I think you need to relax. Everything looks great. Sometimes, you need to stop trying so hard and let your body catch up. Take a week off.

Then log your food for a week. Look at your calories and your ratios of fat/protein/carb and see if there is something you can tweak there. I would say that might not be enough food, but I only eyeballed the calories. Stick with a change for at least 4 weeks before you decide it's not working.

You may want to try cycling your calories or carbs also to give your body some variety. When you do the same thing over and over for too long your body gets used to it.

You may also want to change your workout. Instead of strength try some HIIT or hit different muscle groups.

I do think fasting can help too. Maybe one day a week, try a 16 hour fast.

Don't give up on a change too quick though, it can take your body awhile to catch up to the new thing and if you keep changing it, you won't know what worked!

I put your day of food into MyNetDiary. It looks like you're getting 75g to 100g of carbs per day!

You might want to try and reduce that to 50g or less, per Mark Sisson's carb curve. I know that he says 50g to 100g is good for effortless weight loss, but that assumes that you don't have some sort of metabolic derangement.

Given your history with IBS, you may have some healing to do. Going under 50g of carbs a day might be necessary for body fat percentage reduction.

Also, consider repairing your gut health before gunning for fat loss.

Congrats

I first want to say that I'm impressed with your understanding and adherence to a Paleo Diet. I also want to thank you for allowing me to write this. I felt compelled.

You've done good, no matter how you feel about your body right now this moment. It's obvious that you care.

However, it's also obvious to you that you're frustrated and your body is trying to tell you something. So, let's listen to it and try something new. Let's hack this shit.

Hack It

First impression: possibly too many carbs, eats too frequently throughout the day, and needs more rest.

Sleep:

Pretend OK is not good enough. Pitch black room. Aim for 8-9 hours (add 30 minutes for the time it takes to actually fall asleep). Don't stay in bed in the morning.

If your kids don't wake you, do you sleep all the way through the night? Or do you wake up around 3 AM?

Weight Training:

2 days/week.

Cardio:

1 day/week of sprinting only.

Food quality:

Take out the yam and saurkraut. Consider taking out the tomato and any other nightshades you didn't mention. Get iodine from sources like salt. Add green vegetables like romaine lettuce and celery if and when you feel like it.

Food timing:

Try eating 2-3 times a day starting around noon (ala leangains). Eat to satiety. Don't snack between meals. This will help insulin have more natural peaks and valleys instead of being mostly elevated and level all the time. Take a look at this graph of insulin levels throughout the day (via this post from Jimmy Moore's blog).

Psychological:

Forget about the concept of pre-workout/post-workout. Seriously. It's never inspiring to read or hear people talk about.

How do you feel after your workouts? Exhausted? Aim for Exhilarated. I used to do a 5x5 version of Starting Strength 3 times a week, eventually reaching 255 lb. full range barbell back squats after warming up. I would get out of workouts so tired and depressed, it felt like I was dragging myself back home.

"Do as little as needed, not as much as possible". ~ Henk Kraaijenhof

Your body is a temple. Your body is God. Listen to it and nourish yourself.

Good luck!

I apologize if this doesn't work. Take what you need. Your situation and mine are pretty similar and I'm trying to solve this for myself too. I'm with ya, dude.

Intermittently Fast instead of grazing.

Train Fasted, this tears fat off you. Eat tubers post workout.

If you're not hungry, don't eat.

Don't be afraid of good carbs, especially if you want to bulk.

I lost 105lbs, thru low carb, gained little muscle. Switched to potatoes post workout and I've gained 20 lbs of lean muscle. We evolved with tubers.

I'm repeating myself because this is the #1 failing IMO, if you're not hungry, don't eat. If you are hungry, eat more, but do it all in 1-2 meals a day. Snacking keeps you in storage mode.

Why not try ketosis? Reduce carbs to just about nothing, reduce protein, increase fat intake. Live on macadamia nuts, coconut oil, butter if you do dairy... If you stay in it for a few weeks and do regular exercise and sprints you will kill fat for sure.

Get some Ketosticks at the pharmacy to check and keep yourself in ketosis.

Also I would recommend getting your body fat checked since you are trying to change it, you might want to know where you are at.

Looks like a lot of food to me, and the sugar from the yam and saurkraut might cause fat storage.

What were you eating before you turned paleo, in September, and why did you switch diets if it was working for you?

