Primal Blueprint Diet...
 

The other day, I was listening to the radio and there was a guest speaker talking about the Primal Blueprint Diet. He made one point that was an amazing "a-ha" moment for me.

He said "Our bodies were naturally designed to burn fat. They were not designed to burn sugar."

He went on to explain that over the years as processed and high sugar/carb food were introduced our genetic make up over the years switched to deal with the over abundance of carbs and sugar, but we can change the genetic make up to burn fat again.

Its hard to say to people high fat makes me lose weight and have it stick.... yet it is so simple to explain why now. I dont know much about the Primal Blueprint diet but how is it any different than Atkins?

Primal Blueprint is not simply a diet--in fact, many people who eat Primally are not interested in losing weight at all. It involves nutritional principles, exercise philosophy, and lifestyle adjustments. It's designed to be a 'healthier' way of life.

If you Google it, you can find a lot of information. You can also Google its creator, Mark Sisson, and get info that way.

Primal Blueprint is Mark Sisson's brand of paleo diet. Check out his marksdailyapple website. This is the plan I follow. The difference is no industrial seed oils (canola, soybean, sunflower, safflower, corn oil), no legumes, and no grains (wheat, corn, rye, barley, oats, etc).

Its a cool plan, and I really dig the principles behind it.

I love primal/paleo! And we now have a section on the site also!

When I grow up I want to be fully primal :D

It's called back to basics to me.

Well said! I'm doing some things primal--no grains, no seed oils, "clean" food sources when I can. I do dairy and I don't fully buy into the "eat like Grok" thing, but I think in general it's a very healthy approach and one I'd like to adopt more fully.

Expecting my freezer next Monday and a quarter side of beef shortly after that.

I wouldn't know what to do with a side of beef. Do you take it to a butcher or butcher it yourself?

Primal does allow dairy - paleo does not. I love Mark Sisson's take on healthy. lifestyle but I can't say I am adherent to the plan though because I do use artificial sweeteners and I am pretty sure that does not fit into either plan.

But lets not forget Mark also says... if you follow primal eating in a 80/20 , meaning 80 percent primal... you are doing good.

That is true! Thanks for the reminder and that is one of the reason's I like his plan so well. He is pretty moderate and for a lot of people, that is what is they need to get with the program.

It's already cut up and packaged and ready for the freezer. About $6.50/lb.

I agree with just about everything I've seen from Mark Sisson and his Primal Blueprint. Last winter, I had the opportunity to meet Mark and have dinner with him and he is very passionate about what he does. He lives and breathes what he preaches! He was in town to meet with my husband (work related) and I got to pick Mark up from the airport. I felt like I was picking up a celebrity. ;) We chatted for the 40 minute car ride very easily and then enjoyed a nice dinner.

I love Primal. This is the plan I most closely follow.

That's why, in part, I say I'm "semi-primal". :)

I'm a big fan of Mark Sisson's Primal Blueprint! :) When I was trying to follow VLC, it just didn't work for me. I stopped losing pretty quickly into it (within the first few weeks) and I was somewhat miserable having to eat only 20-30 carbs a day. One day my friend sent me an email. He was big into paleo eating and talked about how he felt so much healthier since starting. Being a researcher, I looked into it and came across Mark's site (Mark's Daily Apple). Everything I read on his site made so much sense! I was hooked, downloaded his free books and bought the main book. At first I dabbled with the lifestyle but completely ignored the exercise part. LOL Plus, since I'm an all or nothing girl, I was trying to eat "right" 100% of the time. Eventually I gave up as this felt unsustainable as well.

Then, my father passed away in October. He had been suffering with all kinds of health problems due to obesity, inactivity and eating the wrong kind of food. He had diabetes, coronary heart failure a couple of times, a triple bypass, high blood pressure and eventually had to have the lower part of his leg amputated due to diabetic complications. He was a mess. The one positive thing that came out of his death was that it woke me up.

I was also on the way to having serious health problems due to my lifestyle which really mirrored my dads. Almost 80 pounds overweight with high blood pressure and high blood sugar (borderline diabetic), I knew that I had to do something or else my fate would be sealed. That’s when I grasped onto the Primal Blueprint like a drowning person to a life preserver. I committed to it and not just the eating part. I follow Mark Sisson’s 80/20 rule (I'm more like 85/15) , which makes it sooo much easier than trying to do it 100% all the time! Makes my life more enjoyable. He says that the “Primal sweetspot for effortless weight loss” is eating between 50-100 grams of carbs per day. That’s very easy to do and allows me many more food options. I feel healthier eating more veggies and some fruit here and there.

I also have completely adopted the Primal Blueprint for fitness which means I lift heavy things twice a week (Essential Movements plus some free weights), do sprints once a week and get 3-5 hours per week of slow movement (walking, hiking in the mountains or biking). I also added in some caloric staggering which means one day a week I have a higher cal/carb day and one day I have a lower cal/carb day. This is because when I eat low cal for too long, my body thinks it’s starving and starts to hold onto the weight. Another thing that has been very helpful has been food tracking and I track my food daily over at Livestrong. It’s been a lifesaver!

So far I’ve only been seriously following the Primal Blueprint since the end of October, but I feel so much better since starting. I’m averaging a 2.6 pound weight loss per week and am getting stronger every day. My resting heart rate has gone down from 85 bpm to 56 bpm. I still have about 68 pounds to reach my goal, but for the first time I can actually see this is within reach.

Wow Michiko!
You are doing so great,I loved reading your post. Thank you for sharing:high5:

So sorry about your father Michiko. I lost my Mom to diabetic complications too and that was what initially motivated me to do Atkins.

So glad that primal is working for you!

Thanks for the clarification, beachguy.

I think I am going to eliminate it for a while starting in January and see....

I love the Primal Blueprint!

This is the plan I mostly follow (mostly because I occasionally use Splenda). Like other posters have said, it can be followed for weight loss or for general health. One big difference I've noticed from other low carb plans is that the Primal plan does not allow any grains / legumes at all even if they are "low carb" versions. The main reason I chose it over Paleo is because it allows dairy (which I tolerate well) and red wine (which I love :) ).

Since I changed to Primal about 2 months into my low carb lifestyle, I have more energy. I work 9 hour days on my feet, but still feel good enough to run errands, shop, and clean the house after work. I used to just collapse into my recliner in exhaustion :)

:confused:Did you mean you had more energy with Primal than regular Low Carb (Atkins) or the old way of eating before .... meaning higher carb???

To me, the difference is processed foods. So many LCers use an overabundance of artificial sweeteners and packaged LC products that are really nothing but processed fake food. Eating Primal means eating whole "real" foods.

My goal going into 2012 is to have a list of suppliers of organic whole foods and grass fed meats.

Woot! Woot! Good to see so many Primals in the house!!!

Thanks for all your feedback... the more I read about it, the more Im realizing that I eat this way. I do not use processed foods at all, not even salad dressing! I only put olive oil on my salad.

I've basically been trying to eat induction phase but I may go over 20 carbs by the vegetables I eat. Im still in ketosis...

Is flaxseed considered a grain?

I'm disappointed that this thread got moved out of the Main Lobby. Primal Blueprint is such a great book/plan and I want more people to know about it. They aren't going to see it here. Phooey!

No, flax seeds are not grain. Grain is the name for seeds from grass. The flax plant is not a type of grass.

Atkins can be that way if you don't eat the fake stuff. :)

Just went out and bought 40 bs of pasture raised, organic beef. Now to get some chicken and pork to add to the freezer.