The Fast Metabolism Diet (9 page)

Your day will look like this:

In this phase, if you are a carb-lover, you get all the good stuff you love and crave—fruit and pasta, rice and crackers, toast and pretzels. These high-carb, moderate-protein, low-fat foods nourish the
adrenals and soothe physiologic stress. I really want the body to fall in love with food during this phase, so it feels good and easy and fun to be in Phase 1.

Sweet fruits and whole grains stimulate the
endorphins in the brain and flood the body with very easily accessible nutrients, making Phase 1 seductive and nurturing all at the same time.

Biologically, the goal of this phase is to really flood the body with nutrients, which stimulates the activity of the five major players in digestion and metabolism that we talked about earlier: the liver, the adrenals, the thyroid, the pituitary, and the tissues of the body. The adrenals are particularly nourished by the high but steady rate of natural-sugar delivery, making everything calm down and start to work better. The adrenals respond to
blood sugar peaks and valleys by creating
stress hormones that specialize in storing fat. But when blood sugar remains more stable (even if elevated at a healthy level), the adrenals calm down and begin to metabolize fat more efficiently. This balancing of the sugars is crucial in an individual who has become
diabetic,
insulin resistant, hypoglycemic, has had aggressive weight gain, or has elevated
triglycerides.

Phase 1 foods are also designed to be rich in nutrients that stimulate
the metabolism. Specifically, they are rich in
B
vitamins and vitamin C. The B vitamins are found in beans, meats, and whole grains, and they stimulate the thyroid, igniting the thermogenic (fat-burn) effect that revs up the metabolism. Those B vitamins are crucial in the metabolism of fats,
proteins, and carbohydrates. Vitamin C in fruits like oranges and strawberries, as well as in vegetables like broccoli and sweet potatoes, helps the body convert
glucose into energy, one of the primary goals of
Phase 1. They help shuttle that glucose into the
mitochondria—your cells’ own little
fat furnaces—to be broken down and converted to energy instead of being stored as fat. The abundant B vitamins you’ll be getting during this phase also help support the
adrenals in stimulating fat metabolism and lean muscle development.

Phase 1,
Unwind
, gently persuades your metabolism that it is no longer in an emergency situation. It’s okay to actually digest the
food you are eating again, to use the energy and nutrients from that food, rather than storing it as fat to guard against future starvation or nutritional deprivation. For the first two days, we are reteaching your body how to turn the food you eat into energy rather than storing it as fat. We’re telling it, “Shh, shh, it’s going to be okay.” And with the foods you’ll eat here, your body will believe it.

Your body starts to feel like everything really might be okay again. This is the first step in the three-step process.

It’s the stimulation of digestive enzymes that helps accomplish this process in Phase 1. When you flood your body with so many nutrients and so much energy, it can actually start breaking down the foods you’re consuming and releasing the nutrients embedded in these nutrient-dense foods. We want
digestion to be as effortless as possible, which is why we keep protein moderate and fat very low. Fat and protein are harder to digest than carbohydrates like grains and fruits, so by keeping these low, the body is soothed and encouraged. Digestive enzymes release the vitamins and minerals and phytonutrients from the food you eat, and the metabolism begins to recover from its starvation state. Phase 1 foods are specifically designed to be easy on your body. You’re ditching all those things that physically stress you, those metabolism crushers like
wheat, dairy, and
caffeine, that cause irritation or
inflammation in the GI tract and can slow your bowels and create
insulin resistance. Those things are all out of
the game for now.
Phase 1 will calm down your
adrenal glands, reducing the release of stress hormones that are keeping you fat. Your
blood sugar stabilizes and your body suddenly feels like it’s out of the danger zone.

Phase 1 is kind to your body and kind to you. The sweeter tastes and comfort foods ease you, physically and also emotionally, into the plan. A lot of dieters haven’t been able to touch these foods with a ten-foot pole for months, even years. It’s time to normalize again. Phase 1
feels normal,
not like a diet at all.

Low-carb dieters tend to panic when they see the list of foods for this first phase because they’ve been taught to believe carbs are bad. Carbs are
not
bad, food is not bad—if you choose healthy sources. Fruits, brown rice, oatmeal, alternative grains like quinoa and amaranth, lentils, beans—they are all good. The carbs you
won’t
be eating during this phase are
refined sugars,
wheat, or
corn. These carb sources are much harder on your body, and most people have ingested way too much of them over their lifetimes.

But if you’re not a low-carb dieter and you’re used to eating a lot of refined
sugars and processed foods that don’t require much digestive work, your body’s going to have to gear up for the job, too. Foods high in refined sugar make the
pancreas,
adrenals,
thyroid, liver, and
gallbladder get lazy. It’s like you’ve been plodding away on the elliptical trainer at a slow pace that barely distracts you from watching the
Today
show on the gym TV, and then you get a personal trainer who steps in and shows you a more efficient way to exercise. But this isn’t boot camp. This is a kinder, gentler trainer who helps you condition in a way that doesn’t exhaust you, but instead gives you more energy and stamina.

