Did you find yourself sweeter and kinder after Whole30 reintro?

[MeadowLily]

Take the dieting Bully By the Horns and shake the stuffin' out of him.   He really does have horns, olde dieting bully.   

 

In ye olden days....it was Whole 30 all the way.   Dieting Bully.   He sneaks in, olde sneaky snake.  You know what you have to do with that one.  Show him the door.  Bye Felicia.  

 

Dieting Bully will tell you he's got your back (side).   He doesn't.  He doesn't care two hoots about you or where you'll end up down the road.

 

Many have tried to jump on his bandwagon but he bucks.  If you want to turn your UP and down, down, down cycles on their head...you can't crawl into that wagon.  I have strong reactions to dieting now.

 

I am not reformed dieter.  I am an informed eater.  

 

Look back at what you did in the beginning of your life.  Were you dieting?  No,  you were not.  

Dieting primes the insulin deranged metabolism pump.  Deranged out of whack glucose carbohydrate metabolism.

 

Dieting and hyperparathyroidism and hypertriglyceridemia and glycogenoses.  Don't start none - won't be none.   No more dieting.    

[MeadowLily]

A Whole 30 is only 30 days.   Thirty compliant days is required to conduct a proper reintro phase. It is a Food Reset.

 

Creating your own positive food mangement plan doesn't have to be by the book, rules or recommendations.  You can go back to winging it and flying by the seat of your pants.  The sky is not the limit.  You can bounce off the walls and return to the scene of all  former foods that you used to enjoy. Mellow marshers or tiddly winks.   Drive-thrus and snackity everything. There's that.

 

Or you can incorporate the trifecta of the Whole 30 into your plan.  Proteins, Vege and Good Fats.  I did that.   It is the backbone and mainstay of my positive food management plan.

 

I'm naturally a winger so I still have to think things through.  I have to weigh the consequences of my decisions against the backdrop of what I used to do.  It does not come naturally for me. I am not on automatic pilot.  

 

I still like to slide around the corners on two wheels...on a wing and a prayer. Can you really pluck out the the old brain grooves that are so deeply trodden with the wagon wheels that you drove through them for years.   Genetics is a cattle drover.   Dieting is the harshest of taskmasters.

 

Dieting ruins your relationship with food.   It may take months and years to unwind that damage.  I know it takes at least a month for every year of dieting.  One for one and maybe more. 

 

Dieting.  Trying to diet with Whole 30 and pretending you're not is doubleminded.  If you do that, that's where you'll find constant restarting and not finishing out your 30 compliant days.

 

You have to WANT it with everything within your being.  More than you want to turn it into another diet and then bounce back to former faves on Day 31.  That happens.  Hopefully, they come back and try it again.  

 

The easiest way is to go Cold Turkey.   You can't edge up on a Whole 30 or try to sneak in through the backdoor.  Easing into it slowly,  giving up a little of this or that.   Nah.  That doesn't work. So Flip The Switch.   Wingers need to flip the switch.   Right Now.

 

You're just too good to be true,  can't take my eyes off of you.  If it's quite alright, I can't wing it anymore.  I have to stop and think.  I still have to wait it out for 5-15 minutes when trickery triggery tries to take me back.   

 

There is no such thing as the Finish Line.  What brought you here may be outside waiting for you in the getaway car.  Winger wants you to push the pedal to the metal and fly around the corners on two wheels.

It wasn't safe then and it's not safe now.   There are road signs all along the way.  We have to pay heed and attention.

 

Stop, look and listen.  They're trying to tell us something.  Falling rocks up ahead.  Drive-thru mellow marshers are blinking like a bright beacon in the night.   Don't stare.  You don't want to burn the retinas out of your eyeballs.  You need to see yourself waaay beyond,  10 years down the road.

 

Good Days start here.  With the trifecta.  It's the backbone of my Happy Awareness.  

[MeadowLily]

Winger felt like a rag doll.   I'd change her sad rags into glad rags if I could. She was such a rag doll.   Though I kinda liked her, I had to let her know that she was a rag doll.   Her clothes were hand-me-downs and others laughed when she came into town.  Rag doll was always hiding.   I can't let her down.  Rag Doll.

