Lolo's Whole30 Journey

[Shongololo]

Today was day 4, and so far, so good. I have been reading a lot about Paleo over the last few months and decided last week to get started on a Whole30. I didn't have a good start as we had a very social weekend and I needed to get my head around this new way of eating. So on Monday I officially started again. I am an endurance ultramarathon runner and so I am keen to see how paleo eating will improve my performance. A key outcome I am hoping for is also to lose weight. I don't have much to lose - but the lighter you are when running long distances the better. And my BF is higher than what I would think it should be.

I currently weigh 55kgs and would like to be closer to 50kgs. I am 156 m tall (5'2")

I live in South Africa, so the foods are slightly different here and when I am awake most of you will be asleep.

3 weeks ago I completed an ultra marathon, and so I am still the the recovery phase and not doing too much exercise. I should have picked it up a bit by the end of the 30 days.

Today my meals were as follows:

B: Smoothie - pineapple, apple, coconut cream, ginger

S: Coffee with coconut cream and closed handful of almonds

L: Biltong (our equivalent of beef jerky)... it was so delicious I had a bit too much, meant to be just a snack - but I got too hungry and it was late. so I turned it into lunch, some fruit salad

S: cocoa made with plain cocoa powder and coconut cream

D: lamb stew - made in the slow cooker. Delicious but VERY fatty. (Just not used to eating all this fat)

Anyway, all good soo far, and I am amazed at how I can go for ages with out feeling hungry.

Let's hope the rest of the days are as good.

[Tom Denham]

Welcome Lolo!

Your meals sound like diet meals. If you are serious about losing weight, you need to trust the process and eat real meals three times per day. You need protein at breakfast. A fruit smoothie is not adequate nutrition and sets you up to be hungry. The biltong at lunch finally gave you some protein, but I would bet you needed more and you need to eat your veggies. I am assuming you had veggies in the lamb stew.

This way of eating really is different, but I promise it works. I lost 2 pounds per month for 15 months eating full meals.

[Shongololo]

Thank you Tom. You gave me a fright, because I didn't think my meals were too small. I am quite a small person and so don't need a humungous amount of food. Yesterday seemed like I ate a lot, and yes the stew had a lot of vegetables in it.

The whole idea of eating so much fat is a very new one to me. I have spent many years trying to avoid it. But perhaps that is where I have always gone wrong. Not eating enough at meals and then picking and being in denial about how much I have really eaten.

Today I will try and beef up my meals.