Nyx's first Whole 30ish log

[Nyx]

Day 4 (March 4^th)

So this is happening.

I heard about a Whole30 from a friend who just completed her first one in January. She was trying to find a non-medicated way to deal with some inflammatory swelling and her results with Wh30 were amazing.

After seeing her successfully deal with her issues through adjusting her diet to a Paleo setting, I started to think about how Wh30 could help me kick start some health goals I made to myself earlier last year as part of my “101 goals in 1001 days†list that I've failed to make any meaningful progress on since writing them down. My goal is to do at least 30 days but ideally 45 days to reset my diet and get used to eating real and nutrient dense food.

I'm starting this log as a way to keep myself honest and to have a place I can look back and see why I started doing this in the first place for those inevitable moments of temptation.

Here are my goals:

I want to have a baby in 2013 and in order to do that I need to be happier and fitter than I am right now.

I want my weight to not be a determining factor in whether I feel comfortable doing something from trying zip lining for the first time to learning how to ride a horse.

I want to feel strong!

And that brings me here. I'll write down my measurements as soon as I find my stubbornly lost measuring tape. For now I'll just stick to writing brief daily updates and logging my meals, sleep and maybe exercise.

Meal 1: 2 slices of a kale, onion and ground beef frittata and a cup of green tea

Meal 2: Pureed butternut squash, Roast chicken breast and roasted brussels sprouts and cauliflower

Meal 3: coconut crusted pan fried pork chops, broccoli slaw and finished off the butternut squash

Side effects today:

Eh, still trying to get over a cold that set in over the weekend. This sore throat is killing me! I have never wanted a cough drop so much in my life and I *hate* cough drops. Thankfully a trip to my acupuncture clinic resolved most of my congestion.

I waited to long to eat lunch and could actually feel my energy draining away until I got a chance to eat. After that everything was much better.

[Derval]

Welcome & good luck Nyx.

Your meals look good - but maybe missing some fat?

[Nyx]

Thanks Derval!

I guess that's one of the questions I've been struggling with since starting my Whole 30. Does roasting my veggies in ghee, pan frying my pork chop and cooking my frittata in coconut oil count towards my fat intake for the day? Or do my dishes need to dressed in something like ghee right before I eat it?

[Nyx]

The cold is vanquished! And just in time because if I needed to go through another day of denying myself cold medication because it isn't Wh30 compliant I would've shot someone if I couldn't take something. All in all, I feel amazing today! I don't know if that's because I've got 4 days of clean eating under my belt or my body's just relived not to be sick anymore. Either way I'll take it ; )

Meal 1: Finished off the kale, ground beef, sauteed onion frittata I made yesterday. Plus a clementine and a cup of green tea.

Meal 2: Leftover spectacular: pork chop panfried in beef tallow and a good sized dollop of butternut squashed pureed with ghee.

Meal 3: Salmon sautéed in coconut oil a little ghee, heaping pile of steamed spinach with ghee and pan roasted japenese yam.

[Nyx]

Headache City Population: Me

On day two or three, my friend Nell, who introduced me to the whole30, related the following story about her day three on Whole 30 she did back in January. She had been at work for 3 hours when her body rioted from sugar withdrawal. She had to take a taxi home and the moment she got inside she ran into the bathroom and threw up. She then crawled into bed and slept for 12 hours.

Intense, right!?

After hearing that I'll be honest and say I thought to myself well, sugar is your best friend but it's like 70^th on the list of food/taste sensations I care about. Salt and savory is where it's at for me. Dessert after dinner? No thanks, I'll just go have 2nds and 3rds and what's the name of that meal you eat at 11pm before you go to bed? Oh, wait; there is no name for it because I'm the only weirdo doing it. Always being hungry for more meals is my thing. All of this led me to assume that my first week of detox would be relatively low key given how sugar seems to produce the strongest cravings/bodily responses in people. And until last night this had been mostly true.

Cue one wicked headache to stab me awake last night at 4am. When I say stab I mean I'm pretty sure I thought tiny spikes were coming out of my head. I had to chug 1 large mason jar of water, walk around my apartment a little bit and rub tiger balm on my temples for 15 minutes before I could start to doze on and off until my alarm went off at 6:30. The headache stayed with me until around 10 this morning.

