This week I passed a major milestone. You may remember me mentioning a couple months back about the big plateau.
In the past dozen or so years, I have developed a barrier I could not break down. It was that weight where no matter how much exercise or lack of eating I did, I could not drop below. It was incredibly frustrating. It did not matter how hard I would work or what I did, it was the bottom of the barrel. Days would pass, then weeks, then months. But still, there I was stuck in the same spot.
Then sooner or later I would give up. It was not worth the hard work and deprivation I was subjecting myself to. If I were anyone else, I would weigh 100 pounds, so why was I stuck where I was? Of course, then I would go back to a more “normal” exercise and diet schedule and of course, gain a few pounds, or in some cases a few dozen.
But, now for the first time since before the birth of my second child, my weight has dropped below the bane of my prior diet regimes.  And I’m thinking there may be hope!
Now remember, when I started eating Paleo, I promised I would be reasonably faithful to the diet, but probably not at 100% due to the difficulties of obtaining truly Paleo food. I would say I’m probably at 80-85% if you discount the fact that a lot of the meat I consume is not grazed or free range in nature. And of course about a month ago I added back butter and some dairy.
When I first started eating Paleo, I was doing really well losing 2-3 pounds each week and figured at that rate I could hit my plateau in 6-8 weeks easily. But that didn’t happen. In fact I think I even had a week or two where I thought the weight loss was over because I held steady. Despite that, the following week I would lose another pound.
So, all in all, I am down 16 pounds in about 2-and- a-half months. That’s a little over a pound and a half each week. But, most importantly (at least in my opinion), I’m still losing.
I’m trying to remember where I was taught that if you consume fewer calories (or exercise more) you will lose weight. I think the formula is a little more complicated than that, something that no one has been able to adequately explain to me.
For me, I’m eating more calories including snacking if I’m hungry and I’m still losing weight. So the amount of calories aren’t as important to my body as the kind of calories—at least (I would guess) to a certain point.  (And please remember that I’ve never been much of a junk food person, I’m referring to grains, and hidden refined sugars. If I only I would have had something as easy as a Big Mac type of habit, I could have kicked to lose weight!)
For a lifestyle change, this really hasn’t been that bad—at least I don’t feel guilty for eating.

Tribune Publisher Mary Hoisington can be reached at mhoisington@gbtribune.com