I am not one of those people who says, “I have tried every diet there is, and nothing works.” I have not. In fact, I barely got on the bandwagon of any diet. I would say that in order to be able to say I “tried’ something, I would actually have to try. Trying, I have come to understand, involves sticking to something for some extended period of time. I don’t know…maybe more than three days, I would assume. No, I never did that.
I did lots of things for a couple days. I was too hungry to last beyond that. Dieting was deprivation, and how could I be deprived and fill my emptiness at the same time? The only way I knew to do that in the past was with food.
For the second time in my life, I can say that I am trying. I am on Week nine of a Macronutrient plan that is extremely high in protein, like I should just move in to a chicken coup and grow some feathers. I have lost ten pounds, a nice, steady pace I would say I swear by in the bigger picture that is long-term weight, sustainable weight loss. My calories are limited, as well as my fats and my carbs. Unlike my previous Paleo plan, I cannot add my Kerrygold butter to everything I cook or snack on nuts all day to fill me up. Everything feels limited, ripped from me like a child’s blankie. There seems to be no safe food to turn to on this plan. In fact, it makes me sad.
I have needed support along the way, so I have another health coach overseeing my Macronutrient process. She is an expert at most things nutrition, it seems. She guides me through the diet weekly, sending encouraging words, sharing recipes for more meat dishes, and assuring me with promises of “If you just get more protein, you won’t be hungry.” So I keep pressing on with baked pork rhinds, random bowls of shredded chicken, and whey protein shakes mixed with fruit and spinach, but not too much fruit and spinach because IT’S ALL ABOUT THE PROTEIN!
I am thinking of trying chicken smoothies, or maybe a combo of steak and chicken, with whey, pork rhinds, and garnished with bacon and shrimp. Maybe after having one of those, I won’t be hungry.
I have heard many diet claims that sound like “If you do this, you won’t want that,” or “If you follow this plan, you will be 100% satisfied.” Hmmmm. I won’t be hungry? I will be satisfied? Wow, this diet must really get into my childhood traumas! I am like the Nutty Professor scene; you can stick me with one thousand acupuncture needles and “still hungry”.
By telling me I won’t be hungry if I do this or that, you are assuming that we define hunger the same way. Hunger is a relative word, I’m afraid. I don’t know that most Americans know what it actually feels like to be physically hungry such that they can literally feel hunger contractions in their stomachs. With over a third of the population being obese, I would say that many cannot relate to true hunger.
When I first started this diet, I would have sworn to the gods that I was withering away by the second of pure starvation. I wanted to cry the first couple days because I felt empty – literally and emotionally. I wrote to my coach and told her this was not sustainable. But still, I pressed on.
I have only hit my protein goal less than a handful of times in eight weeks. Everyday I hit my fats and my carbs limits before I can get enough meat. It is easy to do that with one small potato, some green vegetables with natural starches in them, and a Quest bar. At 6:30 nightly I realize I need to get out the chicken backup and keep clucking, I mean, chucking away to try to hit that protein number. I find myself wondering when this madness will end. I no longer victimize myself for needing to go down these wormhole diets; I just wonder if and when it will all end.
Why am I doing this? What purpose is it serving? Is the Macronutrient message different from other diet messages? And again, when will it end?
I am doing this because I want to lose slow weight to get to my weight goal. Contrary to popular belief, moderation is not key when in weight loss mode. Moderation will sabotage weight loss. When one has developed an addiction to or an emotional connection to food, as many of us have, moderation quickly turns to derailment. When you have been abusing your body with years of toxicity, it is going to take a detoxifying abstinence of many foods to reset your body. This is just science. Extreme years of food addiction requires extreme measures for reversal. But this is not permanent. Resetting can get one to a place of moderation, which has always been my goal. When I can live moderately, that is when “it will all end”.
This diet is a well-rounded plan that does not allow the dieter to gorge in any one area, unlike many other diets that support very high levels of fat, low-fat products, or even vegetables. Though it requires high levels of protein in order to be in weight-loss mode, the protein has to be selective because of the limits in fat. So while the Keto diet allows high fat steaks dowsed in butter, the Macronutrient plan calls for a very lean cut of meat, and there is little room for any fats in butter. The foods are often plain, unless you can spend a ton of time in the kitchen researching recipes and prepping them.
