I’ve heard and read people discuss about diets that help in weight loss. Diet Names that aren’t even easy to pronounce. Diets that make people starve and later hog devilishly. I considered all as idiosyncratic diets that promote eating patterns that promote short-term weight loss, usually with no concern for long-term weight maintenance, and enjoy temporary popularity.
I thought exercise was the way to go. I had did it once to reduce my ballooning weight and waistline. Well, that was good 12 years back when I was single, happily unmarried with little to care about. But now with 2 tiny tots to engage and a huge team manage, I knew exercising to loose weight will be a total failure. I didnt even give it a try. I was neither obese or fat, but surely over the border.
Flicking through a few social media sites to seek advice, was when I found this cave man’s diet – a Paleo diet that replicates the life style and eating habits of humans we knew of the prehistoric past. I was skeptical but decided to give it a shot. I had nothing to loose.
But instead of entering the regime blind folded, I decided to do a bit of search on the research around this diet. I cam across some crazy stuff and rave reviews of people calling such diets as temporary solution. Eating right was always a problem for people like us. I came across diets such as Low carb (& high fat), Atkins Diet, South beach, Primal diet and last but not the least the classic Paleo diet.
After a detailed study into these diets, i had found that all these diets had a common say on processed food! they say AVOID them at at any cost. Most of them did ask to take meat (loads of them) instead of high carb starchy food. Seemed okay if you are a meat eater, but I was a pure vegetarian (okay a eggtarian by choice). But! what the heck, I first compiled a list of food (both natural & processed) to be avoided.
1. Avoid Wheat – Reason: Contains Gluten which causes inflammation.
2. Avoid rice in any form as it is high on carbs.
3. Avoid starchy (high on carbs) vegetables and fruits such potatoes (or sweet potatoes), plantain and apples.
4. AVOID SUGAR (instant energy – high on carbs)
5. Avoid grains in any form (grains are evil as they contain pesticides)
6. Limit diary to acceptable limits. Milk should be only whole milk! not skimmed milk.
7. Avoid the use of vegetable oil for cooking.
8. BIG – Avoid processed food of any form (No more road side dabha food, Pizzas, samosas, vegetable puffs, vegetable rolls or burgers)
9. Avoid bread in any form (White, brown, whole wheat, whole grain – anything and everything to be avoided)
10. Avoid cereal – They are nothing but grains which are harmful.
11. Avoid Soya (milk or balls)
12. Avoid Corn
So being a vegetarian, i had eliminated almost whatever I eat ever day. What am I left with. I took stock of what I can eat.
1. Eat non-starchy vegetables. Carrot, cabbage, lettuces, cucumber, tomatoes, onions, bell-pepper, broccoli, string beans or french beans.
2. Eggs, eggs and loads of them.
3. Ghee, Butter and Cheese in any form and any quantity.
4. Dry fruits, Nuts and berries
5. Paneer (lots of them)!! anything fat.
6. Sprouts salad
and..that’s about it! I just couldn’t think about thing else. What a curse, being a vegetarian is such a curse when trying to gear yourself for a paleo diet. On deeper research, I found that the advantages being paleo outweighed the downside.
I knew I would quit being 100% Paleo, so self introduced the 80%-20% rule where I would take 80% paleo and 20% non-paleo (but non-toxic food). It was 26th Aug 2012 when I hit brakes of my (so called) unhealthy life style and started to reverse things around. I weighed 81.6 kgs (being 172 cms / 35 inches waist) – I just wanted to end being over weight.
For first few days, I was kinda depressed. Followed by migraines and extreme stomach cramps. As I knew these were common symptoms, I had held on to my nerves and continued. My Diet for the first 8 weeks looked like this.
Morning – BF – Coffee with Whole Milk, Dry fruits, Nuts (almonds, wallnuts, raisins and dry dates). A handfull of peanuts.
Lunch – A couple of boiled eggs and cooked oats (say 50 grams).
Snacks – A handfull of peanuts, green/lime tea and dry fruits (say 20 grams)
Dinner – A huge bowl of Italian or continental salad with mayonnaise or other french salad dressings in optimal quantity.
Thats about it! My body took quite a while to get adapted. I knew I was undercutting the colories but This is the only way I could maintain less than 50 carbs/day! I pushed myself into Ketosis by the 1st week. By the second week. my body was fat adapted. Those extra pounds were just falling off like crazy. I was loosing weight, but never lost the energy. My concentration levels improved dramatically.
Post 8 weeks, I had started to increase my carb intake to a level between 50 – 100 grams/day. I had introduced Red rice in my Paleo Diet instead of oats and also started having vegetable Sambar (south indian delicacy). I did make a few modifications but made sure I didnt fall off the wagon and rice on paleo diet worked for me too. I had also started to do cardio to supplement my weight loss and also to gain stamina.
The results were just breathtaking. I couldn’t do 100 m jog pre-paleo, but now after a few months into the regime I can run 5 kms non-stop and still have the energy to do other activities. Let me give you a brief on timelines & weight lost till date.
26-Aug – weigh in @beginning – 81.6 kgs / 35 inches waist
26-Sep – weigh in – 76.3 kgs / 33 inches waist
26-Nov – Weigh in – 68 kgs / 31 inches waist
26-Dec – Weigh in 63 kgs / 29 inches waist
Jan 2nd week – Present – 61 kgs / 28 inches waist
I had managed to maintain my weight by balancing my carb intake. The carb supplements were all natural. I had started taking sweet potatoes, bakes white potatoes, rice (Dosa & Idli), Organic wheat based Chapathi (gluten free) and red/black rice with vegetable Sambar. I have shifted to 60% – 40% rule with former being absolute paleo. I have changed my life style for the better and will be following this diet for as long as I can. I do have cheat days, say once a week or twice/thrice a month (limit to that).
Post by Arun Vijayaraghavan from crazytester
Comments
Post a Comment