Primal Journal (PaleoEric) page

[PaleoEric]

Hey guys/gals/self,
This thread will house my ramblings (and maybe some of yours) until I get tired of rambling. I don't intend to keep up with every meal for 30 days straight but I do appreciate having a place to write about this life-long journey.

Food:

Today's breakfast consisted of 4 eggs, a handful of spinach, coconut oil, a handful of frozen blueberries and macadamia nuts. I just put it all in a bowl and scarfed it down with a spoon. I washed it all down with water w/ lemon juice. I plan to eat lunch with my brother out somewhere. It won't be a perfect meal I'm sure but I plan to enjoy it anyway.

Exercise:

Yesterday I got on a row machine and got after it for about 10 minutes. It had a fish game on it where your intensity controlled the fish and you tried to eat smaller ones while trying to prevent being eaten by larger ones. It was a pretty fun way to burn some calories. It has been storming here recently so outside activities aren't exactly safe.

I intend to get in some more exercise today. No idea what it will be yet. In case it isn't obvious, having a strict schedule isn't what I'm going for here. My job is all the schedule I care to have in life.

But what I'm REALLY excited about is PrimalCon 2013. I am GOING and it will be my first time visiting California. WOOHOOOOO!

[DCarr10760]

Hi and welcome!

I hear you on the posting every meal and the strict scheduling. I can't do it either. I admire the folks that take pictures of beautifully prepared meals and then post them, but it's certainly not me.

As long as the meals are tasty and support your health goals, who really cares if they look like a dog's lunch!

DC

[PaleoEric]

Hi and welcome!

I hear you on the posting every meal and the strict scheduling. I can't do it either. I admire the folks that take pictures of beautifully prepared meals and then post them, but it's certainly not me.

As long as the meals are tasty and support your health goals, who really cares if they look like a dog's lunch!

DC

Hey DC, thanks for the welcome. I enjoy looking at pictures of food sometimes, but as you stated I just know it isn't my style to do that. Too much effort honestly...I prefer to not spend most of my free time at a computer. I need a balance that includes basketball, tubing, or anything else that doesn't require electronics.

[PaleoEric]

For lunch I had "Five Guys" (waiting for stones to be thrown at my head). I did split the regular fries with my brother and even after we both ate from it, we threw about half of them away. My brother is very fit and would be a good influence on me if only he lived nearby. I've been fortunate to spend the past couple weeks visiting with him but he's leaving the area soon.

Since there haven't been any stones thrown yet, I guess it's safe to say that I also had some yogurt after lunch. TBH, it tasted great and now I feel like my gut is 5 times the size it was before lunch, and that's a pretty awful feeling. I'm in the very early stages of all this and am learning what foods really do make me feel like crap. I'm actually proud of myself for trying the sweet tea, realizing how gross it tastes now, and dumping it out to get unsweetened for my meal.

Looking back, the Five Guys actually made me crave a sweet finish to my meal-time. I believe this to be true because I didn't have the craving after a grain-free breakfast this morning.

Challenge ahead: Lunchtime at work. I like to get out of the office and spend time with 2 of my buddies. One of them has almost stopped going with us because he said it's too expensive to eat lunch out every day. The other guy eats whatever he wants, so it's tough to go anywhere with him and still eat healthy because all the neolithic stuff still looks good to me (yet I'm learning it doesn't make me feel good). I seem to have a mental block on making my lunches Paleo/Primal. I don't have much trouble with breakfast and I can do pretty well with dinner usually.

It's not that I don't know what to do...it's just a matter of making myself do it, against my own will. Which means to me that I have to make it my will. I read somewhere that if you want to achieve something you have to make it a "MUST" in your head. I'm working on that, because I know I want and need to be more fit.

