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Starting July 9 and so excited!! Here we go!


Tara Vil

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I am in my mid 20s and looking to do this for a nice reset on my system! Want to be more aware of food and what I put in my body. So excited to start this but kind of nervous to! I can do it though. I won’t fail!!! 

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Hi!

I started yesterday, July 9, so thought I might jump on your thread as an ongoing convo with others that have the same Days. 

I started because I have been counting calories and macros for 3 months and having a hard time with cheats and weight loss. April and May I lost 5 lb a month. June was flat and July has been creeping up. I need these 30 days to get back on track to where I wanted to be by now and create a new daily food relationship.  Most of my calories had been coming from yogurt and cottage cheese and legume. Definitely sugars and dairy were part of my diet. The rest was pretty close to whole 30

Luckily, hubby is on board with me because we share cooking responsibilities and he loves beer, ice cream and peanuts. He also likes to bring me “treats” so it is so key that he is doing this with me.

day 1 went great. We get hello fresh and had a box come yesterday because I forgot to cancel. We just adjusted the recipe and it was still yummy. Today, we realized our almond milk has sugar. Time to correct that. 

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This is a good idea to keep us July 9thers on the same thread. 

Day 1 was great for me (until the evening when I really wanted a late night snack - but avoided it). 

Day 2 definitely started out ROUGH!  Felt like I had the hangover for sure.  But as the day has progressed it's gotten much better!  Had a rough night's sleep with leg cramps that came out of nowhere.  I'm wondering if I may be drinking too much water and throwing off my electrolytes.  We'll see what tonight brings.  

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I also started on July 9th!

 

I wound up not getting home from a trip on the 8th until nearly midnight (was supposed to be around 7-8pm, but traffic and traveling with a baby slowed us down). Thought about pushing my start back a day, but my boyfriend is doing it along with me and he was ready to start so I went ahead and started a little less prepared than I would have liked. Luckily my standard breakfast has always been Whole30 compliant (two hard boiled eggs and a banana) so I could figure out the rest at work the next day.

 

Like pags98, day 1 was great until I began craving a late night snack in front of the TV. Usually I eat ice cream or cookie butter directly out of the containers at that point of my evening :wacko: I think I got up and opened my freezer at least 10 times. Considered making a smoothie with orange juice and frozen fruit, but it seemed like that might be a SWYPO type thing, especially since I would solely be making it to satisfy a sugar/snack craving. Plus, I'm hoping to teach myself to eat intentionally - which means no more mindless snacking in front of the TV!

 

For day 2, I began feeling hungover as well - not directly when I woke up, but around 11am. 

 

8 hours ago, MegOSchmidt said:

Today, we realized our almond milk has sugar. Time to correct that. 

Just an FYI, Carrageenan is also a common almond milk additive you have to watch out for. I bought New Barn plain unsweetened almondmilk from Whole Foods yesterday (it was on sale for only about $3 for the bottle, which seemed reasonable). The main reason I picked it was because it had very few ingredients and all of my other options in the refrigerated section had a gazillion ingredients and I didn't feel like googling "Is ________ Whole30 compliant?" for my entire lunch break (which is when I went shopping). 

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I started on the 9th too! 

I binged on cheese and tortilla chips and finished off all the beer in the house the night before, which was probably stupid.

Then the morning of the 9th I found out I won concert tickets for tonight!  I thought about changing my start date so I could have a beer or two at the show, but I was committed. I also thought about not going, because I got hit with a headache and exhaustion around 4pm on day one, but I woke up on Tuesday feeling pretty good after A LOT of sleep.

Crashed again halfway through today and took a short nap. Went to the concert with my daughter and didn't even have a single bite of her ice cream (which she threw away half of!) and oddly enough didn't miss the alcohol either. Really enjoyed the show! But now my head is pounding and I'm still wired from some coffee on the way to the show and the adrenaline from seeing two of my favorite bands (Weezer and the Pixies!)

