Some Whole 30 Information

I've been out on the Forums at the Whole 30 site.  Today I saw this...

Snacking is discouraged for the following reasons:
1) Your meals should satisfy you until the next meal
2) Your digestive system needs time to recover in between meals. Without any food to process.
3) Snacking leads to over eating or eating foods with no brakes.  (Food with no breaks is described in the book as food like oreos that are designed to get your neurotransmitters revved so you want/need to go back for more...and more...and more.)

There were also a few comments that mentioned the fact that in weeks 1-3, some (me) ate like there wasn't enough food on the planet for them (me) to get full.  Apparently, THIS IS NORMAL.  Eat when your body tells you you are hungry.  Check in with yourself to be sure you're not bored, or stressed, or emotional but if you're hungry, eat.  I can attest that this wears off as time goes by.  I'm usually not hungry until meal times and even then, not nearly as much as I used to be.

For example, I was late getting home last night.  Everyone was somewhere else and my friend was picking me up in 20 minutes to go do another painting (she's addicted...I go along for the ride) and I had no time to fix anything.  I wasn't that hungry but I knew if I didn't eat something I'd be in trouble later and would be in a position to just go buy anything which usually equates to junk.  So I grabbed one of my trust pieces of chicken (which I shared with the dogs...shhh...we're not supposed to be feeding the dogs people food) and a small handful of nuts.  When I got home I had another small handful of nuts and I was fine.  Better than fine.  I was GREAT.  Go figure.

There's a whole post on "Can I have..." out there.  The bottom line for me is that I'd rather focus on what I CAN have rather than what I CAN'T.  Plus, I'm busy and a little bit stupid where science is concerned so the KISS principle applies when it comes to food (Keep It Simple Stupid).  I'm eating meat prepared with olive oil or baked.  Big salads dressed with olive oil and balsamic vinegar and loaded with cucumbers, olives, peppers, tomatoes, grilled chicken and my "cheat", goat cheese.  Eggs - hard boiled or scrambled.  Meat and whatever vegetable the hubs has cooked for dinner (or put out to be cooked) or another salad (in case they are eating something else).  When I need a snack, during the witching hour or the 4:00 hunger attack, it's fruit or nuts (but I'm being very careful about this as well...I tend to go overboard on the nuts).

But sometimes I weird myself out.  Should I eat this fruit?  Is this creamer really going to ruin everything?  How many nuts was that again?  OMG my goat cheese is DAIRY?  They are going to vote me off the island!

And then I read this, from Robin Strathdee, Whole 9 Director of Communications:

"Please don't over think think this. You don't have to address every food related issue you have, break every bad habit, and shun every food that gives you comfort to succeed with your Whole30. If you need to you can always extend or repeat the process, and things will get better each time you do."

Whew!  That's a relief.  I'm just going to keep on keepin' on...

Namaste

PS - I just signed up for the Whole 30 Daily which you can read about here.  It's designed for those going through the program for the first time but I wanted to try it for my next go round.  Looks like good stuff.