OXtoberFest ZC Challenge


#441

Day #30

So good to get back to a lunchtime omelette to kick off the day:
3 eggs from the hens just outside the door
3 strips of “middle” bacon, which is the combination term for short bacon and streaky bacon combined. It’s cheaper to buy the middle bacon.
3 slices of Jarlsberg cheese
Cooked it in leftover sausage fat.

Coffee intake is up due to work paper mountain workload to get through = 2 cups. 1st with double cream, 2nd with ice blocks.

It’s been a hot spring day here. My health coach took me down to the beach on the lee side of the cape we live on for a walk and a swim before work. We usually do all our activities on the wild side because I’m a surfer. But today is a work day and I need a sleeping Labrador so I can get stuck into the admin. The seawater is gin clear and we were the only ones at that part of the beach.

The Hass avocado tree flowered really well this Spring and I can see a whole lot of tiny fruit developing. The Fuerta avocado is the companion pollinator but it doesn’t look like the fruit will come from its flowers. Other Spring blossoms are on the trees in the food forest. There is the perfume of nectarine, plum and lemon - maybe I could bottle it as a signature celebrity scent for when my Labrador gets famous?

Fillet steak and eggs are calling me. It’s 6pm. I’ll salute the sunset and then have dinner.

Oxtober Fest finishes on Halloween. That puts me in mind of bone broth. Trick and toxins is not a thing in our culture despite so many millennials wanting to mimic the USA, so all that processed crap and screams in the moonlit night (from sugar crashing children and overwrought zombie parents) are a bit of culture we miss out on.

I wonder if @KellynP will be ‘treating’ the kids with biltong?


#442

Best we lock in our goals for NoCarbvember because it will be over before we know it.


#443

yup, real fast you will know what foods fill you up and satisfy very well and what meat/seafood just doesn’t cut it for you. Like eggs for me are useless :slight_smile: I can eat 8-10 eggs and feel like I ate absolutely nothing at all, so they are only eaten as a ‘side dish’ to a big old slab of meat!! I always pair fish and seafood with a big ol’ hunk of meat also. I am a surf and turf gal definitely! It is cool you are discovering what works for you and how it effects ya. I am the same tho, at a certain time of night I don’t like food on my tummy before bed and being zc people, we can easily hold off eating til the morning and then enjoying whatever we want then. But ya know, if you are one who can eat later and are truly hungry, then do just that, eat. Alot of zc people eat whatever time they want, right up til bed cause they are types that have no body issues doing this, if you are one of them, then just eat at any time LOL I’m n ot one tho, I like bedtime with a more empty digestive tract :sunny:

I bet that added some very delish flavor to that omelet.

THAT PIC of Billie is wonderful and wow, that water is gin clear :star_struck: You have a nice wonderful summer coming and I see it in that pic, and here I am going to start freezing my buns off and oh boy I envy you right now :rofl:

And you are right, NoCarbvember will probably fly by like all these other months!

luckily my kid is 15 now so she has 0 interest in Halloween, thank goodness. For us it will pass on by like it never existed. I never ‘got into’ Halloween and it truly is more for the little kiddies. You guys ain’t missing much on it HAHA


#444

yesterday food was

almost 2 lbs. of NY strip steak
close to 1 lbers. each

ate the first one with some taylor ham paired with it.
ate the second one with a tin of sardines.

then I had a small cheeseburger patty. wasn’t that hungry to eat it but heck it called my name so I hoovered it down :wink:

feeling wonderful
Oxtoberfest went very well for me except for some ‘carb insanity’ annoyances that I got thru unscathed.
All going extremely well on my lifestyle.

just waiting now for NoCarbvemeber and us guys are gonna go all in and attack Nov., stay on plan tight, and have fun chatting about how good we are doing :slight_smile: Cool!


(Heather) #445

Yes! For my 14 yo daughter and me, it really matters if we get enough fat. Just this past week, she developed a migraine, due to not eating enough food in general and definitely not enough fatty meat. It’s amazing how our bodies “balk”, if we don’t treat them properly :grinning:.


#446

yup, very true. Our bodies will signal us quite clearly and we have to listen and respond to feel better. Good post!! Tell it like it is, eat on zc and thrive and be healthy.

many times I ‘wander’ into lower eating days and I do fine with that a bit, but in the end, I have to knowingly ramp my food intake back up when I realize it ya know. Glad everyone is eating good and feeling better!


