EATING MEAT

Hello Everyone,

After my attempt at being vegan I decided to add meat back into the equation.  I listened to people like Dr. Ken Berry, Dr. Anthony Chaffee. Dr. Shawn Baker. Dr Jason Fung and many others before going all in on carnivore.

It was during the second year of my journey that I stopped eating other foods.  I thought that I could not live without peanut butter.  I still had it on a limited basis but it was my Achilles heel.  I really thought that I could keep on eating it and lose weight and I did but boy did it slow me down and I finally gave it up.

Going on an all meat diet was not as hard as I thought.  I had some aversion to red meat having been eating  a SAD diet for so long.  I had no idea how sugar and processed food would dull your tongue. Actually, I believe those foods kept me addicted to them and caused me to crave them and not healthy food. 

I went through strong withdrawals about 2 weeks into my diet change.  I actually had the shakes!!! I found myself crawling into bed so sick I thought something was really wrong.  After a couple of days I started to feel better.  I stayed on course and after a month my cravings slowed.  

Two years in and now I don't have those cravings. If I slip and eat corn chips or something those cravings all come flooding back. Some people can moderate.  They have no trouble eating just a little and walking away.  I am not that person and I am not alone. It's all or nothing with me so I choose nothing and I feel better for it. As long as I don't taste it I can abstain from it.

I begane carnivore with eating a lot of bacon and eggs.  Hamburger was also on the menu as was pork and chicken. I still keep a few hard boiled eggs on hand if I feel the need for a snack. 

I still feel into the mindset that boneless and skinless was the way to go as was low fat.  I have learned otherwise.  Saturated fat is not our enemy polyunsaturated fats are. Going meat based is going whole foods. Any time you eliminate sugar and carbs you will feel better. The thing is to track how you are responding. Better sleep, reduced inflammation, better focus and of course weight loss are some of the benefits I have experienced eating only meat.

My husband has also gone carnivore this year and the changes in him are amazing.  He used to be type 2 diabetic, used to have high cholesterol and his high blood pressure is reduced.  He also lost weight and the inflammation that has come off of him is amazing. last year he had to get his wedding ring cut off because his hands were so inflamed.  We got him one of those rubber wedding bands people are wearing now. Well, so much inflammation came off of him that the ring slipped right off his finger and is now big for him to wear.

Our doctor was very skeptical when I told her how I was eating. My first seven months in she wanted to check my cholesterol. She thought I was going to have a bad number but it actually came down.  After 2 years she is looking forward to taking my husband off of more medicine. He is off 4 of his 7 medicines. 

I will be getting my yearly blood work done this coming week and will share those numbers.  

Remember, Jesus is Lord God is in control and only Him do we serve.

Rock on carnivores!!!!

IT'S BEEN THREE YEARS!!

 Hello Everyone,

Today marks 3 years since I started this journey to lose weight and regain my mobility. I have had my ups and downs but overall I feel blessed and successful.  

I began this journey realizing that I needed a change if I wanted to age gracefully and enjoy what years The Lord has left for me on this earth before joining Him in heaven. Being able to be up and about with my loving husband, children and grandchildren is priceless.

Three years ago I realized how bad my situation was. I was 59 and losing my mobility. I weigh 258 pounds and could believe that I had gotten that far gone. I needed help getting out of a chair, in and out of the bath.  Standing and cooking was a struggle. Doing household tasks was very difficult.  I felt like I was losing parts of my life.  Thank you Lord that I now have them back.

The first year I lost 30 lbs. I began walking and could not walk far. I persisted and started to walk my neighbor's dog and by the end of that year I was walking 3-5 miles a day.  Because of my three level fusion and nerve damage I should only have been able to walk 1/2 mile.  

Philippians 4:13

I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.

The second year I lost another 20 lbs and continued to walk daily. 

The third year I have lost another 24 lbs. My disability has decided to try and bring me down .  Long walks have been difficult but I am walking 2 miles. 

