Category Archives: Whole 30

As we gear up to start our January Whole 30 (Just FYI: I’ve decided we are officially going from January 2-31 -though I’m not closing the door to actually doing it for 60 days) I’ve been paying specific attention to the current state of my health. I’m noting how I look, how I feel and also how my body is performing because I want to get a baseline of where I am starting. This is so important, and in just a second I’m going to encourage you to do the same thing. But I want to do a little bit of housekeeping before we start.

First of all, I was OVERWHELMED by the number of readers here who are planning to participate in the January Whole 30 with us. When I wrote that post last week I was hoping a few of you would dive in, and that maybe we could all complain about our sugar withdrawals together. But between the emails I got, the tweets, and the comments on that post OVER ONE HUNDRED OF YOU WHO READ HERE DAILY ARE PARTICIPATING.

Holy heck on a ham sandwich, that is amazing! OVER ONE HUNDRED. I am flabbergasted. So because of that, I definitely feel like I want to make sure I’m facilitating some community instead of just bitching about my food for 30 days, because who does that help, really? But before we start let’s all get on the same page here.

If you are doing the Whole 30, I think it is important to respect that it is a proprietary program — it’s not just some random 30 “cleanse or detox” it has an actual protocol. It’s a free protocol, so it’s not like you have to buy something to do the Whole 30, but it is specifically developed and designed by Dallas and Melissa Hartwig over at Whole 9 Life.

Here it is, from the horse’s mouth:

Established in April 2009, the Whole30® is Whole9’s original nutritional program designed to change your life in 30 days.

The physical benefits of the Whole30 include improved body composition, energy levels, sleep quality, attention span, mental attitude and athletic performance.

The psychological benefits of the Whole30 include changing long-standing, unhealthy patterns related to food, eating and your body image, and a dramatic reduction or elimination of food cravings, particularly sugar and carbohydrates.

So of course if you want to achieve all of those awesome results, you have to play by the rules, right?

The rules and A METRIC TON of easily digestible information regarding the science behind the rules are available in their book It Starts with Food. But even if you don’t want to buy and read the book, the information can still be found out there for free.

*Want a PDF outlining exactly what the program is: here you go!

A few things worth noting: You should not be counting calories, you are not dieting, you do not need to be counting carbs, and this isn’t really a “detox.” The Whole 30 is designed to give you 30 days to focus on how your body looks, feels and performs when you are eating only “Good Food”. Good Food is outlined in detail on the Whole 9 site but I’ll give ya the cliffs notes right here. They stick to 4 parameters:

1. Promote a Healthy Psychological Response
2. Promote a Healthy Hormonal Response
3. Support a Healthy Gut
4. Support Immune Function and Minimize Inflammation

*****And THAT, is the Whole 30 in a nutshell******

Now, if you are not going to follow the program that they outline, this doesn’t mean that your 30 days are a waste, or that you are a terrible person, or that you aren’t “being healthy” or any other crazy judgment, but it does mean that you aren’t doing a Whole 30. I don’t say that to be the food police, and I certainly am completely supportive and encouraging of any and all food experimentation that feels right to you right now (YOU KNOW THIS!) but I felt like it was worth noting that when it comes to the Whole 30: there is a specific protocol to follow. It’s what makes it The Whole 30, and not a Paleo/Primal/Sugar Detox challenge. And before we get started I wanted to underscore that this is what we will be doing in January and what I plan to be sharing my strategies for.

While we are talking about getting rolling on this Whole 30, here are a few of my favorite resources from the Whole 9 site:
A “Good/Better/Best” Grocery Shopping Guide (hint: everything doesn’t have to be grass-fed, organic, hippy-ville to be transformative)
Look, there is even a Vegetarian Version (This is why I particularly love Dallas and Melissa — they are quite inclusive in their pursuit of spreading the word on good food.)
Meal Planning Guide (This may spark some inspiration for your own meal planning)

****If you have any favorite resources to share, please do so for everyone reading in the comments!

The last thing I want to talk about, and the thing I want to encourage you to do before you get started is to acknowledge the current state your health in all its glory. 🙂 If you are anything like me, December has been a liiiiiittle bit lax on the health front. Maybe you’ve been eating more cookies than kale, maybe you have been working out, maybe you haven’t. Maybe you’ve been sleeping great, or maybe you are just a little bit cranky and think the holidays may be to blame. Because there are a million ways to measure health that don’t include the scale, I encourage you to do a quick audit of how you are feeling right now. Make this a December to Remember. 🙂 Need some ideas about things to think about, check out this post. This will help you see how much changes in January, and I am glad to share my own with you. So here comes the complete honest truth.