(Kellyn ) #447

Thank you, Jules. I am really looking forward to it.

LOL, that would be a great idea if I were handing out treats. :smirk: We will be taking the kids around trick or treating and then going to a haunted house. I do not like to be scared but am willing to put up with it for the kids because they are begging to go.

I am learning to be patient with my weight loss and focus on how I feel instead of the scale. I have stalled, but I read through the forums and carnivore Facebook groups and I realize that my weight will drop in time. I have lost 30 pounds and hit a stall, but I love meat and this lifestyle is so easy that I am not giving it up.
I ended up eating shrimp and steak last night instead of chicken wings. I had bacon and eggs this morning w/ my coffee. I have steak cooked for lunch and my husband is grilling a lot of hamburger patties for me to take to VA with me. We are leaving for the 4 our drive around 4:00 tonight. I always enjoy the drive as me and my daughter get a lot of time to talk and sign to music. I hope you all have a fun and safe Halloween and I will be back on the new thread Monday.


#448

NoCarbvember…HERE WE COME!!! LOL!
So ready for a good 30 day challenge. October was off a bit for me, but ready or not…I am gearing up and planning now. The big thing here is Thanksgiving. We’re hosting this year for for at least 19. What used to be a stumbling block was prepping foods that I couldn’t eat. Now, since doing that while EF, I can handle it fine. (That is such a relief!) But, with at least 19 people here, and me being carnivore- not sure if there will be enough meat. Guess I’ll fix one turkey for me, and one for everyone else. :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

@KellynP … Absolutely thrilled you tested negative, and visit the folks!!! That will be just the thing to cheer your Dad. Nothing like that Daddy-daughter time. Enjoy, and encourage. I’m jealous of the nice, warm weather you’ll have. It’s so flippin’ cold up here, and snowing!

@Fangs and @JulesyMcJulesface … Another clothes-shopping hater here. My whole family LOVES Kohls, except moi. They find great deals every.single.time. Once in a blue moon, I’ll find something on clearance that fits, or a pair of shoes (very rarely). Our Goodwill isn’t particularly well stocked. And the local consignment store’s hours of operation at pretty much in line with the current work schedule- so, I don’t get there often. Did find a few things about 3 years ago! LOL! The best place I’ve found is TJMAxx. Its almost 2 hours away, (but pretty much everything is up here), but well worth the trip. I’ve found work clothes there, dressy clothes, house furnishings, Christmas and birthday gifts…love that store. The prices are insanely low. I got a winter coat there last year for under $20. Shoes are hit and miss, though.
The main difficulty I have now is with finding tops and blouses. The “twins” are still pretty big, so finding a button down top (for work), that isn’t all poofy, but isn’t stretched across the bust is nearly impossible.Solution? I recently resorted to buying a reduction bra from Wacoal (online). Its squished things down a good inch or so, and allows for a better fitted top. And, the upper back feels better as it forces a better posture. So, maybe try something like that? It was the best work-around I could come up with, and those bras last FOREVER.

@FrankoBear… What a lovely pup!!! And, what a blessing you’re near water that’s warm enough to splash around and swim in! I feel for ya! Paperwork sucks. No way around it, though. I hate it so much, but running my own business for years now - found a reasonable solution: One day per month to fill out my ledger book and file invoices. One day/year - I dedicate to putting it together for taxes. Any more time spent on it sucks all the fun out of the job.Treat yourself to a nice juicy steak (or several steaks) afterwards.

@Alex_PN … The things I notice most when ZC are: Increase in energy level. Increase in mental clarity. Far less tired. The middle/mid-rif flattens out and its easier to breathe. Zero inflammation in the joints. Sleep is better. Skin is much smoother, and toned. And, I don’t get hungry as often. Yes, weight comes off too- but- all the other benefits are things that I actually can feel and see constantly- which makes ZC something both irresistible and addicting. I’ve said that about EF too, but on ZC, it’s amazing AND you can eat. For young people, the joint inflammation might not be so big a deal, but, over 50 - with 5 knee operations under my belt…that is a HUGE deal. =)

Other stuff…
Hubby was out of town for work the last 2 days, so he did an Aldi run for me. Got a PILE of the uncured turkey bacon that I love, and 4 pounds of butter, plus cheese, etc. They usually have butter for 1.99 a pound- which is a killer deal here. Saw it at the local store the other day for $4.99/lb. (sticker shock!)