 

I've changed her sad rags into glad rags. 

[Hutlifr]

Glad you found a good food management plan. It took me a while to find the right balance, which would not slow down my digestion that became so great, or not cause me to lose weight. I am more relaxed about non compliant items that sneak in such as peas or corn, and I use butter now when I run out of ghee, the first time in 2 years. The biggest indulgence is cream, extra heavy and thick cream, so it holds a spoon up, and of course my cheeses... But not even once a month. Just when the occasion presents itself. I ant believe I learned to live without my daily consumption of cheeses...

[MeadowLily]

We have a big Sunday Dinner every week.  Today, it is Filet Mignon wrapped in bacon from our local rancher. Baked potatoes, salad, cooked greens and homemade soup.  Yes, we use KerryGold butter without any problems.  We will have some full fat sour cream with those potatoes.  I hear you with the extra heavy cream.  We use that in some our soups/cooking. 

 

I'll always remember what you told us about the aged cheeses.  I can shave those on top of dishes.  We make up a batch of Bone Broth...bones roasted for at least 4 hours before simmering on stove for about 24-36 hours.  My husband renders/cans his own kidney fat for cooking.    He knows how to hunt, fish and process/butcher domestic or wildgame, anything really. We have a local rancher for top quality beef. 

 

Bear grinds his own grain/flour for his biscuits and bread.  He even makes ciabatta and sourdough.  He works hard all of the time and can eat anything he wants.  Never been on a diet.  His muscles are from lifting heavy things since he was a young kid on a dairy farm.

[Hutlifr]

I wish I could just come on over one of these Sunday's! How I miss his masterful prepared meals! Him just whipping up "nothing special" as he used to say, and I was like in awe!...

Also discovered that any cheese prepared with raw milk will not harm my tummy... But those are banned in the USA, unless you make them yourself. There are enough natural bacteria in those cheeses to help me digest it without problems. So I always look for cheeses "au lait cru"... My burgundy family told me to try them, insisting even. Glad I trusted them...

[MeadowLily]

Ahhh, another good tip.  Max was a natural and it was a work of art.  To watch someone in fluid motion, it's a complete blur.  Bear took me out to a work site and I watched him do what he does, it was the same thing.

 

I was mesmerized by the smooth and seamless motion.  Artistic.  It doesn't matter if it's carpentry, water treatment plant, railroad, ranching, farming, high voltage power grid or a master chef,  it's art, Hutlifr.   Hard work is art and it has value above rubies. 

[MeadowLily]

Here are some of the things I've learned while traveling around Europe.   Mindful eating with all five senses.  This is easier to do when you're eating French food. 

 

Eat with the seasons.

 

It's a sad state of affairs that in spite of all the messaging, the rates of obesity and diabetes are sky rocketing every year over here.   Diets are a dime a dozen and they work only short tem.  They promise fast weight loss but the rebound is twice as fast. 

 

Europeans respect their body and they know they only have one.  They walk, walk, walk everywhere and hike like you do in the Swiss Alps.   They savor their food and good company.   They eat plenty of fresh vege and berries.  They are merry.

 

They eat a great deal of variety and they do not bring the trigger foods home.  They don't stock it and it really is that simple.  The markets are much smaller and you can't buy large economy bags of shelled nuts.  

 

Europeans do not use food for a pacifier.   They have family meal rituals that they practice. When you're surrounded by loved ones and friends, you're not going to take super-sized servings and not leave any for the last person.  Everything is downsized. They use manners and discretion.  There's that. 

 

They have great espresso and it takes away the early morning depresso.  They don't eat 1/2 pound of bacon in one setting.  Sweets?  Nah.  Those are merely an afterthought. They eat fruits for a condiment and nuts as a decoration.  

 

Your people, Hutlifr,  eat actual meals.  Every minute of life is worth it and they're going to savor it like a fine wine.  The only sad thing is that our fast food joints have made it over there. 

