I've had to cut out all sugars and carbs - and I truly feel like I've been checked into Rehab and I'm in Carb Detox. I should be locked in some facility with white metal bedframes and plastic water pitchers on the bedstand. I'm one Duncan Hines commercial away from having the shakes. I want some carbohydrates so badly! My fat cells are screaming out: "Feed Me, Seymour! Feed Me!"

I can only hope that as I get used to this diet (thank goodness it will only last 2 weeks, max) I'm hoping that the obsessing over food and the raging cravings will mellow out. If not, I may not be the nicest person to be around. I've been told that maybe this diet "isn't for you" - but despite the mood swings I end up doing it every spring anyway. Tortuous, painful, mind-altering as it may be, it delivers results. And after all aren't all challenges character building? That's what I keep telling myself, as I sit in the rec room weaving a basket and trying not to think about spaghetti bolognese.