What counts as fat?

[krazy4whole30]

This is my second whole30.  My first one was a great success, but this one is failing badly.  I'm on day 27 and feel horrible. I've been trying to troubleshoot why I feel tired all the time.  Now I'm starting to question as to what's causing my fatigue.  

In the morning, I take the train to work and I don't leave myself a lot of time to get ready in the morning.  My first meal of the day needs to be travel friendly.  I've been making beef and spinach muffins.  The beef is usually grass fed and ranges in fat percentage from 85% to 95% lean.  I'm usually eating at 6am.  My lunch isn't until 1pm, so I've been eating a snack around between 10-11am.  I was mostly snacking on a couple tbps of almond butter.  I recently switched to eggs for a better source of energy.  Sometimes I eat a later dinner and eat a snack on the way home.  That usually consist of nuts or more eggs.  My dinners usually consist of a protein, a starchy veggie and a salad.  The salad is romaine lettuce with homemade ranch dressing, which is homemade mayo, whole fat coconut milk, garlic and herbs.  I put a couple of tablespoons of dressing on the lettuce.  My lunch is either leftovers from dinner or a salad.  If I take a salad, I put plenty of dressing on there too.  I don't eat too many starchy veggies for lunch.  I thought I was getting enough fat since I was eating ground beef for my first meal, but now I'm wondering if it's enough?  I always cook the food in coconut oil or ghee.  I've been eating egg frittata muffins for breakfast for a very long time.  I needed a break so I thought these beef muffins would be a nice change.  I'd eat leftovers for breakfast, but I don't have time to sit down and eat at home.  I'm already up at 5:10am getting ready to catch a train.  I don't have time to get up before that.  There is 8oz of frozen spinach between the two muffins too.  I can take with me crudite for meal 1 if that will make a difference.  I don't understand what I'm doing differently this time than the first time.  

[ShannonM816]

Humans aren't static creatures -- we change, and our nutritional needs change. So it may be that you're doing everything exactly the same as last time, but your body needs something different now, due to different exercise/activity patterns, stress levels, hormonal changes, etc.

Do you like olives or avocado/guacamole? Those would be fairly easy fats to carry with you and eat with your breakfast. If you're getting 4-5 hours on your breakfast before you're hungry, you may be getting enough anyway.

I do think your snacks should be more along the lines of a mini-meal -- some protein, fat, and veggies, or at least two of the three.

Did you eat more starchy vegetables on your first Whole30? We generally tell people to start with one fist-sized serving a day, but some people do find they feel better with more, others need less, so if you were eating more of them and feeling better before, try adding a little more and see what happens.

Are you drinking plenty of water? Salting your food? Dehydration and lack of salt can both cause fatigue.

Are you sleeping okay and getting a consistent amount of sleep each night, aiming for about eight hours? If not, work on that, because no matter how much you work on the food part, if you're not sleeping, you're going to have issues with being tired.

Are you exercising at all? If so, are you having pre- and post-WO meals? Post-WO of lean protein and some starchy vegetable within about 15-30 minutes of exercise can make a difference in recovery.

[krazy4whole30]

Hi ShannonM816, 

Thank you for your reply.  

I actually love olives, and avocados too.  Olives would be a great addition.  I never thought about carrying them around with me.  I will start bringing them with me to add to my meals.  I'm also going to add a little avocado and veggies with my snack to make it a mini meal.  That's a great idea.  

You know, I actually think I was probably eating more starches on my first whole30.  I remember eating a lot of sweet potatoes and winter squashes.  Maybe I should be a little more consistent and try adding a little starch with lunch too.   I only bring starch for lunch if I had leftovers from the night before. 

I think I am drinking enough water.  I also drink a little black coffee in the morning and matcha green tea in the afternoon.  

The salt raises a good question.  So I switched to sea salt and pink salt a few months ago.  I did not realize those salts were not iodized.  I was salting my food liberally, but was I using the right salt?  Will lack of iodine make a difference?  My first whole30 I used regular iodized salt.  I switched to sea salt because I thought it would be healthier.  Before I started the second whole30, my husband and I would go out to eat once maybe twice a week.  I'm sure I was getting iodine from that food, but most of food is always made from scratch.  I only discovered last Wednesday that I was not ingesting iodized salt. Would this also make a difference?

I would love to get 8 hours of sleep, but I get 7 every night.  That's pretty consistent, even on the weekends when I'm not working.  I try to sleep in, but my body is so used to getting up, that I can't sleep more than 7 hours.  If I'm feeling healthy, 7 hours is good for me.  I was able to achieve Tigers Blood on 7 hours and I could go all day just fine.   

I've only worked out twice since during this whole30.  I've had no energy to workout, which breaks my heart.  When I was working out, I'd eat a couple of eggs about 30 to 60 minutes before I worked out.  I was not doing a post workout meal since I live down the street from my gym.  I'd hit the gym on my way home from work and then go home, quickly shower, and then eat dinner.  I was eating within 30 minutes of working out.