Eating disorders are serious mental health conditions that can profoundly impact an individual’s physical and emotional well-being. And after experiencing this herself, Amanda White found that restricting foods wasn’t helpful in her healing journey. So how and why did she choose paleo?
Amanda Finding Her Way To Paleo Diet
Everybody is different, and therefore every body will require a different diet. For Amanda, her body prefers the paleo/keto lifestyle. She isn’t strict on it though, because she believes there’s always some room for treats. So instead, Amanda chooses to live by the 90/10 rule: 90% of the time, she eats well, while the remaining 10%, she allows for some wiggle room with dairy, grains, and processed foods.
We all know that there is a lot of information about health and nutrition out there. However, there is also a lot of conflicting information. Amanda struggled to decipher all the information at the lowest point of her eating disorder — she had no idea what to eat or how to eat. Here, education and experimentation were key.
Benefits Of A Paleo Diet
It took her several months of trial and error to find an eating style that worked for her. She felt best when eating fruits, vegetables, organic meats, and nuts — all foods that fall into paleo. Amanda also found that fasting 2-3 times per week helped get her digestion back in line by giving her system a break. While she still practices it, she knows how to listen to her body. When her hunger is ravenous some days, she respects that and doesn’t move forward with fasting.
Paleo has become the new normal for Amanda. She found that focusing on pure, whole foods helped to clear her skin, make her gut happy, manage her anxiety, and even improve her digestion and help her lose weight! But Amanda believes that whichever style of eating you choose, the goal should always be to feel light and happy after eating. And most importantly, whatever you do, make sure that it makes your body feel good and makes your mind feel happy!
What’s on Amanda’s Paleo Recipes?
Are you intrigued by how Amanda starts her day? She believes that breakfasts should pack a nutritional punch and flavor. So Amanda’s week includes keto oatmeal with sautéed figs, eggs with kale and avocado, paleo pancakes, and even bananas with homemade cashew butter and coconut flakes.
For lunches and dinners, you can interchange any of the recipes because they’re great as leftovers! Think about butternut squash soup (for those cold winter days), citrus chili chicken with guacamole and plantains, honey mustard salmon, sweet potato burgers, and even a healthy take on your favorite Chinese dish, spaghetti squash lo mein!
If you participate in intermittent fasting as Amanda does, you may miss out on some of these delicious meals for that day, but it doesn’t mean you can’t have them the next!
If you’d like to follow Amanda through her journey, be sure to check out her Instagram @TheWholesomeFig, to keep up to speed!
