21-Day Cleanse

I'm almost done! Three more days and I will have officially completed a 21-day cleanse. My mom did it, too! 

The regimen for the past 21 days has been a smoothie for breakfast, a healthy lunch (I typically eat something like brown rice with roasted vegetables and chickpeas), and a dairy-free soup for dinner. 

On the good side: I feel great. I've lost about eight pounds. I sleep better. I don't have weird shifts in my energy levels. I can exercise easily (run three miles or do yoga for an hour). I think I have broken my addition to sugar.

On the bad side: I miss food! I especially miss cheese and bread. Big time. I thought I would miss desserts the most, but I don't. It's the dairy and the carbs! And I never want to touch a bowl of soup again. 

When the cleanse ends, I'm not going to go crazy and start stuffing my face. I'm going to ease into a life of moderation. I'm going to work really hard to primarily eat for sustenance, and then for joy, and rarely to fill an emotional need. I'm going to continue to look for recipes with cleaner, more whole ingredients and reduce my intake in general (especially when we go out to dinner on Friday and Saturday night).

Mustering up the motivation to resist bread, quesadillas, queso, chips, macaroni and cheese, pizza--etc.--for 21 days was so, so hard! It helped when I would project myself into the future (specifically to the end of the cleanse) and to feel what it would feel like to get to the end. I knew I would feel proud if I got to the end.  

I don't necessarily recommend the process I went through, although it was a good jump start to a healthy new year. My mom and I have had a great time talking every day (sometimes several times a day) about how it has been going for us. I look forward to continuing to support her for the rest of the year as she strives to achieve her weight loss goal by Christmas 2016.

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