[PaleoEric]

I measured around my belly/love handles and I also measured around my waist 1 week ago. I re-measured after 1 week (yesterday) and I am happy to report that I lost 1.5 inches around my belly and 1 inch around my waist. I find that pretty remarkable for only 1 week. I don't know what change there was in my weight, if any. That's really not the "end all, be all" for me as I just want to feel great and look like I belong on the beach when I take my shirt off. :-)

I'm also proud to report an amazing day of victories against food temptation today. I wasn't very hungry this morning so I just grabbed about 10 macadamias on the way out the door. When lunch came around I went with a buddy of mine to the food court in the mall. I would normally go to Moe's Southwestern Grill and get a huge helping of nachos with cheese, beans, and chicken and then wash it all down with a sweet tea. But today I went to a salad bar and drank a bottle of water. I made it a point to add avocado to my salad because I knew my body would crave the fat if I didn't. But the food court temptation didn't end there. My workmate wanted "a coffee", so we found ourselves standing in front of a Cinnabon. I'm convinced that the Devil himself invented this place because if there's one thing I love to gorge myself on, it's a Cinnabon. But I won! Not only did I resist the sugary coffee substance that he purchased, I didn't get a Cinnabon either. And to tell you the truth, I really didn't even feel that tempted by it. I knew that I had just eaten a healthy meal and I just didn't desire additional food. It was awesome!

Then for dinner I ate most of a rotisserie chicken. I played basketball after that and then my roommate wanted to go out to eat. We began driving around and when he'd mention a place, I'd say, "No, there's nothing there for me." Before Paleo, I'd say, "Let's get a pizza." but tonight, we eventually landed at Wendy's. I got a baconator with no mayo and I didn't eat the buns either. So I had two patties, several slices of bacon, and a trace amount of cheese (most of it was stuck to the buns). I don't necessarily feel like on my feet at the moment, but I'm happy to have steered clear of all the stuff that I used to stuff my face with. :-)

I feel like I need some veggies and fruit to even out all the meat I've had today, but I'm super-happy about avoiding all the sweets and grains.

[PaleoEric]

Breakfast was a cup of coffee and about 15 macadamias. For lunch I thought I'd try something out. I got a huge plate of nachos with white cheese, chicken, pickled peppers, and mushrooms. I washed it down with unsweetened tea and then had a "middle of the bun" bowl from Cinnabon. WOW, I finished the meal about 90 minutes ago and have been sweating profusely ever since. My stomach feels like it's a 45lb plate attached to the front of my body and that any moment, I may have to visit the restroom. How in the world did I eat this stuff EVERY DAY? Geez Louise...

Oh and now I'm having some small chest pains. I don't seem to have those pains unless I'm eating the "old way". And I feel really, really thirsty even though I had about 32 oz of unsweetened tea at lunch. Mama mia...

[Louisa655]

Breakfast was a cup of coffee and about 15 macadamias. For lunch I thought I'd try something out. I got a huge plate of nachos with white cheese, chicken, pickled peppers, and mushrooms. I washed it down with unsweetened tea and then had a "middle of the bun" bowl from Cinnabon. WOW, I finished the meal about 90 minutes ago and have been sweating profusely ever since. My stomach feels like it's a 45lb plate attached to the front of my body and that any moment, I may have to visit the restroom. How in the world did I eat this stuff EVERY DAY? Geez Louise...

PaleoEric: You are doing great. Enlightenment is the first step towards making changes. After all, you don't know what you don't know. The fact that you are seeking out better options makes all the difference in the world. And besides that, we are all human, and we're not going to get it perfect all the time -- it's all right now and then to make a choice that is less healthy. I may add that after doing this for 8 weeks -- I had occasion to have a very small piece of pita bread while on a conference out of town --- what a big mistake. My stomach rebelled and it demonstrates to me that your body is going to let you know when it something is objectionable. Here's to good abs on the beach! /louisa

[PaleoEric]

Louisa, thanks so much for the words of encouragement. I knew when I ate like that daily that I usually felt "foggy" (mentally) and that I just wanted to nap a lot. Last night I fixed myself 2 eggs scrambled w/ spinach in coconut oil. I also had bacon and frozen blueberries with it. I ate around 6pm and was very surprised to find myself with a constant flow of energy for a good hour of basketball and I didn't even feel hungry afterward. I slept well too and I think not eating too closely to bed time helped a lot. I really like not having the ups and downs associated with grains and sugar consumption. Again, thanks for the encouragement! BTW, it looks like you're making speedy progress towards your goals as well. Good job!

