Let's talk about sex, baby.
Sex With Your Pants On--that is.
The creators of the Whole30 coined this little phrase "Sex With Your Pants On" in reference to the practice of trying to recreate comfort foods with compliant ingredients. For example, pancakes made with sweet potatoes, eggs, and coconut flour, or ice cream made from blending up frozen bananas. All of the indulgence, none of the guilt, right? Right?!
Yes, the components of these sex-with-your-pants-on foods are technically Whole30-compliant but in It Starts With Food we are encouraged to think realistically about why we're driven to make these "comfort" foods in the first place. It's probably because we're trying to satisfy a craving, isn't it?
So even if the "treat" we make contains ingredients that may not bother our intestines or stimulate generalized inflammation, we are doing nothing to improve our hormonal response or psychological relationship with food. Also, the sugar dragon doesn't know that homemade Larabar technically follows all the rules. All he knows is that he wanted a sweet snack, and you gave it to him (Your sugar dragon could also be female--it totally depends. Personally, my sugar dragon hasn't shown enough of itself yet for me to really get a sense of its personality--HOWEVER--I'm coming up on PMS times so I'm sure there will be more on that soon.)
ANYWAY.
Those following the Whole30 protocol are given the charge to not have sex with their pants on with food--figuratively speaking, of course--which means a lot of common food "groups" are completely off the table.
This is where I think the Whole30 way of life deviates sharply from the Paleo diet. Now, I have not done any reading about Paleo and only really know what I can glean from social media and pop culture--which is nothing accurate, I'm sure--so I will refrain from passing any judgement on the Paleo diet at this time.
I will say this: Whole30 and Paleo are not the same thing.
Like I said, I don't know exactly what the "guidelines" for Paleo are, which is why I hesitate to say that anything I eat is Paleo. I have a sneaking suspicion it is a square/rectangle situation--where everything Whole30 could be considered Paleo, but everything considered Paleo is not necessarily Whole30. You know what I mean? (And please correct me if I'm wrong.)
I follow a lot of Paleo food-bloggers on Instagram and my feed is constantly bombarded with the most delectable, indulgent, mouth-watering, cavity-inducing foods that could easily rival work from the Paula Deens of this world. Kudos to those people for achieving the right texture, taste, and consistency everyone knows from the "real" thing using ingredients that you have to take out a small loan to afford at the natural foods store. Please pardon my inability to see what is "primal" about any of the recipes in a cookbook entitled My Paleo Patisserie.
I understand that people have food allergies and sensitivities that they are trying to cope with using some of these ingredients, but for the purposes and goals of the Whole30 most of that just doesn't make sense to me.
If I had trouble putting the breaks on eating an entire pint of Ben & Jerry's in one sitting, replacing that with a pint of "paleo" coconut milk ice cream changes nothing. I'm still going to feel guilty and ashamed afterwards, and in the end it's probably still going to upset my stomach.
The Whole30 mantra of "No slips. No cheats. No excuses." may seem prude and stern--even tyrannical--but I see why it is necessary to achieve a complete hormonal reset. Even if my intentions are pure, sex-with-my-pants-on foods are a slippery slope. And being only a little over halfway through my first 30 days, I can't in good conscience tell myself that I've had nearly enough time to tame my sugar dragon to the point where I could give into temptation and not spiral into a "life of sin", as they say.
So even though a sweet potato pancake brunch sounds amazingly sexy, I will remain celibate for now. It's for my own good.
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