THE WHOLE30 COMES TO AN END!

Hooray! My W30 email today told me to do something celebratory tonight not only for my dad's birthday but also as a reward for a job well done. I taught tonight though, so, as far as relishing my W30 success was concerned, I was prepared for an anticlimactic evening.

But! I underestimated my guests! Which I should never do because they (you! YOU! GUYS!) are so rad. Lovely Naomi showed up a little early and mentioned that she'd been reading my blog and had also completed a Whole30 Challenge over a year ago. The floodgates were opened. Our class was smaller than expected - only 9 showed of 14 registered - and they were an exceptional group. Several of them had heard of W30, some had done it or experimented with other paleo diets - they all had experiences and opinions to share, all with a lot of openness and no judgment. It was a wonderful night for me. So not anticlimactic. Andrea, Josh, Naomi, Marless (sp?), Ron, Maria, Scott, Katie, and Dano: Thank you! You were all so animated, engaged, competent, and great at making and talking about food! (Ron - those carrots were unbelievable!) It was so nice to be able to share my current food baggage with you without making it all about me. (Which is what the last 30 days have been. And I'm a little tired of myself.) You made the end of my Whole30 a delight. So thank you thank you thank you. Come again! I especially love groups of men in their fifties! (Insert [wink emoticon] if I knew how to use emoticons. But as it is I don't even know how to use Instagram.)

As for the rest of you: thank you so much for reading my blog, which has taken self-indulgence to an entirely unprecedented level (the level without sugar) during the last 4+ weeks. You really are my good friends! As such, you probably wanted to know what I ate today.

Breakfast at 7:30 a.m. Kale, 2 eggs, knob of ghee, salsa, sauerkraut, 3 strawberries.

Not pictured: black half-caff coffee at about 11:30 a.m.

Lunch at 1:40 p.m. Spinach salad with sprouts, beets, carrots, kalua pork, herbed vinaigrette, and a cup of kombucha.

Dinner at 8:30 p.m. Sweet potato quesadilla of sorts (no cheese, used 2 plantain tortillas); 1 chicken apple sausage. A v. unphotogenic meal. The sausage looks like weird breadsticks. Drinking a cup of turkey stock as I type. I drink about 2 of those a day, maybe just one if it's warm out. Today I took a picture of it because it's Day 30.

Tomorrow will be mostly Whole30 but with DAIRY! I can't wait. I am going to have cream in my coffee, fry my eggs in butter, and devour cheese for dinner. Wish me luck and the opposite of indigestion. I'll do a little recap of what's been lost and what's been gained in this process. Thereafter, however, I will revert to original and curated recipes rather than just blabbering on about which ailments come out of remission as sugar, dairy, legumes, alcohol, et cetera reenter my diet and poison me forever. If you are interested in doing a Whole30 or just looking for more information on one fairly normal, typically healthy-eating, kitchen-savvy, mother-of-two, mostly vegetarian individual's experience completing the Whole30 challenge, I am happy to answer any questions you have. Feel free to email me. Thanks for listening! Being accountable to readers has helped loads. 

Days 26-29: One Day More!

Perhaps you need some musical accompaniment to get you as excited about where we're at as I am? Always at your service, my friends: kindly click here.

Hi! Happy Easter or Passover or Spring!

Hi yourself! And Happy Near-End of Whole30!

Thanks so much! I'm pretty stoked, like we all were in the late eighties. Except NEWSFLASH: because I want to make the most of my clean slate, I'm going to be essentially Whole30 for a couple more weeks as I gradually, with a great deal of deliberation and journaling, reintroduce foods. Full disclosure: as soon as I realized my transition might take a while, I started adding some things in before my 30 days were up. I know. Not v. W30 of me. You say cheating. I say methodically compromising.

Dude. What are you on about?