Nut butters and nuts are basically out, as they are too high in fats. Vegetables are mostly limited to non-starchy unless you want to kill all your carb numbers in one meal. I have news; carbs are in everything, and fats are, too. This is a puzzle each and every day. My pieces never quite fit together perfectly, but I wedge them in somehow and end up losing a little bit of weight this way.
When I get to my goal weight in about twenty-five pounds, I then will have that famous phrase staring me in the face – MODERATION IS KEY! Moderation? What’s that? I only know all or none. I only know a dozen donuts or the Meat Stack diet! Moderation also, is a relative word. That’s why it only works for a few.
What I have learned from all the diets I did not try and the ones I did and the one I am currently trying is that they are all, if I listen beyond the food plan, telling me where to stand in relation to food. With deprivation, comes strong emotion. With limiting structure, comes a teenage rebellion. These inner pained voices are not sustainable, and I am done trying to tame them. I do not like getting out of balance to the point that I have to purge myself of toxicity again, but that is where I am, relearning all the lessons these diets aim to teach me.
Deep down, after three days of Jenny Craig, two weeks of Weight Watchers, a decade of eating low-fat snacks we thought were healthy, a lifetime of binge-eating sugary baked goods, a year of on and off Paleo, a couple years of lying about still being on Paleo, and my newest Macronutrient diet, I know what to eat! I know what makes me feel great! I know what makes me feel bad! I know that excessive ice cream adds a shelf-like shape onto my butt, like the top of an apple. I know that gluten, while New York style pizza is amazing, causes my blood to feel hot and my body to want to retreat into itself. I know that whole foods and low carbs and healthy fats feed my spirit somehow in a different way than donuts and fried chicken do.
That is what the Macronutrient diet and the others have done for me – reminded me that my body knows how to eat. It knows how it wants to feel. The emotion that has come up for me in this diet paves way for more understanding of my attachment to food. I do not think people fail at diets because they are hungry on them; they fail at them because the diets force them to deal with their attachments to food, and that is oh so difficult to dissect. There is so much value in this if one can get to the point of learning this common lesson from all dieting. We have to stick to a diet, and really try, though, to get this huge message!
I call this a diet instead of a lifestyle change because I do not know if it is sustainable for the average person to eat this much meat. This is yet to be determined for me. It is a means by which some of us have to rid our lives of a toxic relationship with food. Somewhere in that healing process is the possibility for a lifestyle change, and each person has to decide what that looks like. For me, it will be that intuitive eating I was describing, my inner knowing of my own relationship with food and the maturity to know how and to choose to nurture it.
I do not know where my actual diet will land. They will find more research on the effects of chicken, whey protein, gluten, sugar, fats, the Paleo and Keto diets, and the macronutrient diets, and I think we should all keep looking at the findings and decide what is necessary for health based on them. I will continue to look at the bigger picture of dieting and lifestyle changes, as one is meant to be temporary and one is meant to carry us through health more permanently. I hope where I end up is in a place where moderation is actually the key and that I have a healthy relationship with food.
There is a time for detoxing, deprivation, abstinence, and dieting. We have to find the balance and ask ourselves what each stage’s purpose holds and when and how to move forward from it.
If I stayed on this Macronutrient plan forever, I’m afraid I’ll end up like Sherman Klump!
Papa Klump – “I’ve seen Sherman so hungry once before when he was young – he beat up a grown man!” Violence is never the answer. So as long as all sharp objects are in tact, I will continue this Macronutrient plan until further notice!
Or worse – John Candy from The Great Outdoors eating the Ole 96er!!! Yikes!
If you are interested in a Macronutrient plan, see Jessica Pinkerton at Vitality fitness.
She is amazing at building your macros to your own needs and likes and supporting you along the way!
