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How I Lost 23 Pounds with a Very Low-Carb Paleo Diet and Exercising Less

I recently had an interesting series of events occur in my own life that I thought might be helpful for others to hear regarding weight gain.

I have always been thin or weight proportional most of my life. Except for a brief period in my twenties when I first quit smoking and had some serious problems with binge eating and if would eat wheat. I can easily gain 20 pounds if I eat wheat on a regular basis, but that isn’t something I do.

Other than that, I have never had a problem with weight and it wasn’t something I was ever concerned about. Most of my life I had very high metabolism.

As I began to approach menopause, I noticed that my metabolism began to change and slow down. I started picking up a few pounds each year. Nothing too significant so I didn’t worry about it.

Then about four years ago, as I went through the last stage of menopause, I had a severe adrenal crash. As I was working on healing from this and still going through menopause over the next couple years, the weight gain increased. Just a few pounds here and there, so I still didn’t worry too much. I figured it would turn itself around with time.

However, then menopause completed and my metabolism seemed to slow down even more and the weight gain continued. I started to be a little concerned and talked to my doctor about it, and he said it was a probably a hormone imbalance. So I tried a variety of natural progesterone replacement options, but they all gave me severe anxiety so I could not continue them.

I also want to point out that I have been following a low-carb and high animal protein diet for more than 25 years and a very strict Paleo diet for about five years. So I do not ever eat sugar or junk food and rarely eat starchy carbohydrates. Additionally, I am never hungry in-between meals, so I never snack.

I eat three meals a day that consist primarily of meat and low starch vegetables. I would have one serving of fruit and nuts a day with one of my meals, usually my lunch. I also ate organic butter, cheese and yogurt several times a week. In the morning, within an hour of getting up, I typically have a little animal protein to hold me over until my breakfast is ready.

My carbohydrate intake was around 50 to 60 grams on most days,  except for an occasional cheat day when I might go up around the 100 gram mark. So, well below the hundred that is typically recommended in the Paleo community for weight loss.

According to Mark Sisson, one of my favorite Paleo experts, fitness expert and author of The Primal Blueprint,you really shouldn’t gain weight if you are consuming less than 150 grams of carbs a day, and you should lose weight if you are consuming between 50 and 100 grams of carbs a day. But that clearly wasn’t happening for me.

I have also exercised regularly for 25 years. A brisk walk 6 or 7 times a week.

I had not changed the amount of food I eat, the type of food I eat or my exercise regimen. This diet and exercise routine had always kept me slim and trim in the past.

I also engage in a variety of stress management techniques like mindfulness meditation, deep breathing exercises and visualization on a daily basis, and I get adequate sleep every night.

So there was no rational explanation for this weight gain. I don’t eat the foods that put on weight, I exercise, and I do not overeat.

I began researching the Paleo literature more thoroughly for what could be causing the additional weight and thought maybe it was the dairy, since dairy does prompt an insulin response and the inevitable storage of fat. So I removed the cheese, yogurt, and even the butter despite the fact that it has minimal impact on insulin, for several months, but this did absolutely nothing. I continued to gain weight.

I tried increasing my walk time and a variety of other exercises, but I had to be careful, because too much would exacerbate my adrenal fatigue. At first the PACE exercise program seemed to help, but then it didn’t.

Then in January 2013 I began to get alarmed, because the weight just kept piling on. During the holiday season I had indulged a little more than normal in carbs.  Just a couple sweet potatoes, some sugar-free coconut and almond cookies and some honey sweetened egg nog; so nothing too drastic, but come the new year and I suddenly realized that I was significantly overweight.  I didn’t look real heavy because it wasn’t in one particular area, it was spread out all over the place.  But I didn’t like how I felt. It began to feel uncomfortable physically. It was difficult getting in and out of the tub, rolling over in bed etc., and it just didn’t feel good.

I then started to suspect that maybe the amount of exercise I was doing was too much for my adrenal glands, so that would be causing me stress, which would cause an insulin response and fat storage, and decided to cut back on the exercise.

For several weeks I only exercised once a week. Immediately I lost about 4 pounds.

Then I took it back up, but instead of my usual 30 to 40 minutes a day, I cut it to only 20 minutes, 3 or 4 times a week. I also still abide by some of the basic principles presented in the PACE exercise program, as well as the Primal Blueprint.

Then I cut the one serving of fruit and nuts I ate per day, down to 3 times a week and the weight just started falling off with ease.

My carbohydrate intake now is about 20 or 30 grams a day for four days out of the week, and around 60 a day for three days out of the week.  I adjusted easily to this change and don’t even miss the nuts and fruit on those days.

It has been six months now and I have lost 23 pounds. I think this is as much as I’m going to lose, because I’ve been holding steady now for several weeks with no additional loss. But this is fantastic and way more loss than I hoped to achieve, so I’m very pleased with these results.  I still have a few extra pounds in the belly area, but it’s acceptable. I’m almost back to the weight I was before menopause and adrenal fatigue ravaged my body.

For those of you with adrenal fatigue, you may also want to note, that exercising less has also helped my adrenal glands to become stronger and move to a higher level of functioning.

So, the moral of this story is this, if you have adrenal fatigue and/or are post-menopausal, then you may need less exercise instead of more, and even less than 50 grams of carbohydrates per day in your Paleo meal plan to lose weight and strengthen your adrenal glands. I was not able to reach what Mark Sisson calls, “The Sweet Spot,” until my carb intake dropped below 50 grams a day and I reduced my exercise.

