I agree with Kaplods and Nelie. I follow a primal style of eating, which is basically paleo but I allow cheese and I aim for 80% compliance, which means I cheat occasionally. I do this for HEALTH. I also watch my carbs and count calories so that I can lose weight too. Keep in mind that finding grass fed meat can be challenging or costly. (Although I found my costs stayed about the same when I quit buying processed food and eating out).

If you are interested in how paleo/primal may be a tool for weight loss, I suggest reading here: This will give you some idea of how to build a paleo style diet and how to tweak your macros and calories for weight loss. I also highly recommend reading his book The Primal Blueprint. It has helped me immensely in thinking of my health first, making good choices about the food I put in my body & dealing with stress.

http://www.marksdailyapple.com/press...rint-diagrams/

My fiancé adheres to Paleo's close relative, the Primal diet. Because of the amount of red meats, I frequently have to limit myself to a small portion of the meat on the dinner table at night. Through diet and exercise, I cured myself of high blood and have no intention of getting put back on that medication. The Paleo/Primal diets allow too much consumption of red meat, in my humble opinion. And, as others have stated, I wouldn't consider it a way to actually lose weight. My fiancé swears by this diet, though.

There are many days where I happen to eat primal since I'm gluten free, but we don't eat much meat or grains. An omelette, a bowl of soup, and a stir fry are a good example of one day's meals for me (sans snacks, which are usually one serving of fruit and one serving of vegetables).

I don't think that paleo or primal necessarily makes people eat more meat, but some may increase their meat intake instead of increasing their vegetable intake to make up for the "loss" of grains.

Sounds about right to me.

Paleo has been working for me. I have lost 20 pounds while on it and I feel great. Yes it was hard at first but now it is second nature.

Last May I was headed for disaster. Extremely overweight and a history of diabetes in the family. I hadn't gotten it yet, but it could not have been that far away. It isn't an exaggeration to say Primal eating not only saved my life but has been a key to my being hunger free, full of physical and mental energy, basically the best quality of life and the strongest I have ever been at 48 years old.

So does it work for me: yes. Not a strong enough word but yes it does.

Primal varies from Paleo in that Primal includes dairy. If you can process dairy, there are many healthy dairy products. I don't drink milk but have high fat low card dairy like hard cheeses, cream, sour cream, grass fed butter, cottage cheese.

The thing they have in common is, as mentioned before, no grains. The viewpoint is that humans were low carb and no grain or very sparingly grains up until 10,000 years ago. We aren't fully adapted to eat grains (and any diet high in carbs in general, although carb tolerance does vary from person to person), they contain 'anti-nutrients' and they have a high glycemic index and glycemic loading.

Carbs including grains spike insulin so many of the calories consumed are stored as fat. When you go low carb HIGH fat your body produces ketones on a regular basis and those are used as fuel and your body burns your stored fat. It wasn't theory for me, it was reality. The belly fat and fat everywhere (my wedding ring fits my forefinger now) just melted away. Also the brain can run just fine on ketones. In fact many people experience increased mental clarity, energy, mood, vigor on low carb high fat.

Also of note, most researchers believe the calories in calories out are much too simple. Bodies just do not work that simply. I am going to link an article by Sam Feltham. He did 28 days of 5,700 calories each day on a low carb high fat and then a low fat high carb diet. Calories still DO matter to low carbers of all kinds. They simply know from their experiences say 2,500 calories a day of high carb food versus low carb food will see vastly different impacts. Also note these are high fat approaches not high protein. Whole foods and non starchy vegetables are at the base of all the WOEs.

He lost waist size on the low carb high fat and gained less than 3 pounds. On the high carb low fat he gained more than 3 inches in his waist and over 16 lbs. Almost no researcher or practioner believes the body responds to calories the same. It is a core belief, a core statement of Paleo/Primal/ low carb no grainers in general. People may disagree that is fine. I know what I've experienced. This is what I think. If people disagree then they need to find a way to explain Sam's results. And the results of thousand, hundreds of thousands, probably millions of people on some kind of low carb way of eating.

Another thing a lot of people find on Paleo and variants is their appetites just plummet and whereas they may have struggled with 'set point' like experiences before that doesn't happen on the no grains low carb way of eating. Also my experience. Virtually effortless weight loss once eating this way.

http://live.smashthefat.com/why-i-didnt-get-fat/

I just happened to find this on Twitter just now. It is very short but another study showing people eating more calories but on low carb high fat lost more weight than people eating fewer calories on high carb low fat.

http://healthimpactnews.com/2014/stu...nic-diet-wins/

Note people on low carb had ketones levels between 0.5 and 3. This is not slightly dangerous. It is called being in ketosis. Now there is something unique to type 1 diabetics called ketosisacidious (spelling). The ketone levels for that are over 10, usually 11-14.

Virtually impossible to get there unless type 1 diabetic.

I've become 'fat adapted' now and my body and brain use ketones. It is great for the body but unbelivable for the brain. You feel good, great actually. And never get the afternoon blahs. So Primal/Paleo for me became way more than weight. The weight loss just kind of happened.

More important but related of course is just how much my overall well-being improved. No more sleep apnea, back pain, allergies, and lots of energy and vitality and great moods all the time now.

Sorry I realized in the post above this one I said Sam did 28 day expirements, they were 21 days each. My earlier post was also before he did the low fat high carb. He has also recently done 21 days 5,700 calories on vegan if anyone is interested it is on his site. And her is his post after finishing day 21 of the low fat high carbs:

http://live.smashthefat.com/5000-cal...llenge-day-21/

I haven't tried Paleo, but my sister-in-law swears by it. She had terrible migraines and hasn't since she's done the Whole30 thing a few times. The funny thing is, she was a vegetarian and I was really surprised when she started Paleo because of the meat; but, she's really happy with how much better she feels. She did say that the first few days were tough to adjust to, but it was worth it in the long run.

When I first started paleo I lost 46 kilos (100 lbs) but I went off it and started eating crap and gained 12.5 kilos (27 lbs) back. But now I am back on track and have lost 6.5 (14 lbs) of those 12 kilos. My ultimate goal I never reached but this time I will there is no question about it.

I must say that I feel so good and never ever hungry eating paleo, I eat normal meals high in healthy fat content.

Paleo is really working for me. I actually want to exercise and be active. I'm losing weight and never hungry. Everything else made me starve myself or sustain on veggies alone. This is the easiest and most effective diet I have ever tried.