Over the weekend I will complete my 21 Day Sugar Detox ( can I get a Halleluiah?!!!!)
I would like to lie and say that I've enjoyed this process and look forward to living the rest of my life sugar free. But I'm not a fan of lightening strikes, so I'm just not going to pretend on this one.
Has it been horrid? No. Not really.
Has it been fun? No. Not really.
Will I continue to be much more mindful of what sugars I do eat? Absolutely.
Do I feel better? Yes.
Did I lose weight? Nope.
But what I did do, was lose 2 whole inches around that nasty wheat belly I'd been carrying around, and I'd say that's much better than 'weight lost.' Because let's be honest, 'weight lost' suggests that I intend to find it again and my friend, I do not intend to do any such thing!
I will tell you that the thing that helped me succeed the most, was clearing out the pantry. When I stopped making excuses for 'buying things for the kids lunches' that I could then later consume ~ and got that pantry down to nearly nothing... that's when things started to change.
SO WHAT DID YOU EAT?!!
First thing in the morning when the kids want to know what they can have to eat, I can honestly answer them with 'Anything you can find in the fridge or pantry.' There aren't any hidden treats or tempting crackers. There aren't even any Gummies or Goldfish. No Ritz, no Cheerios, no Ghiradelli chocolates and no bread.
We could literally go to the fridge and eat whatever looked good. "But my kids are picky" Grapefruit began disappearing at the hands of the kid who would previously only eat cheerios and peanut butter. Cabbage is being consumed raw while they watch movies. And I have been able to make the switch from craving chips and chocolate to honestly craving a meal instead. If the right choices are the only choices, our kids aren't as picky as we allow them to be! (hmmm... there's a thought.)
BUT WEREN'T YOU HUNGRY?!
No! By having only what we should eat (tons of fresh fruit, veggies, easy protein, eggs and nuts) the choices were so much easier to make. I didn't have to try to 'overlook' things, and I didn't have to worry about making the right choice. It was simply a matter of pulling together what I did have and putting it on the table.
It wasn't more work. Once I decided it was what we were going to do.
It wasn't bland food. Bacon can spice up anything :)
And no, I wasn't hungry all the time. As a matter of fact, I enjoy being full now because it doesn't come accompanied with that awful bloated- I-need a nap feeling. I eat, I feel full, I feel satisfied and then when I'm hungry again I eat.
In a way it reminds me of parenting. If you ever put your child on a schedule and kept track of what your baby ate and when and how much, (which I did because I'm a nerd) it takes the guess work out of the equation. If I knew for certain that I had covered the basics I was a much more confident parent ~ and then if things were out of whack I could track down the problem because most things had been eliminated.
Feeding my body has been a lot like that process. When I eliminated certain things and kept track of what I was eating and when - it became a lot easier to listen to my body.
I wasn't always fighting some ailment, or fighting an upset stomach- or popping pills to settle the indigestion. The food I began feeding my body began working with my body instead of against it. Which settled the hunger. Which fed the energy. Which stopped the 3pm bonk. Which gave me the confidence to do it another day. Which helped me lose the weight in inches.
Which gave me more energy at the gym .......You get the picture.
I want to share a post by Coach Scott Abel
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