I Don’t Believe in Diets Anymore. Instead, These Lifestyle Rules

I get asked all the time, “what do you eat on a normal day?” It’s such a frequent occurrence that I actually expect it whenever I have a conversation with someone about being a health and wellness coach.

It’s usually when I answer that first simple question that a slew of others come pouring out at me, mostly because what I see as a “healthy” meal falls far outside what is espoused in conventional wisdom today.

I also get asked a lot about what “diet” I follow. Do I follow a keto diet? A carnivore diet? What are my thoughts on the Mediterranean diet?

The truth is, I don’t believe in diets, not anymore anyway. I personally don’t diet and haven’t in at least two years now.

Since I stopped dieting and moved away from a “diet” mindset, my health has improved year over year and month over month, and I’m at a point in my life where I am healthier now than I have ever been as an adult, mentally, physically, and spiritually.

• Aren’t diets the only way you can lose weight?
• What’s the healthiest diet to be on?
• I hate being on a diet, especially since I have to eat “diet” food.

Are any of those questions or thoughts familiar? They are to me.

In fact, I used to have that last thought pretty frequently, and it was a big reason why it was so hard for me to change how I ate or how I looked at and understood food.

I used to hear my doctors tell me that I needed to go on a diet to lose weight, and they would often recommend the same thing repeatedly, eat more fruits, veggies, and whole grains, minimize fat and eat less red meat.

The sad thing about this advice is that it completely disregards the fact that every one of us is different, and there is no one way to eat that is the “right” way for everyone.

There are ways to eat that are beneficial to most, based upon how the body processes different foods and macronutrients, but blanket statements that are a part of the conventional wisdom can be very damaging, both physically and emotionally.

What’s so bad about being on a diet? Isn’t that the best way to lose weight and get healthy?

There are a lot of negative connotations with the word “diet.” Being on a diet indicates a short-term change in eating behavior, usually done with the sole goal of losing weight. The thing about getting healthier and improving overall wellness is that it’s not a short-term kind of journey and its sole goal is not to just lose weight.

While losing weight is important, especially for those that are carrying excess body fat that is impacting their overall metabolic health, by no means should it be the primary goal or sole focus of a wellness journey. Being on a diet also invokes thoughts of food deprivation, calorie restriction, starvation, and negative body imagery.

Intentional calorie restriction and starving your body of the nutrients that it needs to heal and get better are the worst ways to go about improving overall wellness and can result in some truly devastating impacts on overall health. I know this from experience, unfortunately. The truth is that the most unsustainable way of living is living a life where you’re always hungry, which is what happens when most people go on a diet.

Dieting, or living in a constant state of yo-yo dieting, leads to a lot of poor choices that impact overall physical and mental health. Binge eating, cheat meals, negative self-thoughts, and disordered views on food and eating overall happen as a result. Dieting, and all its associated connotations, are not good and are not the ideal way to lose weight and get healthy, and it never will be.

So, if I’m not dieting, how do I lose weight and get healthier?

I have spent most of my adult life caught in what felt like a never-ending cycle of dieting and disappointment. I would always feel hungry because I was restricting calories, or I was constantly craving food that I told myself I could have again once I was “skinny enough.”

I don’t diet anymore because all those negative connotations that I mentioned earlier were all things that I repeatedly experienced whenever I dieted. And in between those diets, I felt like a hopeless, weak failure. I know those negative connotations are real because I’ve experienced all of them. A lot. So, the question becomes, how did I get out of that damaging cycle?

For me, turning to God and understanding who I was as a valued child of God was the single biggest turning point. It’s how I finally came to terms with understanding that no matter what I had done in life, how many times and how badly I messed up, He loved me. I wasn’t a failure in His eyes, no matter how many times I fell flat on my face and failed at a task. That acceptance is what helped me change my mindset about food and how I needed to approach being truly healthy. Instead of approaching my journey towards health as a “diet,”

I changed my mindset to one of making a change in how I lived. I wasn’t going to go on a diet, a short-term and generally selfish-minded task. I was going to change how I lived and my lifestyle for the long term by learning how food impacted me and which foods truly nourished and healed my body. So, that’s how I started my journey six years ago. I call it a journey because I’m still on it, learning and applying my knowledge to help me heal and grow my mind, body, and soul.

