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First Whole 30 Complete


BroccoliMan

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Today is day 31 and my first Whole 30 is complete.  I've followed a "mostly Paleo" diet for a few years now, but never really sweat the small stuff.  Creamer in my coffee every morning, not paying attention to hidden sugars, and "cheat days" on the weekend that more often than not turned into cheat weekends.  Most of the time I would spend the entire week working off the weekend.  I had shoulder surgery in January and knew I needed something to motivate me and keep me on track to make some real gains as I get back to my normal activity level and ability.  A few notes:

 

-I definitely had a sugar addiction.  I had a headache for about the first 4 days and that was not fun.

-I never thought I could stomach black coffee.  I loved my french vanilla creamer each morning.  I'm fine with black coffee and plan to never use creamer again!

-I always ate a lot of fruit, but cutting out the refined sugar really makes you appreciate how great fruit is.  The only fruit I really ate throughout the day was a few strawberries in the morning with my scrambled eggs and avocado but darn were they delicious!

-I really enjoyed the cooking part.  Lots of Sunday meal prep and new recipes.  The biggest winner was mango-coconut chicken served over cauliflower rice.  

-I felt OK in workouts.  Since I'm recovering from surgery, it's really hard to tell if my performance is being affected by my diet or my lack of activity.  

-I enjoyed the steady energy levels throughout the day.

-Eating out was tough.  In the first two weeks I had to go to restaurants about 3 times.  Two were OK.  The worst was a large birthday dinner at a steakhouse that lasted 3 hours.  My game plan for the last two weeks was to be as anti-social as I could be and I succeeded.  

-I probably snacked a little more than recommended.  Previously, I was addicted to zone bars.  I knew they were just glorified candy bars but I felt good after eating them (the sugar).  I'm now much better off replacing the mid-afternoon zone bar with some raw mixed nuts.

 

The scale:  I"m sure this will make many of you cringe, but the scale really was the most important part for me.  I compete in a sport with weight classes and I knew I had some work to do on the scale before I can even think about returning to competition.  The last few days I started to get a little nervous about stepping on the scale and the possibility of seeing a minimal weight loss.  I felt great, but I didn't receive one compliment from coworkers or friends about looking like I've lost weight.  Some days my pants felt loose and other they didn't.  Luckily I lost about 11 pounds!  I'm very happy with the number.

 

Moving forward, I've made the commitment to stay Whole 30 compliant with ONE cheat meal per week.  I've got more work to do!

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Great job, and amazing results.

 

I would suggest you work on reintroductions before you start a cheat meal per week. I rocked my first W30 and then decided to 'treat' myself and realized that I am no where near my goal of taming the Sugar Dragon. I have undone the majority of the great work I did and am going to start another W30 on 5/1. This time I will focus more on the NSV's and will make it a point to do proper reintroductions so I know what my triggers are and aren't. 

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