I often hear from people who anticipate starting Medifast soon or who have just started the diet. They often want to know what kinds of things or experiences they can expect. Common concerns are questions like how hungry will I be? How will I feel? Will I like the food? And, how much weight can I expect to lose from the start? I’ll try to address these questions below and also try to give you an idea of what you might expect to experience in your first week of Medifast.
You may be hungry, but you may not be as hungry as you expected: It’s common sense that any time you eat fewer calories or fat than you’re used to, your body might have to make some adjustments. This can result in feeling hungry and many people expect this to happen. But quite a few people have told me (and I agree) that they weren’t as hungry as they thought or feared they might be.
It is true that portion sizes tend to be small. But to make up for this, they give you a lot of those little meals. If you’re on any variation of the Medifast 5 plus 1 plan (and most are), you’ll eat five of those small meals and one larger meal each day. If you do the math on this and you look at the 12 hour period during which most of us are awake and going about our day, this makes you eat every couple of hours, which I really think is a major contributing factor to staying hungry. . hey, which brings me to the next point.
Having to eat so many times during the day can be annoying at first: For one thing, eating often means you’re less likely to be as hungry. But on the other hand, it means that you will have to make time to eat several times during the day. Although prepackaged foods are convenient and don’t require a lot of preparation (and some don’t), you’ll still have to make time to eat.
Yeah, I’ve heard people say things like “well, how hard is it to unwrap a protein bar and eat it while going about your business?” This is a valid point, but when you’re used to sitting down or eating only three meals a day, sometimes going to six is an adjustment. However, I find that most people adjust to this pretty quickly, especially if they are already seeing some results.
Expect mixed results and know that the first week is just the beginning: Probably one of the most common questions I get asked is, “How much weight can I expect to lose in the first week on Medifast?” There is no answer for this. Some people report losing more than they expected. Some were in line with what they expected or what the guidelines suggest (2 to 3 pounds per week). And some end up simply missing the mark.
Sometimes there is no rhythm or reason for this. People who cheat sometimes lose more weight than expected and people who don’t deviate from instructions can fall short. But what I sometimes find is that next week will often even things out. It is important to remember that one week does not determine the final results. Your weekly results will likely vary a bit, and when you’re done with this diet, will you really remember (or even care) how much you lost each week? Or are you just going to care what the end result was? I would suggest not getting caught up in day-to-day or week-to-week results. Instead, get caught up in the process and learning new habits and believe that the results will follow.
Expect that you might worry or wonder if you are doing something wrong: I remember looking at this diet early on because I was used to diets where you had to work really hard or learn something new. An example is learning to cook low carb on the Zone Diet or learning how to score points on Weight Watchers. So when you start Medifast and all you really have to do is just eat what they send you and then make just one meal on your own, you can feel like you’re missing out.
You are often learning more than you think. At the end of the process, she often discovers that she has actually learned a new way of cooking, eating and planning through her “lean and green food”. And she’s learned to eat small, regular meals to get her metabolism up to optimal levels, but she often doesn’t realize it at the time.