Grain Free/Primal/Paleo in January 2011!!! - Page 8

[laohaire]

From personal experience, I don't worry about fruit when I'm adjusting to a new way of eating. When I quit sugar or whatever, I feel free to up the fruit to help me get by. Inevitably, I reduce my fruit intake naturally after a time. My philosphy is that a crutch is a good thing when you're healing. It's only when the crutch doesn't get put away that it's a problem. I think for most people, they naturally put their crutches aside when they can - no effort, no fanfare. It's only when there's something else going on that they cling to their crutches - and even then, I'd say it was the other thing, not the crutches per se, that was the real problem.  

[joybird]

I also think eating more fruit is fine.  It can help get you over the hump and it is absorbed easily.  

I felt terrible emotionally at first, but only for a week or so.  The headaches lasted longer, maybe a few weeks.  After that things leveled out quickly.  But I also was very diligent with my CLO, vit/min supplements and detox baths.  Epsom salts are your friend.  I should buy stock in epsom salts.  I've also been doing other detox baths.  Seaweed is a goodv detoxifier and provides accessible minerals.  I use a powder but any seaweed will work.  Also clay detox baths - Uncle Harry's makes one or you could just use bentonite powder in your tub.  I've also read that ACV in the bath or baking soda (not together!) will help detox but I haven't tried those yet.  

[crunchy_mama]

re: fruit: I should say I think they can be fine for some.  I just feel better without them and I can get the carbs I need from veggies.  However, there have been times I have ate them, quite a bit.  We all have different experiences and different bodies so of course such things will vary.

[laohaire]

2 1/2 weeks grain free.

Unexpected benefit: improved circulation. My feet used to get colder than one could ever think POSSIBLE. Even though I dress very warmly. This was an issue for years, and suddenly now my feet are merely cool to the touch, not icy.

Unfortunately, the weight loss stopped. I shouldn't complain too much, but I needed to lose 25 pounds to get back to my old fighting weight. 5 pounds came right off. And, in the last week, absolutely nothing more. If anything, I might have gained a pound back. Maybe it wasn't the grain-free but simply starving myself that did the trick. Now I'm eating again - but I seriously doubt I eat way too many calories. Sample meals:

Breakfast - banana and peanut butter, OR hardboiled egg and 1 ounce cheddar cheese.

Lunch - bowl of leftover soup (blended squash and homemade chicken stock with some onion and dried tomatos for crunch). Or sometimes I even skip lunch.

Dinner - spinach salad, small sweet potato with butter, small amount of chicken

Beverage - water, water, water, water. Nothing new, I always drink water

Now, I know you could say I shouldn't eat the banana or the sweet potato, but for crying out loud, I'm hardly stuffing myself.

Also, that initial burst of energy never came back. My loss of appetite got me so weak that one day I got dizzy standing. Now I have figured out things to eat again but I don't really feel strong enough to exercise. And now that I seem to be gaining it all back, I just don't frickin know what to do - I instinctively just want to eat less so I don't bloat up again, and I don't want to exercise and run the risk of being hungry. I'm soooo not vain, and I'm watching myself standing at the cliff of anorexia. I've found it's actually in me. I'm not actually being anorexic of course, but I'm just saying it's a path that beckons.

[crunchy_mama]

I don't know that you are going to have the energy without some more fat or meat.  Instead of all the carbs why not up the fat?  I would say you aren't getting enough calories and w/ a good percentage of those calories coming from carbs I would say it isn't surprising that your blood sugar is wonky.

[organicmidwestmama]

No matter what diet or way of eating one follows, you need a certain amount of energy intake aka calories and I would be very hungry with only eating a banana and pb, that's not much protien or food total. I think its been proven over and over again in research that low calorie dieting is not a long term solution and can mess up a healthy metabolism.

[laohaire]

Well, I'm not trying to do low calorie dieting. I'm not hungry, I just don't feel strong enough to lift weights.