I consumed alcohol on Saturday and ate legumes on Sunday. He is Risen, after all. So instead of Easter candy, I enjoyed a tiny mimosa Saturday morning; and instead of Easter ham on Sunday, I had lentils for lunch, stew with beans in it for dinner, and a peanut butter Lara Bar after working out. The alcohol was a trip. Three sips in, I felt it v. pointedly and suddenly in the v. front of my head. This, according to the healthcare folks whose company I was enjoying even more than the mimosa, is to be expected, as the brain's frontal lobe is what the alcohol gets to first. It wasn't painful, just v. there. I also got buzzed-feeling and boneless about three minutes after those sips. It only lasted a little while and I recovered completely in under an hour.

The legumes were less noteworthy, except that I got a weird pain in my face near my left sinus. I don't know if it's related to food. It lasted all yesterday afternoon and evening and then went away overnight. I guess we'll see next time I try legumes. I have felt so great for the last couple of weeks that any ache or pain is v. acute and obvious. This is a big change from pre-W30, when I always had weird aches, pains, ailments. I am still stewing over what this all means, and what kind of food changes are sustainable for me. 

My reintroduction plan is tentatively as follows:

Day 28 Legumes

Days 29-30 W30

Day 31 Dairy

Days 32-33 W30

Days 34-35 Gluten-free grains

Days 36-37 W30

Day 38 Wheat

Days 39-40 W30

And, finally, what I've eaten while we've been taking a break from each other...

Day 26, Friday

Eggs and veggies for breakfast with a glass of mango kombucha. I had some strawberries and a tuna burger in the late afternoon.

Day 27, Saturday

Chicken livers for breakfast (heck yes! and probably never again!), with a side of kale, mushrooms, guacamole, sauerkraut, and a clementine. I needed the fruit to take away the chicken liver flavor in my mouth. Too much psychology and texture that early in the morning. But I did it. Which isn't nothing. Clearly, I'm a changed woman as I approach the close of my W30.

My favorite lunch: chicken pozole, baked sweet potato (a purple yam!), spinach, avocado, some salsa.

Green salad with Nom Nom Paleo's Kalua Pork, boiled yellow beets, sprouts, and herbed vinaigrette. A slice of potato rösti. (So, so good - it's like a giant french fry! I used ghee and pork fat.) I'm pretty sure I ate a hot dog earlier in the evening too because the pork took forever.

Day 28, Easter Sunday

Blueberry Eggs for breakfast with a glass of mango kombucha. Egg flipping didn't go so smoothly.

I had lentils for lunch and a big salad. Also had a few deviled eggs that had Miracle Whip in them (and accordingly a whole slew of non-compliant foods - my first official cheat!).

Dinner was a big plate of fresh vegetables, some fruit, and a bowl of vegetable stew with kalua pork and some beans in it, plus the rest of my kombucha. Super hit the spot.

Day 29, Monday

Breakfast at 7:30 a.m. Kale and leftover rösti hash, 3 eggs and some ghee, sauerkraut.

Lunch at 1:30 p.m. A handful of olives and a big spinach salad with sprouts, purple cabbage, 2 tuna burgers, avocado, and salsa. A slice of paleo banana bread with chocolate chips (see end of post).

Fan-tas-tic dinner at 5:30 p.m. Kalua pork tacos with plantain tortillas, avocado, and a delicious little slaw I threw together: 2-3 cups thinly sliced purple cabbage, 6 chopped dates, 1 grated carrot, 1/2 teaspoon salt, about a teaspoon of ground coriander, juice of 1 lime, 1 tablespoon olive oil, handful of minced cilantro. (Amber: make this!)

I've also dabbled v. cautiously in sugar. The deviled eggs on Sunday had sugar in them (Miracle Whip - high fructose corn syrup to be specific). Then today I had that paleo bread which has all W30 compliant ingredients except for some chocolate chips (those chocolate chips made it v. tasty). So, by normal quick bread standards, barely any sugar. By W30 standards, a lot. I got a crazy headache tonight that put me out of commission for about three hours. Was it the sugar? I don't know. But I don't typically get migraines. It also could have been caffeine withdrawals (I drank a lot of coffee this weekend and did not today), but I've had caffeine headaches many times before and this was distinct from and much more debilitating than those. I will continue to dabble. I'm taking weird notes. I'm excited about cheese. I'm not going to inhale a scone any time soon.

