I can't/don't drink alcohol anymore, but before paleo I used to eat a ton of fruit. Last summer I ate bowls and bowls of cherries. Maybe I ate as many as five servings of fruit a day. In the last few years I had lost some weight by eating less and exercising more, but I couldn't get the scales to budge any further. Along came paleo and the problems with fructose were revealed. I quit eating most fruit except berries and my extra pounds fell off. I believe that the fructose was acting much like alcohol used to, but not as apparently evil for me. I'm content to give up grains, etc., but fruit still provokes me. I've appreciate what others have said about their detachment from alcolhol in several threads. I add this question to focus on connection on fruit as a fix and weight. I feel great and hold no fantasies about alcohol as such, but the fructose fairy beckons still.
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The fruit fairy will continue to beckon because we are programmed to see those little packages of sweetness as something we need to eat - they are even colored in the most appealing hues to tempt us.......Unfortunately for us, fruit is available all year round, whereas in primitive times these richly colored treats were only available in late summer/autumn, for the specific purpose of giving us an extra layer of fat for the winter months. So we have a quandary - eat fruit all year round, have winter fat all year round. I am not sure whether this knowledge alone will be incentive enough to become a seasonal fruit eater, probably not - so, I would also try shopping at the local fresh fruit and veg market and buying from stalls that have goods only in season (I assume you live in a temperate zone?). Supplementing with bee pollen is another trick - it is only needed in very small amounts, helped hugely with my sugar/fruit/alcohol cravings at the beginning, I think because it contains all essential amino acids, which help with sugar imbalance. Also, knowing that fruit is not completely off limits forever; local berries and fruit in summer and fall are perfectly suitable, much more environmentally friendly and if you wait long enough for them, they will taste 1000 times better when you do eat them - and you then may not want to gorge yourself on them when that time comes along - although that, within reason, is OK too, they are after all, one of nature's special gifts..... The book Potatoes not Prozac is a fantastic resource which talks in depth about the chemical connection between all these sugars and our brain function/mood/weight and how replacing one with another will not necessarily help in the long run. |
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I'm not a recovering alcoholic, but absolutely. I cut out fruit a month ago and got my body fat even lower to about 5%. Pretty cool. |
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Maybe your liver was damaged, so you couldn't process fructose well. |
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When I hit one of my plateaus during weight loss, my trainer and I went through my foods logs to see what I could change. Everything was "perfect" calorie-wise and my protein/carb/fat ratios were right where we wanted them. Nothing looked off. I decided to drop my daily banana and BOOM, within a week my weight started moving again. I've really found that my body really reacts to the sugar in fruit. I try to stick to melon and berries and lower fructose type fruits, but I do love apples and pears, so I try to limit them to once a week or less. |
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i see where your mind is in this question. i think we are very similar :) i never, ever drink anymore, nor have the desire to do so... i just don't feel like it, and it's that simple for me. i wasn't ever an alcoholic, though, in the sense that i never craved a drink or drank that regularly. i was just a stupid punk kid who partied like a wild child for 2 or 3 years during college. but i have always been that person who has an addictive personality. i've always been hooked on something, partying, drugs, working out, binge eating... always something. so dieting for me is the same way. i wrote this in another comment about fruit, but it's the one thing food-wise i just can't give up nor do i want to. not eating fruit is a guarantee i will consume mass amounts of anything else i can get my hands on, and it doesn't seem to affect my weight loss or cravings negatively at all. it's my one pleasure food. i have other food sensitivies beyond just being limited by paleo so food is emotional for me, and yes, fruit is something i really feel i can't live without. don't know if this ramble helped, but if it did i think i understand what you mean! |
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Aren't fruit and alcohol essentially the same addiction or the same disregulation in the gut biome? I'm pretty sure that is why they suggest stocking up on candy bars in AA, the body has become accustomed to having a lot of sugar around, and going cold turkey on the sugar can make alcohol withdrawal more difficult. I think you did it just right, switched to fruit, and then when you were ready, dropped the fruit. Well done. |
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