Beside the weight loss there are a number of non scale victories.  Being able to bend up and down easily, doing housework, riding in a car, cooking and enjoy the fresh air outside and my husband's company. These are only a few victories.  Yes, they are victories when you have felt like a burden.  No more, I participate in life and not watch it go by.

 Now, 62 I went from 258 pounds to 184 pounds. That's 74 pounds gone!!  I went from a  2-3X shirt to a large.  I wore 22 pants and now wear size 13/14.  I have more to go but I am getting there. 

Jesus is Lord, God is in control and only Him do we serve.

Rock on Carnivores!!

VEGAN OR NOT TO BE VEGAN

Hello Everyone,

When I decided to take more control of my health one item on that agenda to tackle was my digestive issues.  i knew that I had IBS but no diagnosis about what was going on with my stomach.  Over the years I saw different doctors with no answer.  Finally, we now have an internal medicine doctor who sent me to a GI doctor for further help. 

This doctor did not repeat the tests that were already done but looked them over and decided on a nuclear test. This turned out to be a 2-3 hour test.  I had some food that was sprinkled with a nuclear drug and they scanned my stomach to view the contents. Every half hour they would rescann my stomach to see how much of the contents my stomach was able to move out. This went on until the test was completed.

I returned to learn the results of that test and I was diagnosed with Gastroparesis level 2.  Normally when you eat your stomach has motility and moves all its contents out in about 2 hours. In my case I still have over 40% of the content still sitting there.  I have nerve damage to my stomach. She started me on 2 medications. One for stomach motility and another for overactive stomach acid.

She recommended that I eat very soft foods. So, I decided to try vegan and eat very cooked vegetables thinking that meat would be harsh on my stomach.  I was wrong. My daughter who is vegan was very happy for me to try this.  I did enjoy my food but my body didn't enjoy eating it.  The high fiber caused all kinds of trouble with my stomach and IBS. I did this diet for several months and became too sick to continue it.

I went back to Google and Youtube and watched videos from various doctors to get more answers. I found the carnivore diet.  Now most doctors and dietitians tell you not to eat to much meat.  These doctors said something else. Meat was part of the proper human diet. I went to The Bible to see what God had to say.

Genesis 9:3

Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you.  I have given you all things, even as the green herbs.

Here God gave the command to eat meat and plants.  No where did He ever rescind that.  I am not anti vegetable.  On the contrary if I could I would eat them. Having a diet of only meat had healed me of IBS and greatly helped my Gastroparesis.  It has also healed my husband of Type 2 Diabetes, and high cholesterol. He is off 5 of the 7 medications he was on.

Is a carnivore diet a cure? No, I don't know what is but this way of eating has made a positive impact on our health.

God Bless you.

Rock on carnivores!! 

THE BEGINNING

Hello Everyone,

In February of 2021 I really started my journey. This is how it looked for me at the beginning.  I did a lot of research on different diets.  Now, many people don't like the word diet because it connotes diet culture. I like to think of it as different ways of eating because that is what a diet is the way you eat. 

There's a lot of talk about calories in and calories out. to lose weight you need to eat in a calorie deficit. That word DEFICIT sounds a little scary to me but that is what it takes to lose weight. Well, I was not sure what my caloric intake was then and I wasn't sure what it should look like.

Thanks to Google and BMI calculator I discovered that I was morbidly obese!!! Yikes!! My BMI was 41.6!!  It was a wake up call and a good one.  I was never over weight until my injury and I still thought of myself as that smaller person even though I could see in the mirror that I wasn't.  Funny how we trick ourselves into justifying the things we do. 

I came back to reality of my situation and purposed to change.  I was getting myself into a position of being a burden to others because of my weight gain that inhibited my mobility and inability to take very good care of myself or others.  The realization that I need to lose weight to get around and function became stronger than the need to "look good".  We all get our whys which push us to change and I got mine.

The first thing I did was get a free app to track my calories since I didn't have a good idea of what 1200 calories looked like. I didn't start my journey as a carnivore. At first I just began eating less and tracking what I was putting into my mouth. All the food was on the table then. I cut out sugar and processed foods.  What a positive impact that had.  

