Days 4 and 5

Finally! I think I'm over the headache-y hump. Yesterday and today were fantastic, with only slight tinges of headaches each day. They came & left quickly both times, which was nice. Clearly, my body is still adjusting to the new way we're doing things these days, but overall, I have a feeling the worst physical symptoms are behind me.

I have to say that tonight I finally got creative about dinner, branched out, and the risk paid off. I decided we were going to have vegan BLT's, so I headed to HEB and grabbed some smoky bacon flavored tempeh. What the heck is tempeh, you ask? Soybeans, essentially, but technically it's a "highly nutritious fermented food made from soybeans, with a high protein content."

I fried this up in some healthy (but often misunderstood) coconut oil, toasted up some Udi's gluten free bread, piled on sliced tomato, green leaf lettuce, and subbed guacamole for mayo and voila! I have to say, it was surprisingly similar to the real thing, sans the grease, and it was GOOD. I wasn't sure how it would go once I opened the tempeh package, but thankfully it tasted better than it looked. That stuff downright scared the hell out of me at first.

(Sorry for no pictures of my food so far, I'm going to try and fix that over the next few days.)

At this point in our journey, I have to give props to my husband. He amazes me every single day. That he was even willing to do this in the first place is quite something, but the fact that he has abstained from meat, Red Bulls, and sweet tea for five days straight is downright amazing. Even just a few weeks ago, I would've never thought he would make it this long eating vegan. No complaints, either - just positive attitude, supporting text messages when I'm sniveling about everyone else in my office eating pizza, and a completely open mind about whatever food we might encounter over the next two weeks. I adore him, and have fallen in love all over again with this new, vegan version of my man. He's the bomb-dot-com, and I'm grateful he was willing to take on this challenge with me.

Good, solid sack time is a part of this cleanse, and it hasn't taken long to get used to sleeping more at night. My body literally starts to gently shut down around 9:30pm every night to go into cell-reparation mode, so I will pay attention to the signals I'm getting (think: incessant yawning) and hit the hay for now. No complaints the past two days, only good stuff. Love it.

Bring it, Day 6!

Love, peace & veggies.

Day 3

Day 3 was much better than Day 2 ended. Only a slight headache in the afternoon, as well as a yawn-filled afternoon lull around 5:00pm. Still didn't feel completely like myself, but I wasn't as miserable as the day before.

We just weren't in the mood to figure out what to cook for dinner, so we hit up Kerbey Lane instead.

We had their vegan breakfast tacos (rice, black beans, potatoes, salsa and tofu scramble or veggie chorizo) in corn tortillas. I personally liked the tofu scramble better, whereas Aaron like the veggie chorizo better. It was nice to have someone else do the cooking, and it was also nice to know there is a restaurant we can go to if we want to eat out. I won't lie, though - my inner carb/sugar/butter/cheese loving self was crying like a baby looking at all the other tables who had pancakes or queso.

As we were driving home from dinner last night, I felt a small, weird sadness kind of set in. I realized that I really, REALLY look forward to food everyday, and eating this new way kind of obliterates that. Don't misunderstand - the food is good, and I know we're doing something good, but I have nothing culinary to get excited about for the next three weeks, and that kind of bummed me out. It probably sounds weird to those who don't really enjoy the food they eat everyday, but I always have. Aaron is a perfect example of what I'm talking about ... he has always just eaten to fill the hole. He didn't use mealtimes as fun, unless it was a special occasion or a weekend excursion on one of our Sunday drives. I have always been the opposite, and sincerely got excited about the food I ate each day. I guess I need to delve more into recipes and finding new things to try, and that spark may come back. I'm going to have to get creative anyway, because I can easily foresee 18 more days of salad and raw veggies getting really old, really fast.

On to Day 4!

Love, peace, & veggies.

Day 2

The morning and afternoon went well, then the evening wreaked havoc on me. Got a headache around 1:00pm, and it didn't go away until I finally fell asleep for the night. I was trying not to take anything, because my headache medicine has caffeine in it, and thankfully, I survived. I got achy muscles along with the headache last night, so I soaked in a hot bath, which seemed to help a little. Being awake and functioning at any normal level was a challenge last night, though. Thank goodness Aaron was feeling well, and for Pee Wee Herman's Big Adventure, because both seemed to keep Z entertained while I rotted in a chair/the tub.

