We are a week in to the Zone’s Cave month. ¼ of the way there! How is it going for you? I figured I would share my experience.
The reason I wanted to try living Paleo: I have been reading more about nutrition and wanted to try something different than our Western diet. I have been consistently gaining weight for a few years and have found nothing seems to work to minimize the gain. I have lacked will-power lately. I can’t say no to things, and when you work in cancer care, people tend to thank you with baked goods. Especially at Christmas! I wanted to change that, so doing this challenge and being faithful to it is something that I felt I needed to prove to myself.
I started a little early to see if I could do it. My biggest concerns were missing cheese and finding a veggie based carb to fill my stomach. I looked for recipes and found one for “cauliflower rice”, I have been experimenting and perfecting and this filled that place I thought I would need.
After a week of eating Paleo, I found I felt pretty crappy; I was tired, and my bowels were not doing what they should. After talking to my girlfriends (because one would not dare talk about their bowels in public or blog about them (ha-ha!)), they agreed that this is a common problem when starting to eat a higher protein percentage. Kath suggested a special powder blend and the possibility of using bile salts. I have used the powder and things are returning to their normal ways.
After a day or two of fatigue, I found that I had an energy spike. I have struggled with low energy all of my adult life, especially shortly after lunch. The past week I have considerably more energy, probably due to the lack of insulin spiking.
What I have noticed is when I eat fruit I get tired. So I am trying to decrease my fruit intake (it isn’t very high to begin with) and move to more vegetables.
Have I had cravings? Yes! But my cravings for sugary things are largely gone. I crave salty carbohydrates. If someone gave me a bag of kettle cooked potato chips and I decided to give in, I would eat the whole bag! But, I don’t think I would feel so well… Even after eating fruit, I get that feeling so I know it wouldn’t be worth it.
My plan is to go hardcore until the end of the month but I am thinking of continuing after that with a little cheating here and there. So far, I am feeling the best I can remember feeling.
b’s Cauliflower Rice
Ingredients:
- Love
- ½ head of cauliflower
- coconut oil
- ¼ yellow onion
- broth
- salt/pepper
- seasonings as per taste
Directions:
- Microwave cauliflower for about 2mins until a little soft (may have to microwave longer if using more)
- Stick cauliflower & onion in your kick ass food processor (Christmas present) with chopping blade on low until “rice size”
- Saute the cauliflower in coconut oil in pan.
- Add some broth (~1/4L ) and cook it off.
- Season as you like! I have been adding Vietnamese curry. You can skip the broth & onion if you wish as well. After the first 3 steps, get creative. I added an egg and made fried rice once. If you make something awesome, please share.
This is super filling so you don’t need too much!
QOD: How has your experience been after week 1 of cave month? Do you feel any different? Any recipes that have helped you get through? please share
Zone Games Announcement: You must register by Wednesday, January 18th. We require 15 athletes to participate to run the event. Get into the gym tomorrow to register! Remember we have a Debit machine now 🙂
Today’s Workout:
Buy In – Back Squat – 3 x 5 reps increasing weight each set. (15 minute time cap)
* Keep your legs warm until the wod begins, it is cold outside!
WOD – “Dash Double Dip”
For time:
Run 200M
21 Back Squats (95lbs/135lbs)
21 Ring dips
Run 200M
15 Back Squats (95lbs/135lbs)
15 Ring dips
Run 200M
9 Back Squats (95lbs/135lbs)
9 Ring dips
Time Cap: 20 minutes, make sure to scale the dips appropriately
* If it is too slippery and nasty outside, sub 250M row or 50 Double unders
Zone 4 – Scale ring dips with rubber band assistance or on the parallel bars
Zone 3 – Scale BS weight to 75lbs/115lbs
Zone 2 – Scale ring dips to jumping ring dips and BS to 55lbs/85lbs
Zone 1 – Scale workout as needed
Cash Out – MWOD 54 (very little sound until 5:30 in the video. Skip to 5:00 to see what to do for the MWOD)
Test: Overhead squat or long sit with your feet straight out and pull your toes back toward your face
Mwod: Mess around with the band ankle mobs 1-2 min each direction/each side
Stretch your calves, 2min
Roll out your leg gristle 4-5 min each side, or until you are out of vomit.
Retest: Improved Ankle ROM? How’s that squat?
[yframe url=’http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NVVUa8aETgY&feature=player_embedded’]
Did I ever mention we should have a bowl of salted pretzel on our front desk? hehehe…
Tara has informed me that steaming the cauliflower, instead of nuking them, would keep more of the nutrients in the vegetables. I'm not participating in this challenge but that sounds delicious. Thanks B! I will be making this in the very near future.
jer-you, tara and baby bomhof can all have it! although you may have to process it a little more 😛 congrats buddy! hope tara and the babe are amazing!
the rough patch a week in seems to be pretty standard while your body adapts to the new way of eating. If you're still feeling the same at the end of week 2, I would start eating more fat and veggies. Just my 2 cents from what I've read and experienced.
i've had b's cauliflower rice & it's delicious!