*My body composition is suffering. I don’t think my CrossFit friends are ready for all this jelly. And I’m not a fan of all this jelly when I have to run, jump and huck myself over a bar.
*My face feels like it has a rash. Constantly. It doesn’t, but it feels like it. Unpleasant.
*I am so so sluggish these days. My motivation to do anything is at an all time low. Garrett said to me the other night “I haven’t seen you sit on the couch this much in the entire 7 years we’ve been together.” It’s epic, my current level of laziness.
*Constant dehydration. No matter what I drink I just feel dry and thirsty. The red wine isn’t helping either.
*My face feels puffy constantly. I am completely certain each time I look in the mirror I’m going to see Mama Elsa staring back at me.

*Two Words: Back Fat. I don’t really need to expand on this one, do I? There is nothing worse than a preponderance of back fat.
*My nails are splitting. This is no bueno for my manicure.
*Vampire Bite Acne. I heard Diane say this on the most recent Balanced Bites Podcast and was like “Yes! That’s it! This is what I have! Acne that looks like I’ve been bitten by a vampire on my neck!” Oh wait…NO! NO NO NO NO NO. Nobody wants to relate to this.
*Speaking of Acne I don’t even want to discuss how much I’m breaking out.
*Icky Body Image. I have the time and money to go shopping right now and the desire to get a few new items for my wardrobe. But THE LAST THING I feel like doing right now is shopping for clothes. UGH.

*****

And that is really the state of my health right now. I can’t wait to get started with January’s Whole 30. I’m looking forward to turning all of this around, and I know from experience it can be done quickly with a little dedication.

I’ve got some meal planning inspiration, some recipes and more motivation coming this weekend, but until then here’s what you can do for me, and everyone playing along:

*If you blog about your Current State of Health, leave a link in the comments.
*If you are going to be writing about your Whole 30 experience leave a link to your site in the comments so we can all add you to our feed readers.
*If you don’t have a blog, feel free to leave your list in the comments.

Let’s help each other out, y’all!

Garrett and I are doing another Whole 30 in January. If we are being totally honest here, my body is kind of begging for it with all of the peppermint and chocolate covered breakfast I have been eating lately. I’d probably dive right in to a Holiday Whole 30 except I totally concur that it’s a terrible idea.

The thing about sugar + booze (and even excessive gluten for me to a degree) is that it just absolutely wreaks havoc on my life. Sure it tastes good for a bit (hell, in some cases ahem Nutella ahem it tastes AMAZING) but the consequences go so much further than just a sugar crash or a Sunday morning hangover. It just seeps its way into so many aspects of my life.

I have been enjoying some delicious treats lately, but I am also not sleeping as well, drinking more coffee than I should to get through the day, lacking energy to work out regularly, I’ve been laid up on my couch sick for two days and I have zero energy or desire to cook. This is not who I am. But this is most certainly who I am on sugar, booze and gluten. It’s all a by product of my holiday indulging and though I went into it with open eyes and don’t necessarily regret it, that doesn’t mean it is without consequences. And I’m ready to pay the piper so I can get back to being the version of myself that I love: happy, healthy, fit, energized and motivated. Because seriously? This ass-shaped dent in my couch really doesn’t go with my living room decor.

So Garrett and are I gearing up to have another awesome month of crystal clean eating. It’s going to be a super good time and I really can’t wait, because as I said on Day 21 of our first Whole 30:

…now I know that I am only 30 days away from inspiration. 21 days, even at the most. From feeling like my best self. And I can do all that without to much grumbling really. And knowing that, has given me confidence and a security blanket that I didn’t even know I needed.

Just reading that makes me remember how awesome that felt. And right now, I am feeling many things but awesome is not one of them. 🙂 So I wanted to see who is out there that might be interested joining me. Are you already planning on participating in the January Whole 30? Are you thinking about it? Are you on the fence?

