My husband and I decided to do a little experiment and eliminate common inflammatory foods from our diets. This would include: gluten, dairy, legumes, alcohol and sugar. We don't eat a lot of gluten or legumes, but I am a native Wisconsonite and a LOVE cheese and I am a sugar addict. Those two categories were really going to be the biggest challenge for me. My husband brews beer, so that category would be the most difficult for him. We would be eating 3 meals a day. Each meal would contain protein that was the size of your palm, healthy fats and veggies. If you were hungry between meals, this means you need to eat more during your meals. We would be using coconut oil, avocados, olives and coconut as our fats. They recommend grass fed meats, but if you are on a budget you can buy regular store bought meats. If you are cooking with non grass fed animal products, you will want to trim most of the fat off the meats. The fat is where the animal stores most of the toxins that it is fed or injected with.
There is a wonderful program called, The Whole30. A friend of mine, Kelly, did this program and it really helped her change her way of eating and relationship with food. I decided that this would be the program that we would also follow. I went on their website and quickly bought their book and a cookbook that they recommended. They do not term this program a "diet". A diet is usually thought to be for weight loss and only for a short period of time. The Whole30 is an entire overhaul on your bodies relationship with food.You will gain a better understanding of the way that certain foods affect your body.
I have a definite emotional tie with food. Usually after long runs, I will "treat" myself to nutrient-lacking-fast-digesting food. These foods leave me hungry afterwards because my body metabolizes them so quickly. I feel like this emotional tie with food happens to a lot of people. Food makes us feel good. When we are having a bad day, we choose to eat food that will make us "feel" better. We know that when we put that cheeseburger in our mouth, we have created an emotion with that food and it makes us forget about our worries and be happy. The Whole30 teaches your body to stop having that emotional tie with food. Instead of eating a cookie to make our workday better, we teach our body to only eat food when our body tells us to eat food. We start listening to our bodies natural hunger signals versus overriding that system with our emotional connections with food. That is a VERY brief summary of the emotional connection with food that this way of eating will help eliminate. I highly recommend reading "It Starts With Food" to really grasp all the science behind the system.
Our journey began July 1st. The first week was a killer! I woke up to a terrible tension headache on Day 2 that didn't stop until Day 7. Like I said, I consumed A LOT of sugar throughout the day. I would always have a diet soda at lunch and usually a candy bar during the afternoon as my "pick me up". Not having these foods in my system showed me their true effects on my overall health. It was amazing to me. I feel like I eat fairly healthy, but dealing with what sugars were doing to my body really was eye opening to me. After the first week, the rest of the month was really smooth. I fell asleep and woke up feeling so rested. I had constant energy throughout the day, versus having sugar highs and lows which left me tired at the end of the day. I had ZERO cravings for junk food. I ate 3 meals during the day and didn't even have the urge to mindlessly snack on garbage food. The best part was that my husband and I made our new way of eating a real priority. We would spend Sundays in the kitchen prepping and cooking all of our food for the week. It was really nice getting to spend this time with him and know that we were doing something really good for our health and our marriage.
At the end of the 30 days, we were so excited. We really changed our relationship with food and didn't even want to revert to our old ways of eating. All the food we made was so delicious and we didn't feel bloated after eating our meals. We have made a decision to continue to eat this way for the rest of our lives.
This was just a very quick summary of my journey with Paleo. I just wanted to demonstrate that no matter how "healthy" you think you are eating, there is always room for improvement. You never know how you can truly feel until you give it a go.
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