We were all in bed by 8:30pm.

Most importantly though, we managed to continue avoiding sugar, caffeine, dairy, meat, gluten and alcohol, and we ate/drank all our fruit & veggies, so overall, it was still a good day.

The book we're following said that headaches, muscle weakness, fatigue, and feeling a little cloudy in the head are all par for the course during the first few days. The only real option is to grin and bear it (which I did). I hope Aaron doesn't have to feel what I did last night, because it wasn't the greatest way to spend an evening.

On with Day 3!

Love, peace, & veggies.

Day 1

We decided, after our weekend of food-filled gluttony, that we should probably go ahead and start the cleanse Monday (original date was Tuesday). If we waited one more day, we might have gone into cardiac arrest.

Fortunately, we were both off from work today, which probably made this day much more fun than it would have been, had we braved it alone at our respective workplaces. We began our day with a glass of purified water, added lemon juice & a dash of cayenne pepper (to get our circulation moving), and skipped coffee. It was actually ok! Who would have ever thought I would say that on day 1?

We dropped Z off at school, then came home and each had a mug of green tea, no sweeteners or weird things added to it. Just straight green tea. If I'm going to be honest, it wasn't my favorite, but this is only the beginning of eating/drinking things I'm not used to & I have to learn to go with the flow. (Speaking of flow, the water + green tea had us both peeing like racehorses by 10:00am.) After finishing our tea, we dressed out and went on an hour-long morning walk.

Next was our morning green drink. We had "green machine" smoothies (courtesy of Naked drinks), which consisted of apple, banana, kiwi, mango, pineapple, spirulina, chlorella, broccoli, blue green algae, spinach, garlic, barley grass, wheat grass, ginger, and parsley. I know it sounds terrifying, but the fruit makes it sweet and they are delicious. I have been drinking these for a few years now, off and on, and Z has always lovingly referred to them as my "booger juice shakes". That'll give you an idea of how they look in your glass, but I promise, they are scrumptious. After our smoothies, we each had a small bowl of organic flax granola with almond milk. Definitely filled us up, and kept us going until lunch.

After running a few errands, we came back and had lunch. Today, our lunch was splitting a can of Amy's Kitchen black bean chili alongside big salads with gluten-free dressing. Our salads had green leaf lettuce, organic spinach, organic raw carrots, organic tomatoes, organic raw broccoli, flax seeds, celery, and broccoli sprouts. Holy moley! We were stuffed afterward! This cleanse definitely is not about starving yourself, it's exactly the opposite. You can eat your weight in veggies and that's ok. I can dig it.

After lunch, we had a few hours before picking up Z from school. Since we are supposed to do meditation, I made my first attempt. Yeeeeeeah ... I suck at meditation, apparently. I kept trying to do what I've been told and focus on breathing, etc, but all I kept doing was falling asleep. Oops! Guess my body was trying to tell me something about how much more rest I need, but I never did succeed at meditating. I will keep trying, though, and hopefully things will fall into place soon enough.

After picking up Z, we had our mid-afternoon snack - I chose a vegan blueberry yogurt cup, and Aaron opted for the vegan coconut yogurt. (Both were surprisingly yummy.) We hung out with Z, relaxed, and watched some tv, then it was time for dinner. I opted for a slightly smaller version of our lunchtime salad, as well as a vegetable medley (red potatoes, onions, tomatoes, northern beans, and basil) we lightly sauteed, and a vegan Boca "burger". Aaron went with salad, the vegetable medley, and Amy's soup. Z had what he's always known to be chicken nuggets (actually Morningstar Chik'n nuggets) and salad. He even became curious about the flax seeds, and asked if he could try some. Once he figured out they don't taste like anything, he dumped a good pile into his own salad and munched away. Just goes to show you how powerful leading by example can be.

