Cutting dairy page

[Owly]

I'll preface this with some history: I started PB and tried cutting carbs, which saw some loss initially for me, but then I hit a plateau. So I cut carbs waaaaay back, eating VLC, which did not work at all. Added back more carbs into the 100g/daily range (including eating the dreaded banana!), and saw some more gradual weight loss. Not much change over the last while, which was okay because I'm at a reasonable body fat level for a woman, so I accepted that it might take quite a while to see more change at this point.

But then I joined a nutrition challenge at my CF gym. People had options on how to do it (zone, primal, or paleo, with whatever adaptations they decided to do). Since I already eat primal, I decided to take things a step further and go paleo by cutting all dairy except for butter. I figured it couldn't hurt to give it a go for the six weeks of the challenge.

So I'm now a week and a half in and down seven pounds.

I really did think I was one of the people who could do dairy no problem. In large quantities, it upsets my stomach, but in smaller amounts, I didn't feel any effects. I was using HWC in my coffee, some 10% fat Greek yogurt, and raw milk cheeses in some dishes. However, it looks like it really did make the difference for me so far. And it's not like I cut back on calories from cream in my coffee--I started making bulletproof coffee instead, which has more calories than heavy cream in the quantities I was using. Cutting dairy is about the only way I can explain this. I still "paleo bake" with maple syrup as a sweetener in small amounts; this week I've made my favourite pumpkin coconut milk custard and some coconut flour muffins. I've eaten bananas, clementine oranges, and sweet potatoes, as well as other root veg. I know I'm not eating less or even particularly differently except for dropping the milk products.

Yeah, I think it's the dairy. My skepticism is overcome: cutting it really has helped.

[Issabeau]

I was eating 100% PB for almost 2 years and then the goat farmer ran out of milk.
I haven't had any dairy (except the occassional local full fat ice cream) in ~ 4 months and I leaned out, dropped roughly 10 lbs of extra skin.

My bowel movements have also slightly improved, they are more consistent. I now know that excess calcium puts the colon asleep, so on days where I do have cheese or ice cream I make sure to take a magnesium supplement.

[egrande25]

I love dairy. Always have. And I've never had any noticeable negative reaction to it. However, my dairy consumption has been way down since starting eating Primally, and I haven't even really made an effort to do so. I just don't crave the two or three glasses of milk I used to wash down heavy dinners with. A piece of extra sharp cheddar cheese makes a filling snack, though, and I'll have a small glass of milk every couple of days. We'll see how it goes. Maybe I'll tweak that down the line.

[jammies]

Wow - those are some pretty impressive results! I gave up dairy when I start primal for autoimmune reasons - but I sometimes think that is part of the reason I had such an easy time with weight loss eating this way. I do still have grass-fed ghee and every once in a while I will have cream in some coffee. But it is not a part of my normal diet.

It seems like lots of women on this forum do better with weight loss if they skip the dairy. It is a shame it is so delicious!!

[mcbeitz]

I'm also noticing results after having cut out dairy. After months of being stuck at one weight, I cut out the dairy on Monday. After 5 days, I've lost a pound. The only difference is that I'm not putting H&H in my coffee anymore. Kinda crazy! =)

[corndogibm]

So what amounts are we talking here? Tablespoons? Ounces? Cups? Grams? I do like half and half in my coffee if I am not doing bulletproof, but is cutting out a couple of tablespoons or a cheese stick a day make a difference? I understand your results may vary per individual but is there an amount that the body sees as not applicable? I am still trying to understand where the dairy line is, cream, half and half,
butter, cheese...Don't they all come from the same (grass fed of course) cow?

[Danielle5690]

I LOVE dairy. I'm very reluctant to give it up... I haven't ever, even in the days when I was otherwise eating a vegan diet. But the longer I eat according to PB the more I notice that dairy makes me produce more mucus (I had to clear my throat alot after my greek yogurt this morning), and I'm thinking if I want to get rid of my cellulite I will probably have to cut it out, at least for a while. I haven't decided whether it's worth it yet.

[Owly]

I definitely don't think my experience is going to work the same for everyone, and some people around here have cut dairy with little to no effect. However, it is interesting since I really doubted whether it would do anything for me to drop the dairy.

Corndogibm, I am still eating butter, but that's almost entirely fat with small amounts of dairy proteins remaining, and ghee is even more refined and is basically pure fat, but all of the lactose is pretty much gone in either case. Of course, cheese has very little lactose, but it still has casein as well as whey. Casein is an irritant for some people; fewer people are sensitive to whey I find (I want to experiment with adding back just whey protein at the end of this paleo challenge to see what effect that has for me).

I should be clear: I wasn't putting on weight by eating dairy, but I think it might have been slowing things for me leaning out. I was eating maybe a cup of yogurt every couple of days, raw milk cheese (1-2 oz) fairly regularly, heavy cream in my coffee every morning, and now and then a dry whole milk cappuccino. Now I am eating closer to Robb Wolf's style of paleo (as outlined in his book), but as I said, no real changes beyond the dairy thing.

[Owly]

Oh, and I am definitely not low carb, nor am I counting calories.

[Leida]

I wish I had such a clear-cut answer. I am not big fan of dairy, the only thing I like is home-made kefir and quark (cheese I had to give up much earlier as it was one of my addictive foods).

I saw no changes in runny nose without dairy.

With weight loss, my weight stabilized on Whole 30, but I simultaneously cut out coffee, nuts, dairy, fruit and stevia (and all grains). I also lost a lot of weight cutting on Ultimate Diet 2.0 using skim milk and quark for 2 days a week I was carb loading.

I am not sure if I should take my kefir grains from the freezer and start using quark again after Whole 30, or just throw the grains away and say buy-buy to dairy for good ???