Starting to think I should've done a bit more research before starting this, but as I said, now I'm committed and will power through. Still haven't taken anything for the headaches, but I might be close because it's getting pretty bad. I'm trying to drink lots of water and eat balanced meals, but maybe not balanced "enough."  Glad I found this forum. :) 

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Day two ended well for me( despite the headache all day and into this morning). After work, I went to the library to pick up the Whole30 cookbook that came off hold, so I have that to peruse for ideas this evening.  Then my boyfriend and I went to Giant to pick up ingredients for this yummy recipe (Shrimp Scampi Zoodles for Two).  He doesn't have a spiralizer so we had to buy the zoodles pre-spiralized. So expensive that way! :wacko: . It turned out amazing!  We swapped the fresh parsley for ground parsley (his idea - one less thing to buy) and the hot pepper flakes for cayenne (we thought he had hot pepper flakes. He didn't).

 

Question: Are you all eating between meals? My boyfriend says it is against the rules according to the book (which he admittedly skimmed), but I don't see anything about it being against the rules on the website. Just that it is discouraged. I've been letting myself have fresh raw fruit and veggies between meals, usually around 3pm, to avoid being *starving* when I get home for dinner. I think I'll try to limit my snacks so that I can make sure I'm not eating out of boredom or some sort of emotional response; maybe set a rule that I can only have a snack if I'm going to the gym or having to wait 6 awake hours between meals? Would love to know what others are doing

 

Good luck to all of us on Day 3!

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4 hours ago, ____Emily____ said:

I've been letting myself have fresh raw fruit and veggies between meals, usually around 3pm, to avoid being *starving* when I get home for dinner. I think I'll try to limit my snacks so that I can make sure I'm not eating out of boredom or some sort of emotional response; maybe set a rule that I can only have a snack if I'm going to the gym or having to wait 6 awake hours between meals? Would love to know what others are doing

 

 

The way I read it is that if you are going to snack don't consider it a snack. E.g. make it a mini meal with protein/fat/veg/fruit.  So what I've done these first few days is about a half a cup of fresh blueberries and a closed handful of almonds.  That way I'm getting Protein, Fat and Fruit.  Incidentally I do not have fruit any other time during the day so this should (in my opinion) fit in with the "limited fruits."  I have my snack in the afternoon around 3pm.  As I progress I'm going to try and make bigger lunches.  Because my breakfasts seem to last me from 6 am until 11:30 am but my lunches definitely do not last until I'm off work. 

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Today was so much better for me! No headaches, no crashes, and had a surprising amount of energy for the limited sleep I got last night. Finally got some fresh picked lettuces and grilled chicken breasts and made giant salads for lunch and dinner. Nearly ate a bite of my toddler's mac and cheese without thinking! Mindless eating is a hard habit to break. I had to return some bacon because it had added sugar...man it was not easy to find any without it, even at whole foods! 

A friend gave me a couple home-grown zucchini (im a big veggie gardener and part of why I started now is because everything is in abundance right now!) so we'll be having zoodles tomorrow! I just saw a recipe for collard green wraps that I need to try with the giant collard leaves ready to harvest out front too. yum.

Do y'all have family members or friends also doing this with you? My daughter who is 8 is now interested in doing this along with me! :)

 

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@pags98, I don’t think leg cramps would be from too much water. Sometimes a banana helps, maybe the potassium.

@____Emily____ hubby went out and got Califia Unsweetened Almond Milk. We found it on Whole30’s approved a list so it should be carrageenan free. 

@ohhey_cj sorry you had headaches yesterday. I feel like I am waiting for the crash and it might come more like Day 5-10 for me. 

Day 2 and 3 went well. Several meals based on leftover kale or wilted spinach with roasted potatoes. Had it with egg and bacon for breakfast. Had it with shrimp for lunch.  Tonight we hosted family for dinner. Had filet mignon, mashed potatoes (only olive oil), grilled vegetables, sautéed mushrooms and berries. Guests had wine and Kids had whipped cream on their berries but hubby and i were strong :)

House is stocked for a week of good eats.

I might make mayo. And i need to do more research on my deli meats. 

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12 hours ago, ____Emily____ said:

Question: Are you all eating between meals? My boyfriend says it is against the rules according to the book (which he admittedly skimmed), but I don't see anything about it being against the rules on the website. Just that it is discouraged. I've been letting myself have fresh raw fruit and veggies between meals, usually around 3pm, to avoid being *starving* when I get home for dinner. I think I'll try to limit my snacks so that I can make sure I'm not eating out of boredom ....