I'm pretty sure that that was my sugar withdrawal slap because I certainly drank enough water yesterday and I had cut out grains and the like weeks ago. So that leaves me with the biggest change I've made so far which is cutting out alcohol aka my 1 or 2 or 3 glasses of wine or beer or whatever a night. Alcohol = Sugar. A fact I conveniently forgot when ignoring my friend's advice about what was coming up. So, sorry Nell! You tried to warn me. Here's hoping for only a few more of these headaches before they clear up permanently.

Meal one: Heaping handful of spinach sautéed in ghee, and two soft boiled eggs (I know not enough protein but I was all over the place because of my headache)

Meal two: Big handful of broccoli microwaved with coconut oil and braised chicken and coconut curry.

Meal three: Finished off the last pork chop from the batch I made earlier this week. Got through a cup and a half of curried coconut and broccoli soup (inspired by nom nom paleo) but had to bail on it because despite letting the falvors meld in the fridge for several days and nuking in the microwave right now all I can taste is the undercook leek I threw in... back to the drawing board on that one.

[simonec]

i'm about 3 days ahead of you (i started march 1st) i love your food choices. sounds like you have some great meals.

[Nyx]

i'm about 3 days ahead of you (i started march 1st) i love your food choices. sounds like you have some great meals.

Hi Simonec! I know, I checked out your log before starting. You gave me the final bit of inspiration I needed when I saw that you were able to start the whole 30 while running a family on top of everything else.

I love cooking so I'm trying to keep my dishes interesting (at least to me) because I don't want to give up my "kitchen time". It's my favorite room in the house so I'd like to be able to continue to be able to experiment with food but hopefully in a much healthier way. Right now, I'm debating on whether or not to pick up a pressure cooker to see if it will cut down on the number of dishes that are piling up with this constant stream of cooking.

[simonec]

i love cooking as well. i find that sometimes making a big enough meal for dinner to then become left overs for a few meals (although, with 2 very hungry growing boys sometimes i underestimate how much food they can/will eat) ,helps me a bit. glad to hear that i'm an inspiration to someone.

[Nyx]

First mini-obstacle/test passed successfully last night!

I'd been dreading yesterday because it would be my first time combining my new eating habits and the part time job I do a few times a week in addition to my regular 9-5. My dread was caused by a few factors. First my part time job is at a 24 crisis hotline, so all of my triggers to eat less than optimally are front and center; late hours, stress from co-workers, stress from listening to sad and graphic abuse stories, take-out everywhere because no one has time to bring food from home. Anyway, when this place was my full time gig I put on close to 55 pounds there in the space of 5 years because of all the stress eating I did there. So, I was really worried that I'd have a bunch of cravings as my shift went on and that I'd be constantly distracted by all the food everyone else was eating.

But happy surprise to me! I felt pretty full and energized from lunch. When I did get hungry I wasn't tempted (okay, I wasn't too tempted) by the take out lasagna a bunch people were eating. The main downside of working there last night was that I was tired and wired when I got off of work at midnight and I was ravenous by the time I got home. I ended up eating a hamburger pattie my husband had left over from his dinner before going to bed. I'm trying to rationalize eating that pattie before bed is better than eating non-complaint food.

Onward and upward

Meal 1: Two sunny sides up eggs fried in coconut oil and sweet potato hash with onions and prosciutto (something went wrong with this for me today. Eggs make my stomach unhappy unless they are on the runny side. I think I cooked these too long because this breakfast made my stomach unhappy and it went right through me. Something for me to remember next time)

Meal 2: Braised coconut chicken curry, nibbled on some broccoli but was feeling pretty full by the time I got to it so I'm saving it for dinner. Hopefully that doesn't set me up for a snack attack later this afternoon.

Meal 3: Leftover stir fry made out of the broccoli slaw from earlier this week, leftover chicken breast from my roast chicken and some prosciutto all quickly dressed with some coconut aminos.

