Day Zero

My Motivational Poster

It's finally here! I've been preparing for this day for a couple of months now. Tomorrow I officially begin taking my life back.

First of all, if you are unfamiliar with Whole30, here is the link to the main site. http://whole30.com/.  It is basically a super clean eating program that you follow for 30 days without ANY slips. It has to be strictly followed to have the reset work.

The reset happens when you eliminate all sugars, grains, dairy, soy, legumes, and chemicals used in processed foods. Testimonials of successful Whole30ers include all kinds of improved health results and they were able to break their addictions to foods.Yes, almost everyone lost weight, but although that was the original thing that drew me to this lifestyle, the weight loss has become just an added benefit.

So, how did I prepare? As those of you who know me best know, I can kind of obsess when I start researching something new, and this was no different. I've spent most of my summer break learning everything I can about Whole30 and how the body processes different foods. Here's what I've done so far to prepare:

• Googled everything Whole30
• Read the website http://whole30.com/ about 20 times
• Ordered and read the book It Starts with Food
• Started a Pinterest board specifically for Whole30
• Promptly started judging all the people who had pinned non-compliant food to their Whole30 boards--READ People! Pancakes are NOT Whole30! and Paleo does not equal Whole30 all of the time
• Started filling my Amazon cart with things like coconut aminos, ghee, and almond flour (basically anything I thought I'd have a hard time finding at the regular grocery store)
• Bought a new crock pot and a new food processor (just got the food processor today)
• Sorted everything in my cupboards into compliant and non-compliant (Unfortunately I had so little compliant food, it ended up on the counter. The stuff left in the cupboard is all Bruce's now.)
• Started practicing with new foods. Who knew...I LOVE Beets! I guess I just didn't like them pickled, but they are awesome roasted.
• Went on vacation and ate whatever I wanted and said my little goodbyes along the way
• Talked to as many people as I could about the program and subscribed to several blogs
• Picked out a handful of recipes to try the first week (not enough to be overwhelming)
• Made a motivational poster
• Made an extensive grocery list
• Went shopping--at Walmart. You can do Whole30 without going to the fancy stores. Here are my results:

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  Produce-I shouldn't have piled it up so much. There is a lot more there than it looks like

  

  Pantry Items and my new Food Processor

  
  

Meat!

 

 

 

Once I got home I went into prep mode. I:

• browned 3 lbs of ground beef with onions and garlic
• baked 1-1/2 lbs of chicken thighs with salt and pepper
• fried 1-1/2 lbs of chicken thighs in coconut oil with salt, pepper, and paprika
• made my own mayo...see!
  
• grilled 8 burgers
• boiled a dozen eggs

At this point I still had veggies to prep and some sauces to make, but my feet were killing me, so, since I don't have school tomorrow, I'm going to do veggie prep in the morning.

This should give me plenty of go-tos for the week. I also bought ground turkey to make into turkey sausage, ground pork to make Scotch Eggs, a chuck roast and a pork tenderloin. I can chase away the boredom by making an actual recipe mid-week.

Tomorrow morning I will wake up to my Whole30 Day 1 email, weigh myself, take measurements, take before pictures (this has to be worse than anything the next 30 days has in store for me), put away my scale, and start taking back my life.