20lbs down - just by eliminating regular colas from my diet

There was a time when I used to think nothing of drinking a case (at that time it was a flat of 24) cans of Coca-Cola. In combination with the other garbage I was eating, drinking the liquid candy just packed on even more pounds! When I began to pay attention to the amount of sugar that I was eating/drinking, I felt more and more guilty about the sugar I was drinking. I couldn’t believe that 1 can contains 11 teaspoons of sugar and I was drinking 2-3 cans per day! Holy crap! How did I not get bigger faster than I did with the extra 33 teaspoons of sugar a day! Even now, looking back at what I was eating shocks me.

Back then, when I was eating - I NEVER read nutrition labels and had no idea how many calories I would put in my mouth in a day. Until last week, I wasn’t entirely sure how many calories my body needed just to function. My weight loss stalled so I looked into it and discovered that I actually wasn’t eating enough!! In high school/college, a typical day would be a bowl of cereal (usually Corn Flakes or Special K) and maybe toast and peanut butter for breakfast. Lunch would vary from day to day but the usual would either be a peanut butter and jam on white bread or bologna with regular ketchup. A typical dinner would either be Kraft Dinner with ground beef and canned peas added to it; a Big Mac combo with a “real” coke & a hot fudge sundae; cheese cappalletti from East Side Mario’s; pizza slices; shake n bake chicken. After dinner, I thought nothing of having a large bag of popcorn with topping at a movie or sitting in front of the tv (multiple times a week) with a 250g bag of Nacho Cheese Doritos and looking down at an empty bag when I got off the couch to go to bed. I hardly saw veggies and when I chose to eat veggies - I chose to eat all the wrong ones. My favourites were potato, creamed corn, canned potato or raw carrots (I don’t like the consistency of cooked carrot).

These days, breakfast consists of either a low carb protein shake; 2 eggs cooked any possible way; crustless quiche made with heavy cream, cheddar cheese and whatever other things I wanted to add such as veggies or meats; a large meat and veggie omelet; “leftovers” from the previous night’s dinner; or whatever you want that follows low-sugar guidelines. Once a week, I chose to have a 1/2 cup of Selection-brand (Metro/A&P House brand) All-Bran. I choose that one because it has the lowest added sugar & only contains 10g net carbs.