I've incredibly increased the amount of protein in my diet - if breakfast involves an egg and cheese, or peanut butter, that's a significant change from cereal. Fat, I don't avoid at all - I make my own soup from scratch, and believe me, all the drippings stay in. I use plenty of butter. I joked recently that I miight call this "the sour cream diet." I've added a lot more meat to my diet, from none to a few times a week. So even if this is a high-carb meal for *you*, it's a big change for me and I assume it's the net change that counts the most. Otherwise, I may as well just eat whatever I want, if the only way it makes a difference is if I completely cut all vegetables out of my life.

Also, what makes you say my blood sugar is wonky? Other than having trouble standing one day when I could not eat a thing. I did say that my appetite came back, and I don't notice any blood sugar issues whatsoever. I know what blood sugar swings feel like, believe me - I get cranky and irritable and have this "feeling" that I can't describe. Sometimes shaky. Yeah, I had that when I was eating zero, and I'm not surprised. I wasn't doing that on purpose, I posted here before in alarm because I didn't know what to do. I've gotten past that. Just have found my weight loss stopped now that I'm eating again, and I'm frustrated.

[_ktg_]

Laohaire - I know where you're coming from. *hugs* I lost an amazing 15lbs (over the span of 2 months) when I first started and now I've pittered out and staying at my current weight (200).  I am finding if I make a small adjustment to my diet that over time the weight does come off - but very slowly or I don't put any on (which is a good thing too).

I've been at this for 6 months and right now I'm not completely grain-free - somedays yes, somedays no.  I usually have it with 1 meal/day (rice mostly) - because I like it, but I'm more focused on staying gluten-free because that is entrenched in my life to have bread, or a bread-like substance with every meal, every day.

Are you tracking your calorie intake as weight loss really boils down to basic intake/output, but perhaps you're not eating enough and your body thinks it needs to store everything?

[laohaire]

No, I'm not counting calories. I don't have a scale. Can't read labels for calories since I make everything from scratch (well, ok, not EVERYTHING - I buy butter and sour cream, etc, but you know what I mean).

I'm being silly because weight loss wasn't my primary goal, but certainly a guilty one. I'm already satisfied with the results I have - mainly, that I can concentrate again. I guess I just got my hopes up a lot when the weight suddenly started melting off, after three years of trying so hard. I was also thinking it might be similar to another time in my life when I had extra weight I was holding on to - I quit sugar and every last pound came off even though all I did was quit sugar (I wasn't on a "diet" I just wanted to stop eating sugar, but that's what happened).

But even those 5 pounds really made a difference for me, so I should just be grateful and keep on keepin' on :)

[crunchy_mama]

When you are talking about getting dizzy and not enough energy, that seems like a blood sugar issue to me, glad to hear it isn't persistent.  I just think perhaps the weight is stalled because of the lack of calories and fat is an easy thing to add in- I know you had said getting more meat wasn't likely.

Just from reading what you are eating it doesn't sound like enough to *me*, I wouldn't have energy on that diet either, regardless of the make-up of it.

breakfast- I ate 3 fried eggs this am and about 2-3 oz of sausage and a cup of hot tea w/ a TBSP of honey and was not overly full- oh and a few sqares of dark choc. (Lindt 85%) w/ a few TBSP PB

snack- a bit more choc and PB

lunch- stir-fry w/ broccoli, bellpepper, mushrooms, olives and tapenade- a wok-ful just for me and about 3 oz of leftover chicken- cooked w/ sesame oil

snack- carrots and homemade mayo

supper- will be ???- I easily eat a large plateful of food- I try to think of any and everywhere I can add extra fat

[laohaire]

I just ate a serious amount of fat :) Usually I make gravy from chicken drippings but I'm grain-free, and having no thickener makes it hard to enjoy the gravy (not for taste but just for getting it to stick to whatever I put it on, lol!). This time I just kept the drippings and made some bone broth right on top of it. OMG! The amount of fat on this soup... it looks like restaurant soup where you see these pools of fat/oil on top. And very yummy :) That soup was probably 50% fat!