[PaleoEric]

Spent the last week on vacation to the beach. Had a great time (too great one night) but did pretty well with my food (compared to my expectation). I'd say I ate Primal about 60% of the time. I ordered the 21 day challenge book today and it's supposed to be here tomorrow. I'm excited to announce that I was given a pay raise while I was on vacation, so I celebrated today with bad food. Counterproductive now that I think about it, but I enjoyed it at the time. Of course my stomach feels huge right now, but I used that feeling to motivate me to not wait on the book to get started. I re-read the PBF pdf tonight and got started on my exercises. I didn't bother with a self-assessment because I could tell from looking at the numbers that I'd be at the bottom in every category. Here's what I did:

(Exercise, 1st set of reps, 2nd set of reps)
Wall Push: 25, 25
Chair-assisted Pullup 10, 10
Wall Squat 20, 20
Hand/Knee Plank 45, 45
Hand/Knee Side Plank 30, 30

Notes: Mark makes this stuff look easy. :-) It was much harder than I anticipated and therefore, I know it's a great program. I assumed (incorrectly) that I could do 50 wall pushes. The pullups were by far the hardest exercise for me. I felt like I was using mostly my legs as I know I can't do 1 full pullup without them. I had to wear a shirt for the wall squats to prevent friction between the wall and my back. The two-hand planks were a little easier than I expected but the one-hand side planks highlighted how weak my arms really are.

Bottom line: I'm much weaker than I realized. It is my belief that functional strength is the real test of a person's fitness and health. A guy I work with is pretty muscled up and I bet he has pretty decent functional strength, but he doesn't believe that body weight exercises are enough to get a person "strong". I intend to prove him wrong. Later on, I hope I get the chance to challenge him to pushup, pullups, etc. and WIN. :-P

[PaleoEric]

Yesterday when I got off work, I decided to get outside and enjoy the beautiful day. I went to a nearby park and found some bleachers to sit on. I rolled up the sleeves on my work shirt and I zipped off the lower legs on my pants. I removed my socks and my shoes and soaked in as much sun as possible for about 30 minutes. With my vacation last week and the sun exposure from yesterday, my skin is brown and my arm hair is the blonde I remember from childhood. As I sat in the sun, I read through the Primal Blueprint 21 day transformation book for the first time. The reading motivated me to do a sprint workout barefoot, so I did. I managed 6 or 8 sprints of only about 30 yards before I had to stop to prevent injury (my quads are still tight this morning).

I didn't sleep well last night and I'm not 100% sure why. I received an odd letter that had me a little worried and I went to bed a couple hours before normal (although I never did fall asleep until the regular time). My stomach also felt a little upset and I don't know if it was worry from the letter or the spicy rib sauce I had at dinner.

I'm really enjoying this journey to better health. On every other "program" I've tried throughout the years, the focus was always on the destination, or the "end result". But this time is different. This time I'm focused on making the best decisions I can throughout the day, while being mindful that all of these decisions add up to the person I am becoming. I got a compliment on my shirt today and this isn't the first time I've worn it. I really believe the shirt looks better on me than it used to because my belly is smaller. Maybe I'm wrong, but what if I'm not? I'm really seeing the world as half-full. I'm looking for opportunities. I'm feeling blessed and feel that I can be a blessing to everyone I come into contact with. While my body doesn't yet look the way I want it to, I'm getting more life out of my years in many ways that can't be described by how my body looks. This is a neat experience overall and I look forward to every opportunity I now have to express the Primal in me.