Christopher Hudspeth

I limited my meals to either chicken breast or salmon with a serving of spinach, lettuce, kale, or asparagus. Low and no-carb diets are typically done in short spans when people have extreme body composition goals or need to cut weight, but they're not considered a sustainable long-term diet. For me, it got very old, very fast, and it seemed like my cravings for fast food were growing more intense.

A sad example of how badly I wanted to eat orange chicken: The grocery store near my apartment has a Panda Express by the entrance and one day I caught myself lingering in its vicinity, just so I could bask in the aroma of orange chicken. Anyway, as tough as the last nine days were, I survived, and they served as the perfect final test of this two-month stretch. FINALLY, it was time to see how much progress I’d made.