Day 16 depressed

[ShellyW]

This is my second Whole 30 and while I know it won't be the same experience as my first I'm getting depressed due to the lack of results I am feeling.

 

I did my first Whole 30 to lose weight and I did lose a little weight (and a lot of fat).  After 30 days I was in my skinny jeans.  However, the biggest victory was sleeping through the night and waking energetic for the first time since elementary school.  I also became regular, no more alternating back and forth between constipation and diarrhea.  My hereditary tremors were also far less noticeable which is nice because I get tired of the questions and stares I get.

 

So far the only improvement in those conditions has been with the tremors.  I'm sure that has a lot to do with maintaining even blood sugar throughout the day.  I am still waking every 2-3 hours and struggling to fall back asleep.  It takes me 8 hours in bed to get 5-6 hours of sleep on a good night.  Some nights I get less.  The biggest problem is waking to use the bathroom at least once, sometimes twice.  Once I'm awake I can't get back to sleep.  As far as the regularity issue I have no idea.  I am eating the same quantity, quality and variety of food I did on my first Whole 30.  These problems were gone by days 7-10 the first time around.

 

 

 

 

 

[Tom Denham]

Maybe you started your second Whole30 sicker than when you started your first. How long since your first Whole30? Any developments since then in you life, health, circumstances, stress, location, etc.?

 

Did you do reintroductions after your first Whole30? What did you learn? 

 

You say you are eating the same during both Whole30s, but you will have to report in detail what you are eating for the past few days for us to be able to offer any kind of guidance about what might be an issue or what you might improve. 

[ShellyW]

My first Whole 30 was in March 2014.  Since then I have maintained much of that style of eating about  20 days/month on average.  I didn't notice any issues during reintroduction, but after the holidays a year ago and a little more off-roading it became more noticeable in how I felt and how my clothes were fitting.  My grandma passed away 3 days after Christmas 2014 and my diet and alcohol consumption was mildly indulgent.

 

Yesterday I had 2 Adele's artichoke and garlic sausages with a small sweet potato, 1 container (5oz) of spinach/kale/chard sautéed in coconut oil with garlic, crushed red pepper flakes and a drizzle of balsamic vinegar for meal 1.  Meal 2 was beef bone broth, vegetable puree (from making the broth-carrots, celery, onion and mushrooms), steak, brussell sprouts and potato.  It was leftovers combined in a 4 cup container.  My final meal was a salad with 8 large shrimp, an English cucumber, 1 avocado and cilantro with coconut aminos and chili sesame oil to dress.  I ate all of the shrimp and cucumber, but couldn't eat all of the avocado.

 

That is a fairly typical day.  M1 is like above, or 3 eggs cooked with enough veggies to fill a dinner plate.  M2 is usually leftovers in a 4 cup glass container assembled the night before.  M3 is a 1 1/2-2 palm size serving of meat/chicken/fish with veggies to fill my plate.  I try to work a sweet potato in to at least one of my meals every day or 2.

 

I rarely can finish my third meal.  Normally I would eat my lunch about 3 hours after breakfast, but on Whole 30 I can easily make it 5 hours.  I no longer feel hungry when I get home from work (around 3pm I would usually snack) and I've pushed dinner to 6:30/7:00 from our regular 5:30 dinner time because I have no appetite.  For the last week I have been forcing myself to eat an evening meal and feel nauseous eating it.

 

I have been on the verge of tears the last two days and feel very emotionally unstable.  I'd like to find out if this is part of the process for me this time, or due to something I'm eating, or lack of sleep (which I was hoping to remedy this time like I did last time), or a combination of both.  It might also be worth noting that I am 41 years old, the age my mother was when she reached menopause.  I only mention this because it feels much like the same emotional roller coaster I feel when I've dealt with PMS over the years.

[ladyshanny]

Well it is possible that you are experiencing a hormonal reshuffle, this is very common when people do the Whole30. Your "compliance" for a month was only about two thirds and you don't say how off the rails you were going the other third of the month. Basically it sounds like you were eating W30-ish on weekdays and throwing caution to the wind on the weekends. This could have set you back far further than you would like to think.

I notice you aren't eating a significant amount of starchy veggies with your meals beyond the one potato you reported; emotional stability, mood, anxiety, depression and hormone issues can all be greatly impacted if you go too low carb as is the case with many people when they start a Whole30. Include a fist sized serving of starchy veggie at least once a day going forward and see how that helps.

Salads generally need to be serving bowl huge to get you enough nutrition. Swap out the salad with 2-3 cups of cooked veggies (not the ones you're using in bone broth, those have all the nutrients and flavour leached out into the broth).

It is possible that the probably hormonal shuffle you are going through with Whole30 may be causing any other hormonal imbalance to be more noticeable. If you think you might be starting menopause, see a doctor.

[ShellyW]

Thank you.  I will try adding more starchy veggies to my meals and give myself 5-7 days to adjust.