Days 2 and 3.

I need to retract a few things in my first post.  I wrote that before I clearly  understood Whole30.  Whole 30 is a strict month with no exceptions.  If I choose to incorporate those exceptions into my daily eating habits after, that'll be up to me.  So, nix my oatmeal exception and the "nutrition" goal.  LUCKILY, I didn't actually eat the oats yesterday, and have been fully compliant for the past two days.  No starting over for me yet!



I. Feel. Like. Crap.  

They said this would happen, so I can't say that I'm all that surprised.  But that doesn't make it suck any less.  At least I have been reassured through the timeline published by Whole9 that I'm not alone.  On the one hand, I am psyched about my compliancy...on the other, I just feel icky.  It's kind of like when you put antiseptic on a wound:  I have to keep reminding myself that the unpleasantness is just crap leaving my body.  Breath in, breath out.  Repeat.

Yesterday was awesome.  Did you know that you can cook scrambled eggs in the microwave??  I normally eat breakfast at work, so I brought a carton of pure egg whites and some Wild Planet sustainably caught tuna fish.  Poured some of the egg whites into a bowl, microwaved for 1:00, stirred, microwave another 15 seconds and poof!  Scrambled eggs.  And I think they taste great.  Maybe I don't have a sophisticated palate when it comes to eggs, but I think that's working in my favor.  I mixed in the tuna and it was deeeelish (should have added some spinach.  Darnit!).  I was a bit concerned that I was going to irritate the people in the cubes around me (eggs and tuna aren't the best smelling foods...), but I asked a few colleagues later and they said they didn't smell anything.  Awesome!  

I realized at some point during the day that while I felt like I had grocery shopped enough to prepare myself, I had no idea what the heck I was going to make for dinner.  I had a bunch of Whole30 approved foods, but nothing that went together.  And although I have some awesome cookbooks on order that will be here tomorrow, I need some food now.  Salad and chicken is not going to cut it.

After looking through quite a few recipes, I resorted to the fact that I was going to need to go back to the grocery store no matter what.  I found this curry recipe from Everyday Paleo and decided to make that.  After a monumentally expensive trip to the co-op I had everything I needed to make the curry, plus a few items that seemed to be a staple in a lot of these recipes.  And I was NOT disappointed.  That curry was gooooood.  I made it with some beef, which I picked because it looked kind of right and it was on sale.  Turns out it's not a type of meat that's ideal for this sort of dish, but it was ok anyway.  I know seriously little about different cuts of meat.  I should really study up on that...

Luckily, I had a broomball game to get to immediately following dinner so I had no time to crave my usual after-dinner treat.  For those of you who do not live in a state with a reasonably cold winter, you are totally missing out on the lovely game of broomball.  It's fantastic.  I'm terrible, but luckily my teammates don't care.  And sometimes I can fake it.

This morning was a bit of a rough one.  I was feeling very pleased with my breakfast (another batch of scrambled egg whites, this time with some breakfast sausage I picked up from the co-op that has no sugar added!  I never thought that would be so difficult to find.  Again, forgot a veggie.  Darnit.), and then I went to a meeting where one of my colleagues brought a belated holiday gift.
  Three stinkin' pounds of chocolate stuff.  I couldn't tell you specifically what's in it, because I spent the next two hours trying to keep it from staring at me keep it out of sight.  But, when you're in a small conference room with only a few people, that's a difficult task.  I'm glad to say that I refrained!  And I kept my coworker, a fellow Whole30er for the month, from eating any as well.  I unloaded the chocolates to the tables in the breakroom, but kept the tin.  It's the perfect size for holding some of my crafting stuff!  Maybe my knitting needles. Crafty.

Lunch and dinner today will consist of some pre-made meats I found at the counter at the co-op and some not-very-exciting veggies.  I got pretty excited about this kale recipe I found, but then couldn't find bacon without added sugar.  Guess I'll have to do something else with the kale.  Boo.

I'm really looking forward to getting my cookbooks tomorrow!  Hopefully I'll be able to share some of the good recipes soon.