 

I don't care for tripe but I tried it.  Escargot.  It's the thought that counts.   A nice starter dish.  I started in Ireland and flew home from Spain.   Good company, good food and no super-sized anything. It's a good recipe. 

 

Keep giving us hints and tips.  It stirs up those wonderful memories. 

 

[MeadowLily]

Europeans eat without guilt and deprivation thoughts about everything. They are not all or nothing.  They can and will eat portions of foods they enjoy.  Not every day or all of the time.  On a whimsy, they may wing it.

 

There are no tables or charts.  No calorie counting or measuring or weighing.  There is a way without weigh or whey.  No drinking of smoothies but eating actual meals with real foods.  You don't see the food obsessions, secret eating in cars and parking lots.

 

They are level headed and have reasonable thoughts about nutrition.  They eat well and slowly.  It's about their state of mind.  Really.

 

It's not just one country but all of them that I visited.  Ireland, Wales, Scotland through Italy, France, Spain.  They practice reasonable eating with rituals. 

 

Europeans think about good things to eat and Americans think about highly engineered to be craved foods to eat.   That is La difference.

 

And why 0 why....because of constant dieting and ruining their relationship with food.  

[MeadowLily]

This is what I have incorporated into my positive food management plan.   Think like a European and think about good things to eat.  

 

After two years,  I think about the good things more than the highly refined and engineered to be craved items in the center aisles of every grocery store.   I head for the perimeters and stay in my own lane.  It doesn't come as naturally for me as it does for them because they grew up that way.  It's in their genes.

 

But over-rationalizations and excuses are out.  Life happens to every single one of us and is no excuse to shove our feelings and emotions down with food.   Everyone of us has stress and eating all of the things will not make it better.  It only last for about five minutes and then you're left with Groundhog Day.

 

Europeans have hardships.  Loads of them.  Babies,  heartaches, heartbreaks, financial worries. And yet, they keep on with their rituals and love of family and friends.  It holds them together.

 

Reintroduction Phase.  Very important.  It buys you some time to create your own plan.  If you go back to what you've always done...you will get what you've always gotten.

 

The secret of eating is to think about the real whole foods, realizing that there are elements in those foods that have not been analyzed in a lab yet.  They're not full of chemical compounds, upside down sugars, round-up ready  GMO's.   Go with those and the longer you goooooo waaaay into your future, the less you'll be constantly thinking and dreaming about the engineered foods.

 

No more excuses or over-rationalizations about why you need to pacify emotions with foods that don't even exist in nature.  No more secret dieting or secret eating.  See yourself 10 years down the road. 

[MeadowLily]

Europeans think about good things to eat and Americans think about highly engineered to be craved foods to eat.   That is La difference.

 

You can get a Head Reset with your Food Reset. 

[MeadowLily]

I flipped the switch.  It is now a mystery to me why Americans are scared of a carrot or sweet potato or one piece of fruit but have no problem returning to the highly engineered to be craved foods. 

 

Upon impact after a brutal diet of over-restriction...go immediately back to multi-crap. Then more up and down cycles of dieting and longing for the multi-crap.  Over and over and remain scared of real foods created in nature.   

 

I had to throw all of that out. 

 

I don't stock my house with multi-crap.   I don't bring it home.  Don't start none and won't be none.

 

I can go out with family and friends and enjoy a meal.   I think about the Europeans.  No super-sized portions and gallons of soda pop.   I can enjoy it and leave it right there.  Walk out the door without dragging the tablecloth behind me with all of the bread baskets to stock my house. 

 

I don't ruin their experience by going on and on about some diet (like I used to).   I do think about consequences now.  I wish I'd never started dieting in the first place.  It is absolutely the worst thing you can do for your relationship with food.

 

Rebound weight gain comes with dieting.  If you're rebounding, you're dieting.  No over-rationalizations or excuses.  Admit the truth to yourself and stop it today.   Find your way without weigh and whey.