Saying you’re not dieting but instead changing your lifestyle sounds like something that is easy to say but hard to put into practice.

It is difficult to put into practice, but that’s like any other goal that you are trying to achieve in life, whether it’s trying to get closer to God, be a better spouse or parent, or figure out what you want to be when you grow up. Those are all things that I’m currently trying to work on now as well, and just like my journey of wellness, these are all long-term, every single day goals that I actively choose to work on.

It is tough and can be exhausting, but at the end of the day, each one of those things is worth all the hard effort that I put into it because it helps me move along the path that God has set out for me and develop me to do the work that God has created for me. So, there are no foods that I believe that “I can’t have” or are “off-limits to me.” However, there are numerous foods that I actively choose not to eat because of how they negatively impact me and how I feel.

This is something that I find myself correcting others on when they say something along the lines of, “Oh, you can’t have….” It’s not a matter of “I can’t have” something, not anymore. Now, for me, it’s a matter of “I choose not to eat….” I choose not to eat most carbohydrates, whether it’s bread, whole grains, pasta, fruit, or most vegetables, because I don’t like how my body feels after I eat those things.

I don’t like feeling gassy, bloated, sluggish, or hungry, so I choose not to put myself in a position to feel that way by not eating the foods that give me those physical symptoms. I choose to eat primarily animal-based foods like eggs, red meat, pork, seafood, and poultry because I like how my body feels when I eat those things. I don’t have brain fog, I don’t feel sluggish, and I don’t experience terrible digestive issues like bloating or gassiness anymore when I focus on eating animal protein only. Also, I don’t keep myself from eating any more.

Like I said earlier, the least sustainable way to live is one where you’re living in a constant state of hunger. I don’t like feeling hungry, so I don’t deprive myself of food anymore. I do, however, listen to my body, and I eat a great deal slower than I used to eat. After six years of learning the best foods for nourishing my body, my hormonal signals for hunger and satiety have improved dramatically.

So, to answer the question that was originally asked, what do I eat in a day and when?

Starting the day …

That normally happens right around 11:00 am to noon for me now, about 5 to 6 hours after I start my day. Sometimes I’m hungry right when I wake up. Regardless of when I feel hungry, that’s when I eat.

To start my day, I will usually eat 2-3 eggs fried in bacon fat or butter along with another form of animal protein, usually 6-8 slices of bacon, 4-6 ounces of seasoned ground beef, 4 ounces of prosciutto, or 4 ounces of smoked salmon. The protein I pick is usually based on what is in the fridge or whatever is leftover from the previous night’s dinner since it’s easy and delicious.

That meal will usually provide me anywhere from 30-50 grams of protein, which will leave me feeling satiated and not hungry through dinner, which I usually eat somewhere between 6:00-7:00 pm in the evening.

Later on in the day …

For dinner, I will again focus on eating solely animal protein, usually between 8-12 ounces of whatever is for dinner that night.

My husband cooks most of our family’s meals, so he will rotate through making something from ground beef, lamb, pork, or chicken thighs for dinner generally.

If I ever feel hungry or snacky between my first and second meal, I will usually snack on either canned sardines, which we always have stocked in our pantry, some bacon, or prosciutto, both of which we almost always have available in our fridge.

About coffee …

I don’t drink coffee anymore, but I do start my day with LMNT salts (electrolytes) so that I can stay hydrated throughout the day, and the electrolytes help keep me feeling energized as well.

I really like LMNT chocolate salt to start my morning and then drink either watermelon or orange LMNT salts throughout the rest of the day.

One of the really great things about eating mostly animal protein and no longer being fearful of saturated fat is that my meals are satisfying and keep me full from meal to meal without any blood sugar crashes that could negatively impact my energy or mood throughout the day.

I can tell you that the way I ate before …

… when I focused on eating complex carbs, fruits, vegetables, and whole grains, my body did not feel that way after I ate.

