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[perrybucsdad]

I was given the ISWF book by a friend and I have been glued to it the past two days.  I'm about halfway though and excited to finish it so I can begin my journey.

 

I have a lot of health issues... some I was born with (congenital heart defects) and others I guess you could say I ate myself into.  My whole life, I was a little underweight until about 5 years ago when I became skinny fat and developed a gut.  I used to drink, but I had quit just before I started gaining weight (what's up with that).  But what has happened is I have high BP (10+ years), high cholesterol (10+ years), low testosterone (3+ years), type 2 diabetes (< 1 year), fatty liver (8+ years) and I want to get my health back.  

 

The type 2 diabetes scared the heck out of me, and helped me lose some weight, but I am still about 15 lbs of where I would really like to be.  I want to reverse this metabolic syndrome that I seem to have put myself into and I think this way of living will really help.

 

I will admit though, I am really scared on how I will do this.  My breakfast and lunch, is almost always the same, so I guess you can say I eat like a dog.  I sort of like that since it is easy to shop for, but trying to figure out what to make for breakfast so I can get out the door in the morning has me concerned.  I'm sure I will figure it out though... well, I'll have to if I want this to work.

 

Anyhow, the thing I am most worried about is not just the menu, but how I get people in my house to eat what I am eating.  Breakfast and lunch shouldn't be an issue, but the common meal, lunch will be hard.  That and the fact that my wife likes to eat out once or twice a week has me a little worried to.  The last thing I want to do is start this journey and then blow it because eating out places something into my meal that I shouldn't have and then I have to start all over again.

 

God bless all and I'm sure I will be talking with many of you.

 

John

[ShannonM816]

Welcome! 

 

There are lots of options for make-ahead breakfasts that you can eat cold or reheat in a microwave or toaster oven. This thread might be helpful, or Google Whole30 breakfast to go to find lots of discussions about it.

 

The easiest way to make sure you have options ready to go for all your meals is to do a big cookup on the weekend. Once you've got several protein, veggie, and fat options made up, you can combine them in different ways throughout the week. So much easier than trying to cook meals from scratch every day.

 

As far as getting other people to eat what you're eating -- you might find this article helpful, or here's a link to a bunch of past discussions in the forum that might be helpful for you. Generally, you aren't necessarily going to be able to convince your wife or anyone else in your household to follow the program if they don't want to. What you can do for shared meals is make Whole30 compliant foods that everyone will eat, perhaps adding non-Whole30 sides for the others. For instance, if you normally would have tacos, you can have a taco salad with meat and veggies and guacamole, and they can have theirs as tacos. Or if you roast a whole chicken and have some vegetables, they could have bread with theirs and you'd just skip it. If they must have a pizza night, you can either have leftovers, or make yourself a Meatza if you want to be able to join in.

 

For dining out, if you decide to try to, you'll probably want to research beforehand. You could call ahead of time at a non-busy time (not right at the lunch or dinner rush) and explain what you'd need and see what they recommend. Another option might be to pick out something special that you can make at home. I don't think I'm a particularly great cook, but it's gotten to the point that if I want to stay Whole30 compliant but have a nice meal, I'd much rather grill myself a nice steak, bake or roast a sweet potato, maybe grill some zucchini or other vegetable, and have a nice salad, rather than go to a restaurant where I feel like I have to special order stuff and never seem to get enough vegetables and always worry that they might have put something in it that they weren't supposed to -- but that's just me, I know some people do go out to eat and stay compliant, I just don't find it that satisfying anymore. I'd rather go out to eat when i'm not on a Whole30 and can relax a little instead of worrying that there might be butter or soy sauce in something.