Not sure what might have gone wrong at work yesterday while unloading the truck, but my back hurt so bad last night, I broke down and took a couple Advil. The truck was around 500 pieces, with only 2 of us working it. One person scans, the other moves all the merch off the conveyor and puts it on the right cart. I was not the one scanning. Most of the boxes (cardboard) weren’t particularly heavy. But some of the plastic totes were. Again, its like that every time- so I don’t get it. I’m used to loading and unloading square bales- like @Fangs … so this truck stuff is like child’s play…normally. But, its still pretty sore this morning, so, planking might be the next remedy to try. Gotta work 1-10 tonight, so, it needs to get fixed quick! Its so unusual for me to deal with this…so I’m a little out of sorts. Hoping it sorts itself out.

Well…off to run a couple errands and get ready for work. Hugs and happiness to you all!!!


(Kellyn ) #449

Thank you, SB. I sure hope your back gets better. Do you wear a back support when lifting heavy boxes? That may help.


(Alex) #450

Just checking in ahead of the november challenge. I’m still struggling to bounce back after the caffeine fiasco last week, feeling very apathetic and sad. We’re going back into lockdown in my city and it’s been grey and rainy all week so that’s not helping either. I really miss the sunshine. Butcher’s been on holiday this week so I haven’t been able to get any low histamine mince either and have only been able to get lamb mince which I struggle to eat more than 200g of at a time. Perfect storm for not making the best choices for my health really.

I haven’t posted this past week as going off-plan by eating the cauliflower mash and berries brought back my cravings in a huge way and I’ve eaten a few chocolatey things and had some orange juice and kicked myself out of ketosis. Feeling a bit trapped and dissociated but I discovered yesterday that cooking my lamb mince or stew in beef tallow rather than ghee or lamb fat makes it much less rich and easier to eat enough of which is helping with cravings. I got into the cycle of trying to fast myself back into ketosis and then getting hangry and grumpy and buying chocolate when I went to the shop hungry.

I’d like to end the october challenge as I mean to go on so I will be eating a zc breakfast (and lunch and dinner) tomorrow. Eaten 1lb of lamb and 1/2 beef today plus some butter.

To end on a more positive note - I did my monthly weigh-in and have still lost 7lb this month despite eating copious amounts of butter. Planning to eat a lot more butter and lamb and beef and have a lovely zc november :slight_smile:


(Polly) #451

I am looking forward to NoCarbvember.


#452

Hi guys I am still not there (I don’t even do keto as always when I don’t do carni) but CLOSE!
I actually wanted to start earlier but well, circumstances, a whole list… It’s the SECOND time in October that my carbier times didn’t want to release me and it’s odd as I always came close enough to carni when I decided before. I reached some limit of mine and bigger than the usual chaos ensued. Very embarrassing, I want to learn to get better, bouncing back from ANYWHERE. It’s nice not to go to that dangerous anywhere but I totally want the super bouncing back ability. I am sure I will get there eventually. I have a whole winter with only a very tiny dangerous time before Christmas. A lot is is up to my meat situation… I have no idea what and how much I can get without feeling horrible. Supermarket meat surely will be little as I just can’t handle all that plastic garbage, it’s horrible. Stupid rainy weather all the time so I still didn’t visit the butcher in the nearby tiny town (it was a village until a few years ago) but it will happen soon. And it’s good as I don’t go near a supermarket every week or 2 weeks and my fridge is still tiny though I try to free some place inside. It has mushrooms and quince now but we will can them tomorrow :wink: The fridge is for my meat, I will store the remaining little veggies in jars too. Or Alvaro can buy them and cook them right away as the normal fridge part is mostly for cooked dishes, cheese and boiled eggs :smiley: He didn’t complain yet but I let the huge cauliflower into the fridge now that I ate my pork soup already. It was nice!!! I don’t know if I ever ate pork soup but it was good even from a simple supermarket. Pork shines so much when it’s home-raised or properly farm-raised though…

Tomorrow I finally get my smoked pork from the usual pig farm. We go early, the holiday was so long ago, hopefully they will have everything this time. It was months ago that I had ribs and lard… Or proper sausage. They sometimes have very tasty ones and another times it’s not as good. Still valuable, my egg sandwiches aren’t the same without sausage but I want the great ones I love so much. Just in tiny amounts as usual.