Day 1.

Well, here I am.  January 1, 2013.  Today is the day I change my eating habits for real.  I know people say that all the time, so I guess you'll just have to trust that I am doing it this year.  Seriously.  I will.  (If I say it enough, will that make it easier??)

Nope.  Today, with a few of my nearest and dearest, I am starting the Whole 30 program. Notice I didn't say DIET.  It is a diet in the sense that it has guidelines around what I will eat, but the word diet intimates that it is for a definite period of time.  I plan on this being a major lifestyle change.  

In a nutshell, the Whole 30 program eliminates certain food groups which could be having a negative impact on my overall health and fitness.  I know there is some truth to this because I did a compact, somewhat legitimate version of this awhile ago and felt awesome.  My skin looked great (and normally never does), my stomach had no digestive issues (that's an occasional nuisance), and I had a ton of energy.  

So what happened?  Summer happened, that's what. Suddenly people were baking with their fresh fruits, grilling with their sugar-filled marinades, and drinking on patios.  Three things which make my willpower cower and eventually cave.  This year, my goal is to make it such a habit that by summer I won't even think twice.  Maybe I won't even like sugar by that time...people say it can happen.  I'm not a believer yet.

Why now??

Great question.  For the obvious reasons, January 1 is a great day to start: fresh starts and clean slates are in the air, and (more importantly) the holidays are over.  I do admire those who want to get a head start and begin their challenges sometime in December, but that would be setting me up for failure.  It would not have worked.

I'm trying to get away from processed things in life.  I've recently discovered Norwex cleaning products and they've REALLY changed my life.  I love cleaning almost all surfaces in my house with nothing other than water and silver.  If you haven't discovered the awesomeness that is Norwex yet, check it out.  Message me if you need some info.  It's great stuff.  Have you ever noticed how many ingredients are in shredded cheese?  Seriously...take a look.  Go to your fridge, or look at the back of a bag the next time you're in the grocery store.  There are WAY too many ingredients in that bag for me.  They add starches to the bags to keep the cheese from sticking together.  But when you're buying shredded cheese, do you also really want starches?  YUCK.  There are too many ingredients in processed foods these days, and it scares me.  I feel like everyday lately I hear about someone else I know being diagnosed with cancer, or crohn's, or some other awful kind of ailment.  I have no proof that there is a definite relationship between these things, but I think there is.  And that's enough for me.  And really, it's not like cutting out those things can hurt me.  I'm excited to reset my metabolism by getting these icky things out of my body.

For a non-obvious reason, I am getting married in 14 weeks.  14 WEEKS.  YIKES!  And HOORAY!  YIKES and HOORAY at the same time!  The Whole 30 program will accomplish at minimum two things for me:  I will lose some weight that I put on in all of 2012 December, AND help my healthier body deal with stress better.

What now??

Well, here I go!  Yesterday I went grocery shopping a little blind, which was a very bad idea.  I'll probably need to go again tomorrow, because I got such random stuff that I'm not sure can really make a meal.  That, or I'll be eating a lot of chicken salads in the next few days.  I have some cookbooks on order from Amazon, but they won't get here until Friday, which is Day 4.  That could be a lot of salads.  And I am NOT a salad person.

I signed up for the Whole 30 Daily, which sends you daily inspiration and ideas for one month hoping to keep you on track.  I'm convinced it'll be the best $15 ever spent.  I'm going to need help.

I already love these emails.  The first one they send has an entire section on how to do this alone if you don't live alone--which I don't.  My fiance is very supportive of my decision to drastically change my eating habits, but hasn't necessarily agreed to comply with me.  Additionally, we have his 7 year old daughter half of the time and she loves her some PB and J.  So we can't really get rid of everything in our cupboards that's not Whole 30 approved.  However, I do most of the cooking so that should work in my favor! Otherwise I think I'll take their suggestion to have separate sections in the pantry and fridge for non-Whole 30 items.  Maybe I can cover them with a dark cloth so I won't even be able to see them.  Crafty...

