Semp has a point in home cooking, knowing what you're eating is an important factor.
I totally agree. If you can do nothing else, making your own food at home goes a long way to avoiding the problems.
But most Americans now days are pressed for time and tend to turn to takeout and convenience foods. When both parents work full-time jobs in addition to running kids around to constant extra-curricular activities on weekends, it's hard to cook every meal at home from scratch.
Your diet looks better to me that what I suspect most Americans eat typically. Probably not a vast difference in calories, but a difference in WHAT you are eating. I didn't see you mentioning grabbing McDonalds egg McMuffin, or quarter pounder with fries, or frozen pizza, or guzzling Mountain Dew and indulging in a late night microwave Hot Pocket.
Not so much how many calories you consumed (though yours may have been somewhat less), but the quality of what you ate.
As a bachelor programmer working long crunch hours, I had gotten into a lot of bad habits. No time to shop or cook, my kitchen was often empty except for coffee. I'd just say whatever, I'll stop by and get a bacon,egg,cheese bagel on the way to work. Yeah, lets just graba quick burger and fries for lunch. No food at home, I'll grab a 6 pack on the way home and order pizza.
Coffee to wind me up, beer to unwind. Oh, and free coffee at work. Sometimes I had drank so much by afternoon my hands would shake like I had palsy.
A decade of that wrecked my metabolism. So yeah, I might need an intervention as extreme as a Carnivore diet to reset my hormonal system. I used to be thin as a rail until I hit about 35.
You heard from Chalenge and Wildin the drastic improvements they achieved. I could point you to sites with hundred of similar testimonials. Especially people autoimmune problems, skin/joint problems, or a lot of recovering ex-Vegans who had wrecked their bodies. It a powerful elimination diet that provides you body with reparative nutrients. After you get detoxed and stabilized, you can add back thing carefully and see what you can tolerate. Or if you like it and it works for you you can stay that way. Many people have for decades and are thriving.
Still, as I've said, it's not for everyone. I think most people would find a traditional low glycemic/low carb diet with intermittent fast easier to maintain. I may end up back there eventually. But for now it's working for me, I don't find it too burdensome, and my health is improving very quickly; so if something is working, I'll run with it.
I thought this was an interesting high level executive summary of Carnivore.
