Obesity, heart disease, and diabetes: These are just a few of the health conditions that proponents of the Paleolithic diet, or caveman diet, blame on our sedentary lifestyles and modern way of eating, which is loaded with sugar, fat, and processed foods. Their proposed solution? The Paleo Diet. Cut modern foods from our diet and return to the way our early hunter-gatherer ancestors ate.
For starters, to be and stay healthy on the paleo diet, you’ll need to exercise regularly while following a strict diet comprised only of foods that can be hunted and gathered.
In its purest form, the paleo diet allows you to eat only those foods that humans ate when they first roamed the planet about 2.5 million years ago.
The diet can improve your health by eliminating high-fat and processed foods that have little nutritional value and too many calories. This plan emphasizes loading up on fruits and vegetables that are bursting with healthy vitamins, minerals, and fiber, which fills you up faster so you eat less, helping curb weight gain.
The Paleo Diet: How It Works
You’ll lose weight because anytime you restrict entire food groups, your calorie intake tends to be lower. And whenever you burn more calories than you consume, you’ll lose weight. The focus on lean protein, fruits, and vegetables over calorie- and sodium-rich processed foods can also contribute to weight loss, but the paleo diet wasn’t created to be a weight loss diet.
Note that though nuts and seeds are allowed on this diet, they can be high in calories, and people who want to lose weight will have to limit their nut consumption.