in my first week of paleo i was having a lot of cravings & headaches. but once that was over i definitely started feeling more energetic. i find my energy is much more level during the day – not so much up & down 🙂
So far so good for me… the occasional craving for dark chocolate is still there, but it's ignorable. Things that have helped me the most so far are finding paleo sausages (Red Barn!), and coconut milk smoothies (adapted from: http://ohsheglows.com/2011/01/13/classic-green-mo… half a can of coconut milk, 1 tbs of almond butter, 1 tbs of hemp seeds, a big handful of fresh spinach and half a banana. An omelet, a turkey sausage and a smoothie for breakfast and I'm not interested in eating again until 2:00.
huh, the closing bracket got included in the link which made the link not work. If you're interested, here's a working link: http://ohsheglows.com/2011/01/13/classic-green-mo…
About half of the Red Barn sausages have sugar (italian and maple for sure). Usually the herb ones and breakfast sausages are fine. We've also started making out own sausage patties using ground turkey from RB. Easy and tasty.
I'm not sure whether I can say I'm doing better or worse on the diet. I'm tired a lot, and hungry a lot (which is normal), but I'm also running a lot. So I would say I'm doing about the same I think. Definitely not eating less…
Hmm, the "making out" was probably too much information 🙂
We started making "our" own sausage patties…
You are making out and sausages are involved…. you have my interest.
My go to breakfast dish is some assorted nuts, some chopped up fruit (usually a banana) some cinnamon and a spoon of almond butter, then poor in coconut milk and mix her on up. If I have that and pork chop for breakfast sometimes I don't think about food until supper.
Do you have a preferred brand of coconut milk? We haven't been able to find any that doesn't have either a preservative or a stabilizer in it.
Can you please tell me how you cook your sausages? I am not joking. I am apparently horrible in the kitchen and afraid I'm not cooking my meat enough so I always end up with a hard, dry specimen that is not very appetizing…. Which ones do you buy and how do you cook them?!
Sarah, we eat a fair number of sausages and cook them by cutting them up into bit sized pieces first then toss them in the pan. Or we butterfly them sometimes (cut them in half down the middle). The only ones we leave whole are small, breakfast sized ones. Then we start with very low heat and slowly turn it up.
And I love the sausages from The Village Butcher on Oak Bay Ave.
We generally get the big fatties from Red Barn (I like tomato basil turkey, chicken curry, turkey with herbs and sage). I cook them whole on med-low temperature, rotating every 8ish minutes to cook evenly from three sides. I'm a bit paranoid too, so I'll butterfly them at that point and if there's still pink (there usually is), let them cook a few more minutes.
Thank you, ladies! Do you use any oil? If so, what kind? I typically butterfly them, but I may try cutting them in small pieces!
no oil for me – I find they produce enough of their own that it isn't necessary to add any.
Thanks Brigit, it's good to know that I'm not the only one whose bowels aren't behaving as they should!
Over all last week, I mostly haven't been hungry, then by meal time I'm starving. I haven't craved anything particular, just I find I want a snack but don't know what to have. I've been low energy over the weekend which I suspect is an adaptation thing – still waiting for the boundless energy but, overall I've been feeling really good.
Brigit – very happy to hear that you feel the best you can remember!
Brigit, rest assured the things you are experiencing are not only expected, but a good sign that your body is making positive change. The Standard American Diet (SAD) tends to make your body "dependent" on carbohydrates for energy, and the concomitant fibre for "regularity". A sudden withdrawl from this induces an attendant short term loss of energy (and regularity! lol). Your reaction to fruit (i.e. making you feel tired) is also par for the course, and the reason I stressed that it was best avoided in the early stages of "going paleo". As for you sudden spike of energy, this is a good sign that your insulin/glucagon system is stabilizing. Insulin and glucagon are the primary metabolic hormones in the body. They are ment to work in a ying-yang fashion with the insulin produced while eating serving to store energy (as body fat) for later use. When later comes, the glucagon drives our metabolism the other way, letting us burn our stored fat for energy. And therein lies the fundamental problem with the SAD – the high intake of dietary carbohydrates leaves us in a constant insulin (fat storage) mode, to the point that our glucagon system becomes dormant and dysfunctional from lack of use. This is why when you first cut off the carb intake, your energy levels plummet, as our bodies have "forgotten" how to use stored body fat for energy. However, as the insulin levels remain supressed over a period of about a week (for most people), the glucagon system "turns on" and suddenly your body is again able to access its stored fat for energy (leading to the sudden spike you experienced). This is why, at the outset, it is important to "crash" your insulin sysytem as dramatically as possible, by totally restricting carb intake (including fruit). Once your metabolic hormones are again in balance, the addition of fruit will not have the same consequences as you experienced. However, those with very little/no excess body fat (like Chris), will find the need to supplement their diet with some carbs (fruit and starchy tubers are the best), in order to maintain the energy levels required for sustained energy output (distance running etc.). As time progresses people typically find their cravings diminish, while the benefits become ever more obvious. Stick with it people, you will be glad you did!
Congrats b! You are doing a great job.