I started the Whole 30 Program on Monday.
If you have no idea what I’m talking about, The Whole 30 is “a short-term nutritional reset, designed to help you put an end to unhealthy cravings and habits, restore a healthy metabolism, heal your digestive tract, and balance your immune system.”
I don’t have any agreement or get any compensation from them — I’m doing this because I just need to get my shit together.
To be honest, I think I’m on the verge of a mini meltdown or I’m going through a mid-life crisis or something.
I’m super emotional about the kids growing up. I’m a disaster and crying almost daily thinking about the impending last day of preschool for Number 7 and it’s a month away.
The secretary at the elementary school has been forced to seriously harass me to fill out the kindergarten registration paperwork for Number 7 because I just can’t get myself to do it.
I’m in denial.
An entire phase of my life is coming to a close and I feel like I’ve let so many parts of it pass by without taking advantage of them.
And I’m feeling like just about every aspect of my life is totally out of control.
I understand that to a certain degree that’s the way it is with young kids and that’s the way it is with lots of kids and we’ve just come off a 3+ year run full of injuries and foreclosures and a whole bunch of other shit, and I think the dust is kind of settling.
And I think for the last four years I have been functioning in that big old cloud of dust swirling around multiple shitstorms, and I’ve been navigating my way from storm to storm, and I haven’t really let myself think about much of anything.
I’ve been surviving on autopilot.
And now that every single second of my life isn’t spent worrying about if/when we are going to get kicked out of our house, and now that the fog has lifted a little bit, the insanity of how I am living is becoming evident.
I can’t live like this anymore. And I sure as hell don’t want to teach my kids to live this way.
So for me, committing to this Whole 30 program isn’t about losing weight.
It’s about living mindfully and living with intention.
I think the way you think about and prepare and eat food can be pretty big barometer for the level of mindfulness you have in your life.
I have been so go-go-go recently that meal times are rushed and unplanned and far from the nourishing experience they should be. And I’m not just talking about nourishment for your body.
I have lost all sense of meal times being an opportunity to sit and rest and reflect and connect with other people.
I have no idea how much food or even what food I am eating every day. I’m eating standing up and picking off of plates and eating in the car and eating on the couch while I watch The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt (my latest Netflix obsession).
I’ve been thinking about doing this program for a while now, and leading up to it, things got even more out of control. I basically went on a food bender. This past weekend I found myself eating chocolate chip cookies in the coaches’ room at a swim meet like I was going to the electric chair. I grabbed a couple and was shoving them into my mouth and I was halfway through the third cookie before I even realized what the hell I was doing. The cookie didn’t even taste good, and I threw the rest of it in the grass.
It does not feel good to be out of control.
So the biggest part of this Whole 30 for me is about making the conscious decision to be more mindful and regaining control of multiple areas of my life, starting with food.
So what is the Whole 30?
Well, for 30 days, you basically eat food that you can either grow or kill, to put it in the words of a friend of mine.
No sugar. No dairy. No legumes. No booze.
I know. It’s restrictive.
To be honest, it’s not the sugar or the booze that’s going to be the hard part.
It’s the dairy and the legumes.
No cheese and no beans and no milk in my coffee and no peanut butter!
Those are the ones I miss the most.
But it’s day 3 and so far so good. Because while there is a lot of stuff you can’t eat, there also a lot of stuff you can eat!
And you can eat as much as you want of the good stuff. There’s no calorie counting, and there are plenty of options. They just take a little bit of thought. And intention. And it’s not forever. I don’t plan on never ever eating cheese again or never enjoying a nice cold Blue Moon. Or five.
I’m doing this because I want discipline back in my life. And I need discipline in my life.
I want to set a better example for my kids.
I want to enjoy the experience of a delicious meal and be conscious of what I am doing.
I want to eat because I am hungry and listening to my body and not because I am bored or scared or stressed or angry.
I need to restore some order back in my life and I want to live more mindfully before another five years of my kids’ lives passes me by.
And for me, all of that is starting with the Whole 30.
Want me to send you the whole30 cookbook? I have an extra copy. I’ve been doing whole30 for almost 2 years. It’s life changing
I love Whole 30. A few weeks ago, I was going to suggest it to you, but then I wasn’t sure about your food budget, etc. Will you let us know how you handle the food budget while doing Whole 30? Mine seems to increase a ton because of all the meat, but I also don’t like eggs much. Would love to see your meal plans.
My tip: It’s all about batch cooking. 🙂
That’s on my list of things to do 🙂 And I already do a fair amount of batch cooking because with this many people to feed, it make life much easier!
So you want to show your kids that when you feel out of control, you find an area of your life you can control, like food. That sounds closer to eating disorder than mindful healthy living. If eating a certain way makes you feel good, you do you. But food for thought–I wouldn’t agree that going on a restrictive diet because you feel “out of control” is an awesome example.
I like your blog a lot, which is why I’m finally commenting. the posts about your food restrictions and intense exercise regimens (for e ample working out multiple hours of times a day during th weight loss competition) are worrisome. Take care of yourself, however you see fit. But think about the messages you’re sending, both the conscious and unconscious ones, when you obsess about diet and exercise.
What? Whoah.
I’m not really sure how to even respond to that one.
I actually had the same gut reaction. As a recovering bulimic/anorexic, I know what it is like to be so afraid of being out of control that I clamp down hard. I am pretty young (30) but my unasked for advice is that extreme reactions, such as a restrictive diet or intense workout regimens, are only a temporary distraction from what is really going on. Especially when you are under so much stress. The diet may fail, and you will punish yourself, or binge, which causes more negativity. Honestly, you will figure out the best way to deal with your shit, but one thing I try to do is exactly what you realised you were missing when you ate the gross cookies- be present, focus on the here and now. Mindfulness is much harder than sticking to a diet or an exercise regime, and the benefits will stay with you, and your family, forever.
When you have a lot of kids (I have 5) and work and are very busy, your crave and require order and structure to survive. Having goals and guidelines help. The Whole 30 dud both for me. It showed me my eating crap here and there was out of control! I felt much better and had more energy too. But it can go the other way too. Too restrictive of diets can cause stress and set you up for more feelings of failure because you are too busy to keep up with the diet rules. I can see that Susie is a goal oriented person that needs guidelines and some competition to motivate herself. I get that! I’ve been looking at my life lately. I cut out half the kids after school activities, staring saying no at work and school committees, and quit diets. It’s heaven. The kids are happier and I concentrate on mindful eating. For nutrition, not comfort. With everything we about to do I ask, Is this necessary and will benefit out entire family. Amazing how much is not worth it! Only took me 20 years yo figure it out!