ShadowInTheKitchen

I started on Friday May 1:
Meal 1: romaine salad topped with chicken salad, Walnuts, red cabbage, Primal Kitchen Ranch dressing
M2: potato egg salad, carrot sticks
M3: roast beef tenderloin, potatoes, Veggie Confetti Cauli-rice from W30 Fast and Easy cookbook
NSV: I ate well and have lots of leftovers for the weekend
NSV: I tried a new food (riced cauliflower) and a new recipe (veggie confetti) & loved it
My hacks to habit: clean the kitchen after every meal, no excuses, so it’s always ready for when I need to cook 
Plan for Saturday: defrost my upright freezer, so it’s a pleasure to use
Day 2, Saturday May 2:
M1: romaine salad with chicken and stuff, PK ranch
M2: potato egg salad, carrot and celery sticks
Snack: banana 
M3: leftover veggie confetti rice
NSV: Upright freezer is defrosted and re-organized. It looks fab
Hack to habit:  Always keep washed romaine leaves in the fridge, wrapped in a clean dish towel and ready to use

Plan for Sunday: prepare more homemade mayo, plan menus for myself and my family the upcoming week
 

I finished my fourth round of Whole30 on 1/31/2021, and I'm determined to do a proper(ish) reintroduction this time around. My fiance did this round with me as well - we got engaged in January and are committed to improving our health together, especially as we continue to stay at home during the pandemic. Here's a summary of my victories, both scale and otherwise.
Weight: Down 7.5 lb 
Mental Health/Emotions: Haven't felt markedly depressed at all in the past month. My anxiety has ebbed and flowed, but eating Whole30, in combination with taking broad spectrum CBD oil before bed, has led to a definite decrease in generalized anxiety. Now, I will sometimes get anxious about specific topics or events, but I'm able to self-soothe and the feelings don't linger. Executive dysfunction has definitely improved - most days, I'm able to move through my to-do list without much effort or energy depletion. I'm still seeing about one day each week where I struggle with getting even basic tasks done. Even those days have improved over time, though. I won't get as much done, but I'll still get some of my most important priorities completed.
Energy: More sustained throughout the day and consistent in the mornings without caffeine. I stay energized and motivated to complete tasks and do activities throughout the evening, until I wind down for bed around 8 PM. Previously, I had been basically useless after work, unless I exerted a herculean effort to make dinner. Now, it feels easy to keep my day going after work ends.
Focus: Haven't seen much improvement here. It's been easier to put habits into action that I know help - limiting screen time, optimizing my schedule for work and other life tasks. However, it's still basically impossible to concentrate on things I'm not interested in.
Digestion: I have less stomach pains and gas on a regular basis. I had about a week and half period in the middle of this round where I felt nauseous all day and could barely eat, but I'm back to a more normal appetite for me. I recently switched to a different probiotic, which I feel has affected my digestion for the past week or so. I'd like to revisit and see where I'm at later this month, once I've adjusted to the new probiotic.
Allergies: Before this round of Whole30, I had been taking medicine for what I thought were seasonal allergies everyday (generic Flonase). I stopped taking it during Whole30, to see how I felt, and have only had one day where I felt that I needed it. We also started using a humidifier at night, and got an air purifier for our apartment, this month, which I think has also helped with my symptoms.
Skin: I didn't see much improvement until the last three days or so. Now, my skin is looking great - fuller, more of a glow, more youthful. I have some healing acne, but haven't really seen new pimples developing. With my increased energy and decrease in executive dysfunction, I've been much better with completing my skincare routine every morning and every night, and have even added some new steps, which I'm sure is helping as well as my diet changes.
Libido: Mine has definitely improved, and my fiance has even explicitly remarked on how much his has increased this month.
Sleep:  In past rounds, this has been a definite improvement that I saw - hugely improved sleep quality. Sadly, I didn't see much improvement in this during this round. During the pandemic, I've started using CBD to help my sleep and anxiety - I was struggling to sleep through the night, an issue I never had in the past. I stopped using CBD this month, to see how Whole30 helped with my sleep and anxiety. My sleep was okay at first, but then, the same time that I had issues with my appetite, I found myself awake for several hours in the middle of the night, or waking up at 3 AM, unable to fall back asleep for the whole day. So, I started using CBD again, which helped - almost immediately. I'm still struggling with waking up in the night - not sure if it's because it's been so cold lately, or what - but, I've gotten much better at falling back asleep if I do wake up.
Exercise: One of my new year's resolutions was to increase my daily walk from 45 to 50 minutes each day. I've been pretty good with accomplishing this most days - 50 minutes vs. 45 minutes doesn't feel like much of a difference, and I'm more energized and walk faster during my walks than I had normally been before Whole30. I've also been more motivated with doing yoga daily - I did yoga 15 days out of the last month. My fiance got a set of resistance bands for Christmas, and we've decided we're going to start doing workouts with those 3 days a week as well. We did a 25 minute upper body workout yesterday - I'm feeling a bit sore, but it was fun and felt good.
 