I lost 11 pounds in the first 2 months and my doctor was concerned that I was sick.  I laughed at that and said I lost it on purpose.  I guess she had gotten used to people not wanting to change and was pleasantly surprised. 

 Looking back I can see now how people just want the doctor to fix them with medication and go on their merry way.  I wanted to change that and I hope you do too.  There are those out there who have been overweight their entire lives and think that is how it is I can't change nor do they want to.  I am not talking about people with extreme situations that are a challenge to live with. But, then again I am also challenged and am making the change.  You really have to get your head in the right place to make the switch from unhealthy to healthy.

 Having always been an active person I know how freeing it is to not have the extra weight.  I remembered those days and am working on getting back to them.  Not to worry I am winning and getting my mobility and life back.

God Bless you all and remember that Jesus is Lord, God is in control and only Him do we serve.

Rock on Carnivores!!!

GETTING SERIOUS

 Hello Everyone,

 I talked previously about my weight loss and health journey starting in 2020. Well, that's not entirely true. I tried off and on cutting out sugar but never controlled my portions.  That pushed my weight up an additional 20 lbs.

I go see my doctor every three months because of being on pain management due to my disability.  In January of 2021 I couldn't believe that my weight had sky rocketed to 258 lbs!!!  How did this happen?  Was I really that lackadaisical about what I ate? Yes I was and I was in denial about it.  

Oh, I justified what I did. I can't walk very well so exercise was too hard, you only live once so eat the cake, my husband doesn't mind so enjoy yourself.  What a load of BS.  I had to get real and do it fast before I gained any more weight. 

We use to go out for lunch every Friday and get Mexican. We would have lunch and I ate the whole thing.  Then we would order a to-go plate for dinner so that I "didn't have to cook that night" blah!! I can't even imagine how many calories I was taking in and worse yet I let my husband do the same thing and he was type 2 diabetic, high blood pressure and high cholesterol!! We clearly had blinders on.

That weigh in at the doctor kept needling me and I started to pay attention to how much of my mobility I was losing.  Doing simple things was becoming hard like doing the dishes, cooking, getting in and out of the shower and going to the bathroom. It was really awful if I had to use a public restroom as I could not twist or bend very well at all.  I could not pick anything up if it fell on the floor.

 House cleaning was almost impossible. It would take me half a day to clean the bathroom and then I would be bed bound or in the recliner the rest of the day. Getting in and out of our vehicle was ruff to say the least.

I started watching videos about weight loss. I studied everything from portion control, veganism to finally a carnivore diet.  Some similarities I found between them all were cutting out processed food, sugar and not drinking your calories. I started with not drinking calories, cutting sugar and processed food.

February 7th 2021 was when I got serious and have never looked back.

God Bless you all.

Rock on carnivores!!

DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE

 Hello Everyone,

I talked in my last blog about eating off plan for my birthday and how the food affected me.  I thought that I would have lost the weight gain ( inflammation) by the end of the week.  I was well on my way than this happened....

Having had those treats awakened my cravings in my brain.  I was doing pretty good at first beating them back.  Then came Thursday. We had a full day of running around going to the doctor, tire store and the Jiffy Lube.  The Jiffy Lube would be my downfall for the week. 

Now how could Jiffy Lube be my downfall you ask?  It was the Sonic next door that got me.  Normally I would fast and not eat till we got home but it was almost 2 pm and my hubby was hungry so I said let's go.  It seemed harmless as we were waiting for our truck to be serviced.  I should have known better.  Actually, I did know better but ate there anyhow.

We each got a double bacon cheeseburger tater tots and a coke zero.  Like that coke zero made it better. At least it didn't hurt.  Now we did not sit there and eat the burgers only the tater tots.  We saved the burgers for dinner. I only ate 1400 cal that day but the scale showed 4 lbs up the next morning.  I knew I would have bloat and decided to step on the scale  anyway and face the music.

