Yesterday was my 25th day on the homeopathic HCG weight loss plan so today is my first day on the maintenance portion of the diet. Sometimes the low calorie portion lasts longer; it depends which program you choose. During my low calorie portion of the diet I lost 21 pounds. And now during the maintenance diet I'm going to make sure that my weight loss will be maintained for good.

So the difference between yesterday and today is mostly the amount of food that I can eat. Instead of being limited on how much food I can eat each day I'm allowed to have up to 1500 per day.

While on the maintenance diet there's no particular portion control other than the total calories per day limit of 1500. There are still specific items that you can't have throughout the 26 days on the maintenance diet.

You basically can't have any sweeteners. There's no sugar or artificial sweetener. There's no dextrose, honey, molasses, sucrose, corn syrup or high fructose corn syrup. You can't have any starch in any form (that means still no yummy bread or pasta, dang it!) You still have to avoid all the drive-thrus since you can't have any fast food of any kind. And you also can't have any nitrites or trans fats.

But if you want to ignore the limitations and talk about what you DO get to have once you're on the maintenance diet we can talk about that! You get to add in any fruits or vegetables that weren't on the diet during the low calorie portion. You also get to add in dairy (milk and cheese) and any/all nuts. I have to say that I had a handful of cashews this morning and they tasted absolutely fabulous!

The maintenance phase is really important because it resets the body's metabolism to a high state and prevents the abnormal storing of fat post low calorie homeopathic HCG diet weight loss plans. You're still supposed to weigh yourself first thing every morning and keep track of your weight. That way if you jump up more than 2 pounds you can do something to stop it. The "something" that they suggest is to skip breakfast and lunch entirely on the day you jump more than 2 pounds from your final weight on the hcg diet. Then for dinner that day you're supposed to have steak and either one apple or one raw tomato. I haven't been there yet, but I'll definitely keep it in mind. It sounds like a pretty simple trick so if it helps maintain the positive weight loss then I'm all for it!