[Hutlifr]

When I look at reviews in Yelp, or any other online restaurant reviews, I can always tell which ones are written from Americans. All of them have an issue with the portions. You eat so much less here, when I go out in the Ststes I go for appetizers now,p. I can't eat the rest, or o share a plate with somebody. Unless of course it's my prime rib with a baked potato... No sharing there!

[MeadowLily]

When I look at reviews in Yelp, or any other online restaurant reviews, I can always tell which ones are written from Americans. All of them have an issue with the portions. You eat so much less here, when I go out in the Ststes I go for appetizers now,p. I can't eat the rest, or o share a plate with somebody. Unless of course it's my prime rib with a baked potato... No sharing there!

You are correct, friend.    Gallons of soda pop and super-sized portions of french fries. Endless french fries now and a couple of gut bombs to go. 

[MeadowLily]

Eating highly engineered to be craved foods doesn't relieve hunger - it creates it.  These foods are not germane to survival.

 

Get yourself free.  Next time you're faced with the options of a piece of real fruit, carrot, sweet potato, steak or real beef jerky vs. an entire pan of brownies .....be glad you're free of that food. 

[MeadowLily]

http://whole30.com/2015/06/dear-melissa-fruit/

 

Fruit is part of my positive food management plan.  It's been that way for 2 years.  I don't eat dried fruits but I did not eliminate fruit at the end of a meal.  Reasonable servings,  1 aday and sometimes 2.

 

I did stick with the berries because of the higher complex fiber content and lower fruit sugars. They have flavor and are more tangy than sweet.  The best way to get phytochemicals is to eat them.  They have friendly bacterias and they helped me to restore the balance I needed.

 

I will opt for berries over any refined baked goods or pastries.   When we eliminate all of our favorite foods it causes more food obsessions.  Complex fruit fibers with vege fibers have helped me find weight stability two years later.

 

I don't snack.  I didn't stock my house with nut butters or dried fruits.  

 

Eating real fruit berries is a strategy that has worked for me.  I don't feel deprived when everyone else is going for a commercial dessert.   Those prime the pump - insulin cue hunger hormones.  I don't zero carb it and I never will.  

 

I ran into a nurse who was starting all over again after a year of zero carbing it.  She rebounded with every single pound.  100 lbs.   If you've never been a thrill eater and are not familiar with the UP and down cycles of binge eating that may sound foreign.  But if you've been there and I have, you know exactly how easy it can happen.

 

The only way I've made it here was by not creating more food obsessions through over-restriction. Those old dieting cycles come with rebound and I had to make a stand.   Draw my line in the sand.  No excuses and over-rationalizations about everything.   

 

This is not hard.   I've read ISWF.   

 

I'm not eliminating fruit.  It's the strategy that helped make weight stability mentally possible.  I think about the good whole foods I can eat.   I am happy to be free of the foods that brought T2 to my door.

 

I'm not answering it when sneaky snake comes to pay me a call.  I have my arsenal now.  Each insulin excursion I took with sneaky snake was a hammer that delivered blow after blow to my cells and pancreas.

 

You can't fight with him in the conventional way.  You have to strategize and think about the consequences of taking another insulin excursion.   I am not afraid of fruit.  Fruit is not my enemy.   Highly engineered to be craved foods don't relieve hunger.  They create it.

 

If you're going 30 days without 2 reasonable fruit servings aday but immediately go back to refined foods on Day 31...at the risk of not coming back....follow  the template.

 

Allow yourself  a real fruit at the end of the meal.  See if that doesn't help with not creating more food obsessions that come to fruition on Day 31 and beyond.
 

[MeadowLily]

[MeadowLily]

Shoving all of your emotions and feelings down with food.  My turning point came when I sat down with someone face-to-face. 

 

Forgiveness is a huge part of recovery.  Choosing to forgive.  Setting your will to forgive.

 

When  struggling with a food addiction or thrill eating... I choose to forgive.  I set my will to forgive.  It does get easier as the months roll by.

 

Deep in the struggle you may curse it, rehearse it, nurse it and disberse it.  You may try to reverse it.

All of the above at the same time.

 

Give me the first 7 years and you can have the rest.  The first 7 years are the most important, the formative years.   The wheels are set in motion and those brain grooves are already there.

