Let the Vegan Adventure Begin!

I'm doing it. I'm going to try being vegan for one week. I started at 6pm tonight so that the week will be over in time for Valentine's Day dinner. We're having crab legs and bacon wrapped fillet mignon. I will be DYING for that meal a week from now.

Remember when I said I didn't want to diet? I just wanted to work out to feel good and eat healthy most of the time? LOAD OF CRAP! I want to be skinny. I had this realization in a dream I had the other night. I was about 7 months pregnant and had a super cute baby bump, but I was skinny everywhere else. It was weird because I could really feel it. People were telling me that I would get really big in the last couple of months and in my dream, I was thinking that I already felt so big. I was dreading that part where I felt huge.

I've been thinking about when I got really skinny when I was around 22. I was really careful about what I ate and I went to the gym often. I never ate fast food or drank soda. The best part? It worked. I wasn't always skinny, I had to work hard at it, but it felt amazing to put on a dress for a party and not feel self conscious about my arms or legs. It was nice to hang out at the pool in my two piece bathing suit without wanting to be covered up all of the time.

I'm not expecting to go back to that weight. I'm older and my metabolism has probably slowed down a bit. I'm also hoping to get pregnant this year, so I don't want to get too skinny. However, I really want to be thin when I do get pregnant so I won't be such a mess after the baby comes.

I'm not going to count calories because that makes me crazy. I am going to try this vegan-ish thing first. My plan (for now - we'll see how I feel after a few days of no cheese... I love cheese) is to eat a vegan diet almost all the time. I'm going to avoid eating out unless it is a special occasion and when I do eat out, I will order what I want. For Valentine's Day, we're not going out to dinner, we're cooking at home because we can make a high quality meal for much less than we would spend in a restaurant. I will indulge that night, but I plan to go back to the vegan thing after that meal. We'll see. Hopefully I can handle it.

Oh, and I don't care about gelatin or if the food has been processed on the same equipment as dairy and seafood (saw that on a can of black beans from Trader Joe's). I'm not going to eat dairy, eggs or any type of meat, chicken, or fish for a week. I'm hoping this will cut some major calories and shed some poundage pretty quickly.

To help the process, I've added cardio to my workout regimen. Tonight, for example, I went to the gym a half hour before my usual core class and did the elliptical for 20 minutes. Then I did some arms and headed into class for abs/buns/thighs. It felt great! I got my sweat on and I know I burned a lot more calories than I would have if I had just taken the class alone. Next time, I will try to increase the cardio to 30 minutes and hopefully I can do that before each class I take.

I'm still not going to weigh myself. I don't want to get attached to a number on a scale. I will gauge my weight loss on how my clothes fit and how I feel. That way, if the number doesn't change, but my body does, I won't get discouraged and give up as I tend to do.

Wish me luck! I'll be back with updates.