Day 1

I set up my blog a bit late; I actually started this all-liquid diet for the Meningitis Foundation of America, INC. on July 1, 2009. It is to last the entire month of July. Me and a handful of other firefighters and police officers in the Albuquerque area are all participating in this together. The reason we are doing it in July is because this will be the 1-year anniversary of a fellow firefighter's infant son who died from meningitis.

Today I weighed in at 180 pounds. Not bad for me. I am 5'9, but could stand to lose about 20 pounds so that is my goal. I started my morning off getting ready for work. I had a 24-hour shift that day. And eating at a fire department is top priority. We do a lot of it. When you get 4-5 people on a shift, you come up with some pretty awesome meals when you put all your minds, and money, together. So I feared it would be hard. When we are not running calls, we are often planning the days meals and cooking together...and eating together. I love to cook at the fire house. I like to give that to them, my partners. I am good at it and I usually get very good responses from my cooking. I didn't want to take that away from them because I am doing this diet.

I headed to work with this in my lunch sack: 1 can of tomato soup, 2 cans of tomato sauce to make tomato juice, beef bouillon cubes, grapes to juice, and a can of a Slim-Fast shake. Usually, I would take: Eggs and/or bacon, potatoes (I LOVE my taters), tortillas, left-overs from night before for quick meal on my own..if necessary..never know what the day will bring in the fire house.

I got to work, we did our usual checks and chores and then I started cooking. Yep, I did. I was cooking while the others were washing the truck for a PR event we had later in the day. I was 1 of 5 ff's on that day. I cooked cubed potatoes, fried with garlic. Turkey sausage links and chopped after cooked which I added to scrambled eggs. I added shredded cheddar cheese to the eggs and sausage. I laid out this platter of the sausage cheese eggs, bacon, potatoes, tortillas. The guys came to eat and I grabbed a bowl of tomato soup...(well, half a bowl of tomato soup. I usually cook red chile in the morning for them but didn't that morning. A co-firefighter saw my bowl of RED tomato soup there amongst the rest of the food, and thinking it was the chile, he poured some on his eggs. We gave him a hard time about it, as we do, but he ate it and liked it.

We all ate together. Cooking it was the hardest part really cause I nibble as I cook. You need to taste it and make sure it was coming along just right, you know. But sitting there with them and eating my tomato soup while they grubbed down some nummy nummies was really not that hard at all. I felt fulfilled and wasn't hungry again until just a couple hours later when I drank my Slim-Fast shake before we headed off to the PR event. During the breakfast, them watching me eat soup while they had a feast, I gained 2 more pledges of $.50 per pound. So they seemed impressed with my efforts and my will. I realized a really great way to get more pledges that I hadn't realized before. That was great.

The rest of the day, I surprisingly found myself doing very okay actually. I was a breeze. It really was no big deal. Yes, my mind was always on food, but then again...it always is. It wasn't as hard as I had expected so that was a relief and I think the Slim-Fast really helped fill me. For dinner they had pizza and I made a fruit smoothy, and it was fine.

By the end of day-1, I realized I CAN do this. Just take it 1 day at a time. I am the kind of person who loves a challenge. Challenge me with something and 9 times out of 10 I will reach my goal. I am just that way. This IS a challenge, because man, I CAN EAT. I can put some food away and other than a nice cold one after working in the sun or something, I find a lot of enjoyment in food, taste, texture and especially eating a new recipe I had just come up with. I get a lot of satisfaction from FOOOOODDDD!! But it's no big deal. This is 1 month in a lifetime and I am really hoping to, not just shed some pounds, but start a whole new lifestyle change where food is concerned. Learn new habits. Lets see what tomorrow brings.