Before I get into the details about this Wholly Journey and why I dubbed it as such, I wanted to introduce you to the plan that the journey is based on. It is something called the Whole30. The Whole30 is a plan that was developed by the authors of "It Starts with Food" who came up with the idea starting with the Paleo diet and from there they developed it into something much more focused, detailed and very specifically goal oriented. The Paleo diet is a long-term lifestyle, the Whole30 is THIRTY days (or 45 or 60 depending on how unhealthy you were before you start) of a strict diet that is supposed to basically “Reset” your body to its’ optimum level of health and functionality.
I don’t want to get into all the nuts and bolts of what the Whole 30 is and preach about something I haven't even done yet - although the fact that I am doing it at all is preaching enough for those who know me. But I do want to tell you why it I have decided to do the Whole30 and take my family along for the ride:
To start, while I was reading "It Starts with Food" I was taken aback with all the "science-y" facts and evidence that explain how food works in our bodies to either make us healthy or unhealthy (there is no in between). The way it works is complex, but it ranges from unhealthy psychological affects to allergies that we don't even know we have, and all of these things come together and cause us to live at a sub-obtimal level of health. (If you want the details about all this - read the book - it's very convicting!)
Then there were the testimonials throughout the book which talk about people who have completed a Whole30 coming off of diabetes medications, cholesterol or high blood pressure meds, they talk about major medical problems being resolved (from common aches & pains to arthritis and Chrones disease), they talk about losing weight & inches, about beautiful skin without acne and healthy hair. But there was one phrase that almost every testimonial had that really caused my "reading ears" to perk up and that phrase was “Life-changing”.
But to be honest, I bought this book to simply get a few pointers on how to make my diet better. I had absolutely NO intention of doing anything as radical as a Paleo diet and especially not a Whole30. But within 2 chapters I was hooked and becoming more and more concerned about what I was reading and how it applied to me. By the end of Chapter 5 I was in tears about just how bad my situation was and how I was unknowingly dragging my family down with me (especially my kids). In one of the early chapters they outline a “bad day” of food choices – and let me tell you what… their “BAD DAY” was really what many would consider “good". And as it applies to me… their “bad day” and the many negative effects of it, was a HUGE wake-up call. Because my "bad" [eating habits] are about 6 circles of hell deeper than THEIR “bad”… so I can only imagine what my body is functioning at (probably about a 4%).
The point is that the more I read the more certain I became that I needed the Whole30 and that weight loss SHOULD NOT be my main concern. There are much bigger fish I need to fry right now – lest I become an obese, Type 2 Diabetic with high blood pressure and cholesterol who dies before my kids ever make it to a prom! (Yes, I am an extreme case – more on why in an upcoming post).
And here is where I can say that I know what you are thinking. You are wondering the same thing I and my husband were wondering when I got “hooked”… what’s the catch? What do the authors of the book have to gain if people do this Whole30 program? The answer is NOT A DARN THING. They have nothing to gain. The only thing I can figure is that these people GENUNINELY care about the health of others and wanted to help people like me figure out how to be healthy and they wanted to let people like me know that... (ready for it?) "IT STARTS WITH FOOD"! Because like I said in my first post, all the exercise in the world, ain't gonna fix a several Big Macs a week habit.
But this post is becoming less post-like and more novel-like so let me wrap it all up in a pretty little bow for you: the Whole30 is thirty days of WHOLE FOODS ONLY:
No Dairy
No Grains
No Gluten
No Wheat
No Beans/Legumes
No Sugar (of ANY kind)
No alcohol
No calorie counting
No weigh-ins
It is:
Protein (meat, fish, eggs)
Veggies
Fruits
Fats (oils, nuts, avocados, etc.)
Seems extreme – but you have NO IDEA just HOW EXTREME it will be for me. Check out my future post “McMe” to see what type of food eater I am now (Preview: I consider lettuce on a Big Mac to be a serving of veggies). (Yea… it’s B-A-D!)
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