Let’s do it together!

It will be fun. And in just 30 days, we will be seriously ready to kick off 2013 in the best way ever.

If you have any questions or concerns about it, or you are still teetering on the fence, let me convince you. Leave your questions in the comments, or if you are doing it let me know. We can all keep each other accountable. We can blog our awesome recipe finds. We can share in our successes and our struggles. It’s going to feel fantastic — well, uh after that initial WAIT WHERE IS MY SUGAR feeling wears off. hehe. And heck, it’s only 30 days. You can do anything for 30 days right? Need some more convincing? Here are a few of my favorite reads.

Resources – Motivation:

*10 Tips to Make Your Whole 30 A Success
*Whole 30 as a vegetarian? — Kathleen did the Whole 30 even though she doesn’t eat meat and has great meal plans and inspiration and a few recipes to boot!
*Why 100% Commitment is Important

Resources – Food:

*A Month of Whole 30 Dinner Ideas
*A Month of Whole 30 Freezer Meals
*Well Fed – The BEST Whole 30 approved cookbook around. Full of deliciousness!
*My Whole 30 Pinterest Board – It is slim pickins right now but I will be adding some awesome inspiration in the next week so stay tuned!

****

So what do ya say? Have I convinced you to join me? Take the plunge.

1. Dinner is in color!, 2. Who needs cheese? #whole30, 3. Burgers + Fries, 4. Smoked Jalapeno Kraut, 5. Berries + Coconut, 6. When can we have honey again?, 7. Grapefrut Fizzy Water (aka NOT wine), 8. Meat + Veg, 9. Steak Salad, 10. Spicy Taco Breakfast Skilled, 11. Chicken + Brussels, 12. Food Prep Sunday has begun!

Well we’re still here and we’re still rocking this Whole 30! I can not tell you how helpful it has been to plan + prep meals. It does take a little extra work but always being able to reach into the fridge and have *something* to eat when you’re hungry really ensures that things go smoothly. Also helpful, not having ANYTHING in the house that is a temptation, because let me tell you — this would have been the week I cracked.

Travel

Along with regular life, I ended up finding out on Tuesday that I would have to go to Los Angeles for work for the day on Thursday. I’m usually pretty flexible about traveling but after Reno last week I just wanted to get into my stupid rhythm and not have to worry about eating on the go. But hey — life happens, right?

I made sure to eat a pretty big breakfast that morning before my 8am flight and when it came time to grab lunch, I wasn’t ravenous so I happily grabbed a simple salad with steak with oil/vinegar. It was not that great, no exciting culinary discovery, but I was just happy to put a little something in my tummy and then it was back on a plane by 2pm heading home.

I had also packed a little backup snack just in case there wasn’t time for lunch or I ended up in the airport and it was complicated to find something decent to eat and um…I do NOT recommend packing blueberries in a ziplock and throwing them in your travel tote. It only would have been helpful if I wanted blueberry jam for a snack. So. Next time I travel, I will be more prepared with portable snacks. But in the end, it worked out because I didn’t need it anyway.

When I got home that night I was completely NOT in the mood to cook. On a normal night I would have listened to Chipotle’s Siren Song and just grabbed takeout, so it was super clutch to have some already cooked chicken and sauteed brussels sprouts in the fridge. Add a few more raw veggies and dinner is served!

Workouts

We also got back to the gym with a vengeance this week which was nice. Actually, let me be real for a second — it was not nice at all because it was 100+ degrees all week and we ended up working out at 5pm which is basically the heat of the day. By day 3 we started calling it Bikram CrossFit.

The workouts were brutal (yay! running 2 miles when it’s 102 out!) and so was the heat, but the upside was that post workout neither of us wanted to even THINK about protein shakes so we ended up just having coconut water while we assembled dinner. Because I had prepped so many meals in advance we were just able to get dinner on the table fairly quickly instead of eating a specific post-workout combo of foods and then prepping dinner separately. This week there will definitely be some morning workouts since the heat is just being stubborn and sticking around. It will be nice to see my favorite morning peeps and get a little break workout in NORMAL weather. I can’t wait!