 

 

@____Emily____I checked the book and you are right. Discouraged but not a rule. My husband is having the same issue... He needs mid morning and midday snacks. I said to try to make your main meals a little bigger perhaps but, ultimately, ok if you have that snack so you don’t binge on something off plan. I think your choices of snack are great. Maybe add a fat or protein to make it last longer. A handful of almonds.  Just make it a plan and not a random grab.  

 

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50 minutes ago, nerdular said:

Do y'all have family members or friends also doing this with you? My daughter who is 8 is now interested in doing this along with me! :)

 

Yes, my husband is doing this with me. Thank god. That helps a lot. I’d let your 8 year old do it. It is healthy

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Day 3 ended well for me. I've had a small headache fading in and out since yesterday afternoon, but it's barely noticeable. Had a delicious dinner last night: I sauteed up a bell pepper and onion and then added sliced spinach chicken sausage. The sausage was a brand called Brat Hans. I got it at Whole Foods on sale for $3.99 (4 pack - I used two for dinner) and there were a couple of varieties that were Whole30 complaint. It was so ridiculously easy to make, which is great because I'm not a good cook. 

 

10 hours ago, MegOSchmidt said:

Maybe add a fat or protein to make it last longer. A handful of almonds.  Just make it a plan and not a random grab.

 

I think I'm going to do that for sure. That way the snack will be even more satiating.  I've picked up some almond butter and I think my snack will be apple slices and almond butter 

 

11 hours ago, nerdular said:

Do y'all have family members or friends also doing this with you? My daughter who is 8 is now interested in doing this along with me! :)

My boyfriend is doing it with me.  One of our bad habits before this was that we would order takeout literally every night we were together - usually pizza or Thai food. I suggested doing this because it was something I was interested in doing, and I thought it'd be a good way to train ourselves to not have that habit. He was on board immediately, which was nice. I totally thought I'd have to do some convincing (or compromise with me doing Whole30, and him just eating compliant dinners with me). It's great that your daughter wants to join! Developing a taste for healthy, whole foods early is so beneficial to kids. Even if she isn't as strict with the rules, she will develop great food habits that will follow her through life (choosing healthier snacks, learning to read labels, knowing how to cook/prepare whole foods, etc...)

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My 8 year old specifically suggested we all go sugar free. I am so down with that for my kids. They are addicted and I feel so guilty about it. 

I didn't rid my home of all the bad stuff before I started because I didn't want to waste things or force my family to comply, but I don't plan on replacing a lot of it. So they will naturally move the same way, anyway... that's my hope anyway. My husband could really use this but he's not ready to give it all up yet. It took me a long time to get there too.

 

God, I feel awful today. I felt SO GOOD yesterday, silly me thought I had somehow gotten past the bad part already. Definitely full of rage. Super cloudy brained. It's also PMS time so I would probably feel this way regardless, but it definitely feels amplified. 

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On 7/11/2018 at 10:03 AM, ____Emily____ said:

He doesn't have a spiralizer so we had to buy the zoodles pre-spiralized. So expensive that way! 

You don't have to use a spiralizer. You can use a veggie peeler to get wide, thin strips of zucchini, which you can leave like that or cut them long ways to get strips. Or you can just dice the zucchini instead of trying to mimic the look of pasta, it'll still taste the same, just won't look quite as fancy.

 

For those wondering about snacks, it is okay to eat between meals if you're hungry, though it is best to try to make your meals big enough to get 4-5 hours between them. If you're including fruit in these snacks, pay attention to whether they're keeping you satisfied and whether they're causing you to crave more sweet things. And remember that for whole30 purposes, nuts are fats, not protein, and they can be really easy to overeat. If you find yourself eating fruit or nuts (or anything, really, but those are the most common culprits) when you know you're not hungry, or because you're bored or tired or whatever, be honest with yourself about it and look for better options that don't affect you that way.

