Spring Cleanse: Days -1 to 1

Here's a pretty uncensored diary of what happened to me early on.

The days before I began
I'm already starting off annoyed. Although my emotional eating binges have been under better control as of late (happening 1 day a week instead of a chain of days, and generally not as bad quantity-wise when they do), Friday ended up being a "bad" food day. Rather than getting angry with myself, I decided to look at it with curiosity and ask why. I determined that it was because I felt socially awkward in a number of situations.

On Saturday I "made up" for Friday--I went most of the day without eating (mostly from being busy). Had a nice quiche from Cafe on the Common around 1:30 pm, and then a lovely salmon dinner with veggies and wine with a friend for dinner. After dinner, however, a voice in my head told me, "you're going to be deprived for 7 days--go get yourself some chocolate cake." (Of course this wasn't true, given my cleanse criteria.) I was actually worried the stores would be closed, so I looked up Hannaford's hours, and I will shamefully admit that at 10:30 pm I drove myself there, went right to the bakery, and grabbed a familiar friend: "chocolate overload cake". Actually it's TWO pieces of chocolate cake, surrounded by the best grocery store icing I've ever had. I suppose it's progress that I made it home and got a fork before eating it (as there have been times I shoved it down in the car with my fingers probably as recently as 6 months ago), and that I took my time trying to find something on the TV. The whole time the voice in my head that said, "don't do this, you don't need this, you'll regret this" was overridden by a primal urge to do it anyway. Sigh. After eating almost all of it, I felt so sick I actually tried to throw up. (That never works for me, by the way. I seem to have a rock solid stomach no matter what I do to it.) And yes folks, the health and fitness nut has been struggling with an eating disorder. So yay, if it wasn't clear, it is now. I'm officially out of the closet. It's actually not my only issue (I've had a rough few years) but it's the only one I'll admit to now, and that's hard enough. For the record, I hope that this experience will help me better coach others in the future. I always say I like to experience something before I tell other people about it, so hey, I suppose it's part of my journey.

Day 1: a new start
This morning I didn't want to get out of bed, but I wanted to "weigh in" at the start of this cleanse at the time when I normally would weigh myself. OK, 116. The most I've ever weighed in my life--and after improving on the binging and getting back on a good workout program for at least a month, it's depressing because I've gained a pound. And before you start rolling your eyes, I'll just remind you that I'm 5 feet tall, have a stomach hanging out where my incredible abs used to be, and don't fit into so many of the clothes in my closet that I had to actually go buy "fat pants"--plus I wear yoga pants way too often these days (for that reason, and because I teach so much). It's all relative people, so before you tell me I'm crazy, think about that. My goal was to lose 3-5 in this 7 days, and this makes me really want to stick to it and lose the 5. However, I'm feeling much like I started yesterday--I don't want to eat because I want to somehow "make up" for last night's binge. And I know that's not the right thing to do. So I've taken my herbs and had my lemon water (something I do anyway, so no big deal)...now it's onto green tea (yuck) and making this protein shake thing I don't really want to have because I keep thinking it will be a ton of calories. But I suppose if I want to have energy to exercise, I need to "eat", and I want to do this program by the book so I can accurately report out.

I'm not constipated yet, yay. The shake finally allowed me to use up this Rainbow Light rice protein powder I haven't much liked--the other ingredients in it actually make it sort of tolerable, though I had to add in extra water to liquify it more, and I already miss the green smoothies I was doing in the mornings. If I do lose 5 lbs, I wonder if this is safe enough to do for 2 weeks and lose 10? After looking it up, it seems as though I can do it up to 3 months if I like! I'm aiming to do it for 2 and a half weeks now, to see if I can feel better about myself before my trip to Austin.

The broth is fine to drink (I bought mine instead of making it from fresh vegetables--it wasn't the work; I just couldn't bring myself to discard all of the veggies afterwards!). I went on a cooking spree this afternoon, making kale with ginger/garlic/olive oil, cod, brown rice (to which I added 1 tsp tumeric as it was simmering), and garlic/rosemary chicken on the George Foreman grill. I ended up with a lot more food than I expected, but I need more lemons. At lunch I added 1/4 avocado because I bought one, it's allowed, and it's going to go bad if I don't eat it over the next day or so. I was totally satisfied by the amount, and it reminded me of the Buddha cleanse. And I love the organic purple cauliflower I found--it's SO pretty!

I did my TurboFire HIIT 25 (from yesterday, admittedly) and am about to do Fire 40 (for today). I'd hoped to go to the gym too but I just can't fit it in, and that might be just a wee bit too much, even for me. I'm looking forward to my bath tonight, because I haven't taken one in awhile, and with getting my hair colored yesterday, it's easier than avoiding getting it wet in the shower. Plus, I stink!

OK, around 4 pm when I had my second cup of broth, it made me hungry. So I made a second shake and took it with me to my yoga class. After drinking it and as I neared the class, I felt very tired and didn't feel at all like being social, much less teaching a class. At that moment I noticed all my cravings rushing in: that chocolate cake I had last night, alcohol, Starbucks (or hell, even Dunkin Donuts--yeah, I've become a coffee snob). I thought that was an interesting association. No one showed up because after all, it was Easter. But I stayed in the room and practiced a trickier part of my flow, then laid in a restorative posture given that I had all the available props. Wow, was that nice. I think I was only doing it for 20 minutes or so but ahhhh....

I went home to have dinner (a LOT of food it seemed, especially with the broth too but I wasn't feeling stuffed), then to take my soak. I discovered a spider as I was filling the tub. Or rather, TRYING to fill the tub, which in my new apartment apparently doesn't hold water very well. I ended up laying in a few inches of water for the 20 minutes, pondering how to rectify the problem tomorrow. Stayed up an hour past my bedtime when I swore I'd be using this cleanse to get better rest. Sigh.