Did you find yourself sweeter and kinder after Whole30 reintro?

[MeadowLily]

So what is this.  This thread and me.  Has it changed anything for me then?  

 

 

Ahhhh, heck-a-toot, yes.  I haven't had a full on blow-out food explosion bender in over 2 years. Nadda.

Not a single one.   I have not rebounded with a single pound.   I have not relapsed.  I'm vigilant and I am not showing off.  It ain't bragging if it's true. 

 

Yes.  There may be some nitwittery and snarkalicious fun but it's all been done out of much love. For you and me.   I stopped caring about myself.  I looked like a runover dog.  I reached out for help.  It saved me.  I'm still swinging by this thread.   Carry on.  Bye Felicias. 

 

[MeadowLily]

Bear had several encounters with bears on his trip.  I know that many want to take all kinds of foods into the backcountry,  compliant or not,  you're a walking picnic table.  We don't do it.  I often think it's beginner's luck if you do and never have a problem.  We're often gobsmacked by what we see and hear about others doing.  My ancestors go all of the way back. We know bears and I would never dream about taking any of it lightly.  It's kinda like the last run of the day on the ski hill when you're all worn out and femurs snap.  

 

You may do everything right but careless hikers/campers in your vicinity...be berry, berry bear aware. We know friends first-hand through the years who've been mauled.  It ain't pretty. Remember a Silvertip Grizzly can smell you from 18 miles away. Plastic containers mean nothing. They can rip right through a tin can. Taking chicken and eggs and all of the rest, a neon light. 

[Hutlifr]

He blew through the door like TNT.   I had the kitchen cleaned, the living room vacuumed and dusted.  I threw everything else into big plastic lawn bags and stuffed them in the closets.  Everything is on the bias. Anyone opens the door, it will all fall out on their head.  A girl's gotta deal.  

 

All of his gear is wet from the rain - so there are tents and fishing waders all over outside.  It's a mess. I showed him my handywork and every weed I've pulled by hand.  He's taking a long, hot shower because he's been taking baths in the creeks and rivers.   He's dropped it like it's hot, around 30 lbs.  I showed him my new snarkalicious muscles.  I'm dreading showing him all of the tiddlywinks I've run over and other mistakes.  

 

We'll load the photos UP shortly.  Then we're running over to the folkaronies.  I'm soooo tired I could lay back in the weeds.  That man drove over 3000 miles since Sat morning and it gives me a big pinch. He promised he wouldn't but he did.   Wisdom. Wisdom. Wisdom.

My favorite quote... Show me a person who never made a mistake and I show you a person who has not accomplished much.... So you may have messed up in some areas, but it's only because you were very entrepreneurial in your activities and had to fill in some big shoes!...

[Hutlifr]

I'm in food addiction relapse prevention and recovery.  Even those who've got your back cannot be with you 24 hours aday.   For the alcoholic, ice in a clear glass can be enough to cause a relapse. 

 

Big Kahuna trigger foods can be brought back to life by going through high stress. The grapes will be squeezed.   You have to find someone you trust when you sit down Face-to-Face.   You share the good, the bad, and the actual ugly.   You learn resilient coping skills. 

 

Repeated and chronic stress trigger the primal brain - our responses to stress and others. Quick to respond or snap at others, moody,  snarkalicious.....Houston,  time to step back and take a look at your own multi-crap once again.   Our reactions, outbursts,  words spoken in haste....cannot be taken back.   

 

If everything gives you a big pinch,  and your fave phrase is ...that really pizz's me off.... it's not about them,  it's you.  Our words and responses reveal alot about our Wholeness.   Neuroflexibility.  The ability to deal when the grape is squeezed. 

 

The Duck Stops Here.    The primitive area of the brain regulates our emotions.   I've got my eye on you, primitive paleo brain.  I'm on hyper alert not to fall back into bowls of pasta and bread and corn syrup. In the midnight hours,  when you're alone with your thoughts...who are you when no one else is watching.  

 

These are times when you absolutely have to care about yourself.  You stand alone.  A food log won't help you.  You may have all of your ducks in a row,  points and calories counted...they won't help you.   

 

You go down deep inside and pull on your spirit.  Your spirit reigns far and above the primitive paleo brain.  You cry and pray.  Everything looks brighter in the morning.  Mercies are renewed and you can face the day.   Intact.   Body.  Mind.  Spirit. 