Socializing

We also had a social event this past Saturday and it was one that I was a little worried about beforehand, but honestly it ended up being no big deal. We had a fun reunion with all of our friends who we used to work with at Peet’s Coffee & Tea at the old sushi bar where we all used to have cocktails after work. Very nostalgic! In fact, random trivia, it is the sushi bar where Garrett and I decided we were going to do this relationship thing! Over gin and tonics, Yum! We both ended up eating kind of a late lunch which worked out for the best because we weren’t super hungry for sushi when we got there. But really, does sushi ever seem like a BAD idea? No, no it doesn’t.

The biggest challenge was managing well-meaning comments in a group like that. I honestly didn’t want to talk about what we were or weren’t eating, or to be told that there were good things to eat on the menu, I just wanted to see good friends, you know? But it’s fairly impossible to do that when most people are eating and drinking and you’re not, and it raised some questions, so there was some conversation about our crazy Whole 30. I hate being the person not going with flow, and it always makes me a little uncomfortable when people really want to talk about what you’re doing about food (because people inevitably feel the need to defend their own position or get down on themselves and what they’re eating, which: NOT NECESSARY) but who cares in the long run? It was fun to see friends. We have some good eggs, I tell ya. That was a great job!

There were definitely things on the menu that were fine to order, but in the end I didn’t really want any of them and decided to just opt out completely. Why go to a restaurant that serves your FAVORITE THING EVER and then order something that you don’t like quite as much? Quality of life, man. Don’t go to a BBQ restaurant and order tofu, you know? 🙂 I just didn’t feel like a substitute that night, I wasn’t that hungry and so skipped it altogether. But I did miss the gin and tonic 🙂 Club soda with lime worked just fine as a replacement though actually. It was 106 out, so it was refreshing and hydrating and really in your hand it looks and feels exactly the same. THAT, was a good substitute for me.

For Garrett, however, this was BY FAR the toughest moment he has had all 12 days though. He had a great time with our friends but on the way home he was saaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaad. Sad that he couldn’t have a beer. Sad that he had to pass up sushi. Sad because ALL HE WANTED WAS TO EAT WAS EVERYTHING AND WE CAN’T EAT ANYTHING AND…WAAAAAAAAAAAH. It was like Boy-PMS. But then we got home and I cooked him a little something delicious and all was right in the world. So you know, I think it is definitely important to not get super ravenous and then go somewhere you will want to chow down on everything and then eat nothing. It might have been good for Garrett to grab a little bite just for sustenance. Hungry=Cranky=WHY CAN’T I DRINK ALL THE BEER AND EAT CHOCOLATE COVERED EVERYTHING ALWAYS?

Cravings

So. There have definitely been some cravings. Friday night wine cravings are not going away. 🙂 But knowing that we would have no ceremonious unwinding with a glass on Friday night, we decided to replace our wine ritual (since that’s really what it is we are craving) and stop at Whole Foods on the way home from the gym last Friday and get whatever overpriced organic crazy town fruit we could find and ceremoniously enjoy THAT as a treat after dinner. It was no glass of wine but it worked! I opted for super ripe apricots and Garrett went with Pluots. Both were AMAZING. The best part of completely avoiding sugar and really not eating much fruit is that when you do have it, it tastes like candy.

We tortured ourselves a little bit on Saturday at Costco during our weekly shop by going down a lot of crap food aisles. Both of us were just dying over stupid things we never buy like Peanut Butter Cups or Chocolate Covered Caramels. It was kind of humorous, but it also made me realize that we are totally out of the physical craving stage.

Now all of my cravings come from my inner-6 year old who thinks that when someone tells me I can’t have something, I want like ten of THOSE EXACT THINGS IMMEDIATELY! But it’s kind of refreshing to realize that because it’s a lot easier to distract my inner-6 year old than it is to deal with actual physical sugar cravings. We just laughed about our cartoon-eyed junk food desires and then bought our groceries. Ok and then maybe went home and finished off the apricots and pluots. 🙂

******

So the second week is down and I’m feeling good. No doubts we’ll make it through the 30 days at this point since we’ve had a number of challenges already and been just fine, but I am still counting the days until wine.

This coming week I’m actually doing some experiment and eliminating eggs. The fact that we are 12 days into squeaky clean eating (completely dairy free) and my face is breaking out more than ever and I’m still having some weird allergy symptoms, mostly after breakfast, which is basically always eggs, has made me want to try that to see if it makes a difference. I’ll let ya know next week!

