Well you can be sure anyone that did will have also stopped hanging out here!

Quite a few times. Every time due to finances and having a family to feed in addition to myself. Being forced to a $5 budget a day to feed two adults and a child makes Paleo difficult, if not impossible (I understand this is subjective, but it is my own experience). Beans, rice, cornbread, and hambones kept me going...

Additionally during my competitive years I did begin allowing myself fairly heavy indulgence in supplements, dairy, and occasional grains. This opened the floodgates and before I knew it, I was basically back where I started diet-wise.

I'm sure people have quit paleo and went back to SAD. But you're not likely going to find them lurking on PaleoHacks! I'm sure the dropout rate from paleo is pretty high. There's the initial dropout, from not liking change. There's the 1 month dropout from not seeing significant enough results. There's the 3-6 month dropout from meeting one's goals. Then there's the slow attrition of folks who simply get tired of it all.

It seems a natural progression for many is to be uber-strict initially, tweaking it down to reasonable functionality while getting health back in line, and then a maintenance level of paleo, where 70-80% of paleo gets you 95% of the results.

Or folks hop over to a paleo-like diet: perfect health, WAPF, ancestral, etc...

It depends on what SAD means to you. I've added back non-raw skimmed milk, white sugar, juices, potatoes and rice. 1 year ago all of this would be a big No-Go for me as it is too SAD related.

I went paleo a couple years ago. Hung out with eating that way for a year. When I started bumping up my running for ultramarathons I ended up turning into a vegetarian. I didn't do it consciously really. I upped my carbs so much that I ended up just weeding out meat in place of oatmeal, rice, beans, quinoa, and sweet potatoes. It was when I added whole grain bread that things started going bad.

I was getting very intense ear aches about every 3-5 days. I went to an chiropractor that was kind of new age (def not a hippy though using crystals and crap) and he suggested that a sensitivity to gluten could have been causing the ear aches. He told me to eliminate gluten, wait 2-3 weeks, and come back and see him. 2-3 weeks later I'm in his office thanking him b/c the stabbing pain in my ears had all but vanished.

I got through my last ultramarathon, some SAD binge eating during the holidays (Thanksgiving= 7 pumpkin cookies, 1 whole pumpkin pie, and 2 pieces of a pecan pie. Christmas= 1 dozen Oreo Balls. NYE= 3 large pieces of cheesecake) and now I'm back on the paleo bandwagon. I definitely feel better and my recovery between weight lifting/running sessions is remarkable.

BTW: Didn't gain an ounce of weight after the holidays :) I freakin' killed those desert foods

Not back to SAD in a "screw this paleo stuff, I was better off before sort of way," but more in a letting stuff slide over the holidays sort of way. And yes, I felt worse, and I'm back on the wagon.

I went semi-SAD for a bit. I did a fitness competition and afterward started to relax back into things a bit. Started off as cheating, then became daily. What happened? My metabolism shut down and I gained 10lbs. I lost my libido and became super moody. I felt like crap, looked like crap, performed like runny crap. I came to my senses.

I agree with Matt. People who truly gave up on or decided they didn't thrive on ancestral eating probably stopped visiting PH once they were sure their decision was final.

I had a "crisis month" about 4 months in and I did ask myself whether it was worth it to give up all my traditional snacks and high-reward treats. It's probably fair to say I gave in, too, because I had 2 binges in month 5. I stopped visiting ancestral sites, including PH, and I went out and bought a huge supply of junk.

A funny thing happened, though. None of the wheat-based foods tasted as good as I thought I remembered and they made me sick. Other binge foods didn't make me flat-out sick but the taste and after-effects were still very disappointing compared to the memories I'd been carrying around.

So, what happened is that I found out once and for all that the manufactured food-like products had lost their grip on me and I had no reason to binge. I haven't been mildly tempted since that time (August) and even on days in December when I had a neolithic treat like ice cream or chocolate the "treat" was never the best tasting food I had that day.

Now my experiments and treats are all safely within the realm of ancestral eating on a day-to-day basis. My wild monthly splurges are something like hard-shell tacos with a few forkfuls each of rice and beans. :O They taste good, there are no negative consequences and no regrets. Foods or food-like products that can't meet that standard are not included even as splurges.

I have fallen off the wagon, but still read PaleoHacks as a source of knowledge and inspiration! The last month has been high stress. 12 hour work days (normally 8 hours), working out, baking (2nd job- yes, in addition to the 12 hour day job), and maybe 6 hours of sleep (instead of 8 that my body craves). All of that just adds to SAD. Eating Paleo for me means really planning my food, and I just haven't had the time or energy to do so. I finally made the decision to walk away from my job, so I am looking forward to going back to Paleo and taking steps towards the next chapter of my life!

I started eating Fage yoghurt everyday for breakfast and I got acne so stopped. I must say I do eat a sandwich or slice of panettone once a week, and sometimes I get IBS. I actually had pancakes at a cafe this weekend with a friend and within minutes I had to run off, so I am starting to realise that some flour products are worse than others. I assume it is depending on the type and grade of flour. All the bread here in the UK is laced with Soya flour so I wouldn't be surprised if the gluten content is less of an issue.

I never actually ate the SAD diet anyway, and have always had loads of organic veg etc. The exception was pasta which I loveed but I haven't eaten it for about five months now. I don't really miss it that much, and I do the courgette noodles instead.

I did, but not because I didn't like paleo. It was because I was in college, and a lot of paleoish food (salads, nuts) are expensive for a college kid. And, this article kinda convinced me eating grains isn't so bad as long as it's mostly from white flour. The jist is that most of the grain's anti-nutrients are in the germ and the hull (bran). Refined flour is made after the hull and germ are removed.

http://www.archevore.com/panu-weblog/2010/3/12/the-argument-against-cereal-grains-ii.html

And I still lurk around on PH.

My mom went back to SAD, I'm sorry to say. According to her, it was too socially hard and my dad was exerting serious pressure against her wacky new diet, and he was ill and on a newly restricted diet due to bloodthinners, and, and, and...

As for effects, her GERD came back, her 'seasonal' allergies that happen every season are noticeably worse, her eyes went back to their usual bloodshot look. Sigh...parents. I hear the only thing worse is kids-

I went back to SAD when I was pregnant because of the severity of morning sickness and then I realized the pregnancy and lactation hormones seemed to erase the IBS symptoms I normally had after eating wheaty things. Luckily, my hormones shifted back and I didn't have much choice but to come back to paleo if I didn't want to feel ill all the time.

If you consider wheat/sugar as part of the SAD, then yes. I used to be very intolerant to gluten, but I can tolerate it fine now, and I do eat it occasionally. I consider sugar to be positive (Ray Peat).

I just had pancakes for breakfast; now I feel disgusting.

Yeah I went back to SAD, there is a time between now and when I first went Paleo back around March 2011, where I was more SAD than I was Paleo for the majority of the time. That said, I have never bought bread to keep in my house since I first went Paleo, and I wasn't very SAD to start with because I am from a coastal Part of Australia before I moved to USA where I ate a lot of fish and not much fast food for about 10 years. Probably, all of my meat was grass-fed as well as my milk. The thing I find is that my facial acne comes back when I don't eat Paleo. Also if I eat pancakes or what-not I get really sleepy. I am not sure what causes my IBS, it started after I had been in the states for a few years and doesn't really want to go away but it is more of a once a month thing now, when it used to be a couple of times a week.