The HCG diet and my 40-pound weight loss

IT’S approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as a fertility treatment, but the HCG oral drops, injections and pills have become an even bigger hit with those wanting to lose stubborn fat.

Short for Human Chorionic Gonadotropin, HCG is a hormone released during pregnancy. The benefit of the hormone in obesity was first realised in the 1950s by British endocrinologist ATW Simeons, who realised that with regular doses of the pregnancy hormone, obese women were able to lose stubborn clumps of fat. The HCG diet promises as much as a 30-pound weight loss in 30 days.

Today, the HCG products are going like hot bread and Jamaicans who have used it as part of their weight loss regimen swear by its effectiveness. Local weight loss consultant Rohan Perrier said he sells a bottle of the hormone droplets almost everyday.

“With the oral drops, the bottle can last for five weeks and within the first phase, some people have lost up to 30 or more pounds,” he said before noting that individuals can lose about 10 pounds in the first week and even more if they combine the diet with exercise.

But the programme could seem very restrictive for first-time users since dieters are allotted only 500 calories per day. Doctors recommend a daily caloric intake of at least 1,200 calories to sustain normal body functions.

The diet begins with a two day “gorging” phase where the individual is allowed to eat all the high caloric foods they can manage, in order to prepare the body for a low calorie diet. Following the gorging segment, the individual is introduced to the 500-calorie diet where they are encouraged to consume only protein, fruits and vegetables with very little starch. The HCG droplets are placed under the tongue and are said to act on the hypothalamus, signalling the body to release stored fat into the bloodstream, thereby releasing fat in key trouble spots like the upper arms, stomach, thighs, and buttocks, while preserving muscle.

Perrier said the calorie restriction has never been an issue for his clients who are carefully monitored during the first phase of the diet plan.

“It is just a matter of you curbing your appetite because you are used to having so much to eat. You are changing from everything you want to just limiting to what you eat now, so it’s not like any life and death situation. You want results so in order to get results you have to curb your appetite,” he said.

Mother of two Marsha Johnson said she is pleased with the results she got from going on the HCG diet. She was able to lose 23 pounds on the diet between August to September 2010 and another 17 pounds between mid October to the first week of December of that same year.

“For me, I had been struggling with weight issues and thyroid issues and cholesterol issues, so this was kind of like a last resort,” she said of her decision to use the HCG droplets.

At five feet and 168 pounds, Johnson said she had the metabolism of a 60- year-old and was really uncomfortable with her body.

“I wanted the person I saw in the mirror, to match the person I saw inside. The way I looked physically did not match the way I saw myself,” she said.

Johnson said she started gaining weight after getting married 11 years ago and with childbirth came more weight. The fact that she had a thyroid problem made weight loss that much more difficult, so despite the controversy surrounding the HCG diet, she made a go at it.

“I was willing to take the risk because I was just tired of being big and not being able to wear the clothes that I wanted to wear,” she said.

Johnson said she has lost even more weight since coming off the programme last December, but she credits this to the fact that she now has an exercise regimen in place, which she was not able to do before she lost the weight.

Another HCG user told All Woman that she was able to lose 40 pounds on the diet. In the first 40 days, she lost 26 pounds, although she said she wasn’t able to lose a pound prior to this although she would go to the gym.

“The first three days were very difficult, then after that I had to force myself to take the 500 calories,” she said.

Given her success, she is now selling HCG droplets to those who want to succeed at blasting stubborn fat. She said she has about 1,000 clients and sells about 200 bottles of the product per month which goes for about $12,000 per bottle.

But depending on who you speak to, HCG could either be a weight loss miracle or a dangerous weight loss scam. While the HCG is approved by the FDA to treat infertility in both men and women, the agency warned that homeopathic HCG is fraudulent, although it did not say that the products are necessarily dangerous.

Perrier is not oblivious to the controversy surrounding the use of the hormone as a weight loss drug in the United States, but he believes the results of his patients speaks for itself.

“It’s not FDA approved for weight loss, pretty much, it is more of a fertility drug, but research has shown that with a proper diet, you can lose the weight on it,” he said.

“It’s only because the weight loss business in America is a big thing and if you find people losing weight, then you are going to have other people not making money. It is just a matter of strategy in not approving it for a weight loss thing, I believe.”

He said he has had patients who have lost up to 120 pounds on the diet and are doing well. But he advises individuals to be careful of where they source the product as buying online makes it difficult to determine whether one is getting the real thing.

“There are people out there who are really wanting to lose weight, because you have people who have been exercising and going to the gym for years and can’t lose a pound and boom you get this product and it works,” he said.

Apart from the severe caloric restrictions, one of the concerns raised by critics is that individuals will regain the weight rapidly once they come off the diet, but Perrier said he is yet to see this with any of his clients.

“If you were on a regular diet so to speak even without the HCG, even after you’ve dieted and you start eating, the weight will come back again. With the HCG the weight does not come back on, because what the HCG does is reset the hypothalamus in the brain, that’s the area that controls the weight,” he explained

Critics also suggest that it is possible for anyone to lose weight while on a 500-calorie diet such as the one prescribed for those on the HCG plan, but the second HCG user referred to in this story said this is far from the case.

“I tried the 500-calorie diet and I couldn’t get past a week; in fact, what happened is that I found myself bingeing. But what once I went with the HCG I didn’t find that,” she said.

At least two local doctors consulted said they still were not able to rule conclusively as to whether the HCG diet was dangerous or ineffective. Doctor of Naturopathy Winsome Christie believes though that it is possible for someone to function normally on a 500-calorie diet.

“Calorie restriction can be done under supervised care, but I don’t provide these kind of diets,” she said, adding that she is more in support of holistic diets.

“People can survive on water, but you have to be supervised,” she asserted.

Perrier said he has a coaching system in place where those on the diet are contacted daily to check up on their progress or to answer any questions they might have.