Whole 30 or Bust!

Whole 30 here I come!

Howdy!  How was your weekend?  Is it still going?  For me, well, it’s Monday, it’s President’s Day, and I feel like a fatty.  I gotta pull it together.  What was going to be a loosening of my usual eating standards over the holidays (ahem, 2 months ago) has turned into a food and drink free-for-all that’s still going strong.  It’s time for a reset.

I have a couple girlfriends who started the Whole 30 program at the beginning of January.  They’re liking it so much they’ve gone on to do it for another 30 days.  When they first told me about it I was like uhhh, no dairy, grains, sugar OR alcohol?  NO.  So I continued my downward spiral into fattydom and then in the past 2-3 weeks I’ve been realizing how gross I really feel.  I’m calling myself a fatty but this is more about how I feel than my appearance.  I mean yes, my pants and shirts are tighter.  My bra is tighter.  I haven’t been exercising much because I broke my toe about a month ago.  But really it’s that I’m sluggish, I’m getting headaches more frequently, I have mood swings (probably come by those somewhat honestly, lol), and even things like my teeth feel kind of yucky from the excessive sugar and junk.  I’m just not taking good care of myself.  I sound disgusting… 

Anyway, after doing a little research, I’ve decided I’m going to go for it and complete Whole 30.  It’s a nutrition program based upon a book by Dallas and Melissa Hartwig called It Starts With Food, which I downloaded a couple days ago.  They advocate removing the major groups of foods I mentioned above for 30 days to basically reset your body, your hormones, your taste buds, everything.  There aren’t tons of rules to this program, and there are really no portions you need to track or calories you need to count.  But you have to completely omit anything with added sugar (including seemingly innocent things like ketchup), alcohol, all grains (even corn and things like quinoa) and all dairy.  It’s pretty hard core but the results sound like they could be pretty fabulous.

People who have completed Whole 30 rave about their energy, clear mind, better sleep, weight loss, and just feeling better all around.  ALL of that sounds great to me!  I am ready to NOT feel my double chin growing in size by the day.

ALSO, an important point: it’s ONLY 30 days.  As they like to say on the website, this is not hard.  Hard is beating cancer or losing a parent (yes, I have experience with the latter…).  Avoiding sugar and forgoing alcohol is NOT hard in the big scheme of things.  And after 30 days they have recommendations for adding things in as you see fit for your personal life, body, and requirements.

SO, as you can see in the photo, I hit Trader Joe’s and Safeway today and spent a small fortunate on a ton of fruits, vegetables and meat.  Yikes.  Scott has decided to do the program with me, which I’m psyched about because we will be able to support each other, through thick and thin!  Hopefully more thin than thick.  HA HA!

I will share a weekly update with you as I progress through my 30 days.  I’m pretty excited and feel as prepared as I’m going to get.  One of my concerns is that I really don’t like eggs so eating them for breakfast doesn’t sound so terrific, but I am willing to eat them a couple days a week and get creative with veggies, fruit, and meat the other days…. yeah.  LOL.  I think I can, I think I can… 

Have you heard of Whole 30?  If so, what do you think?  Have you completed it or would you?  Wish me luck please!