Whole30: Whoa, we're halfway there!

We're on day 18 of our Whole30 Paleo/whole foods challenge.  TJ is a lot less cranky now, and mostly just sad and resigned.  I caught him eating an orange the other day, so it must be really bad.  (This is a man who believes fruits and vegetables are what his real food eats.)  He was also eyeing Trillian's soy yogurt, which is even worse.

I feel good.  I have energy, I don't need naps and I don't have that massive tiredness in the afternoon after eating a big lunch.  In fact, I haven't felt that "overly full" feeling in AGES, which I think means that all this protein and fat is helping me realize when I'm full so I don't overeat.  What's not to love about that?

The challenge stipulates that we only weigh ourselves at the beginning and the end so I have no idea if I've lost any weight.  I'm sure I'll have lost a bit, but I almost don't care, because I just feel so much better eating this way. 

Another interesting side effect of eating *no* added sugar?  Sparkling water actually tastes good to me now.  I used to hate it, because it had a bad "salty" taste, even when there was NO sodium in it.  I think it's because I always drank artificially sweetened drinks and ate a lot of sugar. 

Also, I can now drink tea with no sweetener and I *like* it.  (As long as it's good tea, not the crap Lipton.)  Speaking of which, the Trader Joe's Jasmine Pearls tea is like a gift from heaven.  Holy crap, that tea is gooooood.

But, there are a few things not to love.  When I don't plan every meal in advance or we're at the end of our shopping cycle, there's very little left in the house that we can eat.  No more mindless snacking on crackers to fill up. Then we get truly hungry and cranky.   I actually need to *cook* stuff for breakfast - no instant oatmeal or cereal + milk. So it's a little more work to eat this way.

And to be honest, I've had a couple of slip ups.  I've gone out to lunch with friends and ordered diet Coke on autopilot and didn't have the willpower to send it away.  The handful of times I've eaten out, I didn't do extensive research on what kind of oils they were using, and I have even had a bit of barbecue sauce with sugar in it.  I will neither confirm nor deny that I ate a homemade peanut butter cookie at the all-day crafty event I attended on Saturday.  (And let me tell you, it made me feel like CRAP.  So not worth it.)

But I'm still eating WAY better than I have been for the past 6+ years or more, so I figure those are small concessions.  They've also taught me that eating out is kind of a pain when I'm trying to do things "right" so I'm actually more inclined to *choose* to eat at home.  And that in itself, was worth the price of admission.

So, only 12 days left on the super-strict path.  And then we'll slowly evaluate what to bring back into our diets.  I also need to figure out how to carve out a time for some regular exercise even if that's just walking on our treadmill.  But, those are challenges for later.  Now, I need to get cracking on the steak and chorizo chili I'm making for dinner :)