I was labelled so many times the "champion of causes" and constantly putting others first was my biggest issue, and stressor. The brain reset experienced with my first extended whole30 made that possible. For the first time I experienced physically and emotionally how good it felt to do something for myself, to nurture myself, to love myself enough to just say "I would love to but I can't" without feeling the guilt that used to be associated with not doing something for others. I am still championing causes, instinctively I still feel like I have to do something, but the "urge" is no longer there, it's more like an itch, which when ignored, just goes away. I take mental notes of those instances where the itch is so big that I can't resist doing something about it.

The only itch I can't resist, at this point, is when I see how the older folks are treated at the home mom is in... Some of those folks never get any relative to visit, and some staff knows that, and even count with the fact that the patient will have forgotten the incident in a few hours... The patient will, but I won't... I document things in my diary, and when time will come to get the "audience" with the home's director, I will have him read my observations after letting him tell me about his vision and the mission statement of this "business" he is in.

[MeadowLily]

My favorite quote... Show me a person who never made a mistake and I show you a person who has not accomplished much.... So you may have messed up in some areas, but it's only because you were very entrepreneurial in your activities and had to fill in some big shoes!...

Hutlifr.  Bears says there are entrepreneurs and piles of manure and it takes wisdom to know the difference.   

[MeadowLily]

We're sisters from a different mister.  I can't stand to see the older folkaronies treated so poorly and kicked to the curb...especially by their families.  Honor your Paw and Maw.   Always and forever. Everything else is but a vapor.   Together is my favorite place to be. 

[MeadowLily]

Bear learned how to make smoked salmon jerky from the Japanese man.  He said it was the finest fish jerky he's ever had.  Exceptionally fantastic person and they shared all kinds of tips. He latched onto every trick of the trade.  He observed and absorbed how the successful fishermen were catching fish.  

Not only was he catching fish but he caught a brand new apple Iphone in the case out of the Kasilof River.

 

He snagged a brand new spyderco knife,  he was finding all kinds of treasures...hooks and sinkers by the handfuls. Someone left a pair of expensive chest waders on the shore.  People would hook their lines and leave it lay all over the shorelines, in the trails and bushes. Miles and miles of monofilament,  fishing gear pollution.   He wanted to help an old seagull with monofilament wrapped around it's leg.  It was limping but it tried to bite Bear.

Monofilament doesn't rot or breakdown.  It's plastic and it lasts for years out in the sun. Bear said the seagulls would be sitting on a high perch and the eagles would swoop in and knock 'em right off the perch and then they would sit there. The eagles were the bully boys. Leaders of the pack.  He said he watched them for hours and hours.  Big claws and big beaks.....as he says, nothing but can openers on the end of their head and so much fun to watch.

 

[MeadowLily]

He did hang with the native peoples.  The older folkaronies said..."We like you."  He helped  the older women drag in their fish. People from everywhere we're coming up and saying...."We know you.  We've met you."  But it wasn't so.   He's just that kind of person that people take a shine to and don't want to let go. 

 

He's big as a grizzly, strong as an ox with a southern genteel manner. He was sharing all of his food with his newfound fishing buddies before the fish started to run.  The hollaring and carrying on when the fish finally made their way up.  There were celebrating and estatic with happiness.  The simple pleasures of life are the best.   Who needs a frickity frick frick Iphone when you have fresh salmon. 

[MeadowLily]

The hardest part of the trip was seeing the native peoples in the big cities. It broke his heart. It breaks my heart and it makes me cry and sob.  I couldn't unsee that and I'm glad I wasn't there.  Paw is so glad to have him back.  He's grateful that he was able to go but we're relieved to have him home.  In one piece.

Thank you.  Thank you. 

[MeadowLily]

Today, we'll try and fix some of the things I've messed up.  

 

[MeadowLily]

Can you find smoked salmon without sugar.  Absolutely.  But you'll have to drive well over 12,000 miles and catch it yourself.   If you're up to the task,  it's there for the taking.  It won't be easy but it's doable.  It takes true grit to make a trip like this on your own.   He would travel for 100's of miles without seeing a single soul on the road. His truck was running on fumes when he would see a shed and two tanks with a credit card machine.  They have them placed just about right before you run out of gas.   Bear said those were the most comforting shacks he's ever seen.   An oasis in the desert.   A lifeline.  A hand-UP.   A most welcome sight.  We were out of contact most of the time..  Maw would sent text messages and she thought LOL meant Lots of Love.  She was writing LOL almost every day. He didn't get them until he came into contact with a tower and then his phone went cray cray....one message right after another.   LOL.  

 

Much love.  Bye Felicias. 