My rules and plans and goals for November, I will write about those in the November thread.
I start to get fired up :smiley:

Wow. This thought never entered my mind… well as I dislike mayo, no wonder but I actually made some 2 days ago and it’s high time to eat it. I will try this - if Alvaro is willing to use up the remaining 480g tomato puree (I don’t use or have ketchup since a decade but I LOVE tomato)… It’s the last day I can use tomato as it’s too much of a plant for my carni November, at least for the first weeks. If I can’t handle the restrictions, I may make curry egg with tomato (the eggs soak up a little sauce but that’s it)… But by default, no plants except a little spice now and then, maybe… Maybe not. I don’t feel I particularly need spices. I think I keep my mustard, well, it has erythritol, maybe not then. I will make my own mustard. That’s never good but well, it just makes it easier to consume less :smiley: Or I just forget about the whole thing, seriously. But mustard is GOOD with eggs and almost a must for sausages.
But I thought onions are a must for liver and I guess not.

:smiley: In my veggie and fruit lover vegetarian keto times I thought I will go vegan earlier than try carnivore… Well, I couldn’t possibly know that carnivore (even just now and then, even not properly, even just close to it) is a whole different world than just keto. It’s nothing like that. Well, 40g carbs vegetarian keto vs carni, yep, that’s not the same for someone who actually likes meat and gets chaotic in the presence of more than minimal carbs.
So I can relate and it’s nice new people join :smiley:

November will be fun :smiley: And more importantly, probably nice and healthy and energetic ~

I am super fired up now.


#453

@Fangs, I saw you writing about exercise and adaption… I wonder what will happen with me. I already had some carni days now and there but very few and only some days at most and then started all the fruit seasons :slight_smile: They were good for getting good habits (as I practiced keto habits even off keto in the past), trying out things but I am still a complete newbie. But a resilient one I guess. I am not the type who has particular problems at the beginning of a new woe - at least if I don’t jump way too big but I don’t.
I actually expect more energy soon as mine is usually so low and I had enough. It is actually higher since some time, I don’t understand but it’s nice. Even gloomy weather can’t make it the usual super low (for gloomy weather. sunshine always charges me up a bit)… Okay, keeping it will be fine I guess.
I do weightlifting since some time, I wrote about it before… So I can see if anything changes!


#454

hope you guys have a blast and enjoy yourselves!!

burgers for the trip is fine eating :slight_smile:

losing 30 is super congrats! And just zc handle the rest. It will :slight_smile: Plus as you change your body will change without the scale moving fast at all and that is always a great perk!

and don’t think ‘stall’ in those terms, your body lost lbs, is adjusting and changing and needs time for repair and more, so the stall is just the body doing other things, later it will address the scale!!

HAVE A GREAT TIME!


#455

Sorry about all that truly. I can feel the stress of this all like everyone and I have to say, we can go bonkers over it all and very sad and tough on us and kids with school etc. Ugh. Do everything and anything to stay positive and upbeat…in fact what I do when I get a bit depressed and stressed is I FOCUS on doing the best darn zc I can. It gives me a goal focus and while I ‘feel the crazy’ stress around me etc. like all, I got a life line with my focus on my eating plan being clean ya know…gives me something to grab onto. Might help you too :slight_smile:

Yea I know. Been there.

Beauty of zc. Just eat zc :slight_smile: You find all that good meat and seafood that works for you and eat up as much as you need to fill you up, satisfy you and make you feel content on plan.

Transition in zc can be hard, not one doubt about it :slight_smile: It took me a bit til I went ‘all in’ and stopped caving into a carb day or 2 or 2 weeks LOL and I had to fight the darn battle also but eventually we grab on and go for it and when you get clean zc eating days under your belt, longer you do, the more gumption you have to hold it and eating this way becomes so easy and satisfying we start to flip stronger to stay on plan, vs. are easier drawn off plan ya know…you just keep moving forward at all times, past is the past, focus on what you will do today to stay healthy :slight_smile:

Congrats on that 7 down!!! You will be fine, you just hang in there and grab onto NoCarbvember when we start and just focus on the future meals and you got this!


