Navigating the Carnivore Diet:
More than 9 years ago, I was posing next to a blue 1948 Ford truck. I had on dark pants and a light blue polo shirt. The polo shirt contrasted with the dark blue Ford. I picked the truck because it was built the same year I was born. The rounded fenders and hood of the truck mimicked my rounded figure standing next to it. At this point, I weighed nearly 256 lbs. Later, seeing this picture was my moment of clarity and decision to do something about my weight. Over the next two years, I lost over 60 lbs and got under 200 lbs. I don’t remember my diet, but it was all about ”eating clean,” whatever that meant at the time, restricting the number of calories and exercising to excess. Like all calorie-restrictive diets, it failed. I was always hungry, and my energy flagged. It isn’t surprising that I gave up. What is also not surprising is that my self-esteem took a hit. I just didn’t have the willpower to stick with it. I felt guilt and shame. I did what every failed dieter does: I gained all the weight back. Around that time, I was dealing with the symptoms of atrial fibrillation. This arrhythmia has a dramatic effect on the metabolism. The blood doesn’t have sufficient oxygen because the heart is not pumping efficiently. This condition of hypoxia hurts your metabolism.
After hitting a low of 192 lbs. in 2017, my weight fluctuated between 197 and 230 for the next six years, complete with four peaks and four valleys. Thanks to Fitbit, I have a graphic view of my weight loss journey. By June of 2023, I had developed pre diabetes and pain in my hip due to arthritis inflammation and toe- nail fungus. I knew I wasn’t healthy, but I didn’t feel sick. Looking back, I didn’t know how sick I was. The fact was I had symptoms I didn’t recognize until they shockingly disappeared. Everyone can draw a circle around all the signs they live with and call that circle “normal.” The sad thing is that nothing in the circle is normal it’s only what we’ve been willing to accept. I want to wake you up and let you know that most of the symptoms that you are experiencing are the direct result of a Standard American Diet (SAD). A high-carb standard American diet is a slow but sure killer. The pernicious truth is sugar is a socially accepted drug as destructive as heroin or cocaine. If the true extent of its harmful effects were known and recognized, it would be banned and outlawed.
My Carnivore Journey
began June 14, 2023, when I was trying to mind my business and watch a podcast. In the middle of that podcast on an entirely different subject was a short video by Barbara O’Neill. She’s a holistic health presenter from Australia. She explained how a metabolic switch from sugar to fat burner caused weight loss. She took it to the cellular level and explained how the body used two different fuels for energy. I became interested, and then I became obsessed. I began consuming voraciously all of the content I could find on YouTube. Her video titled “Weight Loss and Diabetes” sticks with me today. It got my attention. I watched it several times until I fully understood how my body operated on a cellular level. She recommended books, and I read those books. I was most affected by a book, Wheat Belly, by William Davis, MD. He explained again how the body uses two fuels. Still, more importantly, he explained the hybridization of wheat by the Rockefeller Foundation in the 50s in Mexico, ostensibly to End World Hunger. That hybridized wheat eventually made its way to the United States. Farmers were ecstatic that they could plant the same acre and get six times the grain by increasing the yield of America’s wheat fields by sixfold. Over the next several decades, this hybridized wheat worked its way onto every farm in America, eventually globally. By 1990, it led to a wheat glut. What would they be able to do with all this wheat on their hands? The Government stepped in to help them out. In 1992, they created the original USDA Food Pyramid. The award for the best food for human consumption? The winner is “healthy whole grains”!! While America was enjoying their natural whole wheat and seeded bread, along came Artisan bread, the good stuff. Well, sell it to Russia. What if Russia can’t take all the grain? The Government stepped in to “help out.” They created what is now referred to as the food pyramid. The bottom of the pyramid comprises bread, healthy, whole grains, and plenty of them. They’re good for you, they said. Working up the pyramid eventually came meats and, finally, fats. As I look at that food pyramid today, knowing what I know, it occurs to me that it’s ultimately upside down. It has been the source of many lies about how to lose weight, how to burn fat, how to get skinny, and how to get healthy. My eyes were open, and I was armed with new information. On the strength of Barbara O’Neill’s video and Dr Davis’s book, I started to limit my carbohydrate intake. The first thing to go was all processed food. Next was all the white food, sugar, flour and bread, potatoes, rice, and pasta. I aimed at any food that had a high glycemic index. Next, I reduced my high blood glucose spikes by eliminating fruits, bananas, and apples were first.
Eventually, I eliminated berries. Somewhere along the line, I had to lose my beloved beans and lentils. All root vegetables growing below the ground were the next to go, followed by cruciferous vegetables, broccoli, Brussel sprouts, and cauliflower. Salad greens met my goal of 20g of carbohydrates a day. Along with my low-carb way of eating, I mixed in intermittent fasting to make the switch to a fat burner. Drastically reducing the amount of carbohydrates I was consuming daily had a dramatic effect on my body. Because the amount of carbohydrates was so small, there wasn’t excess glucose to be stored as fat. My body rapidly adapted to burning stored fat for energy instead of relying on sugar for fuel. In three and a half months, I burned 40 lbs. of fat. I purposely make the distinction here between burning fat and losing weight. I was teetering on the edge, near total carnivore, but not quite. On October 1, 2023 I decided to take the small step to an all-meat diet. I have not looked back. I mentioned earlier about my pre-diabetes and inflammation. My low-carb, intermittent fasting, and carnivore eating all led to a curative result. I stand in awe of the power of carnivore protocol. It is not a stretch to say that I’ve been set free by the carnivore lifestyle. A decades-long battle with depression, suicidal ideation, and brain fog was gone. In its place is a mental clarity I have not known since childhood. Indeed, my teenage years before alcohol and drugs marred my mental state. If that were not enough, I have boundless energy and never experience the cravings prevalent in low-fat, calorie-restrictive diets. My hunger is rare and controlled by drinking water until fixing a meal is convenient.
Finally, I am not an expert with initials after my name. What I am is a personal development junkie who has battled my weight for a lifetime. I’ve researched what does not work and found what does. I am making it my mission to help others see the light of metabolic health and help them make the switch from sugar burner to fat burner. To show them that the carnivore lifestyle is not merely a way to lose weight but a curative way of eating that will lead to complete and robust health. It is eminently sustainable. People not on the diet need to understand it’s not dull. When you allow sufficient time between meals to be hungry and feed the body what it needs, the body is satisfied. Simple and profound.