Detox — Final Thoughts

Sorry that it took me a few days to get caught up with this… I’ve been on an eating binge since I stopped the detox and haven’t looked up from my plate to take a breather and just now.

Actually, I’m kidding… I am really happy with how I felt during the detox and plan on doing something similar again… sooner rather than later. The moment I stopped the detox and starting eating real food, I started feeling like crap again. I don’t think I’ve discussed it much on this blog, but I am plagued with daily headaches, occasional migraines and (pretty much) daily abdominal pain. I’ve had upper GI’s, lower GI’s, abdominal ultrasounds, etc. and still can’t figure out what’s wrong. I get a lot of pain in the upper left quadrant of my abdomen and have been told I have an “over production of acid” in my stomach. My pain is definitely associated with stress, what I eat and most of the time — I have no idea what triggers it. I also have a lot of digestive issues — but I won’t go into details regarding this. 🙂 And no, I’m pretty certain I don’t have IBS — but who knows. I’ve been tested for Celiac… that came back negative too. It sucks.

In any case… during the 2.5 days that I was eating and drinking mostly raw fruits and vegetables I felt awesome. It was the first time — in what seems like forever — that I went an entire weekend without being doubled over in pain and without a headache. Literally, as soon as I had a solid meal — I started getting a headache. Last night, I was layed up on the couch all night with an awful stomach ache. So what the hell gives???

My guess is that I have some type of food intolerance. I’ve seen a Naturopath and have been given advice on how to handle such a thing… but honestly, it’s hard and not realistic and I have ZERO willpower. I really suck at sticking to certain diets, etc. Which is why I’m pretty happy with how I did on the detox.

My last blog post was on Sunday, when I was trying to follow the Fat Flush portion of the detox. I ended that day with a mid-afternoon smoothie that consisted of 1 apple, 1/2 avocado, 8 basil leaves, 2 carrots and 2 celery stalks. It was actually quite tasty… you juice everything except for the avocado and basil and then transfer the juice and the solids to another container and use a hand blender to puree.

At the end of the day, as my friend The Missus would say, I did a SHITASTICK job at finishing up. I had two slices of pizza for dinner and half a pint of ice cream… but at least it was a dairy-free, soy version. I felt “OK” that night… and went back to normal eating on Monday. On Monday I felt awful… and it’s been pretty much the same way all week. For me, I think the key is juicing. Most books agree that raw juice is very alkaline… which mush help my intestinal issues.

OH… and as soon as I started eating “normal” food again (and let it be known that I actually tried to be semi-good), I was starving all the time! I think it was the whole glycemic index thing. Even though you would assume that I would be hungry when drinking mostly just juice, I stayed satisfied for much longer and got gratification from more juices and raw nuts. After I ate that Rice and Lentil dish I wrote about on Sunday, I was starving again 2 hours later — and there wasn’t even anything white in the dish (it was brown rice).

The last funny thing is that the one thing I craved after I started eating whole food again was grapefruit juice! I believe my body was trying to tell me something.

So what now? Well, I’m sitting in Barnes and Noble in Chestnut Hill as I type this. I have a book sitting next to me that I intend to purchase and hope to follow starting next week. We are leaving for Las Vegas on Friday morning and not returning until Tuesday (before you go and get all jealous… our 4-yo is coming with us — we are heading to a wedding)… so I can’t change anything until we get back. Oh, and you most likely will not be hearing from me while I’m gone… except for maybe a few photo uploads.

What’s the book you ask? The Miracle Juice Diet by Amanda Cross. I know, I know… all these “miracle diets” are a bunch of bullshit and I couldn’t agree with you more. What I do like about the book though, is that she offers several options… like, a “7-day Juice Diet”, a “Weekend Only” diet plan and a “1 Meal a Day” plan. And I really like the juice recipes she offers. I think (and hope) if I just incorporate more juices into my diet in general, that my overall health will improve and hopefully I will lose a few pounds in the mean time…

For those of you that want to know if I lost any weight during the weekend Detox… yes, I did. Two pounds. However, I’ve gained one back from all the gorging I’ve been doing. 🙂