 

I was visiting with my dentist.  We were laughing about childhood.  Do you remember brushing your teeth after a thrill eating candy spree.  He said hardly any of us grew up brushing after every piece of candy or sugar sugar bender.  Heads were already being filled with dental cavities, his included. 

 

I was always running over to the candy store from Grandmaw's house.  She was relieved to get us out of her hair.  Soda pops and candy bars. There was no teeth brushing.  Tanked up on sugar in my formative years.  All weekend long.  

 

Has anything changed.  Kids are still tanked and jacked up on sugar sugars in their formative years.   That's SAD sad.   I wish I knew then what I know now.  

 

Give me those 7 years back.  I would change everything. 

 

If you're still budgeting your weekends for thrill eating and food benders, nothing has changed.  It's a throwback to those 7 years.

 

Sugar = Approval and Cheering and Love

 

My first 7 years.   I can't curse them or rehearse them or nurse them but I set my will and choose to disberse them.   I can't reverse them.    I remember all of those candy store excursions.  Maw, why did you let me do that.  That's what I have to work with.  

 

Whole 30 helped me set some much needed boundaries and take complete responsibility. The consequences are all mine.  You can't blame your Maw or your children or your job or your relatives.  We all have those.  

 

When you take complete responsibility without making excuses and over-rationalizations about everything...you're on the first part of the journey on the road to recovery.  

[MeadowLily]

Was your first Whole 30 your favorite one.  They're all different.  

 

You learn different things how food reacts with your body, brain and culture.   Culture is just another fancy word for your Maw's cooking. 

 

Did you create your own positive food management plan.  Has it changed everything for you. Mine keeps evolving as I learn new things.   

 

Did you construct your own rules and recommendations after 30 days.  I did.  But I remember tooling along all of the backroads of the forum.  Reading manifestos and comments from the creators.  These are the things that stick with me and mean the most. 

 

I want to remember that refined carbs = sugar sugars.   They are, too.   Not a lick of difference.   A blob of white flour mixed with white sugar and a dollop of some fat is the trifecta of every baked good or bread.   They prime the insulin pump and not in a good way.  

 

I'm keeping all of those things in, along with the 2 Brazil nuts for a can of fish.   You can take the girl out of Whole 30 but you can't take away the tenets that have replaced my culture.  Maw's cooking.

[MeadowLily]

I have went through the door.  I'm no longer going down the rabbit hole but I would miss my friends.   I tell them things I would never dream of telling anyone else.   Maw's cooking is excellent but I wish she would've paved the way for me.  I'll always be the kid.  

 

The Good teacher will lead the horse to water.  The Excellent teacher makes the horse thirsty first.

 

I'm a Horse With No Name. 

 

On the first part of the journey

I was looking at all the life
There were plants and birds and rocks and things
There was sand and hills and rings
The first thing I met was a fly with a buzz
And the sky with no clouds
The heat was hot and the ground was dry
But the air was full of sound

I've been through the desert on a horse with no name
It felt good to be out of the rain....

La la   la la la la

You know the tune. 

[MeadowLily]

A long long time ago
I can still remember how
That music used to make me smile
And I knew if I had my chance
That I could make those people dance
And maybe they'd be happy for a while

But February made me shiver
With every paper I'd deliver
Bad news on the doorstep
I couldn't take one more step

I can't remember if I cried
When I read about his widowed bride
Something touched me deep inside
The day the music died
So

Bye, bye Miss American Pie
Drove my Chevy to the levee but the levee was dry
And them good ole boys were drinking whiskey and rye
Singin' this'll be the day that I die
This'll be the day that I die

Did you write the book of love
And do you have faith in God above
If the Bible tells you so?
Do you believe in rock and roll?

[MeadowLily]

Bye, Bye Miss American Pie

 

I was going to leave today and walk out the door.  I threw myself across the bed and cried. I was crying for myself because I would miss myself.        

 

Big tears for everyone here.  My buds and friends.  I don't think I'm leaving today after all.         