I had unexpected company over the weekend, and ended up going off plan. So that was 21 days for my first streak of eating whole30-style. This log probably doesn't actually belong here, as I'm not doing a proper whole30, but am rather keeping track of my eating and how it effects me in general. Maybe I will wrap up here and move to the post-whole30 logs, which is where this probably belongs. 
In regards to going off plan on Sunday, I don't feel that it was necessarily a poor choice. I made a deliberate choice to eat something that isn't particularly a problem food - barbequed short ribs, provided by my brother. I feel like it was a reasonable off-plan choice. 1. My brother didn't know I was doing Whole30, 2. Barbeque is not a food without breaks for me, 3. The rest of the meal was on plan, 4. I didn't use this as an excuse to go on a crazy binge. I think that last one is the most important. If I'd gone off plan for chocolate cake or something, there's no telling where it would stop. 
So, the counter restarts and now I see if I can break 21 days. 

31st R1D24
M1 - Coffee
M2 - Normal veg etc
M3 - Rissoles, Potato Tuna fritters and steamed veg
1st R1D25
M1 - Coffee and Banana
M2 - Normal veg etc
M3 - Leftover Tuna and potato fritters.
2nd R1D26
M1 - Coffee
M2 - Normal veg and leftover meats scramble with fresh eggs from our chooks.
M3 - I made up a recipe tonight, fried off some bacon, then some chicken breasts in salt, pepper and paprika.  Put them aside and fried off some cherry tomatoes from the garden till they burst, then added a can of coconut cream, nutritional yeast, lemon juice, homemade mustard and homemade pesto, brought it to a simmer, added the chicken and bacon back in.  Served it over leftover fried rice for the kids and over cauliflower rice for hubby and I, was very nice.

You can do it!

Day 27, Monday February 1, 2021
Sleep: 11pm - 7am, 8 hours. Awake 17min at 11, 9 min at 3:30, 4 min at 6. No insomnia.
M1: sweet potato, kale, prosciutto, 2 eggs, ghee
Snack: dates and pecans
M2: shepherd's pie
Snack: Blueberry Rx bar
M3: tomato-vegetable-hamburger soup, white potatoes and onions fried in ghee
I definitely feel that I'm sleeping better since I began this Whole30 but my sleep pattern is still not set.  I think it's a good idea to make a sleep schedule for myself but will I set my bedtime at 10, 10:30 or 11?  Sometimes I'm just too tired to wait until 11, and sometimes I'm too bored to stay up because there's nowhere to go and nothing on TV.  I need to set an evening activity schedule to include crafting and reading because I doubt that the province will open up at the end of the Stay At Home order next week and so the restrictions will likely continue.  For me this means no gym and no evenings out.  Evenings will be easier when the weather is milder and I can take a long walk in the evening. 
What time will I plan to get out of bed?  I used to be an early riser and that is how I identify but lately I haven't been getting up until 7, 8, or later.  I  tend to feel happiest when I begin my day at 6am.
For now my goal will be to go to bed at 11 and get up at 7.  I will stop drinking water at 9pm.  The weather is less cold so I will try to walk 7km every day again.  
5... 4... only 3 more days to go!

Really found the diet very easy to follow - I never felt hungry and I remembered how much I enjoy cooking and being creative in the kitchen.
Lost 16 pounds in my 30 days and feel awesome. Increased my walking dramatically during the month.
Will take one week off (not go crazy) but have a few things that were not allowed -emphasis on few and then restart Whole 30 on February 8. Will continue the walking and start resistance band training as well just to add a little to the level of difficulty and keep in interesting.
 