Why would this be so? Because too much exercise is stressful on the body. If your adrenal glands are weak, they can’t handle as much exercise as they used to, your normal exercise routine may be too long or hard and will feel like endurance to your adrenal glands, and therefore it will cause stress.

When we are under stress, the liver releases it’s glycogen (sugar) into the bloodstream, and insulin is released and it gets stored as fat. Exercising harder and more only drains the adrenal glands more and drives more fat storage.

Adrenal fatigue is very common in menopausal women, largely because the adrenals are now taking on the job of producing sex hormones, which used to be the job of the ovaries. Since many women have adrenals that are overworked due to the demands in their lives, this hormonal change often pushes the adrenals over the edge.

Additionally, these hormonal changes may affect their insulin sensitivity, even if they are watching their carbohydrate intake. A woman who has no problem with insulin resistance prior to menopause, may suddenly develop it, in response to hormonal changes. A woman’s ability to handle carbohydrates changes with menopause. As illustrated with my experience; in my younger years, I could get away with eating a lot more carbohydrates without any consequences to my weight, but now I can’t. I hear this same story from many women that I work with.

Furthermore, during and after menopause, metabolism slows down, so the amount of carbs you were able to burn off is likely to change. Put these two factors together and you have a recipe for weight gain. Reduce the exercise and carbohydrate intake and this vicious cycle is put to a stop.

Update 9-27-13

When I first wrote this post in August,  I thought I was done losing weight, but to my pleasant surprise, that wasn’t the case. I have lost four more pounds. So that’s a total of 27 lost all together.

Update 1-17-2014

Well to my surprise again, I have lost seven more pounds since September.  It has now been just about a year since I made these changes in my diet, so that is a total of 34 pounds that I lost in the last year.  I haven’t seen the weight I’m at now in more than ten years.

Throughout this process I have discovered that I feel and function best on a ketogenic diet without fruit and nuts. However, I get a little bored with my diet if I stay ketogenic every day. So, allowing myself to go slightly above ketosis with some fruit and nuts three days a week gives me enough variety to alleviate my boredom. I like this pattern, so I will continue to eat this way.

4 thoughts on “How I Lost 23 Pounds with a Very Low-Carb Paleo Diet and Exercising Less”

  1. This is me in a nutshell and I’ve been to plenty of doctors and they say to ‘hang in there, you are going thru getting older’. I’ve been exercising at 5:00 am to 5:45 am for the last 25 years and eat the same way for 25 years and I’m now 48 going out of my mind with weight gain and feeling crappy every day. I would love to know what a typical day or two of eating is like for you and the exercises you also do. Thank you.

    1. Admin - Cynthia Perkins

      Hi Berneda,

      A typical day of meals for me looks like this:

      Breakfast, Lunch and Supper

      Baked Chicken Breasts
      Steamed Cauliflower and Broccoli
      Walnut oil sprinkled over it, or I might use ghee or butter on some days

      Breakfast

      Scrambled eggs with fried cabbage (fried with ghee or butter)
      Small piece of salmon

      Lunch and Supper

      Ground bison
      Steamed cabbage

      Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner

      Beef Roast
      Spinach with walnut oil

      So basically, I eat nothing but meat and low-starch vegetables for all three meals. To make things easy, I usually cook enough food for breakfast to last me for the whole day. So I am frequently eating the same thing for all three meals in that day.

      On the three days a week that I include fruit and nuts, I typically eat that with my lunch and that would include something like:

      6 to 8 strawberries and 1 or 2 TBSP of walnut butter

      Macadamia butter and 1/4 cup of cherries

      7 or 8 slices of a peach and 1 or 2 TBSP of almond butter

      1/2 cup of Yogurt with 1 TBSP of cashew butter or macadamia butter and a dash of stevia.

      1/2 cup of Yogurt with a handful of raspberries, 1 tsp of almond butter and a dash of stevia.

      You can find more details on diet on the following pages

      https://www.holistichelp.net/blog/paleo-breakfast-ideas/

      https://www.holistichelp.net/blog/paleolithic-diet/

      https://www.holistichelp.net/blog/candida-diet-recipes/

      As far as exercise, I just take a 20 minute walk. During that walk, I include a variety of different levels of intensity. For example, I stroll most of the time, but I increase my speed a bit a few times during the walk and then slow it back it down. I also go up a few hills for a little more intensity as well.

      I also do a round of about 12 squats and knee bends and stretch a little before I walk.

      I also do a round of about 20 push ups each day to strengthen and tone my arms. I usually do this first thing in the morning after I get up, not part of my walking routine.

      Best
      Cynthia

  2. Hi Cynthia. i am about to tell you my ailments. I have a few problems, one H.Pylori. Bad gastritis, and burning in stomach. I am constipated, am diabetic 2, have hiatus hernia, no gallbladder, fatty liver as well. I have bad gut issues, and pain, rumbling in gut when i eat, and after i eat for awhile. I take digestive enzymes, pe-biotic and probiotic together in one capsule. I dont know if i have candida, or SIBO at all. i have had an endoscopy hence gastritis. Always have dull pain under right rib cage. Have you any ideas what i can do and eat as well.

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