#456

yea it is different for all but even a ‘very low carb’ eater comes into zc and thinks easy breezy and for most it just isn’t…that withdrawl from any amt of carbs and all those carbs eaten in the past do have to adapt out of ya, you will have toxin releases and who knows what other adaption troubles you might find, cause each of us are so different…or you could be one who comes in great? Only time tells on that one :slight_smile:

My biggest pain was tired. I was ‘extreme low carb’ and tiptoeing in zero carb for about a year before I flipped to total carnivore, and my worst adaption was being so damn tired…tired where I could barely keep my eyes open. Like the arms and legs felt weighed down but of course I just kept eating well and it all went away and I flipped into big energy. I thought I should adapt fast, wrong, took me a few months truly to come around into a whole new world on zc…worth the time and going thru the adaption tho.

will be very interesting to see what goes down for ya!


(JJ) #457

Yeahhh! That is the spirit! November is a new month and it sounds like despite challenges, you have done well and achieved some progress.

Whinge Alert: I have had a miserable last 12 hours. Utterly horrid. I worked last night and had a lingering headache all night. By 0500hrs it is very intense, struggled through until 0700 when I finished and I got a long black on the way home to ‘treat’ it. No joy. Ate ground beef breakfast once home, showered, felt wretched. I work permanent night shift, so it was more than just that. Headache, fatigue,nausea, dizziness. Then to top it off a cold sore wanted to make an appearance. I only get them every few years at most and usually when I am very run down and always in combo with my period. A 100km round trip to the nearest open pharmacy for some antivirals by my wonderful husband, took them along with an anti-emetic and caved and also took some ibruprofen and had a rest. Ate a hearty red meat lunch, despite not really feeling it, once the first mouthful was in though, it tasted great and I ate it all. Now at 5pm just starting to come out of the fog. My skin is blotchy and feels prickly though, I can tend to be a bit ‘rashy/allergy’ normally, so it feels like that. Looks like the cold sore on my lip may decide not to fully blister, hoping so, as I won’t be allowed to go to work if it does.
Adjusting?
Oxalate dump?
I didn’t like feeling like this as I know I only get really unwell like this when I have pushed too hard, but I really have gone gentle on myself this week and have had a nice, relaxing time of life in general this week.


(Alex) #458

Sorry you had such a rubbish day, it sucks when you’ve been doing all the right things too :frowning: It’s hard to say what it was caused by. I get similar symptoms when I’ve eaten too much histamine, particularly nausea and the prickly feeling, any itching?

As you’re early in it could just be adaptation or oxalate dumping though, I think the symptoms of that are similar.


#459

I love that. What a sweetie! It is wonderful when not feeling well your hubby would do all the work for ya to help you :slight_smile:

I love how you wrote this. This is one of those actions you try to explain to new zc people. A person feels icky thru adaption, really has no hunger and food is not calling to you, but you try food anyway, and after that first bite, you say, WOW I DO want this LOL and eat up very well and you start to feel better quicker. This scenario is what we try to tell newer zc people to do and ya did it and it worked out great for you :slight_smile:

Adaption can do alot to people in the beginning and we never know how each of us will get hit. Not just oxalates and all, your body is truly dumping out all kinds of toxins and it can show on us in different ways, like itchy, rashy and other symptoms. All one can do is treat the symptoms with OTCs if needed for your comfort. But luckily those types of tougher symptoms that annoy us do move thru rather quickly if you hold plan, eat well, and truly get some rest and take it easy on yourself :slight_smile: I know when I started I had a heck of alot of naps, and I am not a napper :wink: but I sure napped every chance I got :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye: My hubby even said, what is wrong with you? You don’t nap in the daytime and I was like, leave me alone, I need a nap HAHA


(Alex) #460

Feeling much better after just a day back on zc :slight_smile: I feel like a character from the old sims games sometimes who used to get fat after one big meal or skinny after one workout, things affect me really quickly which seems unfair when one or two days of eating sugar make the numbness in my fingers come back but it’s great the other way round when I feel good quickly!

I have been having so many naps this month. I fell asleep at 4pm the other day and just slept right through to the morning ha.