Jackie says her health wasn’t much of a concern until she was in her forties. Jackie is 5’1” and says for most of her life, she was “average size.” However, once she hit her forties and started the process of menopause, she gained a lot of weight. Jackie tried to combat her sudden increase in weight by reducing her calories. She says she ate many “low-fat” foods, including Snackwell cookies and Tab diet drinks. Jackie describes she got to her “fighting weight” a few times, but the restriction was never sustainable.
Jackie says that her joints, particularly her ankles, knees, and hands, also started becoming an issue. Jackie describes her hands becoming so swollen she could hardly move her fingers in the morning. Jackie was also struggling with high blood pressure. She says several of her family members have died because of complications with their blood pressure. Jackie also says she never personally struggled with type 2 diabetes, but it was prevalent in her family, especially among women. Jackie believes if she had not been trying so hard to lose weight, type 2 diabetes would have been her fate as well.
In 2015, Jackie discovered the popular no-sugar, no-grains diet (NGNS). Jackie says for two years, she was on and off the NGNS diet. Jackie had some success but still had a sugar and carbohydrate addiction. In 2017, she fully committed to the NSNG diet and followed it for two years until 2019, losing fifty pounds. In the fall of 2019, Jackie had surgery on her foot, and by Christmas of that year, she regained all of the fifty pounds she had lost following the NSNG diet.
Around that time, Jackie heard Dr. Shawn Baker speaking with Vinnie Tortorich on the Fitness Confidential podcast. Dr. Baker was early in his carnivore lifestyle, and Jackie thought he sounded crazy. Jackie says the carnivore diet kept coming up in her social media feed, and that is where she discovered Kelly Hogan– whom Jackie describes as her “carnivore twin.”
Kelly’s story so inspired Jackie she decided to try the carnivore diet. Jackie says she initially tried the diet for a week, then a month, before fully committing to the lifestyle one year and eight months ago. While she struggled with diarrhea initially, Jackie says she knew her body was detoxing, and eventually, her bowels evened themselves out. Jackie says she has lost sixty pounds following the carnivore diet, with minimal exercise, and her blood pressure normalized within three months.
Jackie says today, her diet consists of many steaks, ground beef, fish (particularly salmon), eggs, cheese, heavy whipping cream in her coffee, and seasonings. Jackie says she typically eats two meals a day but listens to her body and tries to eat intuitively.
Jackie is grateful she found Kelly Hogan and followed the carnivore diet. She says, “I feel healthy.” She describes at almost sixty years old, she feels better than ever, and her blood pressure is no longer an issue. Jackie says for anyone considering following the carnivore way of eating to try it, “your body can turn around and heal itself.” Jackie is living her healthy life, free from medications and an addiction to carbs, and she has no plans to turn back.
