John Durant on the Colbert Report. I'm pretty much sold on anyone who goes on Colbert.

Actually, it was really Michael Pollan for me. I joined a local CSA and started getting my meat eggs and veggies there about six or seven years ago. I alwats had a vague interest in food politics, but Michael Pollan really changed my world view. Having the chance to learn about and experience the difference in my health from eating local and humane food got me solidly on a path that lead me from vegetarianism to paleo. Mark Sisson was what ultimately convinced me, and through MDA I found hunt gather love, robb wolf, et al. But Pollan changed my life.

I did Atkins about 7 or 8 years ago and lost about a hundred pounds in total (I gained it all back after quitting). It made sense to me because I knew from personal experience that there was no way my ancestors from as recently as a hundred years ago ate as many carbohydrates as people do today. I also saw the effect of obesity, type-2 diabetes, and heart disease that modern diet has had on Native American's today. Atkins made sense on an intuitive level but the constipation and brain fog I experienced from having to stay in the "induction phase" in order to continue the weight loss made me quit. Then years later after trying all of the "conventional wisdom" methods of weight loss to differing levels of success I found a link to www.Marksdailyapple.com on a Mixed Martial Arts forum. It instantly "clicked" with me, although I have had a hard time complying with Paleo/primal in the years since that I had with Atkins or caloric restriction diets, even so the low level of compliance has kept me from continuing to gain over the years.

I found Mark's Daily Apple. Being a type 2 diabetic, found the Definitive guide to Diabetes, and I was hooked!!! Changed my life forever!!!

I first heard about it from Melissa at at huntgatherlove.com , but it wasn't until a friend of ours recommended watching Fathead, and then reading Gary Taube's books, that we decided to do more research, and we too ended up at Mark's Daily Apple and were convinced.

What's kept us here is the sudden peace and quiet in our previously disgruntled guts. We're grain free! (Said in our best Dave Ramsey voice!)

I did Atkins in 2001-2002 and I knew it was controlling my diabetes really well as I was able to go off meds (which I had no idea that it would have that effect when I started). but the scare tactics of "But you'll die of a heart attack" worked and I quit low carb (and then added back the meds and eventually Lipitor and blood pressure meds as well).

Three years ago, I just could not control my blood sugar and I knew I had to go back to low carb, but I was still scared as heart attacks run (in fact gallop) in my family. My father had 3 heart attacks and major surgery by the time he was my current age.

I turned to the internet and started hanging out at the Low Carbers Forum. That lead me to Dr. Michael Eades blog, where I was able to read convincing research about statins, heart disease, the lipid hypothesis and saturated fat. Not long after, I started reading Tom Naughton's blog and started wandering around the blogs of Jimmy Moore, Stephan Guyenet, PaNu and Hyperlipid. I read for about a year before actually (slowly) migrating to paleo. Dr. Harris was a huge influence, but Dr. Mike is where it started for me.

MDA, Robb Wolf, FTA all came a bit later for me. (But are awesome!).

I've been gluten-free and sugar-free for 12 years and intermittently grain free for some of those years. I encountered the Grain free diet through Dr. Mercola, but it wasn't enough. Several years ago when I was digging through the internet looking for grain free turkey stuffing ideas, I came across an obscure paleo recipe share site. It planted the seed and over the years I've researched it on and off. Finally I decided to give it a (serious) try 2 months ago.

I heard about paleo from Free the Animal, and really, what more could I ask for? Eating steak every day? Done! Though I seriously wondered about my ability to give up bread...

Worked my way through the blogosphere, read through Mark's Daily Apple, and read Robb Wolf's "The Paleo Solution". Finally found Archevore and was sold with Kurt Harris's thoughts on the diet.

I started with the Primal Blueprint, and am now on a vlc experiment (Archevore "how to lose weight").

I heard about Paleo from my CrossFit trainers then at my CrossFit certification. Did some more research on it and I loved the idea of eating everything fresh and I honestly think I found the answer to that belly fat. I cut out all grains last week and I feel great. Im really excited to go home (deployed) and be able to do this way better. Its hard with the food they give us but I really try! I can't wait to see how I look and feel 3,4,5 months from now. :)

PaleoHacks.