We’re pampering and nourishing now, not abusing. We’re breaking old patterns, not indulging them. The
B
vitamins in this phase will help modify a natural sense of panic your body may temporarily feel from being without habit-forming refined sugars and white flour.

What else can you expect during this phase? No more feelings of starvation! You won’t be eating any refined sugar, juice, or dried fruit in this phase—that’s making things
too
easy and allows the
metabolism to get sluggish and lazy. But juicy apples and pears, pineapples and strawberries, watermelon and oranges? Fruit smoothies and spelt pretzels and brown rice pasta and oatmeal? Go for it!

In addition to the fruit and whole grains in Phase 1, you’ll also be
eating high-quality proteins like organic chicken, organic turkey, and even buffalo, as well as
herbs and spices like parsley and cilantro that will help stimulate digestive enzymes, so you’re getting plenty of protein your body can easily
digest. Everything you eat will be nutrient-dense because nutrient-dense foods require a greater caloric expenditure from the body to extract their nutrients. This wakes up the body’s organs and digestive enzymes and basically signals:
Hop to it, fellas, we’ve got some work to do!
My clients love this phase for all the wonderful comfort foods that don’t make them feel like they are dieting. Another benefit of
Phase 1 is that good carbs boost your mood, help you with crazy
sugar
cravings, and even ease you out of your
caffeine funk, if you are (as I will strongly recommend) purging caffeine from your body during the next 28 days. These Phase 1 foods help head off that “crash” feeling. So does the frequency of eating—you’ll be eating five, sometimes even six
times per day, so get used to it!

Calm, happy, and living in a land of plenty—that’s what we’re going for in Phase 1. We are sending your body the signal that everything it needs is readily available. We are extracting nutrients from food and feeding the
adrenals, and happy, fed adrenals will set a body up for fat release. It is not in a state of famine. If you’ve been chronically dieting, your body will recognize this stage with a huge metaphorical sigh of relief.

Why will you lose weight in Phase 1? I like to illustrate what’s happening in your body like this: Imagine that your best friend asks you to host her engagement party, at your house. She wants fancy hors d’oeuvres, a cake, party favors, decorations. You’re already busy and you have no idea how you can handle it all, and you know you’re either going to have to decline or stress yourself to the max. It’s totally overwhelming.

This scenario is like you asking your body to lose weight when you’re already stressed and nutrient-deprived. Your body may say, “I’m so sorry, but I can’t accommodate that request.” Or it’s going to do what you want, but it’s not going to be happy about it. You’re not going to look or feel good. It’s going to be hell.

But imagine, instead, that your friend asks you to host her engagement party, but she says, “I know you’re busy, so I’m going to have a cleaning service come over and clean your house for you. I’m going to have the whole event catered, and I’ll have a full staff come over to serve and clean up. Afterwards, I’ll have a carpet-cleaning company come to clean your carpets.” Now how would you feel about the task? Not so bad a prospect, right? In fact, it might even be fun! You’re not used to getting that level of service, even when you aren’t hosting a party! So what happens when the serving crew arrives, and somebody says, “Oh, no, we forgot the forks!” What are you going to do? You’re going to be feeling so good, so energized, so
not
inconvenienced by it all, that you’re going to skip into the kitchen with
a big grin on your face and say, “Forks? No problem. I can provide forks.”

This alternative scenario is like you asking your body to lose weight
while on
Phase 1.
If you give your body the natural sugar, carbs, fiber, and protein it needs to function with ease and comfort, then your request for fat burning is going to be no big deal. So your body isn’t getting fat during Phase 1? It’s just like the forks. Your body is going to be happy to give over some fat to burn because it’s so
not
inconvenienced by other dietary restrictions. It’s got plenty of what it needs to feel good. Burn fat? No problem. Your body is getting the support it needs to handle the job, so the job becomes simple, joyful, and easy.

When you go on the Fast Metabolism Diet, you are asking the same thing of your body that you ask on a starvation diet, weight loss, but the terms are different—so different that it changes everything.

But Phase 1 isn’t without rules. The one thing you won’t be feeding your body during Phase 1 is very much fat. This is not the
time for almonds and avocados. By delivering the carbs and proteins without the fat, we make the body start metabolizing its own fat stores to find the fat it needs. This is where the body’s hard work comes in for Phase 1, a phase that feels easy to you but is actually pretty challenging for your body. We distract the body by flooding it with delicious carbs and protein, nourishing it while we also force it to go searching for fat. You’ll start burning your own fat, not your muscle, because you won’t need what the muscles contain. You’re getting that from the food. While your body’s having a natural-sugar-happy party, it barely notices that the fat burning has begun in earnest.

This is why we do Phase 1 first. We flood the body with nutrients and jump-start your system in a way that challenges your body while also feeling deliciously indulgent.

In Phase 1, you are going to wake up in the morning and have breakfast within 30 minutes of waking. You will have a grain and a fruit, such as oatmeal and berries (no nuts or flax seeds, please—these are Phase 3 foods), or honeydew and a slice of spelt or brown rice bread. My assistant
loves hot brown rice cereal with organic frozen peaches. I also have a client who puts oats in her fruit smoothie (find the recipe for her
Oatmeal Fruit Smoothie
).