Re-Toxifying

The detox is lost now in the mists of time. Have I changed anything as a result?

I started coffee right away, but with just one cup each day. Now I'm up to two - but I wait and see if I really want it, rather than just assuming I will.  So slightly decaffeinated, and perhaps this is the most decaffeinated I'll ever be willingly from now on.

I also started dairy right away.  I don't drink milk, but eat cheese and yogurt in various forms and as ingredients. I don't think I've ever really had a problem with dairy, aside from its calorie content, so I'm content with my ability to add it back in. I seem to be able to keep up portion control, which I'm very conscious of now. I don't do low-fat cheese or even yogurt usually, as the carbohydrate content is usually a lot higher than the full-fat versions. I'd rather have a small portion of the real stuff.

I'm happier to eat fruit. I'm eating more, and more often. Less afraid of the sugar content of fruit.  Good timing on the seasons, as strawberries are coming closer.

Flour and gluten - if I had written this a couple of hours ago, I would have reported I remain gluten-free. But my takeout salad was packed with a slice of beautiful rustic bread even though I said no.  Of course, they didn't make me eat it. I really think flour is a downfall for me, and want to mostly stay away from it. I've read a lot about gluten-sensitivity that falls short of actual disease. I don't know if I am gluten-sensitive, but maybe I need to focus on my reaction to this first bit of bread.

But sugar.... This is the reason I went cold turkey on the extreme detox, to break the sugar habit.  I started back small and slow on the sugar, but now I'm just as out of control as I ever was.  I'm totally unable to hold back on overeating sugary chocolate treats in the house. I think I need to not buy them. I continually think I should be able to manage portion control, and what's wrong with a tiny little snack? But I don't buy just one square of chocolate, and once broken into, it's all gone.  I made two trips to the supermarket this weekend bypassing the ice cream aisle, but 9 pm found me on a trip for the sole purpose of getting ice cream. A quart of ice cream. Gone in one sitting.

This is irrational behavior, that needs to be addressed.  I have some ideas, but I'm anxious for strategy suggestions.

Detoxification: 4

Things I liked about the 10-day Detox Diet:

1. Blueberry-nut-seed-dairy-free smoothies - such a change from my normal hand-held meat or cheese - and they didn't make me craving food before lunch unlike sweeter smoothies have in the past.
2. Eating dinner with my girl - often we don't sit down together.
3. Baths - I think it has been over a decade since I had a bath.
4. Pushing myself to try something new.
5. Weight loss - from the scale reading at the start to the lowest scale reading was 4.8 pounds - but I consider my "true" weight to be the trend, which is about 2 pounds down after the 10 days - this is classic very low carb water loss - the heavier you are and more sugar / other carbs you have been eating, the greater the initial loss will be.

Things I didn't like about the 10-day Detox Diet:

1. Feeling bad all the time - it was a little bit better towards the end, but not much - raging headaches, muscle aches all over, panting after small exertions - Atkins flu added to caffeine withdrawal for more days than I expected. (I hope to post separately on Atkins flu).
2. Being stupid all the time - I've got plenty of outside evidence that I performed stupidly at a number of tasks - couldn't remember how to start the boat engine, couldn't complete some concentrated tasks at work, wrong turns on routes I take every day, many more - each of these could be explained but the cumulative impact supports my subjective conclusion that I was stupid - the last thing I need to do is create an Alzheimer's simulation in my brain!
3. Being de-caffeinated - not sure how much that contributed to #1 and #2, but it clearly did, even though I tapered. I had to prolong the taper into the start of the diet because it wasn't right for me to perform so badly at work when a small cup of coffee would help. I had 7-8 days of no coffee at all.
4. Preparing smoothies and salads in the morning - food prep started at 45 minutes long and by the end I got it down to 30 minutes by doing what I could the night before (despite exhaustion in the evenings) - I was late to work several times.
5. Cooking from scratch on a weekday evening - I liked eating the food ok, but we normally eat leftovers from the weekend or takeout or frozen food during the week. You are supposed to stop eating three hours before bedtime - but I get home at 6:30 and bedtime is 9:30 or else that 5 am alarm will be even ruder than usual.  But I can't start cooking the instant I walk in the door - need a little down time - and even easy recipes require 30-45 minutes, especially if including fresh vegetables that need to be cleaned and prepped - didn't leave time for baths most evenings - and couldn't prep the night before (exhausted) or the morning of (see #4).  I finally resorted to roast chickens from Whole Foods which I reheated with fresh vegetables which seemed to be main point.
6. Cleaning the kitchen each night - since I often don't cook or else eat over at the kid's house I usually go a week between dishwasher runs - but I needed a clean cuisinart each morning for the smoothies.
7. Cooking fish - I love to eat fish but its been over a decade since I cooked fish (other than salmon or shrimp) in my house - now I remember why - the house smelled for three days even though it was fresh flounder bought at Whole Foods that afternoon. I did also cook frozen salmon and shrimp and those are fine as long as the garbage goes out each evening.