[crunchy_mama]

Yum- my soup usually very fatty as well!  It gets that hard level that encases the top in the frig!  Oh, I thought of another fat adder for you- w/ your pb mix in some EV coco oil, yummy and extra calories easily!

[crunchy_mama]

I think tonight I am going to do some asian stirfry w/ ground beef and cabbage, carrots, and peas- w/ some sesame seeds-lots of garlic, ginger, some red pepper and my coconut aminos.

[Koalamom]

Laohaire, I would be starving with what you wrote you ate. It could be that I am nursing my active 19 month old.

I agree about upping the protein a ton.

Here is what I ate yesterday

pre-breakfast- 1 apple, few squares of 90% lindt chocolate and a tablespoon or cashew butter
breakfast- 2 chicken sausages, and a giant serving or peas cooked in the sausage drippings and extra beef fat
Lunch- ground beef with white beans and steamed kale on the side
snack- more chocolate and some dried fruit
dinner- bone broth soup- maybe some meat or beans and lots of veggies. (example- mushroom cauliflower chick pea soup- tastes like heaven)
If I am hungry later, perhaps some grapes or some hogendaz mango sorbet

If I ate eggs, I would have them for breakfast and eat 4 or 5 to feel satisfied. Just one would bug the heck out of me.

[Koalamom]

Can we talk about paleo kids? My ds is 19 months sill nursing (my milk never fattened him up anyway) and eats regular meals with me. He really liked his rice and potatoes and he hardly does that anymore. We are on a very limited diet without dairy anyway. He has always been skinny, but he seems to be growing and thinning more. How do you keep your children from wasting away from eating a paleo diet?

Just a note, I have noticed that my ds's crowded lower teeth are all of a sudden opening up, so his body is responding to this diet!!!

[crunchy_mama]

My older 2 (6.5) and almost 4 do not eat Paleo- they get oats 1-2 a week and the same w/ rice, corn tortilla chips or popcorn on occasion.  The baby I try to keep grainfree- she did get a bit of rice off the floor the other day though.  She seems to be growing fine, we are gluten, dairy, soy free and as I said she eats what I eat so grainfree.  We do eat potatoes, eggs, I smother everything in fat, coconut oil, tallow, lard, whatever!  She loves coco milk smoothies and homemade mayo straight, guacamole, she seems to eat well and a lot, a lot more than the others did!

[Shazer]

I would suggest sneaking fat in wherever you can to help with paleo kids.  Maybe more starchy carbs can help, too. 

My DD is not paleo, although she was when she had food intolerances as a baby/toddler.  We are trying to get her eating better, such as I stopped buying any snack foods from the store.  She eats rice, drinks raw milk, eats popcorn, waffles, and tortilla chips.  If we are at a restaurant, she sometimes eats bread.  I'm trying to keep her grains low, like 1-2 servings per day since I don't think she will ever give up her morning waffle.  But she loves fruit and will snack on veggies.  Unfortunately, the only way she gets eggs into her is in baked goods.  She will not touch an egg any other way.  I think the raw milk benefits her as it actually gets some protein and fat into her system.  But at $15 a gallon here, she ends up drinking about half plain organic ultra pasteurized milk (although I hate her drinking this for obvious reasons). 

DH and I went grocery shopping today.  We spent $70 on produce.  Granted, $10 was for fruit for DD's birthday fruit salad (her request for a special birthday dinner).  I'm in shock, not that we bought so much in the produce section, but that the price of everything is sky high.  Food is so expensive these days.  I really can't wait until I can get my garden started at this new house and we can get 1/4 cow to stock our freezer.  But I seriously feel the crunch in trying to eat well.  I've been scanning coupons and if I really tried, I could fill my pantry with a lot of crap for half of what I'm paying for decent food.  There always seem to be coupons for cereals and snack foods.  Alas.  I keep having to remind myself that money I spent on good food is money I will not spend on doctor's visits down the road.