Our journey of eating paleo, sort of started by accident. Josh and I went through Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University to get our finances in order. The program is wonderful! We paid off all of our (my) student loan debt, all credit card debt and became completely debt free except the mortgage. We were able to follow his steps and built up a decent emergency fund and even began thinking about and taking action toward our retirement. Dave recommends a bunch of different things to keep spending in check. He recommends using Emeals to help keep grocery spending to a minimum. Josh wanted us to try it out and I reluctantly agreed. I got onto the website and was given all these options on which meal plan I would like to sign up for. I saw "paleo" and was like "hmmm I wonder what on earth that is." I took a look and liked what I saw. I ordered the paleo meal plan and then I started to research it in detail.
Everything, well almost everything, I read about paleo I liked. Just like everything else in life, I often wonder about how God intended us to view and use food and nutrition. Did God really intend for us to eat processed foods changed from its original form? Is there something lacking in His creation of fruits, vegetables, plants, and animals that would drive us to eat things that don't even resemble natural food? Well of course nothing God created is lacking, and so eating a "natural" diet made a lot of sense to me. The modern American diet is a diet based on convenience and instant gratification. High in sugar, processed carbs and "bad" fats; the most commonly consumed food in our current culture are manufactured and engineered to stimulate the part of the brain that is most active during the pleasure sensation, addictions and overindulging. This shouldn't be shocking though, because in every way it can, our culture promotes the individual to maximize pleasure with a disregard to the consequences. Making food choices out of a "need" for convenience or instant gratification leads to a very very sick and diseased life. I know this first hand.
The majority of my life I have been overweight and obese. At 5'6" I tipped the scale in 2009 at a whopping 255lbs. I started making major changes in the way I ate in December of that year. I had a gastric sleeve procedure done which helped me restrict how much I was able to eat. I switched from white breads, pastas and rice to whole wheat and brown, and cut out sugary drinks. Even though I lost a lot of weight, over 100lbs, I still was not "healthy." I felt better, but anyone would feel better after losing an entire person's worth of weight! I did not start to feel healthy until after we started eating Paleo in 2012.
The first changes in transitioning to paleo were MAJOR. We had a 180 switch on our outlook of fat intake. Instead of always choosing low fat, we stopped worrying about keeping track of how much fat we were eating and instead became hyper-vigilant about what TYPE of fat we were eating. No more vegetable oils, corn oil or processed oils. Instead we started using naturally occurring fats like fat found in meat (ghee, grassfed butter, and my favorite: BACON GREASE), first cold press of olives and coconuts and other seeds and nuts. Fatty fish, nuts, and avocados are other awesome sources of naturally occurring "God-made" fats.
The next huge change was getting rid of the grains. OUCH! This was pretty crazy, especially considering that Josh and I were making these changes not only for us, but for the kids too. No bread, rice, pasta, corn, cereals. You know, the stuff that we feed our kids ALL THE TIME! (Thank God we started these changes young because the kids have done amazingly well!)
The third big change was switching from using refined sugar, high fructose corn syrup and anything with those two in it, to using only local honey and pure 100% maple syrup. This step wasn't too bad though. The hardest change (for me anyway) was getting rid of any and all artificial sweeteners. I was drinking almost a gallon of crystal light tea a day which is full of Aspartame. There are 5 major foods that stimulate that part of the brain responsible for overeating and addictions: Bread, Rice, Pasta, Cereal and Potatoes. But there is 1 thing that trumps them all and stimulates that part of the brain much much more; artificial sweeteners. Sheer will power is the only way to quit it. It was tough. Headaches, moodiness and unbelievable cravings bombarded me the first month quitting artificial sweeteners.
The last 2 changes someone has to make in order to go fully paleo, are getting rid of legumes and dairy. We are not too strict about this. No one drinks any dairy in our house. I became lactose intolerant to milk and ice cream :( after the twins were born, and the kids don't tolerate dairy milk too well either. We drink almond milk. Cheese and grassfed butter, however, are still a part of our diet. I am a cheese-a-holic and am working on that. We also don't eat a ton of beans. I will however, occasionally use beans in taco soup or chili. I believe the reason legumes and beans are restricted on a strict paleo diet is because beans were not consumed regularly until after the agricultural revolution and therefor our Paleolithic Ancestors (which the paleo diet is based on) would not have consumed them. I'm not too strict on this rule, but again we don't eat beans too often. So if you go strictly paleo you may have to modify some of the recipes you find here because I will occasionally use cheese, butter, and beans.
The first 2 or 3 weeks of us going paleo were unbelievable. I lost weight without trying and so did Josh. The kids adapted really well. They love veggies and so I just substituted extra veggies and fruit for the grains we got rid of. I was never big on giving the kids a bunch of sugar filled stuff before. So they didn't really miss out on that either. Our energy levels were better and so was our "regularity" with digestion and elimination. The third weekend after starting paleo, we went to a family function where they served Gumbo, white rice, potato salad and sweet tea. We splurged and enjoyed the time with family. But as soon as we got home we regretted it! Our bodies were not used to all that anymore and let us know! After being on paleo, you realize that you feel so much better than before. But what's crazy is that you weren't even aware before that you felt bad in the first place because it was just "the way things are". I hope you enjoy that "Ah-ha" moment too!
So we started paleo in 2012 and have had our ups and downs. The last 6 months have been terrible. We have been eating really poorly. But all of that is over and we are already enjoying the fruits of this Paleo re-transition.
Good luck to you as you go paleo. It is doable and it is worth it, even if you have kids.
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