I got my days mixed up, and the bunless burgers was the 29th, no idea... lol.
 
29th
30th - R1D23
M1 -
M2 - Veg, bacon and eggs.
M3 - Roasted Chicken, Mash, veg, confit mayo
 
Things are pretty hard now, we only shop monthly's, I have over a week till the next big shop.... food is hard, we're bored and over the regulars and sick of lack of fresh foods (we get veg from the garden each day, but its exactly the same veg, as we eat seasonally, so Beetroot, Kohlrabi, Noodle Beans and Zucchini (and plenty of tomatoes) are on the table atm.
Hubby has been able to stay off his reflux meds (and has lost a fair bit of weight, I know, not supposed to weigh!)
I have had absolutely no changes whatsoever, lost a bit of a sweet tooth by removing sugar from my coffee etc, and we've created some good habits (got rid of all the soft drink and cordial, I did make fermented ginger beer and stuff though)
But as per usual (with every 'dietary change' I ever try) I have had no NSV's or SV's so far. Pain levels have been the same, my psoriasis is still bad, headaches have still been on the cards, my monthly's are coming in just as bad as normal.  Sleep has been hit and miss, mood/behaviour has been the same (pain makes me snarky and I'm having pain issues most days again)
So, we'll continue on, and the plan is to move to a more paleo style diet next month, so that I can bake a bit and things like that.  I won't buy cordial or soft drink, we've managed to get rid of that and we'll keep that gone, and we will stick to coconut cream in our coffee, I might mix a little maple into each can of coconut milk and that way we're having very lightly sweetened coffee.
I'm also going to reintroduce fermented bread products (I make a lot of long ferment sourdough items, English muffins, flat breads, cinnamon scrolls, breads, pancakes etc)
 

Day 23, Thursday January 28, 2021
M1: romaine salad with green grapes, chicken, PK gg dressing
Snack: banana
M2: sweet potatoes, prosciutto, eggs, ghee
Snack: nuts and fruit
M3: green beans, potatoes, roast beef
Sleep: 10:00 - 9:00, with 45 minutes of recurring insomnia at 1:30, 3 and 4.  Feeling rested after this big sleep.
Snacking: I just do it.  I'm so bored, working from home with orders to stay home except for essentials.  Ugggh.  At least the snacks are compliant.  I know I would feel better if I restrict snacking, but with coVid restrictions as they are, I feel that putting further restrictions on myself would be too much.  So I eat too much.  
One more week to go.

Day 24, Friday January 29, 2021
M1: sweet potato, green beans, carrots, kale, prosciutto, 2 eggs, ghee
M2: tomato veg chicken soup
Snack: raisins
M3: grilled sweet peppers, onions, chicken
Sleep: 11:00 - 7:30, 8 1/2 hours with 6 periods of being awake, but only for approximately 5 minutes each time, no insomnia.  My legs, hips and glutes ache from sitting around so much which I especially feel at night.  Its extremely cold outside, too cold to walk much and with the Stay at Home order I can't hardly go anywhere other than to the grocery store. I believe I will sleep better once I can move around more throughout the day.  If there was junky food in the house I know I would be eating it.  I'm so bored. 
I'm coming down the home stretch.  Just six more days to go.

DAY 3
Sleep - pill - 10:30 - 7:30 (up at 3:30 but fell back asleep within minutes)
B - coconut-cauliflower soup; coffee (half-caf)
L - zucchini noodles + salsa, sautéed mushrooms, sausage
S - grapes
D - salad (kale, radicchio, lobok, olive oil + acv, herring, olives, 1/4 avocado)

Feeling well-rested, not as foggy or hungry as usual. 
Might have apple slices and almond butter later if I’m feeling hungry 

Day 22, Wednesday January 27, 2021
M1: green beans, prosciutto, 2 eggs, ghee
M2: l/o mixed stir fried veg in olive oil, chicken wings
Snack: pork rinds, dates and cashews
M3: romaine salad with grapes, chicken, green goddess dressing
Sleep: midnight to 7:00am, 7 hours with 15 minutes awake 4:30
Energy: high in the morning, fairly high all day long