[Nyx]

^{Day 8}

^{And that's a wrap on week 1! Kicking off week 2 now!}

^{Lots of nor'easter related craziness today. Keeping a long story short the upside to it all was that I got to get out of work at 3pm instead of 5pm, which gave me a chance to do next weeks grocery shopping today instead of tomorrow morning. It also meant I could realistically set myself with meals for next week, which was awesome, since I will be dashing between the main job and the part time job from Saturday through Thursday. So from 5pm-11:30pm last night I did a massive cook-up during which I made: chocolate chili, Bo Kho, roasted beets, and green sliders.}

^{One last note I wanted to throw a quick list of intentions for this week:}

^{I will on the mental side of this project and focus on which situations provoke my cravings}

^{I will get up and move around more this week by walking, doing yoga or at-home weightlifting.}

^{I will make sure to drink enough water.}

^{Meal 1 Breakfast scramble with leftover sweet potato hash, hamburger pattie, sliced up braised cabbage (surprisingly delicious! D. improved on it by throwing a sunny side up egg on his)}

^{Meal 2 Left over chicken Broccoli stir-fry}

^{Meal 3 Carribean Seafood Stew as seen on everyday paleo's site (I went with using one of my favorite fish, monkfish, and bay scallops) This one's a keeper, so simple to pull together and quick!}

^{Exercise: no, unless marathon cooking counts}

^{Water: Didn't keep track but I know I didn't get enough}

[dukunbayi]

First mini-obstacle/test passed successfully last night!

I'd been dreading yesterday because it would be my first time combining my new eating habits and the part time job I do a few times a week in addition to my regular 9-5. My dread was caused by a few factors. First my part time job is at a 24 crisis hotline, so all of my triggers to eat less than optimally are front and center; late hours, stress from co-workers, stress from listening to sad and graphic abuse stories, take-out everywhere because no one has time to bring food from home. Anyway, when this place was my full time gig I put on close to 55 pounds there in the space of 5 years because of all the stress eating I did there. So, I was really worried that I'd have a bunch of cravings as my shift went on and that I'd be constantly distracted by all the food everyone else was eating.

But happy surprise to me! I felt pretty full and energized from lunch. When I did get hungry I wasn't tempted (okay, I wasn't too tempted) by the take out lasagna a bunch people were eating. The main downside of working there last night was that I was tired and wired when I got off of work at midnight and I was ravenous by the time I got home. I ended up eating a hamburger pattie my husband had left over from his dinner before going to bed. I'm trying to rationalize eating that pattie before bed is better than eating non-complaint food.

Strong work, Nyx! I can absolutely relate to the late work hours and stress. I, too, find that when I feed and water myself well the temptations decrease and my ability to manage the kind of stress you're talking about increases. Total win-win. That's the kind of domino effect I want, not the spiraling down into Dorito despair.

You are doing really well, and I know you are going to rock this. I look forward to following your log.

[Nyx]

Day 9

Not looking forward to today at all. I woke up feeling blah and had a hard time pulling it together. Felt mentally clouded for most of the morning which was not what I was looking for since I was volunteering at my acupuncture clinic until 2pm. I think this is all from not drinking enough water yesterday. On the brightside I feel like a culinary superstar! During my 1.5 hour break between volunteering and heading out to the part-time gig I managed to make a new batch of ghee, cook two spaghetti squash, and pull together a good sized batch of whipped rutabagas blended with the old batch of ghee.

Getting all of that done in such a limited amount of time made me feel good and convinced me that I really had no excuse to ever order take out or cheat on my 30 because I “was too pressed for timeâ€. That said I am looking forward to being a slacker and reaping the benefits of all this cooking next week.

Meal 1 Braised curry chicken with sliced braised cabbage (I don't know why there are still leftovers but they need to go!)

Meal 2 Braised curry chicken with sliced braised cabbage (Finished it off, finally!)