Bottom line:

For me, much more negative than positive. If you look at the reasons I started this (previous post) it was because I felt bad and because I needed to break the sugar. I felt worse overall during the detox than before (though I had been feeling pretty bad before).  I did break the sugar, because I am generally very obedient and it is so much easier to follow a strict set of rules than to make choices. I haven't decided where and when to add back sugar, though its a good thing there isn't any chocolate in the house because I would have eaten it last night. But I've already added back caffeine (one small cup a day) and dairy, with no second thoughts. The weight loss is a nice bonus, but my long-term weight goal is only about six pounds away and I've spent three years trying to get there and am of two minds whether it matters and whether I could maintain it if I got there. (The dream weight goal is another five pounds below that.)

I think this would be good if:

• You intend to jump-start a diet with a long way to go, and you will follow for the long term a low-carb, high fresh vegetable, moderate protein way of eating such as the same doctor's "Blood Sugar Solution".
• You suspect you have problems with food sensitivities: gluten, dairy, caffeine and want to find out.
• You have the cluster of health problems called variously "syndrome X", pre-diabetes and high risk for heart troubles, and want a quick turn around.
• You have time set aside from normal responsibilities to feel bad and stupid and enough time to prepare everything. (This might make a decent retreat, especially if that means others do the cooking!)

Where do I go from here, having made it this far? Not sure. 

Detoxification: 3

So what do you actually do when following the 10-Day Detox Diet?

(This list is from memory. If you want to do it for real, buy the book.)

Each day, one is supposed to:

1. Measure yourself: weight, waist and thigh diameters.
2. Write in your journal
3. Eat a breakfast smoothie: non-dairy, fruit based, with vegetables also included in some recipes, heavy on nuts, seeds (hemp, flax, chia, pumpkin) and almond butter and extra-virgin coconut butter, and avocados (!), all fresh and organic of course.
4. Eat a salad of mixed greens and 4-6 ounces of lean protein (chicken, fish or hard-boiled eggs, no lunch meats) and homemade vinaigrette.
5. Exercise - at least take a walk.
6. Snack on nuts or veggies and (non-dairy, gluten-free, made from scratch) dip.
7. Breathe for at least five minutes (meditation encouraged).
8. Eat one of the fabulous dinners requiring many fresh and organic-only ingredients and more than three steps. Pretty much grilled or broiled chicken and fish, with herbs, soy sauce, ginger, garlic, oils or vinegars as sauces, with a big side of 1-2 vegetables with the same spectrum of seasonings.
9. Take a long list of supplements, which are sold on the website in a convenient package.
10. Take a fiber supplement to keep things moving down below (gotta get the toxins out of your body somehow!) - a specific one, also sold on the website.
11. Take a bath with epsom salts, baking soda and essential oil of lavender.
12. Fill out some tracking sheets.
13. Media diet: turn off the entertainment electronics.
14. Get at least seven (preferably eight) hours of sleep.

What I actually did:  Numbers 1 (weight only), 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 11 (twice in ten days). Not sure everything was organic. Didn't hit seven hours of sleep once in the ten days.

I note how very close to Atkins induction the food is. The main difference is no-dairy (Atkins allows some) and the berries for smoothies, and Atkins allows nuts only after the first two weeks. Also Atkins doesn't emphasize organic or cooking from fresh yourself - they are fine with processed foods as long as you read the ingredients to make sure there are no hidden carbs like corn starch which is prevalent in low fat foods. I guess I'm still a little defensive about Atkins, though the world is slowly coming to realize he was (nearly) right all along.

Takoma Park 5K

I'm just back from the Takoma Park 5K, an event for which I was sadly undertrained.  However, I did my best and that satisfies me fine. I don't have the official results yet, but I had three different devices tracking me (!) and the unofficial results are a pace of about 13:20 and a time of about 41 minutes.

EDIT: OFFICIAL RESULTS

545 278/327  190/219    480 Nan Shellabarger      F 59 Silver Spring MD    00:41:06 13:14 00:41:35 13:23   

It means I was 278 out of 327 (190 out of 219 women) and my time was 41:06 for a pace of 13:14.

I ran the first mile, and from then on, alternated jogging and walking. My heart rate had gotten quite high - over 150 - and I really couldn't maintain that for long. It seems that for this morning, at least, that heart rate was the edge of nausea - my redline.  So I walked until the heart rate dropped and then I'd jog till it got back up and stayed there for a bit.  The first time, I was looking for the recovery rate of 120 but then I thought "wait a minute, this is a race, just go as fast as you can" so I'd recover to under 140 and then push into a jog again.  Just before the end, my left calf started to hurt but I barely noticed it. It's quite sore now, however.

