It Starts With Food: Discover the Whole30 and Change Your Life in Unexpected Ways (32 page)

“The Whole30 has set me free of so many things. Now I can look at my plate as I am creating my dinner and know when enough is enough so after my meal I am neither hungry nor uncomfortably full. I have, for the first time in my life, learned how to listen to my body. I can list all of the ‘classic’ bonuses of the Whole30 with an emphatic yes. I am sleeping better. I am feeling better. My intestines are behaving the way they should for the first time ever. My skin is clear. I have lost weight, and my clothes fit better. I have kicked the sugar demon to the curb and am coping with stress without eating the entire kitchen, packaging and all. But even with that entire list, if I could only tell someone one benefit of my Whole30 experience, my answer would be a single word: freedom.”

—Laura C., Mullingar, Co. Westmeath, Ireland

You’ve finished your Whole30, and you’re probably feeling pretty good. You’ve worked hard to change your habits, and you’re finding it easier to turn down foods you used to find “irresistible,” thanks in part to a reduction (or elimination) of cravings. But you may also be a little bit nervous about what’s to come. Here is one universal truth:

The rules of the Whole30 program are very specific, and completely non-negotiable. They remove some of the stress from making your own food choices, take all the guesswork out of our expectations, and give you a clear goal. (“Start eating healthy” is a far more difficult challenge to wrap your head around than “Eat no added sugar, alcohol, grains, legumes, or dairy in any form whatsoever for thirty days.”) The program also gives you an easy fall-back when faced with social or peer pressures—a built-in excuse for why you don’t want that piece of cake or glass of wine. Blame us. We can handle it.

The rules of the Whole30 function much like training wheels on a bike, giving you all the support you need while allowing you to
complete
the program under the power of your own pedal strokes. But what happens when your thirty days are up? All the comforts of our rules, your built-in excuses, your clear objectives disappear with the end of your Whole30. Which leaves you with the
desire
to continue to eat healthfully, but no clear plan to make that happen.

So, let’s create a plan. We’ll outline our best suggestions for transitioning your Whole30 program into lifelong, sustainable habits—and then
you
can customize the plan to suit your lifestyle and goals.

Here’s what most of you Whole30’ers can expect when your first program is over. You may wait a few days before eating anything off-plan, nervous about taking that first step. Eventually, though, you’ll reintroduce some less-healthy foods. Most likely, these foods won’t taste as good as you remember, and perhaps they won’t make you feel as good as you felt during your Whole30—which makes it pretty easy to set them aside and return to your Whole30-ish eating habits.

But slowly, eventually, inevitably, poor choices will start to creep back in. Vacations, stressful situations, family events, and celebrations are common catalysts for the backslide into old habits, although perhaps the backslide starts with a glass of wine or bowl of ice cream on a random Tuesday night. It might take a month, or two, or three … but we predict that eventually you will wake up and realize that (a) you’ve somehow slipped back into mediocre eating habits, (b) you don’t feel so fantastic anymore, and (c) it’s really time to clean things up again.

When you get to this place, hear us clearly:

Habits are hard to break, pressures are hard to resist, and the temptation of delicious, less-healthy foods are everywhere. In the real world, it’s easy to have a relapse—it happens to everyone, including us. And it will, at some point, happen to you.

This process of restoring your health (and then some) is just that—a
process
. While the Whole30 was a fantastic jumping-off point, and will form the foundation of your healthy eating habits for the rest of your life, remember that it’s a marathon, not a sprint. You cannot expect yourself to be a “perfect eater” today, or tomorrow, or probably ever. In fact, we don’t generally think that’s a good goal to strive for. And it’s unreasonable to expect a lifetime of habits, patterns, and relationships with food to completely change in a mere month.

Which means that your lifelong healthy-eating journey will take you, well, the rest of your life. And that’s OK. Because much like your Whole30, this healthy-eating thing gets easier with time and practice.

Instead of preplanning your “nutritional off-roading,” we recommend a more flexible, intuitive approach. The basis of your everyday meals should look a lot like our “more healthy” recommendations, focused on high-quality meat, seafood, and eggs; vegetables, fruit, and healthy fats.