[MeadowLily]

http://picosong.com/kg4H/

[MeadowLily]

I've been coasting on my laurels.  It's irrigation day.  I took a breather but I think I'll keep on with outside chores.  Functional muscles are rather nice.  It was painful to build them.  Crawling around on my hands and knees and soreness for weeks on end.   I better get out there and jack myself UP.  Bear can rest while I earn my keep.   The Ant and the Grasshopper. 

 

[MeadowLily]

Multi-crap0meter status report:

 

Weeds are whacked.  Everything has been mowed down, including the small trees that were planted last spring.  I did THAT and a bunch of other things.        I'm keeping UP with the outdoor chores. 

 

One hour of solid chores = 10 hours at the gym on the dreadmill.  Two hours of chores = 50 hours of lollygagging around on the floor and flinging my arms and legs around.  16 solid hours of chores = an entire week at Fort Huachuca.  8 weeks of solid chores every single frickity frick frick day = Snarkalicious muscles and much improved brainwaves. 

 

Nitwittery abounds at Snark Central.  Snarktistics say that functional muscles are better than skinny fat.  The Snarkasaurus says that to be ensnarkened is to have a finely tuned SnarkOmeter. Snarkaeology is the study of the great snarks of the ancient past.  The dim past and how snarks were used against our dim ancestors who didn't think that nitwittery was worth much.  Look where that got them.   Be beary, beary aware of snark attacks.  We don't need any snarkaramas today.  Snarkaritis is a caused by the desire to post snarkisms instead of doing any actual work.   But I did work and now I'm giving myself a snarkling break.   I guess I will have to go to Snarkaholics Anony-Mouse for Snarkspeak.   Bye Snarklings and Felicias.  

[jmcbn]

One hour of solid chores = 10 hours at the gym on the dreadmill.  Two hours of chores = 50 hours of lollygagging around on the floor and flinging my arms and legs around.  16 solid hours of chores = an entire week at Fort Huachuca.  8 weeks of solid chores every single frickity frick frick day = Snarkalicious muscles and much improved brainwaves.

What? You mean you don't like Zumba?

[MeadowLily]

Snark extinguishers should only be used when someone sets their hair on fire.  Use your snarkination and cook with reckless abandon today.  Create something in your kitchen that would make HK/GR proud. Bear was fished out, so we had filet mignon with all of the fixin's last night.  It was divine and I feel great today.  We started out with the BAB,  having Bone Broth and a BAS for lunch.  We're running on jet fuel.

[MeadowLily]

What? You mean you don't like Zumba?

That was snarkissistic.  Lurve it.  You know darned well that I would have to be on snarkotics to go to a zumba class. 

[MeadowLily]

When this is all over....

 

When this is all over we will not regret what we did.  We will regret what we did not do.  We will look back and say we should have dreamed bigger.

 

When this is all over we'll be kicking ourselves for letting fear defeat us.  We'll give ourselves a big pinch for letting our own words confine us into a lesser life.  We will realize that as dark and tangled and actual ugly as the ego and super ego can be - we were able to do much more than we thought. 

 

When this is all over we will regret - more than anything else - that we did not stand up for our best life.

 

 

BUT it is not over.   

 

Be bold.   You can recover from food addictions and thrill and binge eating. 

 

Mind = lesser

Spirit = greater

Body = reaps all of the benefits from being integrated and Whole.

 

Our spirit doesn't speak to our heads.  Our spirit lives and speaks into our hearts and that rises UP into our brain and changes us.

[MeadowLily]

You have to hold onto the promise and fight for it.  There will always be resistance. 

 

The greater the struggle, the greater the reward and not in the form of food rewards.  Most of us challenge our brain with our circumstances, rather than using the spirit to challenge the circumstances.

 

Getting in touch with your spirit can be used as a tool against all of the expected resistance before entering the higher phase of your best life and your destiny.

 

Before I could start caring about myself,  I did this for a higher cause and spiritual reasons. Then I moved out of my hole of despair and onto the mountain of promise.   I was promised I could change my relationship with food so I took a leap of faith and actually believed it will all of my being.

 

The mind likes overthinking and overlearning.  It thrives on it.  The spirit - not so much.   The spirit would rather you quit blathering on and foaming at the mouth.  The spirit is where you'll find true discernment.

The spirit will give you continual preservation and protection against letting food addiction and binge eating destroy your life.

 

We are responsible to fight for what has been promised and shown that it is possible.  There will be personal battles for that  promise.

 

But it is not over.   You can recover and go on to your promised land.   That land may not have milk and honey but the trifecta of wholeness.  Proteins.  Vegetables.  Fats - good dietary fats.   