Jess Pinkerton
Owner Vitality Fitness
Precision Nutrition Certified Nutrition Coach
I am not one of those people who says, “I have tried every diet there is, and nothing works.” I have not. In fact, I barely got on the bandwagon of any diet. I would say that in order to be able to say I “tried’ something, I would actually have to try. Trying, I have come to understand, involves sticking to something for some extended period of time. I don’t know…maybe more than three days, I would assume. No, I never did that.
I did lots of things for a couple days. I was too hungry to last beyond that. Dieting was deprivation, and how could I be deprived and fill my emptiness at the same time? The only way I knew to do that in the past was with food.
For the second time in my life, I can say that I am trying. I am on Week nine of a Macronutrient plan that is extremely high in protein, like I should just move in to a chicken coup and grow some feathers. I have lost ten pounds, a nice, steady pace I would say I swear by in the bigger picture that is long-term weight, sustainable weight loss. My calories are limited, as well as my fats and my carbs. Unlike my previous Paleo plan, I cannot add my Kerrygold butter to everything I cook or snack on nuts all day to fill me up. Everything feels limited, ripped from me like a child’s blankie. There seems to be no safe food to turn to on this plan. In fact, it makes me sad.

I have needed support along the way, so I have another health coach overseeing my Macronutrient process. She is an expert at most things nutrition, it seems. She guides me through the diet weekly, sending encouraging words, sharing recipes for more meat dishes, and assuring me with promises of “If you just get more protein, you won’t be hungry.” So I keep pressing on with baked pork rhinds, random bowls of shredded chicken, and whey protein shakes mixed with fruit and spinach, but not too much fruit and spinach because IT’S ALL ABOUT THE PROTEIN!
I am thinking of trying chicken smoothies, or maybe a combo of steak and chicken, with whey, pork rhinds, and garnished with bacon and shrimp. Maybe after having one of those, I won’t be hungry.

I have heard many diet claims that sound like “If you do this, you won’t want that,” or “If you follow this plan, you will be 100% satisfied.” Hmmmm. I won’t be hungry? I will be satisfied? Wow, this diet must really get into my childhood traumas! I am like the Nutty Professor scene; you can stick me with one thousand acupuncture needles and “still hungry”.
By telling me I won’t be hungry if I do this or that, you are assuming that we define hunger the same way. Hunger is a relative word, I’m afraid. I don’t know that most Americans know what it actually feels like to be physically hungry such that they can literally feel hunger contractions in their stomachs. With over a third of the population being obese, I would say that many cannot relate to true hunger.
When I first started this diet, I would have sworn to the gods that I was withering away by the second of pure starvation. I wanted to cry the first couple days because I felt empty – literally and emotionally. I wrote to my coach and told her this was not sustainable. But still, I pressed on.
I have only hit my protein goal less than a handful of times in eight weeks. Everyday I hit my fats and my carbs limits before I can get enough meat. It is easy to do that with one small potato, some green vegetables with natural starches in them, and a Quest bar. At 6:30 nightly I realize I need to get out the chicken backup and keep clucking, I mean, chucking away to try to hit that protein number. I find myself wondering when this madness will end. I no longer victimize myself for needing to go down these wormhole diets; I just wonder if and when it will all end.

Why am I doing this? What purpose is it serving? Is the Macronutrient message different from other diet messages? And again, when will it end?
I am doing this because I want to lose slow weight to get to my weight goal. Contrary to popular belief, moderation is not key when in weight loss mode. Moderation will sabotage weight loss. When one has developed an addiction to or an emotional connection to food, as many of us have, moderation quickly turns to derailment. When you have been abusing your body with years of toxicity, it is going to take a detoxifying abstinence of many foods to reset your body. This is just science. Extreme years of food addiction requires extreme measures for reversal. But this is not permanent. Resetting can get one to a place of moderation, which has always been my goal. When I can live moderately, that is when “it will all end”.
This diet is a well-rounded plan that does not allow the dieter to gorge in any one area, unlike many other diets that support very high levels of fat, low-fat products, or even vegetables. Though it requires high levels of protein in order to be in weight-loss mode, the protein has to be selective because of the limits in fat. So while the Keto diet allows high fat steaks dowsed in butter, the Macronutrient plan calls for a very lean cut of meat, and there is little room for any fats in butter. The foods are often plain, unless you can spend a ton of time in the kitchen researching recipes and prepping them.
