brings general visible improvement: shape and suppleness return, breathlessness disappears, compliments come by the dozen, and you have the satisfaction of getting back into clothes that did not fit before. Add to all this the classic excuse of “just this once,” and your wonderful strong determination from the early days suddenly makes way for bingeing followed by a return to drastic dieting, creating a chaotic, yo-yoing situation that soon becomes dangerous.
It is in such circumstances that—victorious up until now—you risk resting on your laurels and ending, up abandoning your goal. You have to realize that in the middle of the race, crossing the dangerous territory of weariness and self-satisfaction that is part of any prolonged diet, half of all dieters fall into this trap and let everything slip away.
In this event, there are three ways to react:
You can abandon the diet, sink into complacency and succumb to compulsive behavior patterns, but with a deep sense of failure that leads to your quickly putting the pounds back on, often going far beyond the weight you started out with.
Or, you can get back on track by resuming the Attack diet and sticking with it until your set goal is attained.
Or, you can admit that you feel incapable of going any further, but that you are ready to do whatever it takes to preserve what you have achieved so far. If this is your choice, stop the weight loss phase of the Dukan Diet and go directly to the Consolidation phase . The Consolidation phase has a much more varied choice of food, and it is easy to work out how long it lasts (5 days for every pound you have lost). Then go to the Stabilization phase, in which you are allowed a completely free choice of food, with just 1 day per week of the pure protein diet.
How Long Should the Alternating Protein Diet Last?
The Cruise phase is the key time in the weight loss period, the one which will take you to your goal, your True Weight.
If you have over 40 pounds to lose, and if there are no other particular difficulties involved, you might hope to shed that weight over 20 weeks of the alternating protein diet—that is, in a little under 5 months.
Resistant Cases
For some, however, losing weight may be more difficult for several reasons:
For physiological reasons, such as a family tendency to obesity
For psychological reasons, such as little self-discipline or weak motivation
For individuals with a history of having dieted many times with bad diets or diets not followed properly or simply abandoned midway.
For girls during prepuberty, and for women when their periods are irregular, or during pregnancy, and above all during perimenopause and menopause
In all these cases, weight loss will be slowed down and will require specific adjustments. Even so, even in difficult cases, the spirit of the Attack phase is so strong, and the pace of the first 2 or 3 weeks of the Dukan Diet so intense, that most resistance and inhibitions are overcome, resulting generally in an initial loss of 8 to 10 pounds. This is the point at which old demons can reappear to slow things down.
If You Are Predisposed to Being Excessively Overweight
If your family history predisposes you to being obese, in less than a month you will likely fall under the threshold of losing 2 pounds a week and reach an acceptable pace of 6 to 7 pounds a month for 2 to 3 months. This,added to your initial loss, will bring you to a loss of about 30 pounds. At this stage, your monthly weight loss will be further reduced to around 4 or perhaps 3 pounds a month.
You may then ask yourself, Is this all worth it? More often than not, the answer is no.
Unless you have been advised by your doctor to continue the weight loss part of the diet for reasons such as the threat of diabetes or severe and inoperable arthritis, or unless you have an imperative personal reason for doing so, it is probably best to stop the Cruise phase and not run the risk of undermining the results you’ve obtained so
It is in such circumstances that—victorious up until now—you risk resting on your laurels and ending, up abandoning your goal. You have to realize that in the middle of the race, crossing the dangerous territory of weariness and self-satisfaction that is part of any prolonged diet, half of all dieters fall into this trap and let everything slip away.
In this event, there are three ways to react:
You can abandon the diet, sink into complacency and succumb to compulsive behavior patterns, but with a deep sense of failure that leads to your quickly putting the pounds back on, often going far beyond the weight you started out with.
Or, you can get back on track by resuming the Attack diet and sticking with it until your set goal is attained.
Or, you can admit that you feel incapable of going any further, but that you are ready to do whatever it takes to preserve what you have achieved so far. If this is your choice, stop the weight loss phase of the Dukan Diet and go directly to the Consolidation phase . The Consolidation phase has a much more varied choice of food, and it is easy to work out how long it lasts (5 days for every pound you have lost). Then go to the Stabilization phase, in which you are allowed a completely free choice of food, with just 1 day per week of the pure protein diet.
How Long Should the Alternating Protein Diet Last?
The Cruise phase is the key time in the weight loss period, the one which will take you to your goal, your True Weight.
If you have over 40 pounds to lose, and if there are no other particular difficulties involved, you might hope to shed that weight over 20 weeks of the alternating protein diet—that is, in a little under 5 months.
Resistant Cases
For some, however, losing weight may be more difficult for several reasons:
For physiological reasons, such as a family tendency to obesity
For psychological reasons, such as little self-discipline or weak motivation
For individuals with a history of having dieted many times with bad diets or diets not followed properly or simply abandoned midway.
For girls during prepuberty, and for women when their periods are irregular, or during pregnancy, and above all during perimenopause and menopause
In all these cases, weight loss will be slowed down and will require specific adjustments. Even so, even in difficult cases, the spirit of the Attack phase is so strong, and the pace of the first 2 or 3 weeks of the Dukan Diet so intense, that most resistance and inhibitions are overcome, resulting generally in an initial loss of 8 to 10 pounds. This is the point at which old demons can reappear to slow things down.
If You Are Predisposed to Being Excessively Overweight
If your family history predisposes you to being obese, in less than a month you will likely fall under the threshold of losing 2 pounds a week and reach an acceptable pace of 6 to 7 pounds a month for 2 to 3 months. This,added to your initial loss, will bring you to a loss of about 30 pounds. At this stage, your monthly weight loss will be further reduced to around 4 or perhaps 3 pounds a month.
You may then ask yourself, Is this all worth it? More often than not, the answer is no.
Unless you have been advised by your doctor to continue the weight loss part of the diet for reasons such as the threat of diabetes or severe and inoperable arthritis, or unless you have an imperative personal reason for doing so, it is probably best to stop the Cruise phase and not run the risk of undermining the results you’ve obtained so
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