Today was Day 25 for my test of Mountain House food packets as emergency food, The Thirty Day SHTF Test Diet. Lots of preppers recommend storing food for a disaster; this series tests it out. As detailed earlier, this diet has turned into a weight-loss diet too.
Five days to go, and the new normal is mostly continuing. My two shifts turned into a night-owl single shift because I couldn't sleep during the first. Again, I frontloaded the breakfast in the wee hours to help me get some sleep. My attempts to wake up earlier in the morning, to bring my routine back to regular normal, were unsuccessful. Despite the hungries returning, my weight is still stuck on the plateau.
Today's Meals
Today's was the Scrambled Eggs with Ham and Pepper, once again eaten in the very early morning:
A cup of boiled water, stirrings, less than a ten-minute wait - the usual for this meal - and:
it was reconstituted. I did eat it right after the wait period, instead of stretching out the cooling period a bit, and there was a fair bit of "egg soup" fluid at the bottom of the packet. Prolly not coincidental.
The dinner was the Beef Stew:
As with all the meals that require boiled water, stirrings and less than ten minutes' wait got it ready to go:
Like all the dinners, the stew took two cups of boiled water instead of the eggs' one.
It tasted like canned stew, although the ingredients are a bit different: the white cubes are potato chunks.
As shown by the Nutrition Facts boxes for each, with the one for the eggs breakfast on the left and the box for the stew dinner on the right:
the beef stew is very low-calorie. The values for the dinners are per half-pouch, so you have to multiply them by two to get the numbers for the entire packet. Even with that adjustment, the beef stew clocks in at only 520 calories: the same as for the Granola breakfast pouch. With the 380 for the eggs, this combination totals only 900 calories.
Tomorrow is going to be an interesting day.
As mentioned above, my weight is essentially unchanged:
making the plateauing stretch a full week.
Effects, So Far:
To be frank, I've been fantasizing about quitting early or at least working in a Hiatus Day or two. I won't, because this is an experiment and I have no compelling reason to do so, but if I was dieting privately I just might. That's because the plateauing looks a lot like my body has converted into famine mode and is drawing down fewer calories. A reboot to feast mode might get me drawing down more fat.
Consistent with the low-caloric lasagna I had yesterday, my stomach did do its share of growling. I've been trying to break the split-sleep routine by setting my alarm earlier, with no luck so far. The realignment might take a few tries.
As per usual, there are no health effects if you leave out the unusual sleep pattern. My energy level is normal: not trudgey, not bouncy, but average.
Conclusion
Still stuck on the weight plateau, although this might change due to yesterday's and today's dinners' calories being unusually low. (Today's combo is in crash-diet range.) From an SHTF perspective, the plateauing is a net blessing. If it's indeed caused by my metabolism slowing and me burning fewer calories, then the amount of calories in a stored-food program will stretch out longer. Of note is the fact that I've been able to get through the day in a more-or-less normal manner (except for the attack of the February blahs) on a calorie count at or below short rations. Undoubtedly, this is due to me being quite overweight - which may prove to be a surprise advantage in a real stretched-out SHTF disaster.
But from the dieting standpoint, it's an impediment - one that may be lessened by jiggering the feat-famine reflex with hiatus days. It seems worth testing out someday.
Thanks for reading.
And feel free to comment below!
Day 0
Day 1
Day 2
Day 3
Day 4
Day 5
Day 6
Day 7
Day 8
Day 9
Day 10
Day 11
Day 12
Day 13
Day 14
Day 15
Day 16
Day 17
Day 18
Day 19
Day 20
Day 21
Day 22
Day 23
Day 24
Day 25
Day 26
Day 27
Day 28
Day 29
Day 30
Great post keep it coming. I think it would be a good test to have hiatus days to see if your weight goes down. Thanks again for your great post 👍👏👏👏👏👏 Remember to keep it up and steem on.
Sure will!
THIS is a very interesting 30 day test.
Last summer I had won a Legacy food (Premium 240 Serving Package - 64 lbs) and have yet to open it.
Call me paranoid but I am leaving it be for now... with the volatility right now, I am thinking I'd rather have it there than not. Although I will admit I am curious about the tastiness of the meals.
I'll keep watching for your last five days on this test/experiment.
Thank you. After it's finished, I'll write a wrap-up post to sum up how it went and what I learned. I'll write & post it on the upcoming Sunday.
I have read of horror stories about cheap prep food tasting like cardboard!
Quick question, those 'Recommended Daily Amounts' on the back of the packets... Who's standards are they from U.S.A. / E.U. /WHO? or are they all the same.
Canada's. And, I hope they're the same...
I applaud you for lasting this long. You really should weighed first thing after rising from bed as your body is at its lightest then :)
Nice thought! But it doesn't matter, except for morale ;) What matter is consistency: weighing myself in the middle of posting usually takes place at the same time of the day. I'm keeping my eye on the differences.
I like the idea of the beef stew. Anything to keep away the calories. Nice meals anyway. And, by the way, why is weight unchanged? Don't be stuck in that plateau.😉
I think it's because my body's using less energy, fewer calories. Thanks for stopping by.
excellent your post Thanks for sharing i will done up vote
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Hey man, sorry to hit you up here, but I wanted to talk to you about out delegation, if you can hit me up on discord or steemit chat, @phelimint, or we can chat on any of my blog comments as well
I like your post
https://steemit.com/adventure/@hamidi103/a-never-exhausting-adventure-in-steemit-b48a0f17aeb0f
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Thank You! ⚜