Lord have mercy, this week at work is just wrecking me. I'm trying to do the jobs of 2 people. The company has brought in a new person to help, which is good, but you know... onboarding a new person always slows you down at first. This is what's known as irony. I think that if I wasn't doing a Whole 30 right now, I would probably be rage-eating over how overwhelmed I feel, so.... yay for not doing that, I guess?
Food journal for 1/21/21, day 23:
Breakfast: Ground beef plus veggies plus sauce
Lunch: Avocado-chocolate smoothie
Dinner: Last of the coconut chicken curry with Very Good Brussels Sprouts* and balsamic aioli dipping sauce**
*Friends, the secret of deilcious brussels sprouts is just nuking them within an inch of their little sprouty lives! This ultra simple recipe from Cooks Illustrated yields delicious sprouts with perfect tender/crispy texture. As with all Cooks Illustrated recipes, it's a tad fussy, but also worth the fuss.
*VERY GOOD BRUSSELS SPROUTS
2 ¼ lbs  Brussels sprouts, trimmed and halved     3 tablespoons olive oil     1 tablespoon water    Salt and pepper Serves 6 to 8
 
If you are buying loose  Brussels sprouts, select those that are about 1½ inches long. Quarter  Brussels sprouts longer than 2½ inches; don’t cut sprouts shorter than 1 inch.
1. Adjust oven rack to upper-middle position and heat oven to 500 degrees. Toss  Brussels sprouts, oil, water, ¾ teaspoon salt, and ¼ teaspoon pepper in large bowl until sprouts are coated. Transfer sprouts to rimmed baking sheet and arrange so cut sides are facing down.
2. Cover sheet tightly with aluminum foil and roast for 10 minutes. Remove foil and continue to cook until  Brussels sprouts are well browned and tender, 10 to 12 minutes longer. Transfer to serving platter, season with salt and pepper to taste, and serve.
**BALSAMIC AIOLI DIPPING SAUCE
Put some mayonnaise into a fancy little bowl. Drizzle just a few drops of balsamic vinegar into the oil. Stir with a spoon. Dip sprouts and enjoy.

1/28/21, day 31:
Well, here we are at the close of this Whole 30. This one has been an adventure, and I'm grateful for the chance to have this time at home. In hindsight, I probably did not put enough energy into cooking and meal planning this time around! Even with infusions from the soup goddess, I drove myself slightly nuts with the same meals every day! I do like what I like, except for when I have it 3x/day with little variety.
Wishing my fellow W30 sojourners a satisfying close to this month's journey, a pleasure to travel alongside you.

Hmm, sleep is still a bit weird. Also today I don't have much of an appetite. I wouldn't say it's food boredom - just, eating at all seems like too much trouble. I feel like I have had this with whole30 in the past, so I don't think it's really weird and it will probably pass in a few days. 
Last night was pretty rough - the only reasons I did not go off plan were that I didn't have any baking supplies in the house and the weather was lousy so I didn't want to go out. I've found that no matter what it is, I can do pretty well for two weeks - an exercise plan, eating well - and then after two weeks it doesn't feel worth it any more. I think that's probably because by the two week point, any exciting newness has worn off but you're not really seeing any big results. Small results, but not big exciting ones. I always plan to plan for this - "Okay, you know that at the two week mark, it's going to get rough, so have something pleasant to get you past that." - but then I fail to actually plan anything. This also tends to be the grayest part of the year in my area - we might go weeks with no real sunlight, and that always hits me hard. I did try a light box before but didn't notice any positive effect. Oh well, enough whining. 

What a weird night ...
I've been having restless sleeping - lots of weird dreams and waking up off and on through the night. But I don't usually have a problem falling asleep. It's more like, I'll wake up briefly at midnight and two and four ... But last night, I could not get to sleep. I was really sleepy and went to bed just a bit early, right around 10 ... and laid there for HOURS. I was sleepy enough that I couldn't seem to get myself up to read or potter around the house for a bit, but also wasn't able to fall asleep. Around 2 I finally got up and read for a while - super sleepy the whole time - then went back to bad and STILL couldn't fall asleep. I finally fell asleep some time around 4 and, of course, overslept. I have no idea what was going on with that. But my stomach was just a little bit upset - the only think I can think of is that I had some rather underripe strawberries with supper. But I can't imagine that would keep me awake all night.
Due to oversleeping I once again didn't eat breakfast before coming to work. I haven't done this a ton, but there have been a few days where I've overslept, and I just can't seem to squeeze in cooking and eating breakfast before work. Today is very cold and very gray and I only have dull routine tasks that need to be accomplished. I'm going to take a few minutes to sip tea, stare at the wall, and try to get motivated.