 

The quieter you become,  the more you can hear. 

[MeadowLily]

I threw all of my before 'selfies' in the garbage can,  along with every dieting book that was in my attic. I did not want them hanging around or rubbing off on me anymore.   Actually,  I just cut myself out of every before photo I could not stand which is all of them.   So I have alot of missing years but I still don't need the visuals.  I've carried those burdens, no photos required.

 

I'm focusing on the present and my future.  The past is gone for good.  The past made me who I am but I don't need to look at myself hiding behind trees or other people...always standing in the back.   Done. Fini.

 

I used to plaster my fridge with celebrity photos for motivation.  Within a day, they were all a blur and just a part of the fridge.  I could look right past them and not see a thing.  I don't do that anymore.  

 

All of the people I know who have an actual normal relationship with food don't take belly selfies.  No befores or afters.   No progress pics.   They simply live and enjoy the scenery.  

 

If you take progress pics has it changed everything for you then.   They certainly wouldn't have motivated me or fixed me.  They would have marshed my mellow and made me focus on my outward appearance which is temporary.  

[MeadowLily]

Give yourself permission to enter into a TIME and not just a season of your greatest transition ever.  So you might have saved the best for last.  Let the last part of your life be better than the first half. 

 

Provoke a dialogue with yourself and dare to turn around and look at all of what has brought you here in the first place.  Let the dialogue release you into a new encounter with your authentic self.  There will be refreshings of personal wisdom.

 

Some days will overwhelm you. The old former days of self-loathing will try to encompass you, too. Continue to make a stand for yourself.  Let your spirit help you rise above every situation and issue that tries to knock you back down.   

 

As you learn what all you've been given to succeed,  you will move into unprecedented levels of bravery.

Fear will take a backseat.  

 

Bye Felicias. 

[MeadowLily]

Fear.  I've always lived in grizzly country.  When I was a young child,  my siblings and I would run loose all day long until suppertime.  I have no idea if Maw was really paying that much attention to us.  I don't think so.  We would usually walk or ride our bikes down a long mile stretch of road into the piney woods.  There were grizzlies and black bears.  

 

Walking alone or with siblings was spooky.  Really, really spooky.  At the end of the long mile was a horse barn with the sweet smell of hay.   We knew if the horses weren't acting up that everything was fine.  But there were grizzlies hauled out of there all of the time.  

 

We were compelled to go down that long mile.  Towards the end we might be running for the barn as fast as our legs would carry us.  Then it was over another hill and down a road with traffic to get a mint chocolate chip ice cream cone.  We did that almost on a daily basis.   

 

We would spend hours talking to tourists and the old folkaronies traveling together by the whopping busloads.  Maw didn't seem to worry about us.  We always made it home for supper.  I'm so glad that no one snatched us back then.   I wouldn't be here to remember everything.  The good.  The bad.  And the actual ugly.   

 

To this day,  I linger long on thoughts of that sweet smelling hay and horses.  Horses smell sweet in the summer, too.  They were brave to stand there tied up to a hitching post.   It was comforting because all was well if they weren't in a state of fear.  

 

On the way back home,  we had to run the rest of the entire way after the barn... homeward bound.  I didn't like that part at all.   However, we were burning off those daily ice cream cones. 

 

What is this.  It's the Hitching Post.  

[MeadowLily]

The Tooth Fairy took my choppers.  Whilst under a great deal of stress,  I found myself grinding my teeth so  I bought 2 pairs of those teeth protectors.   I put one under my pillow last night and it's gone. No money and not even a lotto ticket was left behind.  I've searched high and low.  The dustbunnies must have ran off with it.  They UP and runnoft like Mrs. Hogwallop.  

 

Washington Hogwallop: Mrs. Hogwallop up and R-U-N-N-O-F-T.

Ulysses Everett McGill: She musta been lookin' for answers.

Washington Hogwallop: Possibly. Good riddance as far as I'm concerned. I do miss her cookin' though.

Delmar O'Donnell: This stew's awful good.

Washington Hogwallop: [examining his fork] You think so?... I'm afraid she's startin' to turn.

[MeadowLily]

Are you always hungry? Could be a sign of leptin resistance.  Carrying extra weight creates metabolic constant hunger that makes you even hungrier.   I had that in the beginning.   My shut-off valve was abby normal from years of thrill eating.  There were no signals telling me it that satiety had arrived.  That went on for months.  It wasn't a real hunger because it would happen after I just finished the BABrekkie.

