Well, it’s been well over 24 hours since I last had any sugar and I feel GREAT! 😀
Of course, I must be honest, I did not set out to do this overnight…I have been gradually cutting back on my sugar and carb intake for the past month. It’s the only responsible thing to do considering that I have 5 KIDS whom I homeschool, along with a small farm to run, I don’t have the privilege of being curled up in bed all day going through sugar withdrawal (carb crash is another term for it).
It’s not an easy thing to do and takes serious work, dedication, and the power of will in order to resist the pull of your body’s internal craving for something it is used to getting and relying on to fuel itself. If you quit “cold turkey” It takes about 3 days to a week to get fully through the withdrawal symptoms and get your body switched over from burning sugar for energy to burning fat for energy.
The main symptoms of sugar withdrawal are this:
- mood swings
- brain fog
- fatigue
- irritability
- jitteriness
- problems thinking clearly or easily
- (nearly) uncontrollable cravings for anything that will boost those sugar levels back up
I slowly weaned myself off sugar and most carbs by first cutting out ALL sweets and junkfood, after that I cut out most ALL alcohol (except for one beer a day-which I stopped yesterday with no ill side effects), then I cut out ALL flour products whether they contained whole wheat flour or white flour and even if it was homemade, then went potatoes and bananas and other “high sugar” fruits and veggies. I said in my post yesterday that I would allow only for oatmeal (and only in the morning for breakfast), brown rice, and beans…but that is only so I can “feel like” I have lots of yummy food options because I don’t really plan to eat them…for the most part, I am not going to eat them.
Generally I would cut something and then wait a couple days for symptoms to subside, after about 2 days-1 week (depending on how long it took symptoms and cravings to subside) I would then cut the next thing, and then the next thing, and then the next thing…until I got to the point where I was ready to kick it altogether.
So, here it is…here is what I ate yesterday:
12 oz. cup of coffee w/ 6oz. raw goat’s milk added (for me this cup of coffee really helps a lot, it curbs my appetite for at least 2 hours allowing me to get a lot done before breakfast)
3 med. eggs (from the younger hens, they’re better foragers so their eggs are more nutritious) fried in 2 tbsp. butter…eggs are the number one breakfast choice for me, super nutritious and low in carbs
4 slices bacon (drool, I LOVE BACON)
1 egg white (from a soft-boiled egg that I made for Samuel, my 7 month old, I fed him the yolk and I ate the white)
1 cup plain whole milk yogurt (which my 19 month old daughter insisted that I share with her, I think I ate half…maybe. Despite what the container may say yogurt contains only 4 grams carbs per cup, they always put the nutritional analysis for milk on the yogurt container and don’t take into account that the process of fermentation uses up most of the sugar in the milk. Read this article: The Yogurt Exception)
2 med. sized chicken thighs deep fried in peanut oil w/ a sauce consisting of 2 tbsp. butter and 2 tbsp. homemade green habanero hot sauce (OHHHHH YEAH…chicken buffalo style I call this, you don’t have to use wings just deep fry any chicken pieces and cover it with butter and hot sauce…finger licking GOOD!)
1 5oz. glass burgandy red wine (A very dry wine and A LOT lower in carbs than beer, only 5 grams)
1 cup raw goat’s milk (my midnight snack, 11 carbs but SUPER HEALTHY)
All other beverages were water or herbal tea except for 1 Vitamin Water ZERO (zero calories and sweetened with stevia)
Here’s my breakdown from FitDay:
I know it doesn’t look like much, but honestly I wasn’t hungry at all…the fat really keeps you satiated. One thing I did was, for a moment, I wanted to eat a chocolate covered marshmallow that I got as a treat for the kids from the farm store. I had to go to the farm store and get hay and feed yesterday and they sell chocolates by the pound and I usually get everyone a chocolate covered marshmallow, but I just quickly gave them out to everyone right after dinner so that there would be none around to tempt me 🙂
I’m still breastfeeding my 7 month old and that requires an extra 500-800 calories a day (so the experts say), which makes me kind of nervous about going so low cal…but I trust my body, if it needs more food to produce breastmilk it will let me know. And all this fat and protein makes for extra nutritious breastmilk!
For activity I unloaded 3 80 pound bales of hay from the car, and 3 50 pound bags of feed. I also moved around hay and feed bags in the shed to get it better organized and tidy…and of course, there is all the usual running after kids and cleaning the house stuff. …
Musings Of A Mountain Mama 
I went completely off of carbs, following the original Atkins book (not the new ones). I was burning ketones like mad – dark purple on the urine stick every day, but I war barely losing a thing in weight.