Day 20, Monday January 25, 2021
M1: l/o stamppot; 2 small eggs, prosciutto, ghee
Snack: nuts, raisins, apple
M2: tomato-veg-hamburger soup
Snack: chicken wings
M3: romaine salad with grapes, avocado, chicken, GG dressing
Sleep: 11:30 - 7:00, 7 1/2 hours, awake twice for 11 minutes and seven minutes
Energy: through the roof from the start of the day!  Def feels like Tiger Blood.  
Hunger: I was HUNGRY this morning, and ate lots of trail mix. Too much maybe, but I was definitely hungry.
 

DAY 1
Sleep - no pill, up at 1:45 & 5:30
B - coffee; chicken-veg soup 
S - 1 T sunflower seeds
L - sardines w/ 1/2 T olive oil, capers, olives, celery, cucumber + sauerkraut
D - zucchini noodles w/ salsa, sautéed mushrooms, shrimp + olives; grapes
(It’s still early in the evening so if I get hungry later, I’ll have a hardboiled egg)
 
Feeling good today - energy level consistent. Had a decent sleep (for me) and got an early start feeling relatively well-rested. 
One of the side effects of my sleeping pills are a dramatically increased appetite/weight gain. But the anti-depressants I’m taking have the opposite effect. Predictably, my appetite feels totally out of whack. I’m trying to use the sleeping pills very sparingly and am hoping to taper off the anti-depressants within the next 12 months. Right now, though, I need them. I’m also taking vitamin D and cod liver oil every day. 

My older brother and I have been working on our Whole 30s together this month, and together, we seem to have accidentally inspired our mother to start a Whole 30 of her own. I have very mixed feelings about this. My poor mother seems to have been on a diet of some sort or another for her adult life (she is 75). She takes exquisite care of herself, isn't on any prescription medication, cuts a trim profile, and has a darned "healthy diet" as it is. I truly believe I have inherited some generational body image dysfunction/food obsession tendencies from her. Now she's all gung ho for a Whole 30 and excited to try it. Sigh. I am not letting this steal my joy or anything, but it's landing in a weird way today. The dynamic between mothers and daughters can be very complex! Joint stiffness has bothered her in recent years. I certainly appreciate her desire to get some relief from it and will cheer her on while continuing to pay attention to my own stuff.
Signed,
Probably Not a Good Time to Quit Therapy
Food journal for days 25-27.... I just stopped recording food here for a few days, because it was all sort of melding into this river of sameness. But it was all Whole 30, and tasty.
Food journal for 1/25/21, day 28:
Breakfast: 1 scrambled egg plus the latest batch of Very Good Brussels Sprouts and veggies
Lunch: Winter vegetable soup with chicken sausage from the soup goddess (wish I had the recipe for that one, it was dynamite)
Dinner: Veggies + ground beef + sauce

@meli22 I use a FitBit to track my sleep, helpful to know how many hours I slept or didn't, but also helps to see that I did in fact sleep when I feel that I didn't. 
I also used to drink a lot of coffee.  I gave it up one year for Lent and haven't drank it since.  Discovered that it doesn't agree with me.  It is possible.... 
 

Well, that was a weekend. I accomplished many annoying chores that I'd been putting off, including the plumbing repair which, as all plumbing repairs do, took approximately four times longer than anticipated and required two trips to the home improvement store. 
The result of all this productivity is that I absolutely did not want to cook. Since it was the weekend, all my batch cooking for the week was pretty much gone. Without technically being non-compliant, I definitely had some meals that were not ... ideal. Did I have one meal that was just bacon? Yes, yes I did. I also had way more fruit than was probably wise, because it was just so much easier to grab a banana than to stop and clean up and fix a meal. There is a Chipotle that I could have ordered from, but that gets expensive and also ... am I even allowed to say this? I don't really like Chipotle. (Gasp, shock, horror! No, but really, I've had a number of people react with shock to this. You HAVE to like Chipotle!) 
So a note to future self: when planning a super productive weekend of messy and tiring chores, make sure to have all meals planned, prepped, and ready to go - either with no cooking or prepped in a foil packet or something. 

