It's not a diet, It's a diet!

Diet: A regulated selection of foods, as for medical reasons or cosmetic weight loss.

Diet: The usual food and drink of a person or animal.

Listed above are 2 definitions of the word diet. One of these directly relates to the Paleo Diet, one definitely does not. The Paleo Diet is modern man's imitation of eating in the same way our genes evolved to eat. It has nothing to do with Calorie restriction, weighing and measuring, scales, egg whites, feeling hungry, or any of the other things that pop in to your head when you usually hear the word diet. People that diet this way often have a couple of things in common. They are hungry, miserable and fat (or if they lose weight, they tend to put it all back on again with a little extra for the ride!).

The Paleo diet is all about eating in a way to optimally fuel your body. It is about correcting any metabolic derangement or gut irritation you are suffering from. It is about allowing Insulin and Leptin to do the jobs that they are designed to do. It is about controlling Inflammation. And through it's ability to do these things you get the bonus of leaning out, feeling better and medically being more healthy.

It is important that we make this destinction because I feel that too many people blur the lines a little. They start on the Paleo Diet and then they treat it like a diet. They drastically under-eat never consuming enough calories to fuel their bodies correctly. The beauty of the Paleo Diet is that it is incredibly easy to regulate how much you eat. By eating a Paleo Diet you should have a much beter controll of your Leptin Sensitivity. If Leptin is working properly then your satiety signalling will be working properly (Satiety = Feeling full). That means that you can simply eat food and keep eating until you feel full. When you feel full, stop. It's so easy.

Eating 2 eggs for Breakfast, a little bit of chicken and avocado for lunch and a couple of Lamb chops and vegetables for tea is a great way to feed yourself if you are a 60kg female. It is definitely not the optimal way to feed yourself if you are a reasonably active 70-80kg male. If you fit into that category (and this is the one that I fit into) then you need to be eating a lot more. Your diet should look more along the lines of; 4 whole eggs, some bacon and some avocado for breakfast, half of a chicken and a large salad or some veg for lunch, and 3 or 4 lamb chops cooked in coconut oil with some veg for tea. You could maybe even throw in some protein and fat rich snacks a couple of times throughout the day.

Maybe that is too much food for you, maybe it's not enough. When you are eating correctly, consuming enough protein and fat (to stimulate Leptin) and eating the appropriate ammount of Carbohydrate your body will tell you when it is full. You will have control over your blood sugar levels and over the course of the day your body will let you know when to eat (you'll feel hungry) and when to stop (you'll feel full.)

Perhaps if more people focussed on eating the correct diet, they wouldn't need to diet!

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