How are you all doing?

Well, we’re 1/6 of the way through our first Whole 30 and I can say with absolute certainty that I haven’t had a bad meal yet! And I’m feeling pretty fantastic. That said, it hasn’t been without its challenges.

1. Taco Salad using a new vinaigrette, 2. Chili Redux with Steamed Broccoli, 3. Leftover Tri Trip Salad, 4. Herb Rubbed Tri Tip, Broccoli, Avocado, Tomatoes, 5. Roasting Sweet Potatoes, 6. photo, 7. Mish Mash Brekkie: frittata, leftover broccoli, cherries, coffee. #whole30, 8. Lobster Cocktail with Clarified Butter (not pictured Salad with hard boiled egg, olive oil and vinegar), 9. Fried Eggs, Sweet Potato Hash + Zucchini Fritters

Days 1-5

Thus far the Whole 30 has been pretty mellow. We are cooking delicious food, there are no “marginal” ingredients in the house so there is no temptation there (I’m uh…not so good with temptation) and life hasn’t felt dramatically different. That said, last week was NOT a typical week.

For starters, we only worked out once (I mentioned we both ripped our hands open TO THE EXTREME on Monday and this, plus other scheduling things, hindered workouts all week. HUGE bummer!) This meant I didn’t have to deal with eating real food instead of my beloved protein shakes post workout. I anticipated that being a challenge, but since I didn’t work out at all I can’t give you any update. Boo.

The first major challenge that we did encounter though happened on the first night. I had meant to prepare some Chocolate Chili on the weekend and hadn’t. I told myself not to worry about it that I’d just make it Wednesday night, but when I busted out the recipe at 6pm I realized that it takes more than 2 hours to make. And I was missing a major ingredient. FAIL. 🙂 In the end I just threw together a chili-like dish (no chocolate) with protein, veggies and spices and while it was not at all the beautiful first-night meal I had anticipated, we didn’t go hungry. Victory.

The second major challenge ended up having to do with casino food. HUH? You see, I do a good amount of traveling for my job (mostly day trips) and they can come on a moments notice. I got a phone call that I would be going to Reno last Thursday for the entire day (Road Trip, on only Day Two!!!) and all of a sudden I had a serious panic attack. What the hell would I eat in Reno? I was meeting with many strangers and honestly I was already sort of concerned about all the hand shaking I would have to do with my hideous ripped open hands. Now I was going to have to be the food nazi too? This was a SALES-ISH MEETING. I was trying to look amenable and agreeable. Siiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiigh.

In the end though, we ended up lunching at the seafood bar at the Atlantis (which is actually super delicious) and while everyone else ate sushi, I happily gobbled up a lobster cocktail with clarified butter (Totally legit!) and a salad with olive oil and balsamic that I had them add a hard boiled egg to for some extra protein. In the end, no need for panic at all. No one was the wiser. And I actually got some high fives for “Ordering the Lobster” which, um…hello? Who DOESN’T want lobster?

I thought Friday night would be a challenge since that is usually when Garrett and I both want to crack open a bottle of wine on the patio and kick up our feet, but Garrett had to wake up at 4am for work on Saturday morning so neither of us even thought about drinking. Saturday night though? After running errands and being productive, doing the grocery shopping and then cooking up an awesome dinner on the grill– well, we missed the wine. And talked about it. Quite a bit. 🙂 But we’ll survive! Instead of wine as a reward, we rewarded ourselves by sitting down and watching a movie together and eating a bowl of cherries instead of popcorn. Totally fun, even though the movie was so lame it was funny.

Sunday (Day Five! What? This is flying by!) I spent a few hours chopping, measuring and stirring and I’ve prepped a portion of almost every meal we’re going to eat this week. Usually when I do this on Sundays I snack on some little treat like sweet potato chips or (even better) DRIED MANGO!! I missed that yesterday, but mostly just out of habit. I wasn’t hungry, and I have really come to understand that my obsession with both of those snacky items goes from “enjoying a bite or two” to “can someone help me unhinge my jaw so I can get this down faster” pretty quickly, so even though I sort of salivated at the thought, I just kind of distracted myself and kept on moving.

