Its hot, no cooking!

I'm really glad that I made that buffalo shrimp the other day for salads, because it is too in my apartment for the oven to be on!  Since my apartment is the size of a toaster, it heats up really fast as soon as the stove or oven is turned on.

Since I'm melting and not cooking (Chipotle was kind to us tonight), I thought I might share a little of my story.  A little more than year ago when I moved back from Oklahoma, I stepped on the scale and realized that I officially weighed more than 200 pounds.  I knew I had let myself go a bit after a stressful spring and had slowly let the abundance of fried foods in the south to get the best of me, but I was disappointed that I had let it get that far.

So, I made some changes.  I began walking to the pond near my parent's house and paying attention to my eating.  I cut my alcohol intake by quite a bit, which was a little easier once leaving a college town!  About a month after beginning this routine, I joined myfitnesspal.com, which is a calorie counting and exercising tracking website that I have been using ever since.  This has helped me immensely and I lost about twenty pounds.  I highly recommend this site, it is a great tool and has a great community.

Although I was losing weight and feeling a little better, I needed a change of some sort.  I was still really tired and low energy and I had a lot of bloating.  I was also hungry A LOT, even though I was eating what I felt was a healthy diet.

I started poking around the internet for some nutrition information. I found some information about something called the paleo and primal diet.  A diet that encourages fat intake and is gluten free?  Sounded pretty crazy. I did some reading and read the symptoms of a gluten intolerance.  Turns out, chronic fatigue and bloating were two of the many symptoms.  So, I gave it a try.

After a week, I had energy, my belly felt great, and I wasn't hungry every two hours.  As a child, I was so low energy that I would ask my mom to push me in a stroller to the swing in my grandmother's backyard!  A kid is supposed to have more energy than that!

I was also losing weight pretty quickly!  I was amazed that I could eat healthy fats and avoid gluten, grains, and legumes and not being hungry!  No more sugar crashes or foggy head when I let myself go too long between meals.  It was an exciting feeling!

This was before Christmas and I figured I would cheat a little during the holiday season.  All of my previous symptoms came back and my weight loss stalled (I may have even gained a few pounds!).  I knew what I was doing before was the right choice for me and that I would go back to that.

Once January rolled around, I went back to my paleo/primal eating.  I felt great again shortly after and have been gluten free since the first week of January.  Sometimes I will eat corn or rice and  I have had some exposures during this time and these present themselves with some pretty obvious symptoms.  My joints will start aching and I'll find myself really tired.

Paleo and primal eating has worked awesome for me and I believe that its worth a try for most people.  Test it for 30 days and see how you feel!  Or at least try some of my recipes!

Overall I have lost 40 pounds and almost twenty of those have been since January.  I went from a 14 to a 6 and I have started lifting weight to become leaner and stronger.

Thanks for reading my story and feel free to share your own or ask any questions you might have!  I love food, nutrition, and helping people!  More recipes soon :)