Specifically, this question from Ambimorph: http://paleohacks.com/questions/25449/why-do-people-consider-ketosis-stressful-to-the-body linked via a tweet from her husband zooko

I had some knowledge of general metabolism and low-carb theory, but didn't really know anything about Paleo. I spent the rest of the weekend reading other posts and following links to other resources. Robb Wolf and Chris Kresser podcasts came next.

The combination of scientific investigation, debunking common misconceptions, evolutionary rationalism, common sense and better health was (and is) most attractive.

Officially it was Richard Nikoley, but I think Mark Sisson had a bigger impact on me. Last winter I was reading a mens fashion site that had linked to a Free the Animal article on why Richard had given up soap and shampoo for the last however long and what his results were. I was intrigued so I read it, then bounced around his site a bit and was more intrigued by the entire thing. Not just getting rid of chemicals on the outside, but paying more attention to what goes in as well.

From there I linked over to MDA and Mark lays things out in such a simple, straightforward manner, that it really makes sense. I would like to thank them both as I have never looked or (more importantly) flet better in my life. It has not only touched my bodily health, but my professional life, my emotional well being, and my overall confidience and happiness has been positively affected.

I don't remember the order of events. I think it went: Randomly shelf-read 'Good Calories, Bad Calories' at the library while killing time, then seeing a chiropractor who was offering a free massage gave me a WAPF pamphlet, which totally made sense to me. Somehow, I'm not sure how, I stumbled upon Mark's Daily Apple and hungrily read everything he had to say. I spent about a year all but worshiping Mark and all he had to say. His philosophy on exercise especially resonated with me, as I've always hated jogging but loved walking and sprinting. Through Mark's link love and such, I discovered this whole world of "Paleo" and that it's not all "Primal". I have to say that regularly checking paleo hacks keeps me far more accountable than I was before. I have serious issues with my accountability, so this is awesome.

I lost 50 lbs eating low carb about 3 years ago, about a year and a half or two years ago friend of mine introduced me to paleo and the book Ishmael by Daniel Quinn, and everything just clicked together.

MDA via twitter sometime in 2008.

"The Triathlete's Training Bible" by Joe Friel

My biologist father discovered Neanderthin in 1999 and lost a bunch of weight. It made so much more sense to us than anything we had learned about "dieting" before. I've been on and off (for extended periods) for 12 years since!

CrossFit + Dr. Cordain

Very thankful :-)

Went to a nutritionist in 2006 who did a bunch of tests and identified that I generally had a problem with grains. I was still vegan+fish at that time, but I cut wheat totally for awhile and ate corn (as a grain, at least) sparingly. But little by little more corn and rice came back in to my diet. All I remembered was "I felt great at this point, now I don't" but somehow didn't really make clear connections.

Then I started running barefoot, read Born to Run, found Barefoot Ted who had a link to MovNat on his page. That sounded awesome! Started to hang out in the Hauraches Google group where some of the guys were talking about Paleo something. Signed up for MovNat in Thailand and had to move it from December to February, and somewhere in that time, I started doing research about this Paleo/Primal thing. Came back from MovNat determined to do the 30-Day Challenge, which I did and I've never looked back, never felt better. At that time I found Robb Wolf, got reminded about Loren Cordain (I had read about the diet re: acne many years ago), Mark Sisson, Richard Nikoley, Chris Kresser, etc. I now listen to 10 or so podcasts regularly that are related to Paleo, barefooting, etc.

Was reading an article on Mark McManus's website MuscleHack.com about "Big Fat Lies".

http://www.musclehack.com/big-fat-lies-is-saturated-fat-bad-for-you/

Couldn't believe it. Starting digging in.

Found Kent Rieske's ridiculous site called biblelife.org via a simple google search about saturated fat myths.

Went down the rabbit hole. Found WAPF, CMast, Kresser, Stephan, Harris, Sisson, PH.

And now here I is.