Nut butters and nuts are basically out, as they are too high in fats. Vegetables are mostly limited to non-starchy unless you want to kill all your carb numbers in one meal. I have news; carbs are in everything, and fats are, too. This is a puzzle each and every day. My pieces never quite fit together perfectly, but I wedge them in somehow and end up losing a little bit of weight this way.
When I get to my goal weight in about twenty-five pounds, I then will have that famous phrase staring me in the face – MODERATION IS KEY! Moderation? What’s that? I only know all or none. I only know a dozen donuts or the Meat Stack diet! Moderation also, is a relative word. That’s why it only works for a few.
What I have learned from all the diets I did not try and the ones I did and the one I am currently trying is that they are all, if I listen beyond the food plan, telling me where to stand in relation to food. With deprivation, comes strong emotion. With limiting structure, comes a teenage rebellion. These inner pained voices are not sustainable, and I am done trying to tame them. I do not like getting out of balance to the point that I have to purge myself of toxicity again, but that is where I am, relearning all the lessons these diets aim to teach me.

Deep down, after three days of Jenny Craig, two weeks of Weight Watchers, a decade of eating low-fat snacks we thought were healthy, a lifetime of binge-eating sugary baked goods, a year of on and off Paleo, a couple years of lying about still being on Paleo, and my newest Macronutrient diet, I know what to eat! I know what makes me feel great! I know what makes me feel bad! I know that excessive ice cream adds a shelf-like shape onto my butt, like the top of an apple. I know that gluten, while New York style pizza is amazing, causes my blood to feel hot and my body to want to retreat into itself. I know that whole foods and low carbs and healthy fats feed my spirit somehow in a different way than donuts and fried chicken do.
That is what the Macronutrient diet and the others have done for me – reminded me that my body knows how to eat. It knows how it wants to feel. The emotion that has come up for me in this diet paves way for more understanding of my attachment to food. I do not think people fail at diets because they are hungry on them; they fail at them because the diets force them to deal with their attachments to food, and that is oh so difficult to dissect. There is so much value in this if one can get to the point of learning this common lesson from all dieting. We have to stick to a diet, and really try, though, to get this huge message!
I call this a diet instead of a lifestyle change because I do not know if it is sustainable for the average person to eat this much meat. This is yet to be determined for me. It is a means by which some of us have to rid our lives of a toxic relationship with food. Somewhere in that healing process is the possibility for a lifestyle change, and each person has to decide what that looks like. For me, it will be that intuitive eating I was describing, my inner knowing of my own relationship with food and the maturity to know how and to choose to nurture it.
I do not know where my actual diet will land. They will find more research on the effects of chicken, whey protein, gluten, sugar, fats, the Paleo and Keto diets, and the macronutrient diets, and I think we should all keep looking at the findings and decide what is necessary for health based on them. I will continue to look at the bigger picture of dieting and lifestyle changes, as one is meant to be temporary and one is meant to carry us through health more permanently. I hope where I end up is in a place where moderation is actually the key and that I have a healthy relationship with food.
There is a time for detoxing, deprivation, abstinence, and dieting. We have to find the balance and ask ourselves what each stage’s purpose holds and when and how to move forward from it.
If I stayed on this Macronutrient plan forever, I’m afraid I’ll end up like Sherman Klump!
Papa Klump – “I’ve seen Sherman so hungry once before when he was young – he beat up a grown man!” Violence is never the answer. So as long as all sharp objects are in tact, I will continue this Macronutrient plan until further notice!
Or worse – John Candy from The Great Outdoors eating the Ole 96er!!! Yikes!
If you are interested in a Macronutrient plan, see Jessica Pinkerton at Vitality fitness.
She is amazing at building your macros to your own needs and likes and supporting you along the way!
Jess Pinkerton
Owner Vitality Fitness
Precision Nutrition Certified Nutrition Coach
[email protected]
