A-Paleo-Way We Go!

I just found out that we're having another Paleo Challenge at the gym in September.  As you can tell from the title of this blog, I kinda suck at committing to the paleo lifestyle (even though I should).  For those of you who are unaware, eating paleo means essentially eating as our ancestors once did.  It is also sometimes coined the Primal Diet, or even the Caveman Diet.

The CrossFit community is super into paleo eating. If you think about it, it sorta goes hand in hand.  CrossFit is a rather caveman-ish way of working out.  Me strong person. Me lift heavy weight. Me climb ropes (trees) and swing sledge-hammers (uhhhh......club?).  Me throw heavy ball into the air......no wait, that doesn't work. Where the frick do wall balls come from anyway?? Frickin' stupid wall balls.  Anyhoo, CrossFit+Paleo = Hot Marriage of Sexiness.

To be very basic, paleo eating is about insulin control.  Essentially, it means cutting all grains, dairy and legumes from your diet and focusing on lean proteins and veggies with some fruits, nuts and seeds thrown in for variety.  It also means eating clean by cutting out sugars and bad fats, limiting your pesticide/hormone intake by eating organic and grass fed food, and consuming healthy oils.  When I first heard of this, I made the argument (me??? argue????) that I'm sure our ancestors used to eat things like rice, right?  Or maybe those were just asian cavemen, I don't know.

Calm down, it was a joke.

I'm not a doctor and don't really feel like getting into the bio-chemistry of it all so Google it if you want more medical deets.  Or check out Robb Wolf - he's kinda the king shit on all things paleo.

                            Who needs medical confirmation when you have a flow chart??
         

But seriously, if you think of it in terms of insulin, it makes sense.  Foods higher on the glycemic index, like carbohydrates and starchy veggies, spike our blood sugars and promote the release of insulin.  When this happens, your body converts from using your fat as an energy source to using the insulin instead.  It slows everything down.  That kinda sucks.

Now I'm sure many of you are criticizing me, thinking that i'm an idiot and that this diet isn't balanced and you need whole grains and dairy and blah blah blah.  I don't necessarily disagree.  However, I believe that our eating habits and lifestyle have to be personalized to what works for us.  A few years ago, I really altered my diet to the point where I was eating mainly vegetarian (slightly vegan) with some animal protein and dairy thrown in occasionally.  I got my main source of protein from soy (until I learned about the connection between soy and estrogen intake), beans and those fake meat things in the frozen section of the grocery store.  It worked fine for me until I started doing CrossFit.  After that, my body needed more. It couldn't survive a tough WOD on that type of diet. I wanted MEAT. I craved it.

                                          That's not me (obvi) but you get the idea

Once I increased my animal protein intake, I noticed that my performance got better.  That's what works for ME.  In an effort to increase the health benefits (and reduce the unhealthy risks), I purchase all of my protein from local farms.  It's all free-range, grass fed, hormone free goodness.  It's better for me and the environment.  It might not work for you and that's ok, but stop bitching about what everyone else eats and just focus on yourself.

So back to the challenge.  In January, we had a paleo challenge that introduced me to the lifestyle for the first time.  Because of my ridiculously competitive nature, I was fairly strict with myself and won the challenge.  I got a foam roller as a reward - that fucker is a torture device that knows no limits on the amount of pain that it can induce.  True story.  After winning, I slowly started getting lazy and eventually completely forgot I really, really liked how I felt and performed while eating paleo.

This time around, since I already got my, uh, prize, I want to focus on tweaking the diet to best suit me.  I'll be honest - I will not give up cream in my coffee this time.  It's just the way it is.  I have reduced my coffee consumption to one, mayyyyybe two cups of day and I like it with cream.  I sometimes go to sleep at night excited to get up and have a cup of coffee in the morning.  I will not be giving up that joy.  (It's the little things, people).  Also, there are many paleo eaters out there that consume "healthy" sugar in the form of organic honey, pure maple syrup, etc.  I will likely do this sometimes too.  There's a 21-day sugar detox I've noticed many of my favorite bloggers have participated in that I might try in the future, but that's for another time.  Other than those few exceptions, I am going to attempt to be as strict paleo as possible for the next month.

I'll try to post some recipes of things I eat and updates on how I feel.  Who knows, at the end of this month, maybe this Not Quite Paleo Princess may become just a Princess after all!