I read "Why We Get Fat", then started at Gary Taubes' blog and found others. I read through Kurt Harris' blog and I think that's how I found you wonderful people! I've been lurking around for a week or so and I love all the info that's here.

I read an article in Outside magazine in January about MovNat and they touched on Paleo nutrition. Which sent me on a book hunt whereupon I found Why We Get Fat by Gary Taubes. It's been an amazing 6 months.

I had a post on my blog early on (maybe the third post...) about the whole progression of my life that brought me to Paleo and set me up so I could understand it. Thank goodness I've always been skeptical of everything. :)

I unintentionally started eating Caveman-style (Atkins-turned-health freak-turned-Cavewoman), but it wasn't until almost a year later (this January) that my dad (who's WAPF) gave me a copy of Cordain's "The Paleo Diet" becaues he was like, "This is how you eat-- you'll find this interesting!"... and the rest is history. :)

Watched one of Gary Taubes earlier lectures by accident. Then Quickly progressed to MarksDailyApple, Hyperlipid, WAPF and Heartscanblog, Tom Naughtons Blog etc etc ...

Quit carbs & sugar within one day. Never looked back.

Podcast with Jimmy Moore and John Durant first, then Marks Daily Apple, Free the Animal...Robb Wolf...

Wow, 24 answers and not one mention of Arthur Devany! I am truly surprised. It is a shame his blog moved behind a firewall, the impact of which is evident by his absence in the answers above.

If ADV hadn't written his 'Essay on Evolutionary Fitness' (the version circa 2006 is the best), I think the paleo landscape would look a lot different. I would go so far as to say that without Art, the whole 'movement' would not be as far down the path as it is today. He was (and still is IMHO), truly ahead of the paleo curve. He manages to keep a hand on the science without ever losing the wider anthropological/evolutionary context at a macro scale. (With ADV's site behind a firewall, J Stanton's site is the only free-access site that has a similarly refreshing angle on the paleo model).

In addition to ADV, I would mention Tamir Katz as a pivotal inspiration. In the mid noughties I was reflecting upon what I would eat if I was stuck in the wild. The answer seemed to me to be meat (lots of), and seasonal fruit and veg (but little of either). The impact of this thought weighed heavily upon me (I was already suspecting that conventional dietary advice was NOT leading me to metabolic health). Katz's diet book was the first place I had seen this concept expressed in writing, and it was backed up with sufficient science to make me dig further, and hence my discovery of Art's work.

Like many of you, I was turned on to Primal / Paleolithic eating by Mark Sisson. While grains occasionally make their way into the weekend routine, the Primal methodology has forever changed me.

Keep eating and train hard, folks!

I'm not a regular reader of Tim Ferriss' blog but I happened to be looking at something there and spotted a recent guest post from Robb Wolf. I had already read Michael Pollan and Good Calories, Bad Calories and was planning to try a dramatic diet change but had yet to turn that desire into action.

Robb's post provided the framework and challenge I needed - try eating according to a few simple rules for 30 days and see if you feel better. Very hard to argue with that.

Gary Taubes, ultimately. His books led me through the door.

But other things before that opened the door, made me receptive to the idea. Bad things like heart disease did that. A SAD story, if you know what I mean.

But before any of that came to a head, there was this: http://tinyurl.com/3jqbmuo

An epiphay from Mark Eberhart, describing our carnivorous origins. I gotta say, that might have been most important of all.

EDIT:

And a special thanks to Melissa HGL for links to carnivore articles and stuff.

I'd read a lot of stuff, and had incorporated bits and pieces -- but I didn't pull it all together and get my behind in gear until just a little while ago -- some time in 2009, courtesy of Nerd Fitness Rebellion (Steve Kamb), and my involvement with Weston A. Price Foundation. It helped me to pull all of the pieces I'd been working on since my Midwifery days into one tidy bundle that I could actually organize and explain. chuckles

I think I initially heard about it via Ask Metafilter, but it also starting hitting me from other sides when researching GCBC. Then I started listening to the 5by5 network and Dan Benjamin started talking about it.

The Universe was conspiring to make it happen, in other words :)