The idea of giving up everything but meat and a little bit of dairy sounds terrifying. If you are anything like me, you love all the food. Bread, pasta, fruit, more bread…

One of my childhood snacks used to be a piece of white bread with the crust nibbled off then squeezed into a tight roll that made it almost doughy. I would eat multiple of these in one sitting. At that time the food pyramid (remember those from school?) suggested 6-11 servings of bread/ pasta a day. In theory I should have been the picture of health. Instead I was 112 pounds in the 4th grade. I remember our class getting lined up to step on the scale and having the person doing it to tell me to step onto it backwards. Looking back, she was probably trying to make me not worry about the number on the scale. I loved all the food and it showed.

A lot of my unhealthy eating habits followed me into adulthood. While my metabolism helped me for years it finally slowed and the weight started packing on. My Hashimoto’s definitely didn’t help.

While my husband and I navigate down this path, our children are not. We are making sure their diet is still, “healthy,” by modern standards. They eat fruit, vegetables, meat and my beloved carbs.

Last night I made chicken alfredo. This was a great change up from just eating meat cooked in butter. We pan fried the cubbed chicken in a heavy serving of butter. Our alfredo sauce was a mix of butter, cream cheese and sharp cheddar with salt to taste. (side note, there are some great recipes for Alfredo on Pinterest. Some use heavy whipping cream instead of cream cheese. I’ll try that next time.) For the kids I made fettuccine with broccoli. At the end of dinner, there wasn’t a bite left on any of our plates. Both kids asked for it in their lunch today.

So what else are we eating? This morning started with a large glass of water (24oz) with 1 tsp of electrolytes. We use 40,000 volts which we found at our local health food store. I won’t lie, they don’t taste fantastic. I would prefer to just take the tsp on its own then chase it with water but this tends to burn my tongue so I suffer though it in my water.

Next is my beloved coffee. Funny thing about coffee, I grew up hating it. Loved the smell, hated the flavor. I was a sweet tea drinker. In our house there was always a large pitcher of tea (Like two gallons). We would usually finish it by dinner then make another batch for the next day. I don’t think there was ever a batch made without at least a full cup of sugar. When I got covid the first time, I lost my taste and smell. Its been almost a year and I’ve only regained hints of smells and flavors. The only thing I was able to taste for months was coffee.

Honestly I think coffee is the only thing that kept me from complete depression. I know it might sound crazy but not being able to smell or taste anything put me in such a funk that I didn’t want to get out of bed somedays. Food has played such a large role in my life. Bored? Let’s go out to eat. Watching a movie? What snacks are we getting? Meeting a friend you haven’t seen in a while? Where are we getting lunch? None of those matter anymore because no matter what I put in my mouth all it was, was texture. Except coffee.

I could spend hours talking about all the things that changed from me having covid (maybe that will be another post.) Like the few tastes that have come back, coffee doesn’t taste the same as I remember it. Besides our morning routine before school (perks of being a real estate agent) coffee is one of the highlights of my day.

Before starting carnivore I felt guilty about every ounce of cream I put in my cup. This morning I put at least 3/4 cups of heavy whipping cream in there. The coffee to cream ratio was probably 1:1. What can I say, I like cream. It has the consistency of almost melted ice cream.

Another great thing about carnivore is I don’t have to think about what I’m going to eat for the day. I have no meal prep. In the fridge we have snacks like cheese wrapped in Italian meats. We found a large selection of Italian meats at Costco. You have to be careful to read the labels to make sure there is no added ingredients. The ingredients on these are salt and ham. My husband is currently smoking a chuck roast that we’ll have with dinner.

This isn’t like every other diet I’ve done. I only eat when I want to. No alarm setting, no calorie counting, or food scales. Yesterday for lunch, my husband made me a steak covered in butter and salt. At dinner, I ate until I was full. This morning I was down another 1.2 pounds from yesterday. That’s a total of 7.6 pounds in 9 days. My energy is up, my body doesn’t hurt as much (I have a long way to go) and my pants are going to need replacing here soon.

Looking back on my teenage years, I thought I had to starve myself to be healthy. I’m eating more than I ever have and the weight is falling off. We have a smart scale in our bathroom, for my height and body type I’m 1 pound away from ideal. I feel I still have a little ways to go. When I got pregnant with our son I was 150 pounds. After our daughter was born, I dropped to about 142. I think somewhere between there would be a comfortable number.

While all this might seem like I’ve continued my obsession with the scale, I could honestly careless what the number shows. It’s just hard to explain my progress without it. I am gauging all of this off how I feel. My overall hope is to lower or stop (dare I dream) my Hashimoto’s and the impact it has on my body.

In the next week or so I would like to find some form of exercise. While we were on our trip this summer, we walked 10-15 miles a day. Now that we are back, I find myself sitting on the couch. Diet, to me is the most important aspect of health. I can workout until my feet bleed but if I’m filling my body with garbage, I’m going to feel like garbage.

What are some exercises you enjoy? What are some of your goals? Are there foods you have noticed impact you more than others? I love all the motivation comments but I would love to hear where you are at and what you feel works for you.