Primal Journal-deMuralist page 177

[demuralist]

While time with my mom is relaxing it likely just balances out the stress from being with my dad! He is a curmudgeon, with lots of rules about the tiniest things (foods can't touch each other on the plate, my dinner plates are too big, has to have a physical newspaper every day, etc) and the littlest things send him repeatedly into a rampage of complaining (spam on his email, any discussion about Penn State's football, etc). In other words he is a pretty negative personality. He is not this way with my kids, but he and I didn't get along when I lived at home and now anything I say is construed to be a negative dig, even though I work hard NOT to notice, be bothered by, or mention those things that drive me crazy. Currently he is into talking about regrets for how little time he spent with the family, how unappreciative he is toward my mother, things like that. I asked him if he wouldn't feel better about those things if he would try to change things now and let go of the past which he can't change and he said he is too old to change.

ok, enough of that!

I think the melatonin is kicking in. It may also be the yard work my mom and I did. Some Vitamin D and digging, bending, pulling, trimming can improve sleep. It will be interesting to see what happens this week. My wake up time moves from "when I wake up" (usually 6ish) to a 5:30 alarm. I am thinking I should just going to set the alarm for 5:30 for every morning (weekends too) and just get into that pattern.

[RMS123]

*Waving hello since I haven't checked in with you in forever*F

So excited to hear about your sleep. The D3 is certainly helping me. I may have to try a small dose of the melatonin again and see if that would continue to help.

[demuralist]

HI!!!! Glad you are back, hope you can stay a while!

maybe it is the combo of the D3 (I am currently taking 6,000IU a day) and melatonin (just increased it to 500mcg the last 3 days).

I am back to tracking, I can't keep away from it now that it is a habit. I am just going to work to not pay attention to the counts. I can't stand the idea of losing the information so that when it is successful I will be able to go back and replicate when I am having a less successful time.

I gave up on the oil shots, although they did seem to reduce my need to EAT (in all caps as it helps to define the frenzy feeling), it did not reduce how much I ate. Also, had a negative effect on my weight. And I wonder if it isn't just I need more nutrition in the morning. similar to when I did the Leptin Reset and got protein soon after waking up. Although it may have just been because my parents were here. But having to do two periods of 2 hours with no other tastes messed up my tea drinking as well as my ACV drinking.

What I am doing now, is a sort of combination of SPEED, Primal, Leptin Reset, the 4 Golden Rules, and what feels right. It comes from Jonathan Bailor and his book "The Smarter Science of Slim" I have decided to give this until my birthday (November), as it includes exercises (VERY similar to Mark's essential movements) done for 10 minutes once a week. I think I can swing that. He calls them eccentric movements, they concentrate on a 10 second down in a push up for example, the let down in a chin-up, the down in a squat, and the down in an overhead press. Working to exhaustion (using modifications where necessary). He also has a 10 minute once a week cardio workout that includes resistance, but I don't have the equipment at home to do it correctly, so for now I will pass on it. It is similar to Mark's sprint idea.

I am also going to get on the treadmill on the mornings that my son goes to school. That is not part of their prescription, and it isn't really cardio, it is just movement. But it is movement that makes me feel good and helps with my measurements. It falls more within Mark's slow movement prescription.

I am not going to weigh myself until my birthday, but will do waist measurements weekly, and full body measurements monthly.

The food is not drastically different than things I have been doing for this past year, just a sort of re-focus. This is good, as it is basically small changes, and thus more sustainable.

[demuralist]

So an interesting thing happened. Last night, I was too full to even think about tasting the pound cake and ice cream my son and hubby were diving into. I did have a snack, which I don't normally do. And it was coconut macaroons (I used a mix of erythritol and stevia to sweeten, yum). And I probably ate a bit too much of it. The really weird part is that I was still full this morning. I could not drink my smoothie, I could barely drink my coffee. My coffee ended up getting cold, so I put the part left, in with my green tea (which had also gotten cold) and added 2 scoops of Protein Powder. Sipped a little of that and then put it in the fridge for when I get home.

Now, looking at my food stats from yesterday, I can see why, so it is not so weird.

Calories....2135
Carbs....81
Fat...128
Protein....160
Fiber....28 NET Carbs....53
Sugar...34

Now, I had no grains and no sugar, the carbs and 'sugar' are from the coconut, and all the veggies and the 2 fruits.

