How Paleo Can Change Your Life: The Paleo Lifestyle
The Paleo diet has been called many things, and chief among them is the title of the caveman diet. A name that unwittingly turn some people off right away when they start imagining a bunch of drooling, hulking individuals beating their chests and running through the wild chasing wild beasts. That can be a disconcerting image, but Paleo is known as an all organic diet, and it is also touted as the low carb and high fat diet that can cleanse the body of toxins and additives of the modern processed foods epidemic.
Obesity, heart diseases, and food allergies (like gluten intolerance, celiac disease, diabetes, and other autoimmune disorders) have been on the rise for the last few decades. What hasn’t eased these number in the last few years is the rising number of additives, like high fructose corn syrup, sodium, and ‘bad’ saturated fats in commercially processed cooking oils, and gluten in grains, wheat and all its by products.
We can’t put an end to the production of these un-organic foods, but we can protect ourselves from further invasion of harmful diseases that may eventually cripple our body because of the empty calories they represent and their zero nutritional value. Even fortified processed foods that claim to have Vitamins and minerals to make them look more appealing can be deceiving because of the really low percentage of the nutrients present in the foods. And even then you may not be able to absorb those nutrients because of the presence of proteins that can inhibit our body’s nutrient absorption by binding themselves to the nutrients and not letting them enter your blood stream.
Let’s spell out what the Paleo diet is all about so that there is not confusion about what is shunned in the diet and how you can integrate the Paleo way of eating into your own lifestyle.
Before we do this, however, we must first clarify what ingredients to avoid with the Paleo lifestyle.
Avoid list of Paleo Ingredients
1. Grains: Avoid all grains like rice, barley, wheat, rye, quinoa, millet, corn, amaranth, oats, etc. as all of these contain gluten in some degree.
2. Starchy vegetables: This means white potatoes. The high starch and high sugar content is not on recommended list in the Paleo diet.
3. Sugar: Eliminate sugar from your diet and stick to raw honey and Paleo substitutes such as unsweetened maple syrup (grade B) that avoid raising blood sugar levels exponentially.
4. Industrial and seed oils: Avoid vegetable and seed oils like peanut oils, sunflower, canola etc. because they are higher in ‘bad’ saturated fats, require more processing to become edible and easily go rancid, which creates health issues. Try oils like olive, coconut oil, ghee, and pure grass fed butter.
5. Legumes: all kinds of beans whether they be peas, mung beans, broad beans, garbanzo beans, lima beans, and/or peanuts. They have always been touted as healthy proteins, but are also high in carbohydrates and increase insulin release in your body.
6. Dairy: Another food source that increases insulin levels in human beings and can contain additives, antibiotics, and growth hormones that can all be harmful to your health.
7. Sodium: Use less sodium as it is known to cause bloating, water retention and harmful to human body in higher quantities. Limit your sodium consumption to 1000mg a day. Most processed foods contain sodium (canned beans, pre-made foods, deli meats, etc.) Try using sea salt instead it’s a healthier Paleo option.
Paleo benefits
With this avoid list you must be thinking, how is avoiding any of this stuff make Paleo a good diet to be on? What are its benefits? After all if I’m giving up my pizza dough, I need to know it’s got to be for some worthwhile reason. No way is any diet worth giving a try if you’re going to be off the conventional pizza’s made of gluten flour and fizzy drinks that are full of high fructose corn syrup.
Let’s talk about some Paleo benefits that are sure to peak your interest.
1. Say goodbye to being ‘hangry’. This is a combination of being both hungry and angry. Being on a high fat and low carbohydrate diet helps you stay satiated for longer. Some people experience rapid drop in their blood sugar, which is followed by hunger and irritability. This is called hypoglycemia, but the Paleo diet will help with satiety and you will find yourself eating less than with other diets.
2. Experience sustained weight loss. Because of Paleo’s food principles, you are consuming natural, organic, process free foods that help in controlling your weight. Processed carbs, sugar, and excess sodium are chief causes of weight gain. In a Paleo diet, once you get rid of foods that are discouraged by Paleo, you will notice a dramatic improvement in your weight and your ability to sustain that weight loss. Many studies have proved that things like high fructose corn syrup (a sweetener present in many processed food items) can be addictive. The HFCS is serving as empty calories itself, and your digestive system digests fructose in a different way from sucrose, but this is not the only cause of weight gain. HFCS is known to be addictive and when you drink one too many cans of some fizzy drink, you are bound to put on pounds.
3. No more bloating and being gassy all the time. You may have noticed that as you get older, eating certain foods causes your body to bloat and you are always gassy at night. This is common if you consume sodium more than 1000mg a day. With Paleo, the use of sodium and salt is discouraged because of its side effects that cause you to bloat, become gassy, and also unable to burn fat if you are trying to lose weight.
4. Healthy fats like omega 3 are encouraged in the Paleo diet. The nutritional value of omega 3 has always been immense, but with this diet you intake of this fatty acid increases to exponential levels. Consuming omega 3 regularly benefits your hearth, helps you burn fat quicker, helps you control autoimmune diseases like diabetes, and promotes positive brain development and a much healthier immune system.
5. Eating un-processed food is the ultimate benefit. This is something that cannot be overlooked about being on a Paleo diet. This diet encourages you to eat natural, organic food, and tells you to avoid harmful processed foods that are full of negative additives, toxins, antibiotics, and growth hormones that are bad for your health anyway. Above all it has a good balance of macronutrient (protein, carbohydrates, and fats) and their appropriate ratios, which should not only nourish and give you exceptional overall health, but also give you mental clarity and a generally better mood.
6. You will be in optimum health because you will be consuming many nutrients and Vitamins that contribute to giving you good energy for the day, strengthen your immune system and the good fats in a Paleo diet will help with good health of arteries, maintain good skin and healthy brain function.
7. When you are on a Paleo diet the fats, and oils you use will not be harmful to your body because the oils used on a Paleo diet tend to be largely stable and don’t go rancid like other commercial vegetable and seed oils that go rancid quickly, which brings about a toxicity to the oil that can be damaging to your body and promote negative heart health.
8. Eating habits really affect your sleep. People on Paleo diet, have a better overall health, this means better gut health, less bloating, less gassiness, water retention and better sleeping patterns. You will sleep better when you aren’t troubled by an upset stomach, or the feeling of being bloated.
While, it may be a bit easier to give up savory foods and snacks, it can be much harder and more painful to let go off everyday desserts like muffins, cakes, cookies, and ice cream. There’s a whole culture of comfort built around these desserts. Gossiping friends, lovers on a romantic dinner, or a family night of movies and ice cream, how can you make the transition to a better lifestyle easier without sugar, butter, and flour?
Let’s take a peek into the world of guilt free Paleo desserts that are healthy but very tasty and scrumptious at the same time. Once you get the idea that healthy and delicious can work in combination, you will be hooked on the Paleo lifestyle forever.