[HotboTgameR]

Once again posting on behalf of someone else! I'm so happy with my own success that I try to encourage it in others.

She's in her sixties. She started loading on Jul 10, so it's the morning of VLCD 8 for her. She's lost less than 7 pounds so far and that includes her loading weight. She's discouraged a bit with that, but she's willing to hang in there. She's sticking to protocol and her personality really doesn't allow for me suggesting that she drop the Melba or the fruit.

The problem - the BIG problem - is that she constantly complains she's hungry.

She's taking Pregnyl subcu, mixed properly. She started on 175 I.U. and when she reported the hunger, I immediately recommended she drop down to 150 I.U. She tried that for three days and said it was better, but she was still hungry. She dropped down to 125 I.U. after that and said she didn't feel much difference. I suggested she try a skip day to see if it's better. That was yesterday. She said yes, she wasn't hungry for much of the day, but she still did feel hungry towards the end.

I'm very reluctant to suggest she go below 125 I.U., because that's pretty unusual, especially for someone taking subcu (at least I think it is?), but maybe that's what she needs? If the skip day was better, doesn't that usually indicate her dosage was too high?

She says she knows she's pretty sensitive to hormones. She talked to her doctor who isn't too familiar with the HCG protocol but seems to have the general idea. He suggested that maybe she should switch to hHCG. That sounds... inadvisable to me.

Another question: routine says that skip days - she does want to do a longer round, although she may not go the full 40 days - is once a week. Can that be adjusted safely to more frequently? Can you do a skip day five days after another, for example, or will your body have too little concentration of HCG after that? She's interested in this because if she does best on skip days, she wants to arrange one for the 29th. I's a Jewish fast day and she's hoping to have as little appetite as possible. Of course, she can just wait until then to do a skip day at all.

One more thing on her behalf: she reports insomnia since she started HCG. I'm not thrilled with her sleeping patterns, but at least when she goes to sleep, she gets a solid 7 hours. Since she started protocol, though, she's been waking up at 5 a.m. and taking an hour to fall back asleep. She does NOT want to take any medications/vitamins to help her sleep, since she says she doesn't want to introduce more stuff into her body. Any suggestions outside of Sleepy Time tea?

Thanks so much! You people are wonderful.