 

See you tomorrow.  Bye, Bye Felicias

[MeadowLily]

[MeadowLily]

I told Bear I sang my Swan Song performance  ....through tears and loud sobbing.   

 

He said,  Oooo, brother. 

 

I said,   Then I retracted it.    

 

He said,  I knew you would.    

[MeadowLily]

I'm happy.  I no longer have any dieting advice for anyone.

 

Find a personal trainer for the mind.   We have no problems seeking out personal trainers for bodies but a personal trainer for the mind is often the last resort.  It should be the first.

 

Sit down face to face with a personal trainer for the mind....to find your way without without weigh and whey.  A counselor.  Skilled with food addictions and food disorders.

 

A personal trainer.  Brain Training.  

 

One size does not fit all.  A personal trainer for the mind can help you find a normal relationship with food that is going to be your normal.   My normal is not going to look like somone with AIP/FODMAP or other health conditions. 

 

W30 is not a fad diet.   If you use it like one and you've been dieting all of the days of your life and rebounding....rebounding,  find a personal trainer for the mind.

 

People may put their hands up and diet harder and faster thinking they can run but the truth will find you out.  Another diet  you return to with more measuring, counting steps, calories, macros, micros, mackerels won't fix it. 

 

I watched another interview with the Weight Loss Winner of a weight competition.  Every pound had found its way home within a year's time.   All that had been removed with rapid fire weight loss came right back home to roost.

 

When you put your body through starvation mode diets,  year after year....your body will outsmart you. It's already 10 steps ahead of your next dieting plan.   It is going to create alternative fat metabolism pathways and see to it that it outwits all of your dieting and starvation mode diets.

 

When the body has had enough,  it will lay down in the trail and not budge another pound or another inch. 

Enough is  enough.   No more dieting for me.

 

The contestant said they were embarrassed.  I thought why.   Why should they be.  They were given a challenge of rapid fire weight loss diet and they succeeded.   Winner of weight loss and 'loser' with rebound.  

 

It's going to take a personal trainer of the brain to help you edge away from all dieting.   It's your chance at Shawshanking it and getting yourself free. 

 

W30 is reasonable restriction but not over-restriction.  It's not a diet.   30 days.  Food Reset.  Create your own positive food management plan.   Find a personal brain trainer if you don't know how to remove yourself from dieting for the rest of your life.

 

There is no shame or embarrassment attached to seeking help.  In real life, if you suggest it to someone you may see them shrug their shoulders or join another dieting organization just as fast as they can.

 

I know I have to sign up for ww now or some cray cray food delivery service.   No.   You don't.  Have you looked at the ingredients in that food that springs back to life when water is added.  Like pop rocks or freeze dried sea monkeys for your fish bowl.

 

I've ordered it before.   I'm storing it for the apocalypse down in a gopher hole.  Frozen boxed diet dinners.  They don't relieve hunger, they create it.  You can eat 4 or 5 of them in one sitting and still be hungry.  Have you noticed that they're every bit the beacon like a box of donuts.  Most of the dinner is made of refined carbs that turn into sugars in the bloodstream.

 

A Whole 30 requires some cooking.   It's good because you're going to have to keep cooking way into your future.   There is no such thing as the Finish Line with cooking or dishes or laundry.

 

If you've had a rebound and it's only one of many in your lifetime,  find a personal trainer for the brain.

Don't kid yourself.   You need someone who can help you snap out of it.   Dieting. 

 

It's not embarrassing or shameful to ask for help.  We've been taught that.... along with 'dieting'. Look at where that has found us.    If you have personal chef and you're still dieting and rebounding for years and years,  time to find a personal trainer for the brain.   

 

It starts in the brain and travels down to every cell in your pancreas.  The pancreas is the most valuable piece of equipment you have.  It's really hard to live without one.  Treat it right.   You can't keep abusing it with dieting.  It will give out and give up with every diet you keep forcing upon it.

 

Did you know that constant cycles of thrill eating is the handwriting on the wall for diabetes down the road.   The pancreas has a lifespan.   Protect it.   Get yourself free.