@ShadowInTheKitchen Oh wow, this is SO encouraging - thank you so much for sharing. This gives me hope! 
I’m hoping to make the switch to decaf gradually as I get really strong withdrawal symptoms even on such a small amount. Fingers crossed!

Day 18, Saturday January 23, 2021
M1: sweet potato, prosciutto, egg
Snack: banana
M2: tomato-veg hamburger soup
Snack: nuts, raisins, blueberries
M3: potatoes, carrots, green beans, roast beef with arrowroot gravy
Sleep: 10:30 - 8:00 broken with 1 1/2 hours insomnia
Day 18, done.

Day 12, Sunday January 17, 2021
M1: l/o spaghetti squash; kale; onion; l/o south-west pork; egg; salsa
M2: l/o potatoes & onions fried in ghee, green beans, 1/4 bratwurst, walnuts and raisins
M3: veggie confetti cauli-rice with sauteed chicken strips
M1 was uninteresting except that I felt pleased to be using up healthy leftovers rather than throwing them out.  I took solace in knowing that my next meal was not far off and would taste better.  I'm wondering how I ever came to think that every meal must be a gastronomical feast fit for royalty.  
My stomach was feeling uneasy at lunch so I had a small lunch which happened to also not taste great.  Maybe I have a stomach bug but I hope its just my gut flora adapting to the elimination of short chain carbs and the huge increase in vegetables.  I'll have soup for supper if this continues through the day.
My energy level is still not great but I did spend a few hours this morning cleaning around and under the fridge and stove and it feels much better to me now.  This continues my kitchen cleaning streak this week.
NSV: I slept 8 hours without insomnia. Unfortunately I didn't wake up feeling very rested.  
NSV: I didn't snack between meals today, I didn't even feel drawn to snacking.
NSV: I haven't had any major food cravings since I began this Whole30.  
Pasta sauce for dinner tomorrow night is prepared and I made a 4-portion shepherd's pie for myself to eat over the next four days (nobody else in my house eats it willingly).  I also have a serving of soup thawing in the fridge so I can rest easily knowing tomorrow's meals are already prepared.  Dinner is the only meal that I cook for my husband and grown daughter, they sort their own breakfast and lunch.  This is the time in my W30's that I usually struggle with food boredom, so having a plan will help get me through this.  
 

Day 9, Thursday January 14, 2021
M1: pineapple & strawberries cup; sweet potato roasted in olive oil; kale; Mexican spiced pork bites; 1 xlg egg pan fried in ghee
M2: salad w/ 2 c. chopped romaine; 2 c. green grapes, avocado, chicken and walnuts, lemon juice & PK GG dressing
Snack: cashews and dates
Snack: walnuts and raisins
M3: l/o stamppot refried in ghee; green beans, roast beef
NSV: I woke up this morning feeling totally refreshed.  Slept 11:30 - 7:30 straight through, 8 hours of solid sleep.  This is just the beginning of improved sleep quality - yay! ...YAAAAY!
I took stock of my kitchen freezer again this morning and am feeling pleased with the change-over of foods this week, even if it was just a few things out (some f & v) and a few things in (hamburger soup).  The assorted shredded cheeses have been taken to the basement freezer because there is no sense in having them handy for at least the next three weeks while I finish this W30.
Today is the first day of a four week Provincially mandated "Stay At Home" order in what is the latest attempt to curb the rising cases of coVid.  Only essential outings are allowed, and visitors are not allowed into our homes.  I'm feeling hopeful that I can stick to this W30 especially now without the distractions that this order removes.
I continue to feel drawn to snack between meals.  I believe it's due to boredom, although sometimes I genuinely feel a bit hungry.  However, I will not allow myself to feel shame about this.  My snacks are healthy and that's a big win for me.  Losing the desire to snack will happen soon enough.  For now I'm keeping my focus on eating well.  
A snow storm is expected overnight Saturday to Sunday.  I need more fresh vegetables.  I know we can survive for a long time with all the food that is in this house, but too much of it is just not compliant.  I continue to struggle with meal planning and with buying too much food.  My anxiety ramps up when I think we'll run out of stuff.  When I go to the grocery store(s) tomorrow or Saturday morning, I will try my best to keep to the list.  This really is a challenge for me and I'm noting it here to try to get an understanding of this problem I have.