Nutrition is my constant battle

Nutrition. Today was another wake up call for me. For the past 17 days, I have been diligently writing down everything I eat along with how much I eat. It has been a big pain in the butt. I have always believed that your food should not be this complicated and hard. I should just eat and not have to worry. This is true, but lately I have fallen off the path of healthy eating and forgotten how to just eat right. My wonderful crossfit coaches told me to start a food log and after 2 weeks they would take a look at it. Well…today was the day. Even though I am doing the Whole30 program, I learned that there are still areas of improvement.

I have been trying to master my nutrition for the past 6 months. I have successfully cut out dairy (except butter), legumes, grains, and most processed foods. My sugar intake has been minimal and for the past 17 days it has NOT existed in my life. So what do I eat you ask? Meat, veggies, nuts, seeds, some fruit, little starch and no sugar. Some people refer to this as paleo/caveman diet, but I just call this a healthy and natural way of eating. It is NOT a diet, but a lifestyle change to improve my overall health.

Even though I have been eating all awesome things for my body, I have been going crazy on the nuts and nut butters. Uh-Oh! When sugar is removed from our daily lives…we crave it! I have been filling that void with lots and lots of fat, and I also some fruit. These two combo’s together without any protein are BAD. The fruit is a carbohydrate, which causes my insulin to go up and it tells my body to store. Then when I add some fat in there….my body will instantly store the fat. So for the past week, I have been allowing my body to store fat with no way for it to be released. Ughhh!! This just pisses me off.

Coach Brad told me to back off the nuts. My problem is that I love almonds, hazelnuts, cashews and macadamia nuts so much that I just can’t eat a few. I always devour them with no ability to stop myself. My solution: Get those nuts out of the house! I immediately went home and through away all the nuts and nut butters I had in my panty. Eliminating them completely is the only way for me to break this habit. I am now going to replace the fat I got from nuts with avocados, olives, olive oil, coconut oil and coconut. I find that I can’t really over eat on these fats like I could on nuts.

What did I learn? I learned that nutrition is a CONSTANT battle. There is always room for improvement and always changes to be made. It can be completely frustrating at times and can even get to the point where you just want to say F*#! it. Trust me…I have been to this point several times. It always takes me a moment to realize and remember how I felt when I ate “dirty.” I was tired, lethargic, weak, and just gross! Eating right has improved my life. It hasn’t been easy, but then again if eating right was easy then we wouldn’t have this obesity pandemic. Nutrition is a constant battle for everyone. There are always going to highs and lows. If you fall off….no worries! You just have to get right back on!

Food for Thought:
"To eat is a necessity, but to eat intelligently is an art.” -La Rochefoucauld