But it is 10am I have been awake for 4 and 1/2 hours and I am still not hungry. I am drinking my ACV water, and I am thinking that it is probably ok to eat that much if the next day I can't eat even my normal amount. We shall see how it pans out.

[demuralist]

ok, just read a short, fantastic article everyone. It is on how to maximize weight loss on high protein diets.

Charles Poliquin's Blog - Tip 403: Make a High-Protein Diet Work For You: Tips To Lose Fat and Be Healthy

[demuralist]

ok, so lesson learned. Can't make coconut macaroons and think I will eat only 1 no matter how full I am. I just love coconut too much! And the boys won't eat it, and well I finished the batch before DD even realized they were there. So I won't be making these for quite a while.

I am drinking my mocha as I type this. I made my coffee last night, added my strongly brewed green tea to it and put it in the fridge. So this morning I just added 2 scoops of Jay Robb Chocolate Whey. Perfect!

I made my grocery list last night. I realized yesterday that I did not have the supplies/foods I needed to be able to reach my protein goals of 175g to 200g. I got close at 163. So I will shop today before lunch. I have a plan in place that I feel will work well.

I love veggies and fruits so that makes getting 10 servings of veggies and fruits easy. Getting the protein from a variety of sources (which mentally makes more sense to me than a single or fewer sources) has taken me a couple of days to figure it out. I obviously had this same issue before, and just gave up. But as I get more and more evidence to support the number, I feel like I need to make another go of it.

So here is today's plan....

Breakfast is my mocha.
Lunch will be the soup I made from homemade bone broth, grass fed beef, cabbage, carrots, yellow squash, and tomatoes. Tastes like stuffed cabbage without the rice and without the work!
Snack I will make a smoothie, using Greek yogurt and cottage cheese with a variety of fruits and veggies.
Dinner tonight is going to be a version of eggs benedict, using salmon patty as the 'muffin', steamed spinach, poached eggs, and homemade hollandaise sauce.

I will report back on how well I did!

[Sabine]

Read that article. I found interesting that, although he gives a formula for the protein, he doesn't mention the amount of fiber, only says to get 'adequate' fiber. Definitions of what is adequate can vary so widely- any idea of what he means? How did you arrive at 10 servings of vegetables?
Also thought it was interesting that he gave a formula based on body weight, rather than lean body weight. The numbers worked out about the same for me.

[RMS123]

The soup sounds divine. What time should I arrive? ()

Hang in there on the protein. I don't know if this works, but I rotate meat the way I do veggies. So, it's usually beef roast and spinach for a few days, then chicken and broccoli, etc. I make a big batch of meat and then use it in a variety of ways. I think that gets me variety, just not necessarily every day.

How's the sleep going? Still well?

[demuralist]

Charles Poliquin's Blog - Tip 392: Eat Antioxidant-Rich Fruits and Veggies at EVERY Meal For A Better Physique and Disease Prevention

This is an article he wrote about research into the antioxidant properties of fruits and veggies. The research suggests 9 antioxidant rich servings for a 2500 calorie a day diet. I rounded it up to 10.

9 servings is also the number that the doctor that Mark wrote about some time back used to cure herself of some disease. Can't remember the details of that but it was why I started to focus on 9 servings a day in the first place.

For fiber, I figure if I am getting my 9 to 10 servings the fiber is covered. It generally ranges from 20g to 30g on the days I achieve the servings.

Ruth, I would be fine eating the same dinner every night, sure the rest of the family would balk though. I was thinking more along the lines of 'variety in a single day'. Such that I didn't want to eat beef all day long or chicken or fish or whatever. I wanted each serving to come from a different source. But given how many servings of protein I am getting in a day, from one day to the next there will be very little variation in the sources. But if I have beef for lunch I can make fish for dinner and then switch them the next day, etc.

Sleep last night was not great, but it is only the second day of waking at 5:30. I did have 2 long stretches, 1 of which was 1:20! I have decided that I am just going to wake up at 5:30 every day, as opposed to waking up later on the weekends. I think that is likely to help. I will take a nap today, and go to bed early (by 9:30) starting tonight. I just have to not get caught up in the Olympics!

[demuralist]

p.s. the soup is divine, when your traveling slows down I can give you the recipe, it makes a HUGE batch and is freezable.