Don't know why you are gaining weight but I think you're eating too much beef and not enough starchy vegetables. I'm a broken record, I know..

What are you supplementing? How many hours of sleep are you getting a night? Is your job stressful?

And if you want to drop fat, slow cardio is a waste of time.

Is it that you are trying to lose wt?? If so I think your Protein is too high - Eat just one egg white and throw the rest away- have the yolks. Have more green veg with your meals. This worked for me after sitting on the same wt - very low carb for months - I did one simple thing - ditched the a few eggs and ( god forbid) the bacon and added Avo/cucumber/ lettuce to my breakfast - so green food was 2/3 the meal - bang there you go - just changed one meal of the day. I use to have bacon and eggs only.

I also did the high fat and no carb thing ( really hard to have high fat no carbs and small protein if you don't want to have dairy) did not work very well and I started to obsess about what I was eating - Now feel very balanced

I had the same problem. I was gainig weight once I started Paleo and it was driving me nuts. I do Crossfit 5 days a week, so also with the exercize. I was obsessing about my diet and the scale was making me crazy. I decided one day to just relax, it's a lifelong way of eating and not a short term fix (diet) so I quit weighing myself and ate when I was hungry and didn't when I wasn't. Today I haven't been hungry at all, so it is IF, but not planned, just listening to my body. My weight gain was all muscle and it took a little bit of time for my body to start letting go of the fat...but it did and is happening. Relaxing about it, giving yourself a break and time and when it's not such a pressing issue...it just seems to happen. Measure your body fat and nothing else.

here are my thoughts: 1. take supplements (magnesium, D3, MV/MM, fish/krill oil, pro-biotics) 2. log/analyze your food for a while (with nutritiondata.com for example) 3. try to find and eliminate all food allergies you might have (could easily be the eggs..) 4. eliminate all high-intensity workouts for a while, only do moderate 2x 30min a week 5. go for a 30-60min walk each night before bed instead (u can listen 2 your fav podcasts etc) 6. don't go lower than 10% bodyfat. your problem does not have much to do with total bf. 7. relax, reduce stress, go outside as much as possible, play, listen to your body.

I agree about working out in a fasting state. That's pretty much a given by most experts.

But also, you don't want ANY carbs 2 hours post work out. That virtually eliminates HGH production (Human Growth Hormone) which you want for very good, youthful health (and a big reason we exercise in the first place).....

You mention you eat tubers post-exercise. I would hold off on that at least Q2 hrs/post-exercise. Go for fat and protein instead.

Also, up your Coconut oil consumption. I recommend at least 3 TBS minimum a day for my clients. More, if they are having difficulty like you are. As long as your system can handle it (i.e. not too many loose stools), it can do wonders as a thermogenic. I see about double the weight loss rate with my "high-CO consumption clients" vs. low/non-consumers.

Good luck and above all, Patience in all things! You are on the right path....We live in a culture where we all want things to happen quickly (this is our nature). You will see progress...perhaps a bit more slowly than some, but it will come and will be worth every bit of effort you've put into your new lifestyle. Remember....this is a journey for a lifetime!

I am just going to make this a simple comment; Relax, September 2010 was not that long ago. Give it more time.

I would say I am 10-12% bf, but who the hell knows. I would like to be around 8% but it seems I just keep going up. Also worth mentioning is it is primarily in my mid-section.

Distilling the high points from your post:

1) You want to get to 8% bodyfat (you don't say why, looks? A 6 pack?)

2) You don't know how much bodyfat you have (you've got to get this measured. Get calipers. You can't set a goal of 8% when you don't know where you are currently or if you've reached your goal).

3) My recollection is that bodybuilders can get to around 10% bf on diet alone, but under that they have to do progressively more work to shave off the percentages (cutting diets, etc). Something you might want to ask is how many people on a paleo diet are in the single digits bfwise, and see what their diets/exercise are like. You might be desiring something that will take a lot more work/control than what you're doing now. Personally, I'm not near single digits, but it's also not something I'm targetting.

4) Midsection weight. Cortisol is the stress hormone. There's a lot of cortisol receptors in the abdomen. Thus mid-section weight is common in guys that have a lot of stress/cortisol. Look into things to reduce cortisol levels as much as possible. Some things you can't change (kids), others you can (post workout nutrition, long exercise sessions, etc).