The idea that dietary “cheats” are necessary to “shock the body” and “jump-start your metabolism” is total malarkey. Binging on pizza, pasta, cake, and cookies has absolutely
zero
positive impact on your health, and may have serious consequences, depending on the food and your context. However, there
are
a few reasons to eat foods that are less healthy.

First, there are culturally significant or family-related events in which food and drink play a major role. A wedding, a special vacation, or your family’s Christmas dinner may involve foods that don’t make you physically healthier but have important emotional significance. In addition, there are valid psychological reasons for eating less-healthy foods. You crave a special food from your childhood. Your brain rebels against the rigidity of “can have” and “can’t have.” You get the urge to “test” a food group again, because you’re not yet
totally
convinced that those foods make you feel as terrible as you remember.

But perhaps the most compelling reason to go off-roading with your food from time to time is:

Sometimes, the fact that a food or drink is
so delicious
is a good enough reason to indulge. So, how do you work these choices into your everyday life?

On a case-by-case basis, making conscious, deliberate, informed decisions.

Keep eating your healthy foods until you bump into something that you believe might be worth it. Maybe it’s the homemade cookies Mom bakes, your favorite pomegranate martini on a dinner date, or that decadent-looking dessert in the bakery window.

Once you’ve identified something you think might be worth it, ask yourself a series of questions to help you decide if it’s
really
worth it. Do I have a
specific desire
for this particular food, or am I just emotional, hungry, or craving? Is it going to be incredibly special, significant, or delicious? Is it going to mess me up—negatively affect how I feel or the quality of my life?

This process might seem tedious or unnecessary. After all, you’ve been choosing your own food for a long time now—surely, you are capable of deciding what you want to eat or drink, right?

Not so fast.

Isn’t that kind of automatic “decision making” what got you into trouble in the first place? Because of the
kinds
of foods and drinks we often indulge with (supernormally stimulating, nutrient-poor, calorie-dense, and highly processed), it’s all too easy to let your reward, pleasure, and emotional pathways do the talking. And if you allow that to happen, you often find that cookie, martini, or breakfast pastry half gone before you even realize it. So please, stop and think critically at this point. It may make the difference between reinforcing your new, healthy habit and taking one step backward into an old one.

If you decide the food or drink really is worth it, congratulations! You can move on to the next step—
enjoying it.

The first thing we’d like to suggest is, don’t use the word “cheat” to describe your less-healthy indulgences. We want you to be able to make
guilt-free
choices to indulge in less-healthy foods from time to time, but “cheating” has a negative connotation. (And really, there
is
no guilt—only consequences.) We don’t believe those negative associations have any place in your new, healthy relationship with food, so going forward, we’ll call them “treats” instead.

The second tip: Eat only as much as you need to satisfy your craving.
If you’ve been dreaming about your favorite treat—say, homemade chocolate-chip cookies—and you decide today is the day, then by all means, bust out the cookie sheet and make some. But remember:

How will you know how much is enough? Because you are going to
savor those cookies
. It’s a terrible thing to mindlessly eat a plate of homemade cookies while watching TV. That is a shameful waste of a delicious food.
So when you finally pull that hot tray of cookies out of the oven, put one on a plate and spend
time
with it.

Take small bites. Chew thoroughly. Savor the flavor, smell, and texture. Make it last. Share the experience with a friend or your family, or simply enjoy the quiet time. Since we indulge partly to provide mental satisfaction, squeeze as much satisfaction as possible out of what you are eating.

With this approach, you should have plenty of time to notice that your craving has been satisfied, and that satisfaction has been achieved. So when it has,
stop eating
. Maybe that’s half a cookie. Maybe it’s four cookies. It doesn’t matter, as long as you are mindful of the process every step of the way.

If you’re following this general prescription, your overall diet should be consistently moving you in the direction of “more healthy,” with just enough “treats” to make the plan feel sustainable and satisfying. Please note, however:

One person’s “healthy and balanced” may be another person’s “I really need to clean things up!” In addition, where you draw the line, and which foods you crave, will most likely change as the years go on. Sure, we’ll go out on a limb and say that 99 percent of the time “treat” equals processed or sugary food or drink. But with time and the reinforcement of your new habits, tastes, and awareness, your perception of what constitutes a treat
will
evolve.