Starting on March 2 or 3, 2014

[PatrickDickey]

I had originally set my start date to March 1, but wasn't ready to go. Since I work third shift, my "days and nights" are a bit messed up. So I'm going to try and start on March 2, but will definitely start on March 3. For me, it's a matter of prepping some meals, and getting the Day 0 things out of the way first (measurements, weight, pictures, pantry cleaning, etc).

 

I can tell you that the hardest part for me will be these things:

 

Prepping meals in advance.

Flipping my eating schedule to reflect my work/sleep/life.

Eating vegetables (I typically just cook a meat dish, and call it good. Then I wonder why I'm stopping for donuts in the morning).

NOT stopping for my daily donuts and hot chocolate/Cappuccino. 

 

Also for me one other hard thing will be to find compliant foods. Even the coconut milk that I chose has sulfites in it. And the "Chicken broth" has non-compliant things in it. I did make some bone broth tonight (I'll see how that turns out in the morning). And even the organic things all have "sugar" in them, or so it seems. I don't have a Whole Foods or anything like that nearby. The closest that I have is a Vitamin Shoppe about 30 miles away. The closest Whole Foods is 130 miles away. I'm going to look into local butchers, but otherwise it's "Hy-Vee" (like Krogers) or Walmart.

 

I haven't decided if I'll go from 7 p.m. to 10 a.m. (my "day") or midnight to midnight, for the daily emails. I guess I should find out if it matters when I click the link for whether or not I did good.

 

Have a great day, and thanks for listening to my long, boring book.

Patrick.

 

 

[Tina R]

Welcome! Check out Nom Nom Paleo she works the night shift and has some great recommendations for surviving in that lifestyle. http://nomnompaleo.com/post/55156756199/surviving-the-night-shift.   She also has some awesome recipes. You may want to use a crockpot, if you don't have one you may want to get one. You can toss stuff in it and let it cook for 8 hours and it will be ready when you get home. You can even make bone broth in it. The Clothes Make The Girl blog has some advise on doing a weekly cookup so that you have food ready to toss together quick meals, this may work for you too. You should be able to find canned coconut milk, coconut and guar gum. This is compliant for your whole30. You can also order stuff online if you can't find it locally. Check out the whole30 facebook page for more ideas. 

[PatrickDickey]

Thanks for the reply Tina. I started out, and found out that the bacon I purchased had sugar in it (after eating about five pieces). And last night, I thought I could get away with buying some coconut water, which I found out was basically a fruit juice with coconut. So, I'm starting over tomorrow (Friday). I've got a crock pot and a pressure cooker. Now it's mainly going to be finding different veggies that I can eat with my meals (salads with olive oil/balsamic vinegar is getting wayyyy old).

 

I'm reading Nom Nom Paleo's Night shift article right now. The main differences between her schedule and mine is, I'm on a steady Sunday night through Thursday Night/Friday night shift. Basically, if you take a normal schedule (get up around 7 a.m., go to work at 9 a.m. get home at 5 p.m. and go to bed around 9 or 10 p.m.), and flip it around, that's my schedule. I always joke that I have reverse bankers hours, as it's easier to explain my schedule then. The other difference is that unless I HAVE to, I keep to my schedule regardless of whether I work or not. Next week is going to be the exception, because I also teach at my local community college, and I'm off work for three nights. So, I'll become a "day person" on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, and stay up until Thursday morning. Then, I'll die for a while, and be ready to go again. After that, I'll stay on my schedule until Easter (if I go spend it with family) or sometime in July (when I go visit family).

 

My main issue as far as the whole30 goes is that I get today's email before I've "finished" yesterday. So, I need to see about changing my time zone (or at least the time that they send the emails out). It's not really an issue, but it aggravates my OCD.

 

I'm going to order a bunch of food from U.S. Wellness Meats, so that should help with the non-compliant things. I just have to wait for the "out of stock" items to come in. Hopefully when I wake up today. I can say this, I won't be ordering there too many times (just because of the high costs). But, if it gets me over the humps so to speak, then the cost is worth it once in a while.

 

Thanks again for reading the book. lol Have a great day.
Patrick.

[PatrickDickey]

Well it seems like I'm a day behind on everything. I just finished Day 3 (and am writing this during Day 4). Today, I felt tired and lethargic. Yesterday, not so much. As far as the cravings, I had some, but I attributed them to not eating a very good lunch. I was at "work", so I didn't get a chance to eat. I ended up eating some hard-boiled eggs with tea to drink. They didn't have salads, or I would have added one to the mix.

 

A couple of days ago, I tried to make the nom-nom Paleo version of mayonnaise. It didn't turn out at all, mainly because I used a blender and mis-read the instructions. I threw all of the oil in at once. Today, I made the version on Melissa's site, and it turned out beautifully. Although I haven't eaten any yet (other than a little bit off of the bowl). Tonight, I had heart for dinner, with some onions and carrots. So assuming I don't eat anything I shouldn't before bedtime, I'll be able to call this a success also. 

 

Have a great day.
Patrick.