 

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Hang in there @nerdular!  Do you have the book, to see the ”timeline”?  How you are feeling is normal!

i don’t seem to be following the timeline too closely. I did have some brain fog today... i worked all day, highly focused, and then I realized I lost a steak. LOL. Yup, a steak. I cut some in my salad and I totally remember that I didn’t use it all but we couldn’t find it at dinner. I guess I actually added it all to the salad to make more left overs. Bizarre that it is all a blur!

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Day 4 has come and gone and man I feel great.  I can't believe I do so early but I'll take it.  Even felt like taking a run today so I did.  However, I was definitely not able to do as much as pre Whole30 - the energy lapse happened about a mile in.  So I'm definitely not "there" yet.  Hopefully tomorrow isn't a relapse to headaches and being angry. :)  We will have a challenge tomorrow as we're celebrating my son's birthday so we'll have to watch them all eating the sugar packed items. Fortunately my wife is also doing it with me so we'll latch onto each other for support!

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I felt great all throughout day 4 too! Honestly, besides an accidental walk down the bread aisle in the grocery store, I didn't even really have many cravings. I slept deeply the night before and felt alert all day. Also, massive bonus: the jeans I struggled to pull on last week were less of a struggle today

 

Has anyone else noticed their sense of smell or taste is more acute?  It was mostly noticeable during that walk down the bread aisle unfortunately.... I felt like I was standing in a bakery or something. But also, I could smell the olive oil as I drizzled it on my sweet potatoes and the lime as my boyfriend zested it into our turkey burgers. Kind of a bizarre side effect 

 

Hope everyone has a great Friday! I go visit my parents every Friday and we tend to eat out, so I may be facing my first real challenge with dining out.  I'm going to suggest Zoes Kitchen since they have Whole30 meals listed on their menu. 

 

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Day 5 was great too. I did 20 min on spin bike and 20 min doing laps and treading water in the pool. My kids (8 and 11) had s’mores around a fire tonight, which happens to be my favorite thing, but it wasn’t torture to resist. They left the chocolate off so that helped. They didn’t ask me to have one and they put the mallows and Grahams away when they were done so I didn’t have to stare at it. 

I am down 5 lbs since we started!  That is a lot for me. I wonder if it was mostly water I was retaining because now the diet is less processed and salty. I’ll take it. Those 5 were stubborn for a month before I started Whole30 . 

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Day 6 was good.  I went to the zoo with my mom and sister and my niece.  It was tough at times, but I felt like I had the energy to walk round all day in the heat, which was great.  The tough parts came when I literally had to watch people eat.... I knew it would happen though. Our plans involved metroing to the zoo and eating lunch near the metro before going into the zoo.  I researched last night and didn't see any Whole30 compliant dishes at any of the restaurants in that area, so I ate lunch before leaving the house. Still a little tough to watch everyone eat the yummy gyros, but I've been exercising my will power so it was up to the task. I packed along a couple of single-serving packets of almond butter in case I got hungry (since I had to eat breakfast an hour early and didn't expect to be home until 7 hours later for dinner); I ended up needing them so I'm glad I did. It was wayyyy to hot for the zoo - all of the animals were hiding from the heat and the sun, and we all overheated. However, it was nice to have something active to do today to keep me from getting bored on my couch (the place I would say is most dangerous for my cravings/junk food habit)

 

Hope everyone had a great Saturday! Good luck on day 7

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Well I had both an unplanned concert and an unplanned birthday party/cookout in week one, but I survived it.  I probably would've started a week later if I'd known these temptations would've both hit in week one, but it really wasn't that hard.  (I've given birth twice without any meds - Melissa is right, giving birth is HARD. This is not hard, at least not like that!)

Came home after spending hours around people eating and drinking all the things I could not have, and cooked up a feast. Come to find out after we're done eating it that the free-range organic chicken broth I used (which we always use/was in our pantry) contains sugar! WHY! Ugh. I am not starting over because I just don't think it's necessary, but it's very frustrating to think I am being so compliant and then later realizing that something I ate had sugar in it. The amounts are miniscule, but still. It's really angering how many things sugar is snuck into. I will probably check labels in the store from now on, even after I've reintroduced it.