Meanwhile, I became SICK. I had BAD headaches, became light headed and very nauseous. I eventually couldn’t walk more than a few steps without having to quickly sit down the floor, or lay down. I slowly started taking carbs back in, and started feeling better, but it took me about a week to feel normal again.
I think allowing some carbs, like oats and goat’s milk, etc. is a good option. When I pay attention to what I eat, I notice I eat a lot less carbs that online places like SparkPeople say I should eat, and I feel great.
I too have a serious sugar addiction, especially when it’s that ‘time’ of the month. Today, I had a pig out on strawberries and sugar, and a large Mountain Dew.
Your posts these last few days have been very motivating and helpful. I need to kick the sugar habit. Sugar causes obesity, cancer, and a whole plethora of nasties, and I don’t want a part in any of
Most people don’t realize this but beer is actually better for you than soda. This is a long covered up secret as most of the food industry and pharmaceutical industry wants you consuming copious amounts of high fructose corn syrup…all the better for making more money! 🙄
Here’s a breakdown for you…
1 12 oz. can of Mountain Dew has 170 calories and 46 grams of carbs
1 12 oz. bottle of Budweiser Select (the only cheap american beer that I can stand the taste of…all of the others taste like piss-water imho…and this is the one I drink if I decide to have a beer while doing low carb) has 99 calories and 3.1 carbs
One is made by taking water and pumping it full of high fructose corn syrup and citric acid and artificial carbonation….the other is made through the natural God-given process of fermentation, and for this reason it even has a small amount of nutrients while the Mountain Dew as ZERO nutrition.
Eat the strawberries (minus the added sugar) and have a beer with it. My favorite thing to have with a beer is spicy pork rinds….I suppose that’s the “redneck” in me, coming through LOL 😀
I have the same problem during “that time”, but my real issue isn’t soda but CHOCOLATE. I just keep high quality dark chocolate around for when I need it and not really worry about it as it’s only gonna last for about 5 days at the very most…and then I just pick right back up where I left off…
Budweiser and many other brands of beer used genetically modified (technology originally given to man by fallen angels) corn products in their beer so while I agree that beer can be more healthful that soda, it depends on the brand and ingredients
Budweiser, while not the most tasty of beers, is made with rice and, last I checked, there is no GMO rice in the united states..yet. My husband and I mostly drink microbrewed beers which are even less likely to contain GMOS. But I do agree with you, it is important to rout out all GMO’s from one’s diet, as a family we make a conscious effort to do this and I would estimate that our diet is close to 95% GMO free 🙂
LOL never mind…have you seen this? http://villagegreennetwork.com/8-beers-stop-drinking-immediately/
Does the same go for non-alchoholic beer? I have a covenant with the Lord – I don’t/won’t drink any alchohol. I consider non-alchoholic beer to be so little in alchohol, that I think it’s fine. I like the taste of beer, but don’t want the alchohol.
Maybe a good treat for me would be a bowl of strawberries, minus the sugar, and some O’Doul’s non-alcholholic beer. 🙂
O’doul’s is 70 calories each and about 13 carbs and .4% alcohol, even kombucha is usually clocked at having 1-2% alcohol… still drinking O’doul’s would be way better than Mountain Dew. It’s not a sin to drink alcohol, I know I’ve read on your blog before about you and your husband having some wine with dinner and there is nothing wrong with that. After all Jesus even turned water into wine, and that was after everyone was already drunk, we know this because they had already RUN OUT and the wedding celebration wasn’t even over yet….so, he gave already drunk people more wine! hahaha! Many Bible scholars say that God even taught Noah how to plant a vineyard and make wine after the flood, and if you read the story of Noah it does seem to support this. Baptist churches often preach against alcohol, I know this because I grew up in one, like the pharisees of old they make up laws that have NOTHING to do with the actual laws of God and then hold other people in bondage to them, looking down on them because they had a beer or smoke a cigarette or said a “dirty” word…however, there is no law in the Bible against any of that. I know you’ve heard of Micheal Bunker, I saw you “like” him once on your facebook page, he has a VERY GOOD sermon on this topic that I think you would like…go to this link: http://www.lazarusunbound.com/audiosermons.shtml and it’s the first sermon in the list, entitled “Hyper-Dispensational Antinomianism”….it’s a real eye opener 🙂
Hi Stephanie! I’ve read your blogs for years (my kids and your oldest 3 are roughly the same ages) and I’ve learned quite a bit from you. I’m hoping to get some thoughts from you: I’ve suffered from chronic dibilitating sinus and joint pain for years, finally last summer I was diagnosed with allergies to quite a few food groups (gluten, yeast, dairy, chicken, turkey, tuna and eggs). Since I cut that all out of my diet the pain is gone, however, I’ve also gained 15 lbs!!! I totally agree with you that low carb is the way to go, but I am having a hard time.
