Halfway Marker: Paleo 30 Day Challenge!

Stir fry vegetables...always with a meet and a little fruit.

Today is day 15. Wow. What do I say?! I can't believe I have gone 15 days without sugar, dairy, bread or grains! Amazing.

Results so far. Let's start with the positive.
Chris has lost 5 pounds and one spot on his belt inward without doing anything different except eating Paleo. Chris lost only a pound this last week, but this last week is when the belt went in a notch. He is beginning the training classes at crossfit, but they are not actual workouts. He is just learning proper form and stuff. So, his workouts are essentially the same (A mix of Hasfit, his personal weight training, a little light running and intense biking and an occasional Crossfit WOD with the neighbor). He feels the same, but I think he appears leaner. He is 5 ft 8 inches and now 160lbs. He was not out to lose any weight, mind you. He is muscle mass, not fat at all.

I have lost 2 1/2 pounds. I lost a 1/2 pound this week...so much better than the 2 lbs I lost last week. I feel my stomach is maybe a bit less full looking...? Everyone has their body dislike areas and mine is my lower abs. I can see my upper ab muscles, but my lower abs I have never liked. This may sound funny because I am such a small person, but I feel like I have lost my butt padding a little. I know, it is only 2 pounds. But, I did not have 2 extra pounds. I am 5'4' and 99 pounds now. I know, however, given one cheat day, I will be back to my 100-101 range. :) No worries. With that said, I do feel a bit learner, like more of my weight is muscle vs body fat. I don't know. I do know that I feel more confident wearing formed fitted things now versus before. I know, I am weird.

FEELING
I can't speak for Chris, but I am still exhausted. I have problems making it through my night shift without having to pace to stay awake. I have so little energy that I have had to scale back my 1 hr workouts (I typically work out for a hour, mixing up cardio and weight training, 5-6 times a week. When I work, my workouts our scaled back to a half hour if I can handle even that on 4 hours sleep). I usually run twice a week. On Saturday, my feet were moving, but I felt like my head had to will them to move. It was a weird sensation.
I feel anxious, like I am waiting for something, much of the time. I also feel energized (by starvation?) for some reason. I feel my house has not been cleaner in a while. Weird. Come 8:30 though, I am ready for bed. Kids in bed...and so am I! I just can't keep my eyes open another second. Sleep comes and goes...so I can't say that my sleep has improved (as many have reported on this diet). I have horrible cravings for things I never ate before. Get this, during Mass Saturday night (a good Homily at that), I was thinking about Cheetos and a chocolate shake! Seriously! I typically do not eat Cheetos or get chocolate shakes! What is going on with me!
There were a few days when Chris was getting up at midnight to eat because he woke up hungry. We have been so busy different activities, our dinner is 7 or later some nights. So, he has not had to wake up to eat (although I have to wake up to go to the bathroom and never return to sleep some nights!).
That is another thing. If you do not have access to a bathroom, do not go paleo. I don't know if I am still detoxing, it is all the water I am drinking (which is about 50 oz a day...still not enough) or the Paleo diet...but the restroom and I are close pals lately. It is easier to go, too. That is all I will say...enough said, too.

Learned
 We have learned more about healthy eating, food prep, better cooking. We have to cook and prepare every meal. We made Lobster for Chris' last day. In the past, it would have been Mamas pizza. It is a toss up which is better. Right now, Mamas Pizza sounds amazing. Anyway, I have made the paleo chocolate chip cookies a few times. Chris loves them. I'm not set on them. I have it set up through Amazon to have our Paleo Larabars autoshipped to us once a month! I know, crazy! But, I was shopping all over the place for these things and they were so expensive! If you sign up to have them autoshipped, they are cheaper and I don't have to go hunting for them (like the hunters and gatherers!). Oh, and check out the ingredients on labels. Here is an example.

Larabar Label: See dates, almonds, unsweetened apples, walnuts and rasins. Thats it! All natural stuff.

Goldfish Ingredients. That is insane. Look at all that crap in there! Now, I won't buy them.

I had bought the kids snack cakes for 99Cents at HyVee on Sale for dessert and treats in their school lunches. I usually homemade a cookie or something, but I can't do that without eating some dough. Seriously, the smell of a brownie would be the end for me. I bought these snack cakes and Chris looked at the ingredients. We about died. It looked like I was feeding them poison. Maybe I am?! What is all that stuff in there?! Here, check it out.

What is all of that stuff?! If it has that many ingredients, I will not buy it anymore.

Negatives:
Cooking, constant chopping and food prep, and shopping at so many stores. I now know where to buy things. For example, Whole Foods (which is super far from us) and Bakers both carry almond flour/meal. Whole foods only carries the paleo chocolate chunks. Farmers markets are perfect to buy the veges (for now, but we only have that for a couple more weeks. BOO!). I buy a lot of fruit from HyVee or Walmart, but fish, not farmed, I can only find at whole foods or Hyvee. All of the fish at Costco was farmed. So annoying! Chicken and bacon that are Paleo are also difficult to find. The lack of energy is a big negative. And, the time spent shopping, meal prep and cooking is a huge negative. And, I am sure this is way more expensive. I'm not sure as I was spending a lot of money in the cereal aisle before, now we are eating eggs.

Challenge:
This week Chris returns to work away from home. He has been working from home, an easier environment to prepare meals in. This will be a bigger deal for him. I am thinking he may have a cheat day in there, too. Who knows? New job is always questionable. He will probably drop more weight this week I am thinking.

Next paleo update will be when we complete our challenge! Come joins us on the clean side of eating!