After 2 week detox plan, I have new view on food

Two weeks ago I started a detox plan with Joanna. I started the plan hoping to give you updates on what I was eating and how I was feeling, but life completely got in the way. Two weeks ago, we also got a new computer system at work so anything other than figuring out the new system and paginating newspaper pages did not get done... but I did stick to the plan as best as I could.

The red/green pepper we found. Cool, right?

The first couple of days on the plan were really tough. I am not a vegetarian at all. I love to eat, but the plan called for all veggies all the time. I was drained. I had very little energy and about midway through my workouts each day my energy level would drop to zero. Around day 5 on the plan my body started to adjust, or maybe it was more like my eating habits started to adjust, and I had loads of energy. Joanna told each of her detoxers this would happen, but to be honest, I didn't believe her. I'm a skeptic, but it happened. I was sleeping better, I was waking up in the morning full of energy, albeit hungry, but not groggy.

Speaking of groggy, let's talk about detoxing from caffeine. Holy crap, what a headache. Let me tell you, it was not easy at all. Not one bit. I work at a newspaper, there is coffee brewing all the time. The smell of coffee is the first thing that I smell when I walk into work every single day. It took a huge amount of willpower to not drink it. I stopped cold turkey. Dear Lord, the headache. I drank Green Yerbe Mate tea, which has caffeine, but it's not coffee. Anyway, it worked as a crutch and as I sit here today, I am coffee free. I will tell you that I did have a cup last Thursday. It was decaf and I only drank half of it and I felt like crap after I was finished. I was shaking like I just finished a pot of coffee. I also made myself a cup before work Sunday night and I had about two sips of it and threw it out.

Some other benefits I've noticed is that I lost three pounds during the last two weeks. I was not starving at all either. I ate a ton of food all the time. My coworkers can attest to this. I probably ate pounds and pounds more food than I ever ate before. My typical day consisted of lemon water and juice that I made from a recipe of fruits and veggies Joanna gave to me, a sweet potato with almond butter (sounds gross, but it is soooo good), some raw veggies with humus or not depending on my mood, a huge salad with homemade dressing, an apple, another veggie meal and dinner.

Clearly I cheated more than once on this plan. I ate a doughnut yesterday, which was delicious and I just couldn't not eat it. I also had a night that I was craving a cheeseburger so badly I was dreaming about it and so I ate one for dinner. During the second week of the plan, I was given the ok to add some animal protein to my diet, so after my workout I'd have either an egg or I once added some ground turkey to some chilli I made. I wasn't starving at all.

Oh, and I can't forget to mention my workouts. After I got through the initial feeling weak phase, I was having one fantastic workout after another. I recovered faster and I never found myself dragging at midday after a long morning workout. 

Over the next weeks, I'll be reintroducing foods into my diet to see how my body reacts to each of them. Overall, I am so glad I did this with Joanna. I can say I learned a lot about my body and how I eat with her help. 

In the next few days, I will hopefully be meeting with Joanna to do a follow up BIA test and, reluctantly, I will discuss my weight and body fat to muscle ratio in an upcoming post. And I have a new video coming that Joanna and I made on cycling. I have a lot in the works and now that the initial new computer system issues are (hopefully) gone, I'll be able to update this blog a little more frequently again. Thanks for hanging in there with me!