To add to my difficulty I had to have my gullbladder removed several years ago and now too much red meat or fat ‘hurts’.
Ugh! Any ideas or places you could recommend?
Oh, and I also agree with you on beer/wine 😉 I have been enjoying Redbridge gluten free beer! or Hard Cider
I think if I were in your shoes I would do a raw/sprouted diet, but I would not go vegan or vegetarian, and I would still eat some vegetables cooked as cooked (usually lightly steamed or lightly stir fried) vegetables can often be easier to digest. Eating things like sprouted grain bread, and making sure that I always sprout other seeds, like rice or beans, before I cooked them. A good portion of the sugar as well as the gluten is often used up during germination, and once the seed germinates it is, technically speaking, a plant now and no longer a grain. Lacto-fermented products are also a good idea as the process of fermentation already partially digests the food for you….I read once that beets have a certain chemical called betaine that helps prompt your body to produce the enzymes which may be lacking now since your gallbladder removal. Do you have the cookbook “Nourishing Traditions”? It has lots of awesome recipes for fermented products, including fermented beets and a fermented beet drink called beet kvass. It also contains recipes for making things like REAL corned beef by lacto-fermentation of the beef before cooking, and also raw meat dishes….raw meat would be better than cooked meat in your situation as it still contains heat sensitive enzymes and probiotics that would help with digestion. Have you ever tried RAW (unpasteurized) milk? or a healthy organic fermented dairy product like Stonyfield or Brown Cow Whole Milk Yogurt? or raw milk cheese? People who usually have trouble with conventional dairy products often have no problem with going RAW/fermented as all the good enzymes and probiotics are already contained within the milk to help you digest the food…. pasteurizing the milk kills all of this. I hope this helps! 🙂
Yes, of course! How did I not think to use Nourishing Traditions? Four years ago I suggested my mam read it after she was diagnosed with cancer and given 6 months to live (the cancer isn’t totally gone, but she sure has beaten the original 6 month). I will defently get it out and begin to study in earnest. Thank You!
Unfortunetly in the area we live raw milk isn’t exactly legal to sell. Or at least that’s what I’ve been told and have not been unable to locate a supplier
I’m beginning to come to the conclusion that a part of my weight issue is the fact that what I did at first was figure we’d eat the same as before, just using product free from everything I couldn’t eat. You know, to make it easier for me. But what I’ve learned is that choice resulted in a high level of ‘artificials’…a lot of not good quality carbs, & sugar and also low quality & quantity protein. So, time to start over….again!
One thing I can say though, it without those foods the constant pain is gone, however, the constant fog, the constant state of ‘blah’ is still remaining.
Raw milk sales are illegal in my state too, but raw milk CONSUMPTION is perfectly legal (there is even some states, I think NY is one where it is even illegal to consume raw milk from your own cow or goat!)….so I raise my own goats to get what I can’t buy.
It would probably be very difficult to get used to your particular diet situation, so just gradually switch out the bad for the good so that it doesn’t become overwhelming and stress-inducing. Scouting out a grass fed beef or lamb source probably isn’t a bad idea either 🙂
I keep seeing how you drink goats milk. I remember when I was a child HATING the taste of raw goats milk! Is this something that I would have to just deal with or get used to? Or is there some other way to ‘tweek’ the taste?
I have been reading your blog tonight (I’ve left a few posts) and I really like it! I have 3 boys and we provide our own water and we have a garden, we eat a lot of venison, etc. We still haven’t figured out how to produce our own electric yet w/o solar, lol. 🙂
I cool the milk down very quickly by putting it in the freezer right after milking. I think too many people make the mistake in expecting it to taste like cow’s milk from the store, a better way to drink it is to taste it for what it is not what you “think” it should be…if that makes any sense?? We’ve been producing our own goat’s milk for 3 years now and I much prefer the taste even to raw cow’s milk which I have had from time to time…goat’s milk is much richer and more flavorful imho…