One of the more challenging aspects of using HCG is getting your dose right. Everyone is different, and most people have to go through a period of trial and error to find the right amount to use. In addition, your correct dose can change over time because of your weight loss or because  your body accommodates to the amount you were originally taking.

It really is vital to have the right dose. Being hungry is not only painful, it is counterproductive to your goals on HCG. When your dose is right you shouldn’t be uncomfortably hungry. Being too hungry can actually slow your weight loss down! Feeling comfortable indicates that HCG is releasing the right amount of abnormal fat into your system, and that you are losing weight at your best rate.

While on HCG, normal hunger is fine. In other words, you should be hungry before your meal times, but not in pain. Once you eat, you won’t feel ‘stuffed’ or ‘full’, just no longer hungry. This may take awhile to get used to. Most people are used to feeling quite full after a meal and it is easy to think you are still hungry if you aren’t really ‘full’. Give yourself time to adjust to the ‘not full’ feeling rather than the ‘stuffed’ feeling. You may notice that it actually feels better; you might have more energy after a meal, and you may notice that you feel less ‘weighed’ down.

If you find yourself in pain, you feel like you want to chew on your own arm, or you simply want to bite everything you see because you feel like you are starving, it is time to adjust your dose. Do not try to just tough it out. Truly. When you get your dose right, you should feel just fine! Most of us who have a history of dieting are not used to this; we think that starving ourselves will help us lose weight. The opposite is true on HCG. You should feel comfortable.

I do think everyone is different, but I have heard of and used these guidelines:

• If you are painfully hungry before you eat, then your dose is too low.
• If eating makes you even hungrier, than your dose is too high.
• If you are simply starving all the time, it is likely that your dose is too high, but it could be too low.
  

I have only used homeopathic HCG, but I have supported a few people who have used injections. My understanding is that most people start out at around 125iu. If you need to increase, do it slowly, maybe first increase to 135iu then 150iu or 165iu. If you decrease, I have seen people lower to 115iu, 110iu, and even as low as 80iu! For more info on dosing and injections, check out HCG Chica’s ‘Troubleshooting Hunger on the hCG Diet – How To Find the Right Dose for You’ post. It is really helpful!

Keep in mind that each batch of HCG might be prepared differently, so use your own hunger as your best guideline. It may take a few tries to get it right, but you should feel the effects of a changed dose quickly, within one or two meals. If you get hungrier from your dose change, you may have gone in the wrong direction. Keep adjusting until you get it right and until you feel good.

Dosing with homeopathic HCG is a bit more challenging. The #1 most important issue is to be 100% certain that you have a homeopathic preparation that has real HCG in it! There are a LOT of scams out there, so please be careful. It should say ‘professional HCG’, and the packing should indicate that it includes real HCG in it. I used Biogenesis drops for both of my rounds and had great success. Just be sure to do your research, and to test it.

I have heard that starting at 10 drops 3 times a day is a good starting point, which is a total of 30 drops each day.

Dosing would be something like this:

Dose#1 (morning): – 10 Drops
Dose #2 (afternoon) – 10 Drops
Dose #3 (Evening) – 10 Drops

About a week into my first round, I personally found that breaking my HCG into 4 doses, rather than 3, worked better for me, even though it is a pain. I also added 6 total drops per day for a total of 36 drops.

This method could look something like this:

Dose#1 – 7am – 9 Drops
Dose #2 – Noon – 9 Drops
Dose #3 – 5pm – 9 Drops
Dose #4 – 9:30pm – 9 Drops

During the second half of both of my rounds, I added an additional 2 drops, which looked like this:

Dose#1 – 7am – 9 Drops
Dose #2 – Noon – 10 Drops
Dose #3 – 5pm – 9 Drops
Dose #4 – 9:30pm – 10 Drops

A small amount can really effect your hunger and subsequently, your results with HCG. A few drops really made a difference for me; this was one way I knew that the formula I had purchased was good.

For homeopathic HCG (and homeopathic formulas in general), you cannot eat or drink anything or put anything in your mouth (even anything like toothpaste, gum, or breathmints) for at least 30 minutes before you use it and 30 minutes after you use it. If you DO put anything in your mouth in this time frame, it will dramatically inhibit the power of the dose. Eating or drinking before or after a dose can make a huge difference in the effectiveness of your HCG. Be really careful to follow this guideline and be strict about it.

Timing is the really tricky part of using homeopathic HCG and can really have an effect on your hunger and on your results. I ignored this at first. I wasn’t careful to use the 30 minute rule of nothing in the mouth before or after my doses. I was hungry all the time and I couldn’t get my dose right. Once I committed to nothing in my mouth for a half hour before or after each dose, everything changed, my dose was more effective, and I wasn’t abnormally hungry.

It is really a bit of a pain when you are dosing 4 times a day and can’t eat or drink before hand to have a full hour with no food, drink or anything else. You need to drink 70-80 ounces of fluids each day, and you have to eat your meals regularly. In addition, For me personally, I found it really helpful to break up my meals. I ate 4 times per day, plus coffee in the morning, drank 80 ounces of fluids, and had to get my doses in. Ugh!

I wound up setting alarms for myself that went off all day long! This was invaluable, and I could not have done this effectively with out it.

My alarms looked like this

• No Fluids Now
• Take Dose Now
• Drink Water Now
• Eat Lunch
• etc

This is a BIG pain, I know, but it worked. I lost 15 pounds my first round and 7 pounds my second round, which is all I needed to lose.

I am including my own schedule here as a reference or a starting point. You will need to find what works best for you personally.

Morning
7 am:
Coffee with low fat milk and stevia
8-10 oz water

8 am
Dose#1 (9 drops)

9 am
8-10 oz water, 8-10 oz Tea

11 am
Dose #2 (9 drops)

Afternoon
12:oo pm
Protein and Vegetable (HCG original protocol foods only and correct amounts)
10-20 ounce fluid (I often made soup to get lots of fluids)

2 pm
Fruit (Apple or 1/2 grapefruit only)
Breadstick (I am gluten free, so I ate a 20 calorie, <organic, nothing added> corn cake instead, which worked fine)
8-10 oz water/fluid

3 pm:
Lemonade (*Juice of 1/2 lemon, lemon stevia (lots!), large glass water)

4 pm
Dose #3 (9 drops)

Evening
5:30 pm
Protein and Vegetable (HCG original protocol foods only and correct amounts)
10-20 oz fluid

7 pm
Fruit (Apple or 1/2 grapefruit only)
Breadstick (I am gluten free, so I ate a 20 calorie, <organic, nothing added> corn cake instead, which worked fine)
8-10 oz water/fluid

8 pm
Lemonade (*Juice of 1/2 lemon, lemon stevia (lots!), large glass water)

9-10pm
dose #4 (9 drops)

*note: I saved my lemon juice every day for lemonade. YUM! I found it really satisfying and quite a treat. HCGChica has a great recipe for a lemon slushy, now that it is summer I would definitely make THAT!

The most important things to remember are this:

• Everyone is different. Use your own process of trial and error to find the best dosage and plan for you.
• Stick to Dr Simeon’s original protocol. It works! I notice that when people stray, they start with one change here, one change there, and pretty soon, they are eating all kinds of food outside of the protocol. The original protocol works.
• You should NOT be abnormally hungry on this protocol. Not only does it feel bad, it is counterproductive to your weight loss and the effectiveness of HCG. Adjust your dose as need be, and keep adjusting until you get it right. When you get it right, you will know!

I hope that you find this helpful. Let me know how it goes!

ENJOY!

~inspired girl aka Barbara