DETOX: Day One

Blech.

That’s how I’ve been feeling lately. My eating’s been blah – not the worst, definitely not the best. I’m still in the gain 3 lbs, lose 3 lbs mode. And it’s totally because I’m completely unmotivated. I also haven’t been exercising at all, other than day-to-day stuff, like walking to my daughter’s school, or, like I took the kids skating on Friday (it was a PD Day at school). Plus I go to Yoga every Friday for 1.5 hrs, but that’s it. No thrice-weekly trips to the gym, no runs, nada.

I am a blob.

So what to do? In frustration with myself this weekend, imagining all the nasty trans-fats and toxins building up in my body, I decided to go on a week-long detox "diet". Well, okay, it’s more fad diet and less detox. But still.

Anyway, you might have seen a similar diet under the names "Cabbage Soup Diet" or "Sacred Heart Diet". It goes like this:

DAY 1:
Eat only fruits (except bananas) and a homemade vegetable soup (I used the Weight Watchers Zero-Point garden vegetable soup, mostly because the recipe that came with the diet called for using Lipton chicken noodle soup in the base…that didn’t seem to jive with the "detox" or "diet" aspect, so I went with a healthier option). See my pic below.

DAY 2:
Eat only fresh raw or cooked vegetables and the soup. All I can say is thank GAWD avocadoes are vegetables! (Yes, I know, taxonomically speaking they are fruits, but for the diet, because of its low sugar content, it counts as a vegetable. *thank you!*)

DAY 3:
Eat both fruits and vegetables (and the soup).

DAY 4:
Eat only bananas and skim milk. Yum…smoothies. Oh yeah, and the soup. Again with the soup!

DAY 5:
Eat lean meat (some versions recommend beef, some any lean meat. We’re going with marinated flank steak) and tomatoes. Up to 6 tomatoes (or a can of stewed tomatoes). And – you guessed it – the soup!

DAY 6:
More lean meat, plus any veggies. No baked potato, though. At least one serving of the soup.

DAY 7:
Brown rice, unsweetened fruit juice & veggies. Soup.

So far, so good. I love fruit, so eating a lot of fruit is not a problem for me. Eating nothing else…that was a bit of a challenge, but what I like about this plan is that you change every day. So, if I get sick of eating only vegetables, I only have to endure it for one day.

But why, you ask, are we doing this? Well, why do I get the urge to change the furniture around in the living room every 6 months? We needed a change. We needed discipline. We needed to cleanse our bodies by eating fresh, largely raw foods for a week or so. This seemed to fit the bill.

One site that I went to described the diet, with the disclaimer "this diet is not recommended" and is "clearly unsustainable". Which I agreed with wholeheartedly at first. And when you take it day-by-day, it does seem ridiculous. I mean, who eats only one food group per day? (Unless you count junk food as a food group…lots of people eat nothing but junk every day!) But if you look at it as a whole, it’s over 80% fruits & vegetables, with a small amount of dairy, lean meat and whole grain thrown in. Over the course of a week, you end up with a rather healthy overall diet. Low in calories & fat, high in fibre. I’d argue that eating the way the majority of Western societies do is the truly unsustainable diet.

I’m not saying I’m going to stay on it for more than a week, or that I recommend anyone else should. I’m just hoping it helps the Hubster and me get a bit more disciplined about our eating habits. We have a successful day one down, and half of day 2 is out of the way now. I’m feeling good and really looking forward to adding in some fruits tomorrow. And can I tell you how much I can’t wait for brown rice and marinated flank steak?

I’m going to pop in daily this week to let you know how it’s going, my little detox.

And if you want to know what’s wrong with our country, check out my personal blog, This Is Kat.