One Week Diet Diaries: The Lady Gaga Drunk Diet (A Bad Romance)
My attraction to the Lady Gaga “Drunk Diet” was immediate: Sure, I’ll take some temporary weight loss advice from a woman who regularly runs casual errands in bodysuits and transparent chiffon overlays. She seems confident in her skin. I secretly hoped that its minimal requirements (whiskey while working and “a ton” of yoga) would finally allow me to don an American Apparel body-con dress without looking like a Kardashian crammed into a tube sock.
Besides, I’d already been practicing Bikram yoga nearly 5 days a week for the last month (and drinking several glasses of red wine almost every night for the last 10 years). Ain’t no thang.
(It should be noted that Gaga’s ex-bf, Luc Carl, literally wrote the book on The Drunk Diet.)
Monday: As a freelancer, I’m fortunate to spend occasional stretches working from home. One would think this would allow me all the time in the world to do no less than two things (drink whiskey, do yoga) for seven days. However, I don’t always have the luxury of submitting all my work at night and I wasn’t about to get loaded at 10am for the love of the diet. I don’t have much of a filter after one too many whiskey gingers, and it definitely does not translate well to work-related word-typing. Also, there was no one willing to Drunk Brunch with me during the week. #jobs
Anyways, I worked sober in the AM, ate a sad Lean Cuisine and went to yoga at 7pm. In case you’re not familiar, Bikram yoga is a 90-minute class where you do 26 particular poses, two times each, in a 110 degree hotbox. It’s not all Child’s Pose and namaste, you guys. Most people opt to wear as few clothes as possible due to the bitchin’ heat and Niagra-esque sweatfalls. Gaga once opted for this:
When I returned, I caught up on some Scandal (Olivia Pope for President!), ate a spectacular salad and took a long, hot shower. Instead of passing out in my robe like I felt like doing, I bellied up to the counter and poured myself a stiff one. I tried to do some writing but ended up getting hammered alone in my bedroom and was up until the wee hours of the morning trying on new outfit combos while grinding in front of my mirror to Azealia Banks.
Tuesday: Slept til noon, dragged my ass to a coffee shop down the street and had a grilled cheese and a giant coffee while I worked/greased up my keyboard. Went to yoga at 7:30pm and bee-lined to my friend Ali’s in my water-logged athletic shorts. We ordered fatty Chinese food and downed a bunch of booze — “It’s for work, so it’s fine,” I told her. Went home around 3am, drunk-dialed my boyfriend and cried about nothing. #overserved
Wednesday: At 9am, I had to let my friend’s brother into our apartment. He was crashing with us for a few days while in town on business, and putting on a bra before noon had never been harder. I popped into Dunkin’ Donuts for a Latte Lite and an egg-white veggie wrap for breakfast and worked at a snail’s pace for the majority of the day.
I begrudgingly went to bikram at 4pm and I swear I saw God at the end of the final savasana (aka: corpse pose). On the walk home, birds were tying ribbons in my hair as I Pied-Pipered woodland creatures and left a trail of glitter. Ate another sad Lean Cuisine and drank a solo Diet Coke before mixing a second DC with whiskey. “It’s for work,” I volunteered to our houseguest. Slammed three of the same, read a few chapters from a book about writing and proceeded to nod off while shopping online for clothes in a size smaller than I currently wear.
Thursday: Oof. Slept in my contacts. Pulling those suckers off of my eyeballs at noon felt like scratching my corneas with sandpaper. Pretty much spent the whole day hydrating in bed before grabbing a salad and crawling to yoga at 6:30pm. I did not want to go there. I opted to take a night off from drinking since my friend Ali was moving to London on Saturday, and Friday would no doubt be off the chain. Also, it’s not like I was getting any work done anyways, sooo …
Friday & Saturday: Flat out: I derailed. On Friday, I laid around lazily, felt super anxious about squeezing yoga in before the night’s festivities and ultimately skipped out to meet Ali for a drink around 6pm. We then headed to a friend’s apartment for a group-hang pregame before 15 of us girls went out for a fancy dinner at Buddakan. Carrie Bradshaw, eat your heart out. I ate and drank everything within arms reach and it was a total sh*tshow — Any and all further details are not for public consumption. #overserved.
Saturday was more of the same, just during daylight hours. Ali left for London around 7pm and I cried. Then I napped. Then I had sushi with my cousin and saw Robert Pattinson on the walk home (the same night the tabloids announced he’d split with K. Stew). It was exciting and I peed a little. Then I passed out before midnight because drinking and eating are EXHAUSTING.
Sunday: I made it to a class in the late afternoon for my final day of the diet, which proves that miracles are real and they can happen to you too. I was having an extreme case of the Sunday Stressies and Bikram legitimately chilled me out, as it’s been known to do before. I really do love-hate the practice. Physically, it pushes every muscle in your body to its limit and kind of makes you want to die. But you burn like, 1,000 calories per class, so there’s that. Mentally, it works wonders on your mood, your day-to-day mindset and your confidence. I walk out of every class feeling like I’ve got the body of Beyonce and the exercise enthusiasm of Richard Simmons. Adding alcohol into the equation undoubtedly makes the classed harder by way of extreme dehydration, but diving directly into drunk immediately after also kind of takes away from the blissed-out high you get when you leave.
The verdict: Not sustainable. I didn’t change my eating habits, lost a pound and may or may not have gained a drinking problem. Bikram is the bomb, but it’s definitely best attended when drunk on water. Bottom line: There’s no way Gaga was born this way. Sh*t is hard work. I would not recommend this to a friend.
