My caveman and I are about 75% into our Whole30, and here’s some new thoughts I’ve come up with since my mid-program recap.
I’m not craving junk food nearly as much as I expected, and most of what I’m craving is based on timing and location. Like a habit I’ve had of eating jellybeans while watching UFC. Or popcorn at the movies. Or buying ice cream bars once a week at the grocery store. Or going to the health food store every day I have a deadline so I can get a quick caffeine/sugar/chocolate fix. I’ll have momentary glimpses (or scents, or memories) of specific items and miss them, but it’s not nearly as bad as I’d thought it would be. I am not even counting down days or anything!
Paleo works much better with exercise. This probably seems like a no-brainer, but my last 30-day experiment was right after I’d finished an intensive 16-week powerlifting program and I didn’t really work out very much. I didn’t see anywhere near the results I am now. Some of this might be because Whole30 is a bit stricter (we added a chocolate bar or two a week the first time), but I really think working out plays a large factor. (However, working out without changing one’s diet is pretty ineffective.)
Meal plans are not for everyone. I’m getting tired of following a strict meal plan. Super glad that we agreed to do it, but I’m looking forward to a bit more flexibility. However, before the Whole30 there was a bit too much flexibility. We planned out dinners, but not lunches or breakfasts or snacks. This made it easy to say there was nothing to eat and go to the corner store to pick up junk.
Improvements continue! My recovery time, overall mood and body composition continue to improve. The changes are less dramatic than at first, but still happening relatively quickly. It’ll be interesting to see when this plateaus and how it changes over time.
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