 

Leptin Resistance left unchecked causes you to eat all of the time and makes you feel hungry when you are not.  It is a vexation to the spirit because it promotes more weight storage, chronic hunger and high triglycerides....which blocks the ability of leptin to pass to the brain where the appetite control center is located.  Without the smoke signals telling the brain you're full,  there's more thrill eating.  You have to know what this actually feels like...the drive to eat it all back.  

 

After periods of dieting and restriction,  that driver is relentless.  It is metabolic and you can eat all of your dieting efforts back in just a fraction of the time.  

 

Guess what the biggest offenders are that bring on leptin resistance.

 

Corn Syrup

Sugar

Upside down sugars - sweetners

 

All of these raise your triglycerides so leptin cannot reach the brain and the appetite control center. Overeating causes more leptin resistance which triggers endless cravings especially for more corn syrup and sugar.

 

I had this.  Corn syrup and sugars will  refill your cells with more metabolic sickness.  So if you find yourself being triggered by all candy - regardless of what it looks like, the number one ingredient is usually corn syrup.  If you keep up with this gerbil wheel activity,  you will end up with diabetes.

 

Fats.  STAT

 

Healthy fats are the antidote for metabolic sickness.  You are going to have to take full responsibility no matter what your metabolic system and genetics have dealt you.   You cannot blame it on the strong sugar dragon and gila monsters.   You have to deal. 

 

Hold onto the promise and fight for it.  Fight for your best life.  

 

Do not bring the offenders home.  Don't put them in your car.  Don't tell them where you are.   That's the way you do it.  Stay away from the offenders.   They'll get you nowhere good. 

[MeadowLily]

I work with someone,  Face-to-Face and I practice Urge Surfing.   It works.  

 

I cannot control the waves but I can surf.  The Bear wanted ice cream.  He drove into town and bought 6 half gallons of the stuff for the deep freezer.  I get it.   He's dropped 30 lbs like it was hot and his cells are screaming for him to eat it all back.   

 

Weight loss doesn't mean anything if you can't maintain it.  Nothing.  I don't care how many years you've been dieting,  if you can't find weight stability and stick that landing,  what good is it.  It's not worth two hoots.  

 

Eating it all back after dropping it like it's hot in 30 days.  Don't go there.  You will end up with more metabolically sick cells.  If you cannot get out of this endless loop and you've been doing it for more than a few years,  find someone who can help you.   I have that someone.  He started out in the military but has went onto to be the leader of the pack of a well-known addiction center/hospital.   I've been working with him for over 2 years.  No GPS coordinates.

 

Last night, when 6 half gallons of ice cream triggers/offenders came into the house,  I had to surf.  I was surfing for a few hours.  But today,  after my evening of surfing....it's soooo worth it.   

 

I don't budget the weekends for corn syrup and sugars.   I don't treat myself with food rewards.  Been there.  Done that.   Food addiction is a chronic disease of food rewards. 

 

I went through my Pain List.  The pain keeps me sane.   The pain of living with a constant food addiction, eating it all back with a relentless metabolic drive to do so is the worst feeling in the world. You have to know what this actually feels like or you may not understand how strong the body's cells can be.

 

They won't shut the hail up.  Chronic, driving, intense hunger after just eating an enormous meal.  When you feed those cells exactly what they want to get the most bang for their buck....corn syrups and sugars,  they're happy for like a micro-second.  It doesn't last long. There is no comfort.  None.

 

You're in this endless loop of nightmares.  So I'm surfing.  It is so much easier when the offenders are not coming into your home.  But you can do it.   It takes true grit.  I practice Urge Surfing.  

 

Eating a bite here and there of playfoods with corn syrups and sugars....not for me.   I can live without playfoods.  I tried to live with them and they were destroying my metabolic system and ruined my relationship with food.  We had to break up for good.  

 

I think of playfoods like creepy old blasts from the past.  Those sneaky snakes. Wily coyotes.  Lily-livered, yellow-bellied,  sapsuckers.  They sux.  Food rewards suxed the life right out of me.  I'm not going back. I've come too far and my past was miserable.

 

I can't play with playfoods.  Take a micro bite here and there.  I've never had to be told to eat, never had anorexia.  Never purged.  Throwing up is something I won't do even if I'm sicker than a runover dog.

I won't do it.  

 

A constant eating problem of Big Kahuna trigger foods that sent me into metabolic sickness and diabetes is different from a non-eating and over-restriction issue.  A relentless drive to fill metabolically sick cells with corn syrup and sugar.  Returning to the scene of the crime with all of the usual offenders....I'm going to be surfing from here on out.   

 

It's alright.  I'm UP for the job.  Find your true grit.