Cravings are a nasty little beast that fills your mind with you really want this or that.  Go ahead you already ate that  burger so might as well have other snacks too.  Temptations like to hold on to some of us like grim death.  I realize some people can deal with food cravings pretty well.  I am not one of them.  Now I feel like I need to white knuckle it through and stay a strict carnivore to get past these cravings.  

I find that staying away from carbs, sugar and processed foods quells the cravings and hot flashes.  Yep, I had some of those since I ate that burger and tater tots.  They always come at night and disrupt my sleep which in turn caused the inflammation to hang on.  

How do we get past the cravings?  First thing is to acknowledge that is what it is.  Am I really hungry or am I bored, mindless eating or bad habits.  We all have different ways of coping with cravings.  Don't have the food in the house that tempts you.  Drink water to fill you up better yet, eat a hard boiled egg or two with that water and it will fill you up. Take a walk do a craft ,call a friend.  Prayer is powerful.  

Jesus fasted in the desert for 40 days and nights when satan came and tempted him right away with food.  Now Jesus being The God the Son stood against satan and he could not prevail because He stood on the Word of God.  We can do that too.

1 Corinthians 10:13

No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will  not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with temptation will also make the way of escape, that you maybe able to bear it.

Am I going to get past this? Yes!! Will I be tempted again. Absolutely!  Can I be an overcomer and not give in to temptation. With God as my Shepherd I can because He is faithful to make a way to escape it. 

God Bless you all and remember Jesus is Lord, God is in control and only Him do we serve.

Rock on Carnivores!!

LET'S TALK ABOUT THE WEEKEND

 Hello Everyone,

This past weekend was my birthday !!  I want to talk about what I ate and how it negatively affected me. Yes, I gained a few pounds. by pounds I mean 5 lbs.

It might sound like I really pigged out for my birthday.  Actually, I didn't.  I had inflammation from the food I ate. What is inflammation?

Inflammation can be weight gain due to insulin resistance and leptin resistance. Inflammation can impair the body's ability to process insulin, which leads to higher glucose levels in the liver.  What can cause this process to happen.  The answer is simple sugar and carbohydrates.

Some people who are insulin resistant develop Type 2 diabetes or can be menopausal. Other things it can lead to are higher cortisol levels which can be linked to belly fat. Cortisol is a hormone that regulates stress response in your body. This can be useful for fight or flight but too much leads to weight gain.

Processed foods , sugars and carbs are a definite culprit for higher cortisol, inflammation and weight gain along with lack of sleep and exercise.

Back to what I ate this weekend.  I am or was down 74 lbs.  So, I thought I could have some cheat foods and be ok.  I really only had two cheat foods some corn chips and cashews.  The rest of the food was carnivore but I did have more dairy than usual. 

Now, I knew these foods would have a negative effect on me. So, why did I eat them? I wanted to. I did enjoy them and had a good birthday weekend.  Today I face the consequences of my actions. I gained 5 lbs!!!  

Sounds like I binged but I didn't. I am not shocked at being fluffy today.  I didn't even eat excess sugar or carbs.  Any carbs or sugars affect me like this. Everyone is affected differently by these foods.  Some people can eat 20-50 carbs and have no inflammation. Others can eat fruits and vegetables and have dairy and not react.  I am not one of those people.

How do I know that this is inflammation?  Experience with these foods and elimination diet like a carnivor has helped me to hash that information out. Being menopausal has made me sensitive to carbs and sugar. I have found, over the past 2 years that if I eliminate carbs and sugar my hot flashes greatly diminished.   Yes, I had night sweats from eating that food over the weekend. Not to mention my gastroparesis acting up.

I am back to strict carnivore and will lose that 5 lbs by the end of the week.  Do I regret eating those foods? Yes and no. No I enjoyed something I haven't had in a year. Yes because of the results and now it has stalled my weight loss for a week or two.  

I made a choice and now I have to live with it. Will I do it again? I like to think not but in a year I might say lets see what happens.  None of us are perfect but don't let that keep you from getting up and going forward.

Rock on carnivores.