I would eat and then only be full for maybe a couple of hours at most, and then I would get hangry, my body would feel shaky, and I would feel like I had to eat because my body would feel so out of sorts due to the rollercoaster of blood sugar highs and lows that my body was experiencing with carb-centric foods.

Everyone’s journey is different, special, and individually unique.

Like I said, I’m still on my wellness journey and have been for over six years now. It’s critical to understand that you can never compare journeys. The journey that I’m on is different from my husband’s journey and will be different from the one that you are on or have been on, and that’s ok.

The important thing is to focus on your journey and the progress that you have made. The changes that I’ve made didn’t happen overnight. I fed myself the wrong foods and didn’t love or nourish my body in the right way for literal decades before I chose to take the first step towards healing and improving my health. Improvements after that much damage take years to make.

Healing takes time, but even the smallest change in a positive direction is a good thing and should be acknowledged and celebrated. The single most important thing that you can do to improve your health and wellness is to choose to take your first step.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again, lifestyle changes are hard to make and sustain. Here are a few tips that might make those lifestyle changes around food a little bit easier to make

1. Take some time to figure out what foods make you feel the best physically and mentally.

Sometimes this means cutting specific foods out of your life for a period of 30 days minimum to understand what the physical impact is on your body.

This is what I did with dairy, coffee, and then fruits/vegetables. I cut out each food group for 30 days and then attempted to re-introduce them for seven days after that first 30-day period to see how I felt physically. Therefore, I still don’t eat dairy, fruits, or vegetables because those foods have a negative impact on my digestion and overall energy.

When I cut them back out, I felt great, so, therefore, I choose not to eat them so that I feel my best. I chose not to re-introduce coffee because my sleep is much better now that I don’t have all the caffeine.

2. Focus on protein at every meal.

Whatever meal you are eating, try to build that meal around the protein source, which should be an animal-based protein, to ensure you’re receiving the most nutrient-dense and bioavailable source of protein possible.

As for me, I eat a lot of eggs. Sometimes I eat eggs for breakfast and lunch, accompanied by another animal protein.

I love ground beef because it is economical and delicious, but I will also eat smoked salmon or prosciutto if it’s in my fridge and readily available.

Those proteins are pretty affordable when picked up from places like Aldi.

3. Don’t be afraid to eat fat.

Eating fat with whatever else you are eating helps blunt the blood sugar and subsequent insulin response in the body. This then helps keep blood sugar more even and stable, which results in less severe blood sugar crashes after meals.

Focus on eating animal-based fats, like the fats that are already in the animal protein that you are consuming for a meal or using to cook, whether it’s bacon fat or butter, which are my personal favorites, or even something like lard or tallow.

If you don’t have those, avocado oil, coconut oil, or olive oil are also good fats for the body. Just avoid the industrial seed oils, like corn, flax, canola, or soybean.

4. Have ready-to-eat protein on hand for those busy days.

We always have packages of salt-cured prosciutto in our fridge and Egg-Life wraps.

On the weekends, usually on Sundays, I will make between 4-5 pounds of bacon so that we have bacon readily available in the fridge throughout the week. We also keep cans of tuna fish, sardines, and salmon in our pantry as easy to prepare/eat meals.

Health and Wellness lifestyle changes are meant to be life-long journeys, not short treks.

It’s been an eventful last six years for me. My journey to wellness has been filled with hills and valleys and a lot of trips and falls. However, it’s also been filled with amazing victories, enlightening education and learnings, and life-changing events. The changes that you make don’t have to be complex or even fast.

The goal is just to be consistent and deliberate in the choices that are made. You might not like the choices that you made that put you in the current situation that you are in. I know that I sure didn’t. All of that is ok, though. Those choices don’t define your worth as a person.

Your value and worth are defined by God, and in His eyes, you are immensely valuable. As John 3:16 says, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” God loves you; He loves all of us, and at the end of the day, that love will never change or waiver, regardless of our choices or actions.

That’s the really great thing about choices. You always have the chance to make a new one. Making that choice to take that first step towards better health, whether it’s physical, mental, or spiritual, though difficult, is worthwhile and will pay dividends for the rest of your life.