I had half a berry-and-nut smoothie (no dairy) beforehand and a small cup of coffee (I'm just re-caffeinating from the detox). Plenty of water.  No water along the way (didn't think it would help the nausea).

Before the race

PsychoKiller blaring on the sound system. I'm adding to my playlist!

Milling about in the starting pen

We're off!  (Into the sun)

Fast runners heading back the other way

I'm now back with the children and strollers and walkers

The finish!!!

Homage to BitchCakes. Plus I'm strangely reluctant to remove the number.

Detoxification: 2

How did I conceive of this plan, ill-timed as it was?  It started with this article in the New York Times. It described how Bill Clinton was not a vegan any more but was healthier and trimmer than ever. So he and Hilary consult this guy, Mark Hyman, on not only their own health, but on health policy issues. He is all about "functional medicine", treating a whole person, not the disease. And he knows that rampant sugar is the evil that makes so many of us fat, and he's got a bunch of books on managing your blood sugar and weight loss.  Oddly enough, I read this article while taking a break from re-reading Diet 101: The Truth about Low-Carb Diets.  I had been looking for some way to control my evening overeating, and I was considering getting a blood glucose meter to check my blood sugar regularly as recommended in Diet 101.

So how legit can you get? Bill and Hilary's doctor, recommending we should eat the way I've been trying to eat since 1997!

I was put off by his web site. He's all about selling on the web. There are many products he sells, including packages of supplements, coaching, and seminars, and books. How is it that someone who claims to follow in the tracks of Mark Bittman and Michael Pollan ("Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.") likes all these protein powders and supplements? If we're eating real, fresh, organic, fresh food, and cooking for ourselves at home to avoid hidden ingredients, why do we need all supplements, and hyper-processed protein powders?

But I digress. I was looking for motivation and possible solutions to my current bad feelings and behavior, and he had a basic message that I was ready to hear, because I already agree with its broad outlines. It was the details I wanted.

I downloaded The Blood Sugar Solution, and began reading. Frustration: too many pages about how sugar and insulin and fat work in your body. Yeah, yeah, I got all that. Atkins, Carbohydrate Addicts, yada yada yada. But what do you DO?  I'm sure its in there somewhere, but back on the website I read about the 10-day detox diet, so I went and got that book as well.  Again, pages of explanation, but finally, what to do and what to eat.

I am not really a slow and steady kind of person. I'm prone to full out enthusiasms between periods of remaining motionless and unmotivated. I can do ten days of almost anything, and I want the gratification.  I asked my girl, on a lark, if she would want to do it too, and was surprised but thrilled when she said "yes".  So I was off and running.

Detoxification: 1

I just finished ten days of Dr Mark Hyman's Blood Sugar Solution 10-day Detox Diet.  I couldn't post while I was doing it because I felt bad the whole time.  But I still have a lot to say about it.

Quick summary of what "it" is:  a very low carb, gluten free, dairy-free, caffeine and alcohol-free high fiber diet, with breathing, exercise, baths, journalling, and volumes of vitamin supplements, designed to drive out "toxins" from your body and create a lovely and serene good feeling body to build on for future good health.

Why did I do it?

• Because I felt bad.  Not all the time, but much of the time. Body aches, sore knees and back, headaches.
• 
  
• Because I was out of control on sugar. Most days started out fine. I would have my cheese and/or meat for breakfast, a vegetable salad with meat for lunch, and a reasonably healthy meat and vegetable focused dinner. Then I'd have just my one small treat. Over the course of the rest of the evening, I would be on a search-and-consume mission to find every bit of chocolate in the house (very few treats have no chocolate). 
• 
  
• Out of curiosity, so see if it made a difference. To see what I felt like as "me", not "me on sugar, gluten, dairy, and caffeine". 
• 
  
• Because my girl agreed to do it with me, and I am constantly worried about her eating and food habits.

So I have muddled results, and I need to think about it. Of course, I wish I had done more writing and tracking during the process (which is actually meant to be part of the process), but I routinely entered some data points into my multiplicity of tracking systems, so I'll have some real evidence to look at. I want to establish what I did and how I felt, and compare to before (and now) - because I have to keep reminding myself that the reason I did it was because I was feeling bad.

This was a really stupidly bad time to take this on, because there is a lot of work required to make food and do the other steps and my always demanding job grew more hectic with a new boss, the logistics of life became complicated because they are working on my road and sometimes I needed to park blocks away, and because I am going to run a 5K tomorrow and it made me feel so bad I didn't even keep up all my walking much less any running.

More later. I'm burning daylight.