Being the very goal-oriented person that I am, I have also set some goals for myself with this program.  Using their S.M.A.R.T. guidelines, here is what I came up with:

• Nutrition:  I will be entirely compliant with Whole 30 by day 21.
• Exercise:  I will get to Crossfit 3 days and bike or walk another 2 days per week.
• Stress Management: I will do housework for 20 minutes 4 days per week.

There they are.  And here are my explanations:

Nutrition:  I know I've raved about Whole 30 and how it's awesome and I'm excited to get rid of processed foods...yadda yadda.  So it should be easy to just cut all that stuff out cold turkey--right?  No.  It won't be.  Some of these foods are a very big part of my life at the moment, and have been for 27 years.  It's going to be challenging to cut them out, and I feel like giving myself the best chance to succeed is to cut some of them out slowly.  As of today, I'm done with:

• Sugar (real or artificial, including honey, maple syrup, and any other sneaky forms manufacturers like to attempt to conceal in the ingredient listings of products)
• Grains (except steel cut oats--see exceptions)
• Legumes (see exceptions)
• Dairy (see exceptions)
• White potatoes
• Exception #1: I eat steel cut oats in the morning.  I love them dearly.  I buy these awesome frozen packages of them from Costco where they are already cooked and portioned into the perfect amount for breakfast.  I'm already going to have to rethink how I eat lunch and dinner, so I'm going to wait to adjust my breakfast until I have a good handle on the other two meals.  The way I see it, it's not like I said I eat frosted flakes every morning.  Steel cut oats only breaks the grain rule, since there is no sugar added.
• Exception #2: Per Whole 30 guidelines, some legumes are allowed.  Green beans, snow peas, and sugar snap peas are more "pod" than "bean," so they're ok.  Whew--I love those things!
• Exception #3: Per Whole 30 guidelines, minimally processed foods like applesauce, coconut milk, tomato sauce, and chicken broth are all ok.  Just be careful to find ones with no sugar added...which is tricky!  I can no longer get my chicken broth at Target, because all of the brands they carry add sugar.  But Whole Foods carries a brand with no sugar added and you really cannot tell the difference.
• Exception #4: Per Whole 30 guidelines, clarified butter or ghee is allowed.  They have a whole schpeal on butter on the website, which can be found here.  I plan to clarify my own butter in the future, but for now I found some (very pricey) ghee at the local co-op. Since bread is dead to me and I hardly ever cooked with butter to begin with, I think my current jar should last awhile.
• By no means are either of these lists exhaustive, and I'm sure I'll come across other things in the very near future which I hadn't considered.  My goal is to become a little more Whole 30 compliant everyday until hopefully I'm entirely compliant.  As in the case of the steel cut oats, that might mean phasing some things out of my diet instead of the cold-turkey approach.

Exercise: I crossfit.  I love it.  It's the first thing I can ever remember that has made me want to go to the gym.  It's challenging, intense, fun, motivating, optionally competitive, and awesome.  But I also need some additional cardio.  My body responds really well to weightlifting, not as much to cardio.  And when I say "walk," I mean powerwalk.  Heart-pumping, arms swinging, out-of-breath type walking.  We live a block away from a lake which has a 3.1 mile circumference...the perfect venue!  Now the temperature just needs to get above zero for that to be an option.

Stress management: Yes, I am aware this actually sounds like it'd cause MORE stress than less.  However, I get stressed out by messes.  Well, the mess might not stress me out as much as the idea of how much work needs to go into cleaning UP the big mess.  Currently, one of our guest rooms is filled with clean clothes that really just need to be ironed lightly and hung up.  My desk has all sort of organized chaos going on, and our room is full of folded, clean clothes that need to be put away.  All together, these things are a big job.  However if I can do 20 minutes roughly every other day, I should be able to get caught up soon and stay caught up with other household chores easily.

So there's my start.  I'm currently doing my "before" photos, so I can have visual proof every month that what I'm doing is making a difference.  I'm excited!  2013 is going to be a great year!