I thought it would be interesting to consider how her suggestions have applied to me. Here are her tips in bold and my success or failure doing them. You'll notice that these are not "quick-fix lose weight today" tips. This is a lifestyle change so it may take time to implement these ideas and adopt them in your life.
1. Go through your entire kitchen and get rid of ALL processed foods, refined sugars and any foods containing gluten.
X It's hard to toss all the things I spent a lot of money on -- especially since I spent months stocking up in case an emergency prevented me from getting to a grocery store (or prevented trucks from delivering to the stores). I did put a lot of bad food (canola oil, bags of flour) in a box, and it's been sitting on the floor in front of the shoe rack for months. Some of it, like the oil, is now old and probably rancid, so it just needs to go in the trash. For several months I kept the bad stuff around in case I didn't want to follow the primal lifestyle/diet, but I think it's something that we can stick with for life.
2. You need to restock your pantry with clean eating items.
3. Locate farms and farmer’s markets in your area.
There are a surprising number of small farmers around. It's fun to buy fresh local vegetables and fruit, eggs, and honey from the Saturday market on Broadway (April - November). Our CSA pick-up begins in a few weeks with vegetables from Jenny-Jack Farm in Pine Mountain. We've been eating pastured beef from White Oak Pastures in Bluffton (had to buy a small freezer to store it), and I just discovered another source for local vegetables and eggs at Rose Paradise Farm, about 25 miles away.
4. Pretend that grocery stores don’t exist.
I've been in the nearby Publix a few times this past year, but usually weeks go by without going there. I buy very little though, mainly canned tomatoes and coffee. However, I do go to Fresh Market which IS a grocery store, for produce over the winter, organic milk, pastured butter, bulk nuts, olive oil, and wild salmon.
5. Plant a garden.
This will be the third season for my raised bed garden...it hasn't been real successful, but I have had some nice lettuce mix, and right now there are some beets and chard growing out there. (One bed has new strawberry plants.) I think the bed is too shallow; we need to add another 6" of wall and raise the dirt. This attempt to raise our food has really made me appreciate the bountiful supply of food we have available every week in stores and food co-ops.
6. Have a weekly meal plan.
X I'm bad at this. My excuse is I don't know what I will feel like eating in several days.
7. Have a few good quality, packaged food items available to you at all times.
X I have never remembered to have a snack in my purse in case I get jittery from hunger. It's not as much of a problem now that I'm not having the swings of blood sugar; I can go several hours and not get shaky like when I ate grains and sugar. It would be easy enough to keep a little container of nuts available. Skip the expensive "health bars" for emergencies...most have soy... no thanks!
8. Cook extra for dinner so you have enough for lunch the next day.
This is the easiest way to have a good lunch. Nic seems to be the envy of the lunch-table crowd with his lunches from home everyday. He takes leftovers from dinner and some fruit.
9. Find other people who share similar views on health and nutrition.
X We know some people who are also buying the fresh produce, not sure they are on the primal diet itself. Family members are mixed: some look at us like we don't know what we are talking about when we say we are giving up grains. One thing that encourages me is reading about the success other people have had with the primal lifestyle. I also enjoy reading other peoples' blogs about primal/paleo living because their ideas help me stay on the path to better health.
10. Don’t ever give up or feel like a failure if you eat something you know you shouldn’t. Whatever I am eating now, it is almost 100% better than before I learned about the primal diet. I knew sugar was bad of course but thought grains were healthy. Now I prepare vegetables for every dinner. And if I eat something with sugar and flour (generally a bite of dessert away from home) it's a one-time thing that doesn't lead to a complete rejection of primal.
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These are good tips, and they point out some areas where I need to improve. Primal/paleo is not a quick weight loss kind of diet. It takes weeks or months to change a lifetime of bad eating habits.
If you want to follow this lifestyle, learn what you can and be aware of what you are eating. Even if your health doesn't seem to improve right away, or if the weight doesn't go down as fast as you'd like, remember Real Food will always be better for you, so don't give up and go back to unhealthy eating.
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