Exploring The Benefits and Challenges of the ‘All Meat Diet’
The Carnivore Diet. Chances are you have heard of this newest trend in healthy eating. The diet is just what you would think it would be, a solely meat and animal product-based diet. It is high in protein and fat and very low in carbohydrates as it excludes all fruits, vegetables, legumes, grains, nuts, and seeds.
If you are considering this diet yourself, the first thing you should think about is your ‘why’, why do you want to do this diet? Is it because you have chronic inflammation in your joints, your stomach or in your skin? Is your mental health suffering and your medications are not working? Perhaps you have type 2 diabetes, are suffering from obesity, fatty liver, hypertension, or chronic allergies? People on the carnivore diet will lose weight amazingly, but weight loss should not be the reason you do this diet, your why should be stronger than that. A strong ‘why’ will help you get over obstacles and will carry you on to success.
The first thing you want to do is to commit to ninety days; if you only commit to a week, a month, or even two months, you won’t give your body enough time to heal, for you to see the full benefits of going full carnivore. Many people, when they convert from their present diet to carnivore, experience carbohydrate withdrawal symptoms; this is usually gone in three to fourteen days. Trying the diet for a week and then quitting because you felt terrible will not allow you to experience the benefits of the diet because those effects are not from the carnivore diet; your body was just going through withdrawal from your carbohydrate addiction.
Another reason to give yourself ninety days is you need to give your micro biome time to adjust to the new diet. When starting carnivores, some will experience diarrhea for a few days, they will want to quit, thinking the diet is unhealthy, this so not true. This diet is very healthy; it is full of all the vitamins, minerals, amino acids and fatty acids that your body needs for optimal health. You will need to give the diet enough time, so that your gut micro biome can adjust and you can up regulate all the fat and protein loving bacteria and down regulate all of the carb-loving bacteria in your gut. Also, it is important to remember that all the medical issues that you took years to develop will also take time to fix.
So, the next question is, how much and how often can you eat on a carnivore diet. Well, you can eat as much as you want! You don’t have to portion control and you don’t have to calorie count. When you are hungry, truly hungry, then you will sit down and eat meat and eggs until you are comfortably satiated, then you will stop eating. You won’t need to snack between meals, you will have one, two or three meals each day, they should be eaten in a time restricted window, maybe six to eight hours, then eat till full.
Now what can I eat on this diet? On a carnivore diet you will eat only animal products, you are not going to eat vegetables, fruit, nuts, seeds, grains and no vegetable seed oils, everything you eat will come from an animal. Now some people will say you can have honey and fruit on the carnivore diet, well fruit is not from an animal and honey is sugar and especially if you are trying to cure a fatty liver or type two diabetes and obesity, you do not want to consume these items.
What meat can I have on the carnivore diet? You can eat any red meat, beef, lamb, goat, venison, wild game, pork, chicken, turkey, eggs, and fish that comes from the ocean, not a fish farm, is good to eat. In the case of dairy, do not include it in your ninety day program, except for butter, ghee, heavy cream that is at least thirty percent or more fat, and no cheese until the ninety days are up. You can cook with butter, ghee, beef tallow and duck fat, avoid cooking with any seed oils. I suggest you prioritize fatty red meat; this seems to be the healthiest, most nutritious and the least inflammatory for most people on the planet.
The next question is what to drink. Carnivore diet or not, water is the best thing to drink. On the carnivore diet, you can drink still water or mineral water. You can also have black coffee plus a tablespoon of heavy cream or a homemade bone broth.
The next thing that is crucial to finding success on the carnivore diet is support! Even though it’s becoming more mainstream; it’s still a little weird to some people. Try and find someone to do the diet with or join a Facebook group.
Once your first ninety days are up, you must do an honest assessment of how you are feeling and how your symptoms are. Is your ‘why’ that you started this diet for doing better and your symptoms are residing? If so, how much better, or is it all gone? Now think about how amazing you feel and ask yourself if you want to remain a carnivore for at least the foreseeable future. Now if you really feel like you are missing something, let’s say some vegetable, now is the time to reintroduce them back into your diet, your body will be very calm and pretty much free of inflammation. The carnivore diet is a pretty good elimination diet, at this point you have eliminated everything that causes inflammation and chronic disease, so when you reintroduce the vegetables back into the diet, you will know right away if it agrees with you or not. The only things you will not reintroduce back into the diet, is grains, seed oils and any form of sugar, these are very bad for the body. It’s time to take back control of your health, make that change.
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