Desire for jaw unhinging, I think, is a pretty good indicator of an “Unhealthy Psychological Response” to food. I enjoyed finding that term in Dallas and Melissa’s book It Starts with Food, which I finished right before we embarked on this Whole 30. Part of this experiment is acknowledging those foods that you don’t really eat because they are nourishing you, but rather to get some sort of fix: comfort, sugar, whatever. I don’t have a lot of those, but let me tell you dried mangoes and sweet potato chips are definitely a slippery slope for me!

Someone asked me the other day if I was really going to cook all 30 recipes in this post? In reality, I probably will not get to all 30. But for me, that list was more of a strategy to keep my own anxiety at bay. It feels better to go into something like this armed with some creative ideas. Despite not planning to stick to that list exclusively, I will be absolutely cooking something every single night (except for two nights when we have plans that include dinner out, which will be their own challenges.) How I keep myself from feeling overwhelmed by all those meals is the Sunday afternoon prep. It is seriously a life-saver and I just can’t recommend it enough if you are going to try to undertake a 30 day nutritional challenge.

Things I Miss

So…is everything absolutely easy-peasy and perfect? No. I miss my glass of wine, damnit! But guess what? I am feeling notably better. So whether it is the seed oils that I’ve given up, or the little bits of sugar here and there, or the alcohol completely — it has absolutely made a difference in only 5 days. And I was eating (what I thought was) pretty clean beforehand. I’m also concentrating on getting a good amount of sleep, and what do you know? If you get enough sleep, you actually think about other things when you wake up in the morning instead of thinking WHERE IS MY COFFEE the second your eyelids crack open.

The other things I’m missing like crazy are my taco salad dressing options. Yes, even though every single one is full of sugar and other crap. I made a substitute vinaigrette that I thought would taste okay and it was only alright. Still working on a replacement for that. And you know I won’t be eliminating Taco Salad this month so a solution MUST BE FOUND! 🙂 Saturday night’s dinner included making Melissa’s Moroccan Dipping Oil with cilantro and let me tell you I literally wanted to drink that right out of the jar. I’m thinking the mix of flavors might taste pretty damn good on Taco Salad so I mixed up a batch yesterday for just that purpose. I’ll report back!

Things Coming Up

I have lots more to say about this little experiment but I think I’ve probably said enough for now. So far so good, but can I get a GODDAMN GLASS OF WINE? NO? HRRRRRMMMPH. OK.

I’m going to show you what’s going on in my fridge this week and also tell you about some of the other habits that I am trying to take the time to incorporate into my lifestyle. Healthy Habits can be hard to create, but one of the things that I’ve realized is that most of the time they aren’t any harder or more time consuming than what you are already doing, they just aren’t part of the routine yet. So we’re trying to routinize some other things that will benefit our health during this experiment and then see if they stick! Here’s to hoping.

Hope you all are having a good Monday. How have your first few days gone?

Hoooooooooooray! It’s Monday again. Oh wait, that can’t be how the expression goes, can it?

Eh, whatever. I’m feeling chipper this morning even despite the Universe trying unabashedly to screw me up, so TAKE THAT. I’m full of vim and vigor (or rather coffee and a delicious breakfast) so my plan is to take this day by the horns. Oh and also, to do Angie. (Yikes! Pray for me!)

Anyway, I wanted to have some Monday Morning Coffee Talk to chat about a few things:

Namely that THE WHOLE 30 STARTS IN TWO DAYS.

OH EM EFF GEE.

Actually, I am now officially totally stoked on it. This weekend we cleared the crappy condiments out of the fridge, ate all the cheese (Goodbye cheese, you’ll be missed) made some salad dressings (minus the honey, obvs) bought some new groceries (fridge pics coming this week) and cranked out some homemade mayo and some heavenly frittatas. On top of that, I really thought about the point of this 30 days, the challenges I foresee, and my strategies. Also: WHY THE HELL I DO STUFF LIKE THIS. I’ll tell you about all that in one second. Hold tight.

