I decided recently that it was time for me to lose weight again.
It wasn’t a hard decision to make. I’ve been needing to purchase new shirts and new pants recently, and I’ve been forced to purchase a size larger than I’ve ever had to wear before. In addition, I found that the pants I was needing to get were bigger than I’ve needed to buy in the past. I felt embarrassed about my size, and I finally decided to do something about it. In addition, Jennifer and I wanted to get healthier, so it was time to do something about it. Instead of going on a diet, we resolved to do a lifestyle change.
To that end, we decided to do what our friend Lindsey did and went onto what’s called the “paleolithic diet”. To describe it quite briefly, it’s eating what cavemen did: meat, vegetables, nuts, fruits, and the like, while cutting out most carbs, starches, and processed foods. In a sense, it’s similar to the Atkins diet, except it’s a little more strict and requires more veggies. It’s definitely taken some getting used to, as many of our old standbys are no longer available, like sandwiches, cereals, burgers, pastas, and the like. On the other hand, we’re still able to eat some of the foods we could eat before with some modifications, like steak (no potato sides) and barbecue (no sauce).
What’s also helped is that Jennifer has gotten her hands on a bunch of paleo recipes for us to try. We’ve had the occasional flop, but much more often than not they come out tasting VERY good, so neither she nor I mind that we’ve changed things up. She’s even gotten creative in regards to some of her original recipes, like her tacos al carbon; instead of putting them in tortillas, for example, she slices open a red pepper and puts the taco meat in the pepper slice. We do cheat once or twice a week, but for the most part we’ve stayed on the path. Unlike other diets I’ve done in the past, the food I’m eating now is pretty varied and tastes good, so I don’t have as much incentive to cheat. There have been temptations (like the donuts in the break room right now), but I’ve mostly managed to stay good.
The thing is, while the paleolithic diet is considered by some to be a fad or ineffective, it’s actually working out for us. In our case, it’s causing us to eat healthier and cut a lot of the crap out of our diets. In my case, I’ve been very happy so far. I weighed myself this morning, and since starting the diet about a month ago or so, I’ve lost twenty pounds. The above-mentioned recently-bought pants are now a bit too big for me and the larger shirts that were a bit form-fitting on me before are now looser.
I still have a ways to go, of course. I do have goals and rewards set for myself; for example, when I reach the halfway point of my weight loss goal, I plan on looking into self-defense classes. I’m not sure what my reward will be for myself when I hit the actual goal, but at the very least I’ll be able to wear several of the shirts that are currently too small for me, including my Atari bowling shirt and a couple of my geeky tshirts I got from Jennifer early in our relationship. Until then, I’m going to keep on at it, and get back to a lower weight. :-)