Almost 4 years ago now my life changed for the better. Not that the life I was living was bad at all. I loved my life. But, now I love it more than I could imagine at the time. On June 15th, 2020 my wife and I had our first child, Juniper Rain Kirchner. Things would never be the same for us and we’d grow in more ways than one. The Dad life began.
As someone who lives a very busy life and spends a fair amount of time away from home during hunting seasons, I wanted to do a little virtual check-in with what I’ve learned since our little girl came into our lives. Some changes I’ve made, mistakes, and what life looks like overall now. With any hope, there are some new Dads out there that can benefit from this. If that is you, let me just say, I’m stoked for you!
Fair warning, this is largely going to be about being a parent and has very little to do with hunting, haha. At the same time, it has everything to do with it.
Years ago I looked at bowhunting as this thing that would never really yield success. It was more of an experience and an excuse to get outside. That was back when I was really getting into this whole hunting thing. For me, rifle hunting was what I’d focus on in terms of success. Hunting with a rifle just seemed like the right thing to do at the time, and looking back it was. Rifle hunting is a great way to introduce someone into big game hunting. The chances of success are much greater. I feel as if it can also act like a vessel to guide one through certain experiences. With the low success rates of bowhunting, it’s kind of hard for a newb to get proficient at butchering animals. It’s also hard to get practice shooting at live critters. All of these things take time. With that time though, my perspective on the matter changed slightly. Why I prefer bowhunting over rifle hunting is something that came to me through years of experience.
And now we land at the Paleo Diet! Man, this has been such a cool journey the past 4 months trying out different diets and seeing how my body reacts to them. I’m really excited about trying the Paleo Diet and can’t wait to see how it all pans out. We are a hop, skip, and a jump away from full blown hunting season as well. In light of that, I’ve got all of my dinners and breakfasts either in my possession or on the way. 14 days of hunting are coming up that will involve me eating Paleo. The first is just an overnight bear hunt here in Arizona. The second is a 7 day backcountry mule deer hunt in Utah. Lastly, I’ll be on a 5 day bear hunt back here in Arizona. All the while living the Paleo diet life.
In the months leading up to a hunt you can usually find me scouring maps, spending an unhealthy amount of time on google earth, sifting through backpacking journals online, and shooting my bow each and every day, sometimes multiple times. I am a planner, and I always have been. Not knowing what is going to happen in the future, somewhat stresses me out and it’s an area that I need improvement. I try everything I can to make sure all of my ducks are in a row. If this isn’t done beforehand, it drives me crazy and I can’t think straight. Oftentimes, it will lead to me throwing in the towel, because I am left not knowing what to do with myself. It is my Pre-Hunt Anxiety. Each year that goes by it creeps up on me, and each year we throw hands at one another.
We did it! We actually made it through 1 full month of clean eating! I have to admit that when we started out with this little experiment, I was a bit skeptical of how I would feel and if I’d even be able to go through with it. The act of breaking routine can sometimes be a hard one, especially with food. Food is pretty habitual for my wife and I. We like what we like when we like it. Completely stepping out of our comfort zone was at times stressful, but ultimately enlightening when all said and done. So, what are my thoughts on this diet?
3 weeks! Cannot believe it has already been 3 weeks of clean eating! I am so close to destroying a pizza in May! I’ll probably regret that, but a guy can dream right? My food fantasies aside, I feel awesome and am noticing little differences each week that goes by. Let’s get right into it!
Man! Time has been flying by! I can’t believe I am already 2 weeks into this clean eating journey. It has been sort of refreshing to be forced to eat different foods than we are used to and in doing so, I believe that has given us(wifey and I) more appreciation for certain foods. It’s also been pretty eye opening as to how much sugar really is out there and in how many places. Things that you would never guess had sugar in them have it. Looking back on my diet before this, I realized that I was literally eating sugar every single meal and snack of the day! So, at 2 weeks clean, how’s it going?
Hey, everyone! I have officially been eating clean now for 1 week! In that time, I’ve already gotten 2 backcountry hunts under my belt as well. For the first 6 days I’ve gotta admit, things were sluggish. Really in terms of my energy levels. I felt so dragged down as my body went through sugar withdrawals. It’s pretty crazy, but my body had to essentially relearn how to harness energy that wasn’t coming from sugar. I never realized how dependent I was on it, until I took it away.
Hey, everyone! Hope everybody’s spring is treating them great and you are getting out in the hills on a more regular basis after the winter time. Some spring seasons are already upon us and I am as excited as ever to see what the coming months bring in terms of bears and turkey. Another thing that I am pretty stoked on at the moment is an experiment I have decided to do with dieting. There are 3 big diets that are being mentioned on a regular basis right now it seems. Folks are chatting about eating clean, keto, and paleo. Instead of picking one, I have decided to try them all.
For some odd reason, when I was a kid, I never connected the dots between hunting and food. Hunting was just always this cool and fun thing that I went and did with my Dad. My young self looked forward to things like hot coffee in the dark of the morning, donuts followed by that coffee, and the possibility of seeing wild animals. I just loved knowing that we were going and looking for them. At no point was I thinking about juicy backstraps over and open flame. Honestly, I was more thinking of what it would be like to walk up on a dead deer or to see one get shot. The consumption of said deer after the fact never crossed my mind really until I got older. I’m not really sure why that is. Sub-consciously I recognized that people indeed ate wild game, but I never really pictured myself doing so as a child. Things all changed for me in my adult life.
Copyright 2019 Dialed In Hunter
Design by NXNW.