Before that, it’s worth mentioning that I will not ONLY be talking about the Whole 30 for the next 30 days. I thought a lot about how I could approach documenting this experience for those who are interested while not boring those who aren’t, and I think the only way to do that is to ensure it’s not the only thing on the agenda. It’s going to be a lot of work, but here’s the thing: I’m a blabbermouth. And I have lots of regularly scheduled stuff to say anyway because OHMYGOD CAN’T SOMEONE SHUT HER UP??? So that was your friendly warning that you might be hearing from me QUITE A BIT over the next month. 🙂 I’m a chatty dork like that. Don’t believe my dorkiness? Maybe this can convince you:

Don’t make me pull out the finger guns, okay? They clash with my sweeeeeeet Hobie tank top.

Today, however I’m going to talk a bit about the Whole 30, because HELLO, it is starting right quick!

The Point

Why the heck would you do that? This is the question that has popped up the most on facebook, etc. This makes me so happy though because here’s the thing — this isn’t THAT different from how we usually eat. So people’s shock at the things we are giving up hopefully means that I am not a giant food douche spouting off about my dietary preferences to anyone who will listen all the time. Awesome. I’d like to think I’m serious about what I eat but not preachy. Fingers crossed.

The point (for me) however, is a month of diligence. Really putting my effort into cleanly fueling myself, which means paying attention to some of the things that I let slide regularly: seed oils, options when dining out, dairy products and booze. It’s the A++ version of how we normally eat, and I’m excited to see the results of our efforts — whether they are dramatic or not.

Also: I love the experiment! Every time I do something *dramatic* (and really, by dramatic I just mean something that I am making a real concerted effort at) I learn new things about myself. And I also pick up new efficiencies, solidify some better habits and overall I improve. I like doing things like that. You may have cooler hobbies than me, but experimenting is one of my favorite things to do! Maybe I should have been a scientist. Missed opportunity, man. I probably wouldn’t look very cute in a lab coat though. So boxy!

Understanding The Challenges

Even though this isn’t a dramatic overhaul of our diet, it is not without its challenges. We have 2 social occasions coming up this month that are decidedly un-Whole 30 friendly (aka they mostly revolve around food and booze.) I’m not too worried because you know what — it is two days of my life. I CAN DO ANYTHING FOR TWO DAYS: including abstaining from booze and non-compliant food. I’m looking at it as a challenge — how can I do it without being a wet-blanket? It will be a good exercise in discipline and strategizing and when I think about it that way, I’m almost looking forward to it. War Games: The Food Edition. MUAHAHAHAHAHA.

This may also have to do with that fact that I’ve been watching The Olympics all weekend and am totally walking around the house humming Chariots of Fire and fist pumping all of the Americans Triumphing Over Crazy Odds! (Those human interest pieces have had me weeping all weekend. I’m kind of a mess.)

I also know that I am going to be challenged with the sheer amount of food prep this month is going to require. I definitely rely on things like Post-Workout protein shakes and some pre-made convenience items right now that probably aren’t doing me any favors. Eliminating those will be different, so for me, I have to make it fun. I’ve got a calendar chock full of awesome recipes that I am SO STOKED to make, and post work out options that are fun, fancy and WAY MORE DELICIOUS than a shake. I’ve got to make it fun or I’ll want to quit.

The Strategy

My mental approach over the next month is going to encompass these three things. Mantras, if you will…light up the patchouli sticks, y’all:

# 1: Get through it, Holly it’s only 30 days.
You’re not living out on a life raft punching great white sharks in the nose without water. You are avoiding cheese and saving the wine for September. Get a Grip.

#2: Where there is struggle there is strength.
When you come to something that feels challenging, take the time to sit in it and figure out why. Then figure out how you could have avoided it so you will know for next time. Maybe all of that self-analysis will distract you. 🙂

#3: Be as prepared as possible, but know your strength, girl.
Don’t get it twisted, you can do this. But you know — fail to plan, plan to fail and all that mumbo jumbo. Prioritize your needs and don’t apologize. You are stubborn as hell, remember that when you feel weak. You are going to do this, just by nature of the fact that it is hard and YOU LIKE HARD THINGS.

If you just chuckled like a 12 year old boy, you are my people.

Alright, alright. Pep talk done. Now…who is doing this with me? Do tell so I know who to aggressively high five this month! And if you are interested in Whole 30 food porn, I’ll be posting most of my meals to the Holly Would If She Could FB Page. Come by and say hi!