Maybe that's why I had a bellyache after dinner. :( That or something was on the skewers I ate at the party that didn't agree with me. Or my period is just about to start. GAH!  Right when the "hardest days" are around the corner. At least I have breakfasts and lunches ready for the next 3-4 days.  Bring on week two! How is everyone else doing?

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2 hours ago, nerdular said:

The amounts are miniscule, but still. It's really angering how many things sugar is snuck into.

There are SO many things that have sugar in them when I wouldn't expect it. Like sriracha or sausage.  It's eye-opening reading the ingredients lists for Whole30... I think that's one habit I'll continue. Reading the labels and putting back items where I can't pronounce or understand the majority of the ingredients.

 

Day 7 went well for me. My family went out to a restaurant where I was able to order steamed crab legs with lemon wedges on the side.  I wound up not needing the lemon - the crab was sooo good. Everyone else in the family got their crab with a seasoning, but I didn't want to risk it (see above.... I'm sure even the Cajun seasoning had sugar in it).

Almost accidentally violated the rules later though. I was hanging out with my family and my dad got my niece a small bag of animal crackers. He handed the bag to me to pass the cookies out one-by-one to her because he was doing his ironing. I had the bag sitting in my lap and almost absent-minded ate one. I had my hand in the bag and was like, "wait...." so I immediately passed the bag off to my sister to avoid that temptation. I wasn't even really wanting a cookie! It was just an impulse... like eating mindlessly in front of the TV.  

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We've survived almost 8 full days now July 9thers! And honestly - it doesn't feel like it's "survival" because it feels good.  Energy levels are very good to great, hunger levels are gone, snacking really isn't needed this week from what I've seen versus last week. Haven't posted because well, it's been going better than anticipated!  Although my Instagram followers are getting food pictures multiple times a day.  But that's also allowed me to see what some other Whole30 folks are doing with food for inspiration.  

Friday was definitely tough because of the brownies for my son's birthday and all the other things that they were eating but my wife and I brought some Hard Boiled Eggs, Fresh Fruit and Tuna with a pop top that was compliant (fortunately we read the labels on our Starkist Albacore Pouches - non-compliant).  My wife almost slipped out of habit tasting the brownie batter before cooking it, and I almost slipped by grabbing a crumb from the pan as I was handing out the brownies - but we both caught ourselves before it happened.

I feel more liberated than last week about all the things we CAN eat versus the things we cannot.  Hoping Days 10 and 11 aren't bad like they're supposed to be, where most people fall off the wagon.  Day 10 falls on my son's actual birth date.  Temptations will abound!

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Last night I went to visit with my parents and sister, and my my mom made a Whole30 feast for me. She made these chicken nugget style things with a BBQ dipping sauce, roasted potatoes, and a mixed greens salad with plums, olives, and bacon crumble. To make the BBQ sauce, she made me homemade ketchup - the leftovers of both were sent home with me in nicely labeled glass bottles.  It was super sweet! One funny thing though - she bought what she described as "sort of Whole30 bacon." So I walk into their house and she says this to me, and I'm like, "What does it mean when you say the bacon is sort of Whole30?" and she says "Oh, a lady was shopping with us and she is also doing Whole30 so she was helping me find compliant bacon and she said this was the closest they had. It should be okay because there's only a miniscule amount." So I asked to see the bacon to see what they were referring to, and cane sugar was listed in the ingredients in the "less than 2% of" section. Otherwise, it actually would have been Whole30 - there were no preservatives. So I had to explain to my mom that we aren't allowed to have any added sugar, even minuscule amounts. So after I examined her other ingredients, I got back in my car and ran out to the nearest health food store to get bacon. Crisis averted and we had an amazing dinner. 

Also, I'm starting to notice positive benefits from this too - I've been waking up fully refreshed at around 6:30am before my alarm even rings. Usually if I woke up before my alarm I'd be exhausted (and annoyed) and go back to sleep. This morning I just got up and started getting ready for my day. It's really nice to feel like I'm getting high quality sleep and not struggling to get up in the AM. I may start using this extra time in the morning to run or stretch, but for now I'm just enjoying actually being on time to work

Hope everyone is having a good day 9! 

 

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