Meal 3 Bo Kho from nom nom paleo's site, whipped turnips and steamed broccoli drizzled with ghee

Exercise: nope

Water: better than yesterday but still a few glasses short of hitting 90ozs

[simonec]

Nyx, i'm planning on making the Carribean Seafood Stew as well, glad to hear it's good.

where is your accupuncture clinic??? i haven't had accupuncture since i moved back to MA from FL, a little over 7 years ago, but i found it to highly effective. I know a chiropractor in my area (Weymouth), but haven't heard much about good accupuncturists on the south shore so am willing to go into Boston if necessary.

you can do this!

[Nyx]

where is your accupuncture clinic???

I volunteer at a coummuntiy acupuncture clinic in North Cambridge, so it's probably a bit too far for you to get too easily : ( I love my clinic and they've done great work getting my cycle back on track. I also love it because since it's community based they try to treat as many people as possible, which allows them to keep the rates low (between 20-40 dollars a visit). That way for anyone with a chronic condition, like myself, can concieveably not go broke trying to get healthy. All community acupuncture clinics are part of the people's organization of acupuncture (POCA) check out there site and see if there is a clinic near you (https://www.pocacoop.com/). I had no idea my clinic exsited until I found poca's site.

[simonec]

I volunteer at a coummuntiy acupuncture clinic in North Cambridge, so it's probably a bit too far for you to get too easily : ( I love my clinic and they've done great work getting my cycle back on track. I also love it because since it's community based they try to treat as many people as possible, which allows them to keep the rates low (between 20-40 dollars a visit). That way for anyone with a chronic condition, like myself, can concieveably not go broke trying to get healthy. All community acupuncture clinics are part of the people's organization of acupuncture (POCA) check out there site and see if there is a clinic near you (https://www.pocacoop.com/). I had no idea my clinic exsited until I found poca's site.

i have to check out POCA...i'd love to find a community based accupuncture clinic, i used to pay $50 a visit, and that was a discounted rate because i was friends with my accupuncturist. you can easily go broke trying to get healthy with the rates at some places.

just wanted to let you know...i found one in Quincy! so glad it exists.

[Nyx]

Catch up time!

Day 10 (Sunday)

Quick notes: Daylights Savings Time is my enemy. It exacerbated my already existing problem of not getting enough sleep. I started taking chelated magnesium on Thursday but I'm still having issues falling asleep at night. I'm not sure what's going on but I'm either going to switch to taking naturally calm or melatonin if it continues. Right now I'm averaging 6-7 hours a night and I know that's not ideal. Hopefully, my lack of sleep isn't a sign I'm doing something wrong.

Meal 1: was a mess , tried to eat the rest of the left over curry sauce with some veggies and left over steak bits I pan fried. The dish didn't come together and I barely ate more than 1/3 of it

Meal 2: Bo Kho, turnips and broccoli

Meal 3: 4 green sliders, marinara sauces and the last of the braised cabbage

Meal 3.5 was hungry again around 9, I think due to my poor breakfast, so I had another 3 green sliders in marinara sauce.*

*lesson, don't mess with breakfast*

[Nyx]

Day 11

As I predicted it would, Daylight Savings continued to wreak havoc on my sleep. Despite getting in bed at 10:30 my body protested. It knew that it was really 9:30 and it wasn't ready to sleep yet. I was really hoping that my last week of shortchanging myself by 1 or 2 hours of sleep every night would finally catch up with me and knock me out last night but no such luck. I ended up falling asleep at 1 am and getting up at 6:30 so that I could move my car for my downstairs neighbor. Booooooooooooo…….

Here's to getting 8+ hours tonight.

One other note, week 2 is shaping up to be much more psychologically challenging than I expected. Lots of intense visualizations of needing/drinking wine or a cocktail, particularly on Friday night because it was the kickoff to the weekend and a few times during real moments of stress during the weekend. It's weird how much my mind associates booze with reward or relief.

Meal 1: 1 soft boiled egg, beet greens sauteed in ghee (better than yesterday's breakfast but still not great. I was just in a rush to get out the door today)

Meal 2: Cup of Caribbean Stew side of steamed Japanese yams drizzled with ghee.

Meal 3: Chocolate Chili over sphaghetti squash

[Jessica M.]