One day more. One good night's sleep is in order.

Day 25: No Snack Success!

Food goal of the day achieved. That feels good. I veered away from my ambitious meal plan and settled on a simpler dinner than my Indian-inspired feast would have been. I overcooked some bison sausages by using this typically fool-proof recipe. (I guess I'll stick to chicken sausages next time. Note: using really excellent balsamic vinegar makes a big difference here.)

Breakfast at 7:30. I went CRAZY and skipped the eggs today. You heard me. Leftover pork tenderloin hash with kale, sweet potatoes, potatoes and zucchini, all fried in a little ghee.

Lunch at 1:45. This is my dream lunch. I reheated chicken pozole, frozen spinach, and sweet potato in the microwave and topped it all with a big spoonful of Wedge guacamole. Mango kombucha  on the side there (which did not make me sick the way juice evidently does - no juice or sugar in ingredient list (just mango puree), and only 12 g carbs versus 36 in the juice).

Dinner at 6. Overcooked bison sausage, slow-cooked onions, green beans, salad with baby kale, tomatoes, purple cabbage, pan sauce from sausage and onions as dressing, and a spoonful of coconut oil.

It was a busy day with busy children. We got sunshine and play time and friend time and family time. I washed my children's feet and told them about Jesus. I ate well and anticipate sleeping well tonight. I won't be posting tomorrow and maybe not Saturday either, but I'll document everything so that I can report back asap. 

Day 24: Portion Uncontrol

I still am never hungry. That is the most striking aspect of my W30 experience, because I used to think I was hungry all the time. Throughout the first week of the Whole30 Challenge, I ate a ton three times a day. I just couldn't believe I could last for 4-16 hours without eating, so I'd load up on both protein and vegetables during breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Without much thought, my portions gradually got smaller by week 2. It became subconsciously clear how much I needed to eat in order to stay satiated until my next meal, and because I wasn't eating the kind of foods that are easy to overeat (e.g. bread, cheese, peanut butter, smoothies), I didn't have the inclination to overeat. It was all v. natural and that was cool. I felt proud of my body for knowing what it needed. 

I have been so proud of my body that I've gotten a little loosey-goosey lately, taking it all a bit for granted. Example: this morning I had some iced coffee to finish up. I thought I'd stir in some leftover coconut milk but it was too thick to stir in, so I threw it in the blender. That wasn't v. good. Way too watery and bitter. So I added half a banana and a spoonful of almond butter. Some of you might call this a smoothie. Guess why smoothies aren't allowed on the Whole30? Because your clean-eating body can only handle so much non-protein food in one go! And liquids are so quickly digested. It was horrible, a la the Naked Juice experience. Totally felt sick after like three sips. Portion control is tricky with liquid food, especially when you're body has grown unaccustomed to it.

I ate my real breakfast and then kept the rest of the smoothie as my PWO food. I tolerated (even enjoyed) it much better that way.

Even though I am sensitive to changes to what or when I eat right now, my recovery time after the deviations and their discontents is super short. I feel this is significant. A sign of enhanced health perhaps. Which reminds me: I've never felt better in my life. Yep. I said it. I am struggling with what that means in the long run. Or even the short run. Only one week left!

Breakfast at 8 a.m. Sautéed kale, mushrooms, and zucchini with sauerkraut and scrambled eggs with magic green sauce. PWO offending "coffee" at 10:30 a.m. See above.

Lunch: salad with chicken, sprouts, cabbage, kale, pepitas, carrot, tomato, olive oil, vinegar.

3 p.m. Almonds and plantain chips for snack. And the sweetest tangerine of my life (no picture).

Dinner at 6 pm. Pork tenderloin, squash-apple compote, and cabbage leftovers; olives; roasted sweet potatoes and potatoes.

During my final week, I am going to work on being v. strict about not snacking. I know how to eat properly at meals so that I don't need to snack. Nibbling is primarily to alleviate boredom, antsy-ness, or frustration, I've found. No snacks and minimal nuts/seeds; sticking to those primarily as PWO food or part of my lunch protein.