This will be me - REALLY!!
This week, despite taking it fairly easy after the brilliant Commando antics of last weekend, I’m still feeling surprisingly lethargic. Each night I’ve been telling myself to get to bed early but suddenly at around 9pm – I finally feel mentally alert and very productive and so the late night (11pm)/ following day lethargy-at-work cycle continues unbroken. Really not good.
I’m also finally coming around to the notion that my increasingly out of control wheat, sugar and caffeine intakes of late are also really not doing me any favours. AT ALL :-((( As much as I *love* exercise and want it to single-handedly resolve the war on my lingering and rather too prominent waistline – I really do need to assist the process and thus seriously review my diet OR rather lack of!!
As ever, I’m jumping the gun slightly as SUPERchicks are kicking off a pre-festivities “SUPERnutrition Mission” which I CANNOT wait to join in with. This will co-inside with SUPERchick's soon-to-be-launched revised nutrition portion of the online SUPERchick Members' Locker. {I’ve been very lucky to get a sneak preview and it looks TOTALLY AMAZEBELLS – all those "don't know where to start"/boring moments at work will be extinguished FOREVER!!}
But considering how bloated, lethargic and spotty I’m currently feeling and how rapidly my birthday is approaching (only 3 weeks to go before size 10 dress doom - eek), I decided that I could definitely do with a headstart and so should get testing some nutrition stratagems pre-official SUPERchick “Nutrition Mission”.
By amazing coincidence, one of my lovely friends has sent me a copy of Robb Wolf’s Paleo Solution. Enter CAVEgirl - Girl on a Mission’s ancestral alter ego prepped and ready for Paleo Mission!!
Robb Wolf’s book and his "Paleo Solution" theory is a bit too heavy on the biochemicals and digestive processes (leaky gut chat - bit grim) for my evolved billennium brain to properly digest!! – but the basic tenets are as follows:
a) Banish all gluten (eg wheat, grains, pasta, rice), dairy and legumes from your diet as this causes inflammation (lethargy, bloating)
b) You can get sufficient carbohydrates from vegetables and fruit instead
c) If you need to lose weight – limit your fruit intake to one piece a day (as fruit is very heavy on the fructose – SUGARRRRRR!!!) and limit your egg consumption
d) Most meals will comprise of protein (eggs, meat, fish), vegetables (the more colourful the better) and good fats (nuts, avocado, olive oil) and herbs for taste.
e) 8-9 hours EVERY night is ESSENTIAL, preferable in a non-electronic, BLACKED OUT environment.
f) Unless you have serious allergies – you can apply the 80:20 rule to paleo eating – PHEW.
g) Exercise is essential for regulating hormones and helping to minimise insulin resistance etc. Woohoo – I at least have one of these dimensions covered.
Clearly I cannot reduce Robb’s lifetime study here in one paragraph- so if you’re interested in finding out more about Paleo eating – check out http://www.robbwolf.com/ particularly his quick start guide . Another paleo resource which I imagine will quickly become a personal lifeline if I become a paleo convert is PALEOPLAN Paleoplan has already come to my rescue as today I’ve been trying to find a breakfast recipe that a) I can eat on the go and b) doesn’t resemble dinner – like Robb’s baked salmon and almonds suggestion. What the hell?!
Here’s my attempt at the paleoplan’s omelette muffin’s breakfast recipe This week's new breakfast staple!!!
Before you think I’ve completely lost my billennium evolved marbles and that I'm just about to run wild like my Neolithic ancestors, I do have LOTS of lingering questions about paleo eating that I’m still looking into:
1. Isn’t paleo eating just a repackaged version of the very gruesome Atkins diet – which had some dire health consequences not to mention being plain unsocial at points – ketone related halitosis anyone?
2. Can you really eat that much protein – how will my kidneys cope!!!?
3. Does paleo eating ensure you get sufficient calcium (hasn’t Gwyneth Paltrow just been diagnosed with osteoporosis due to macrobiotic eating – which I imagine has many correlations to paleo/ all unprocessed/ sugar free eating regimes?)
4. How can you eat paleo when you’re trying to lose weight as you are meant to restrict your egg consumption but almost EVERY paleo breakfast involves eggs – CONFUSED?!
5. Seriously who manages 9 hours of sleep and manages to keep ANY kind of social life? How's a CAVEgirl meant to snare a CAVEboy?
6. Is there a more winter appropriate paleo soup option – how can you eat salads all year long when you don’t live in balmy California? What do you do for the 10 months of the year when avocados are not available?
7. Once you eat "clean" – if/when you reintroduce/ revert back to “forbidden” foods – will your body react uber extreme compared to currently? Girl cannot live without pasta forever, particularly if snared CAVEboy is Italian!!
However my prehistoric CAVEgirl alter ego, just like C21st Girl, likes a challenge – Robb Wolf reckons you should go paleo for a trial period of 30 days, this CAVEgirl prefers to take smaller steps out of her cave – so I’ll be taking it one week at a time – that’s really as much as I can plan ahead meal wise anyway! x
This week's PALEO foodshop - yup fortunately Waitrose is as old as the hills!!! Any paleo aficionado's will be able spot a couple of cheats!! But SERIOUSLY I'm trying my best.
p.s. Don't panic - the next exercise/fitness mission GUARANTEED to get me looking skimpy loin-cloth-pummel-your-chest-tastic is being planned to perfection as you read this (full details will be released after I complete the SUPERchick 10km race, UNDER AN HOUR!!!, on the 6th November). Plus I have a Running School update that I'm desperate to get online. Ooh the excitement!!
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