Hmm. Wondering if my "sweet potatoes" are japanese yams. Are they kind of white on the insides? Hope you sleep better tonight. Sounds like you have been doing really well. I think I'll try making the green sliders this week! They sound good. :-)

[Nyx]

Hmm. Wondering if my "sweet potatoes" are japanese yams.

Are they purplish on the outside and white on the inside? If so, then they probably are. They are so deliciou! As much as I love sweet potatos and yams in general, japenese yams are my favorite!

[Jessica M.]

Yep. Very tasty!

[Nyx]

Day 12

Breakthrough!

Guys! I was sleepy last night when I got into bed at 11! And that wave of sleepiness led too…….. SLEEP in a reasonable amount of time!!!! I want to use all the exclamation marks right now but I won't.

But yes, either my new eating habits are finally clicking or more likely the magnesium tablets I've been taking are finally impacting me. Either way, I got a solid 7.5 hours of deep sleep and woke up feeling full of energy. Well, that's a lie, I woke up to my normal “wha, what's going on†mindset but after that I was much more alert than usual. Full disclosure I think it was ultimately the combo of solid sleep + a solid breakfast that accounts for my energy.

Other breakthroughs: my sense of smell much more sensitive these days! I started noticing it last week but didn't really make the connection until last night. This new improved nose is definitely a double edged sword. On one hand, I'm loving the whiffs of spices and coconut when I'm cooking. On the other, I've needed to walk away several times from chopping onions because it was burning my throat and eyes.

Lastly, I've been getting hungry earlier lately. During week one it felt like I could go 6 hours or more between meals and even then I ate more as a reminder to myself that human beings eat three times a day and not out of any real desire for food. But ever since Sunday, I can *just* make it to 5 hours before noticing that I want to eat sooner rather than later. My current theories on why this is are 1.) I'm still not doing the best with my breakfasts and need to hit a better ratio of protein, veggies and fat or 2.) I ovulated and my body is in “you could be pregnant mode†(I'm not) and it needs all the food/fuel.

Meal 1: two soft boiled eggs, and steamed yam with ghee

Meal 2: Chocolate Chili over spaghetti squash and a side of beet greens

Meal 3: All the things... I was pretty upset about something so I had a bite of all my leftovers that were heated up and out for guests we had over. So, Bo Kho, steamed zuchinni, roast beets, mashed turnips...

[simonec]

nyx, i know what you mean about the sense of smell...i love smelling all the seasonings as i cook, but there are some smells that i wish weren't so strong (neighbor's smoking, people wearing cheap perfume...)

[Jennifer Dent]

Nyx, I enjoyed reading your entires. Congrats on that good nights sleep! I'm on day 16 and can relate to your week 1 experience. Keep up the good work (and the yummy meals)!

[Nyx]

Nyx, I enjoyed reading your entires. Congrats on that good nights sleep! I'm on day 16 and can relate to your week 1 experience. Keep up the good work (and the yummy meals)!

Thanks Jennifer! I feel so much more like a real person now that I am sleeping better.

[Nyx]

Day 13

Had an emotionally upsetting night last night when I learned over dinner that two close friends of mine were getting a divorce. Really wanted to have a stiff drink to make the situation less awkward (I know that doesn't make sense but that was my reaction) but resisted. As it was I ended up unintentionally snacking when I wasn't hungry all evening because I needed something to do with my hands while they were over at our house.

Good news: This is the 2^nd night of deep sleep, so here's hoping I'm on a roll! Also I got happy belly back! Ate breakfast at 9 and felt full all morning until I had a tiny pang of hunger right before lunch at 2 pm Hopefully, this will continue through the afternoon and evening.

Random questions I'm thinking about: Should my meals be simpler? Are my portions to big? Stuff to ponder today….

Meal 1: two medium boiled eggs, turnip hash (really turnip fritters that fell apart), scoop of chocolate chili.

Meal 2: Steamed Cauliflower mashed in coconut oil and the last scoops of Bo Kho

Meal 3: Chicken breast from the roast chicken I made and so many beets! I need to remember that I ate them before I scare myself when I go to the bathroom tomorrow.