This is really good. There are links to other good ones as well. A resource I'll keep checking, I think. Always best to be armed with as much information as possible.

Thanks

Great article.

When I first started out I made the mistake with trying to use some Paleo substitutes. Fortunately, I've known for a long time that I need to limit my carbs (inc fruit), and eat a fat based diet, so I didn't go off track for long. I still use Paleo treats for my child. They are still much lower in sweet, and much higher in nutrients, than other things she could be eating.

Also, in the beginning I was eating much less than I should have been. Oops.

Other than that, I'm not making any of the mistakes and maybe that's why I'm able to continue on indefinitely. I don't find this lifestyle "restrictive" and I really do love what I eat. I acknowledge that some people disagree with my ketogenic approach but I have been experimenting with adding more carbs and it makes things much harder for me. So, for me, ketogenic Paleo is a win. On occasion I do fail to "get organized" but I never let that be an excuse. I never get bored of steaks and salad and those are quick and easy to prepare. As are any form of eggs.

I do see a lot of Paleo people getting carried away with substitutes and fruit, and making excuses to keep consuming poisonous things such as soy milk or diet sodas. I find it hard to stay supportive of people who choose to constantly struggle, and are on and off Paleo foods and then complaining about how bad they feel and not losing weight. And I'm not saying occasional indulgences are bad-I have organic popcorn and alcohol occasionally. I do not obsess about a "cheat"-I don't even call it that, I just have my treat then continue on. I also don't understand when people go crazy with food before and after a Whole30. It seems to me that the benefit of W30 is lost if it becomes an excuse to "eat all the things".

This lifestyle is not hard. It's a choice. Paleo is really about health, imo, and since I take my health VERY seriously now, that's how I view my food choice as well.

The lifestyle things mentioned are also important. I get sun when I can (I live in the Arctic), I spend time connecting with nature, relaxing, I get lots of sleep, I play, I lift heavy things, etc. Life is getting better all the time; why would I ever walk away from being so happy and feeling so darn AWESOME?

This is great, thanks!

Awesome! Definitely a good read, and some necessary reminders. Thanks for sharing!

Good articles, both of these.
Love the bit about getting organized -- this is my current priority in my life/home. The more I prioritize cooking/preparing healthy meals for myself and family, the more I realize how organizing everything in my life/home would help in so many ways.

And, now I will go straight to bed, since that's my biggest remaining mistake.

How many times have I read "a calorie is a calorie" and "calories in, calories out" on the boards here?

...without believing it, of course, as I've found from personal experience that some calories are more equal than others (to badly paraphrase a famous quote from Animal Farm).

Thanks for the links; they were interesting and informative.

And reading the second one makes me sad and angry. From what I can remember, it appears that my parents' health was ruined by "an unproven theory that somehow became common knowledge." They ate "healthy" and died relatively young from cardiovascular disease, Type II Diabetes, and complications of high blood pressure and systemic inflammation.

The Calories In-Cories Out (CICO) mantra is moronic. I read an article written by Taubes, which explained things quite clearly. The whole premise misses the point. A phrase from the article

"If you asked me this question — why did this restaurant get crowded? — and I said, well, the restaurant got crowded (it got overstuffed with energy) because more people entered the restaurant than left it, you’d probably think I was being a wise guy or an idiot."

http://garytaubes.com/2010/12/inanity-of-overeating/

How many times have I read "a calorie is a calorie" and "calories in, calories out" on the boards here?

...without believing it, of course, as I've found from personal experience that some calories are more equal than others (to badly paraphrase a famous quote from Animal Farm).

Thanks for the links; they were interesting and informative.

And reading the second one makes me sad and angry. From what I can remember, it appears that my parents' health was ruined by "an unproven theory that somehow became common knowledge." They ate "healthy" and died relatively young from cardiovascular disease, Type II Diabetes, and complications of high blood pressure and systemic inflammation.

The Calories In-Cories Out (CICO) mantra is moronic. I read an article written by Taubes, which explained things quite clearly. The whole premise misses the point. A phrase from the article

"If you asked me this question — why did this restaurant get crowded? — and I said, well, the restaurant got crowded (it got overstuffed with energy) because more people entered the restaurant than left it, you’d probably think I was being a wise guy or an idiot."

http://garytaubes.com/2010/12/inanity-of-overeating/

Technically speaking, they're not wrong, and that's what makes the mantra so damned annoying.

The problem with it, and where reality diverges from theory, is because there are a number of confounding factors - the largest one being that our metabolism isn't constant, but instead fluctuates based on our environment, and in some cases, the "energy out" side of the equation is so low as to be unsustainable using that model alone. Simply put, we are not an isolated, closed system.

There's evidence that a healthy person's metabolism will "heat up" somewhat in response to eating more (this mechanism, obviously, has its limits). Likewise, it will "cool down" when deprived of too much food for too long. Then, there's hormones, and, of course, malnutrition (either through lack of food in general, lack of nutritious food, or the inability to absorb the nutrients from the food we do eat), which can greatly affect a person's weight in either direction of optimal.

I know, I know, I'm preaching to the choir here (and reiterating some of what Taubes said in that link, which is awesome, btw), but I've wanted to put that down somewhere for a while now.

I agree to some degree, but to completely dismiss calorie intake and expenditure I don't think is necessarily the right way to look at it either.

I don't dismiss the idea of energy intake vs energy expenditure. I said that CICO is moronic and misses the point, not that it is wrong. To quote Taubes' article again, "It’s what logicians call 'vacuously' true. It’s true, but meaningless. It tells us nothing. And the same is true of overeating as an explanation for why we get fat. If we got fat, we had to overeat. That’s always true; it’s obvious, and it tells us nothing about why we got fat, or why one person got fat and another didn’t."