Whole 30 Update

Day 23 of Whole30 has begun!

According to the timeline, I should be mid-Tiger Blood stage and over the Day 21 "I'm So Over This" hump.  I definitely had a few "I'm So Over This" moments last week and I don't really feel all "Tiger Blood Hear Me Roar" but I have noticed that I am not passing out from being so tired by 8:30 pm.

Challenges
The last week was so much better than the week previous in terms of challenges.  I was really nervous about last week because my husband was going to be out of town 6 of the days/nights and I was worried I was not going to be able to keep up with meals, etc much less keep our kids alive and get to work on time :)  We made it!

The biggest challenge I had was pancakes.  I know, #firstworldproblems.  We started incorporating a "breakfast for dinner" one night a week several months ago and I let my kids pick what we have.  They either pick pancakes or waffles and last Wednesday it was pancakes.  My love for pancakes runs deep.  I REALLY wanted some of those pancakes!!!!!!!!!  Alas, I stuck with my eggs.

Overall, it is getting easier for meal ideas and meals to come together.

My digestive system has yet to adapt to Whole30.  Digestive distress is not uncommon according to the Whole30 authors (and billions of blog posts on the subject).

Surprises
At some point in the last week, I started to feel full from meals.  HALLELUJAH.  The magic in this, I think, is fat, particularly at lunch.  I have taken to eating an avocado or having a coconut milk based soup with my lunch.

I ate a STRAWBERRY!  Strawberries have been a large oral allergy of mine since around college.  I tried one last week, had no reaction so continued to eat them.  That is a nice perk.

I ate a PEAR!  (see Strawberry)

I did not miss rice with my stir fry.  I made a really delicious sesame chicken stir fry on Friday night for dinner.  I made rice for the fam and I didn't even miss the rice!

Cravings

• Pickles
• Banana peppers

I haven't checked Whole Foods yet, but do you know that no varieties of pickles or banana peppers (as in the jarred/pickled kind) that were at my local grocery store are Whole30 compliant?  Believe me, as I checked every single variety (to the chagrin of my husband and children).

• Hummus - Legumes are one of the banished foods :)

• Brats

I also checked every organic variety of sausage/brat at Woodmans and every single one said "contains less than 2% solution of....sugar"  I almost cheated on that one last night figuring in the "less than 2%".  But, I stuck with my hamburger.

• TORTILLA CHIPS

• KETCHUP

Whole30 compliant ketchup exists.  I just haven't made it to Whole Foods to get some.  I didn't initially buy any because I typically do not really eat ketchup all that much.

Workouts
So far the biggest surprise for me with this whole thing is the impact on running.  I was expecting to feel sluggish and slow but on the contrary my runs this month have felt amazing.  I am not entirely attributing that to Whole 30, but there must be some small impact at least.  I am really curious about the impact of this type of diet on running, particularly after reading Tina Muir's post.

Other
Holy eggs.  Last week, I bought an 18 pack of eggs on Sunday and went to Costco on Thursday to get a 24 pack and again bought 18 yesterday. I am eating eggs all.the.time.  Good thing I love them!

I also broke into a Lara Bar stash that my brother-in-law bought for me.  LaraBars are technically whole30 approved, but they are sorta sanctioned cheating so I was trying not to eat them.  Sometimes, a girl's gotta have a coconut cashew bar, y'know?!

My face is looking good, so much so that my husband said "Your face looks better".  (A man of so many words, no?!).  I mean, it's not glowy-amazing, but much improved.

So, one week to go!  After my 30 days are up, I am planning on doing the reintroduction plan since the whole reason I did this was to figure out if I had any food sensitivities that were contributing to symptoms.  This adds ten days onto the whole ordeal.  I have decided to let the results of the reintroduction guide me as to "the future".  Several people have asked me if I am going to keep this up just so I can eat strawberries/almonds/apples/etc.  Eating according to the Whole30 rules is not sustainable for me.  It is not worth my sanity to try to keep up with this.  The only reason I have been successful is because there is an endpoint!

That said, I likely will not go entirely back to the way I ate before.  My early prediction is that gluten will be the troublemaker.  The fact that my mom has Celiac may be heavily influencing me on this one, but that is my hypothesis.

Stay tuned!