The Brown Rice Diet

Oh yeah, that was another one I tried back in the late '70s. I'd gained about 100 pounds with my first daughter (at that point, she was maybe 17 months old - 1977). I remember this one because it involved food I hated with a passion ... rice. Brown rice at that. I also remember it because it wasn't long after (a couple of months) I started it that I had to quit it because I'd discovered I was expecting my second child. The doctor insisted I eat normally.

Although I hated the diet, I was desperate to get rid of that 100 pounds, and it was working (I'd lost about 40 pounds in 2 months). But rice alone wouldn't provide enough nutrients for a growing baby.


The book ... well, that was one of things you found in the back of a magazine, and ordered the magical book with it's magical diet for $29.99, guaranteed to lose weight! Lots of large lettering in that ad, yep. I'd decided it was easier just to eat one food for a while and no expectation of eating other things. The first few weeks, you only ate steamed or boiled long grain brown rice. That wasn't easy given that I didn't like rice ... at all. No way, no how, no matter what you did to it. Rice made me gag.

After the first few weeks, you could cook your rice in juice (sugar free of course), like apple, or tomato, or even fat free chicken or beef broth. Later, you could add a few tablespoons of veggies into the rice.

I have to say that it was very depressing to eat that way. Particularly when I had to cook full meals for the hubby, and my other toddler. The only thing that brightened my mood during that time was stepping onto the scale and seeing it go down, pretty much every day. Of course it was going down ... I was starving myself to death. I disliked rice so much I only ate a portion of what was allowed per day. It didn't matter if you ate the days proportion of rice in 3 meals, or six or whatever kept you full, but my revulsion was such that I ate just enough to stop the tummy rumblings. Naturally, after several days of this, the old gut didn't rumble much ... I suppose it knew it wasn't going to get much, or maybe it had a life of it's own and realized it didn't like the rice either.

<sigh> When you're young (I was still in my early 20s), you can talk yourself into believing almost anything if you want it bad enough.

I looked online for the diet book to see anyone else had used it. There are several versions out there of a brown rice diet, but I didn't find one that was as restrictive as that particular one was, and I can't recall the author of it.

Once my doctor told me I had to quit, the book got buried in a storage box, and I don't recall ever seeing it again. Hard cover, with a nice shiny book jacket ... white background, black text ... no picture.

The only good thing about that diet ... it taught me to be a little more circumspect about the foods I ate - both the amount, and the types. As my second pregnancy ground towards it's end in the spring of 1978, I had only gained 15 pounds this time, so I managed not to wipe out the entire weight loss. Good thing because it was hard-earned ... but I knew by then it was something I'd never do again.

(Ha!)

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