We were once again stuffed after dinner, and relaxed together as a family the rest of the evening until bedtime. Since part of the cleanse is to make sure you get adequate sleep, we were all in bed early. I did spend about 20 minutes preparing Aaron & I's food for our lunches at work today, which is all part of the program - gotta think ahead. Only complaint so far? Aaron and I both got headaches, almost simultaneously, around 7:30pm. All in all, I'd say it was an incredibly successful first day.

I promise I won't continue to give a blow-by-blow of everything we ate for every meal, just trying to give some examples of what we found at the store that were tasty and healthful. Everything except the vegetable medley were found at our normal HEB, thankfully, because I think we'd be broke if we tried to shop only at Whole Foods or Central Market. Even getting everything at HEB added up quickly, and took us off guard at how much more our grocery bill was, but that's ok. Once the sticker shock wore off, we remembered it's all for a great cause.

Looking forward to Day 2!

Love, peace, & veggies.

Finally back

Wow, that was a really long, unintentional hiatus I just finished. Whew! What a busy, hot, blazing fast summer that was. August was a complete blur. It's finally time to stop, take a deep breath, and reflect.

There were some good things about this summer, like going to visit my cousin, school starting, and air conditioning, but if I'm going to be honest, I'd have to say the end of the summer had me pretty beaten down. Work is always the craziest in August, and this year was no exception, but that was the least of my worries at most times. Because I didn't want to use this blog as a place to solely complain, I dealt with my stress in other ways. The record heat of this summer kept me from running & getting that stress out naturally, so I did my best to compensate and find other ways to decompress. But mostly, I did feel like I took a whippin' throughout the month of August. There wasn't enough exercise, alcohol, or chocolate in the world to actually comfort me - it was just too much. To give you a brief rundown what I'm talking about, I'll quickly spout out the list of stressors that were giving me a run for my money:

- Aaron changed jobs.

- Lost insurance coverage.

- Car broke down weekly for the entire month of August.

- One of the times it died, I was on the side of the road in 100+ degree heat, with my kid.

- Had to get a rental car, for the first time ever.

- Aaron's new job had (or has?) payroll glitches, which resulted in delayed paychecks, sometimes up to a week late.

- Diving into the world of private insurance, which was overwhelming and frustrating.

- Without insurance, Z's monthly medications came to $472.00. For two nose sprays and a daily chewable pill. Seriously? Thank God for sympathetic doctors who took pity on me & gave me samples to carry him through until I found insurance.

- My debilitating pain-inducing cyst made an appearance, after 8 years of not having shown it's ugly self.

- School starting, which included school supply shopping - the first year since we've been at our school where I opted out of buying the pre-packaged supply pack. Stupid me. Lesson learned.

- A friend needed a place to stay, so we had her move in with us. She is a joy, don't misunderstand, but it was still something that took place amidst the craziness of August.

- Enduring the wretched, God-awful, surface-of-the-sun type heat, day in & day out.

- And of course, the busiest work load of my entire calendar year. This month, only. Of course.

So, now you may see why I didn't have time to blog, or rather, why I had no business blogging. It would've been a sonic whine-fest. I was emotionally tapped out, pissed off, and as edgy as any of my worst PMSing weeks of the past. But I'm happy to report, we survived the crap-filled curveballs that life threw at us over the past six weeks, and actually lived to tell about it. And what are we doing to reward ourselves? Starting a 21-day cleanse on September 27, which consists of no meat, no dairy, no white anything (bread, sugar, table salt), no gluten, and no caffeine. Yes, I know, we are gluttons for punishment.

Since I still refuse to use my blog to a place to vent my complaints about how much I'm going to miss my morning coffee for the next 3 weeks, I will instead use my blog as a place to log our journey into the strange, unknown world of raw, healthy, non-processed foods. Along with the new way of eating will come intentional meditation, consistent exercise, and positive thinking - otherwise, we don't stand a chance. To be clear, only Aaron and I are participating in this vegan nightmare (<-- oops! not positive!), it's not something I want to put Z through right now. We will slowly change over his diet to more of this way of life, but in baby steps. I don't need him having a meltdown from the sudden shock of withdrawing every less-than-healthy thing he consumes during the week. It's going to be bad enough that Aaron and I are going through it, and we'll need him here to mediate and keep us from turning on each other & getting a divorce. Mood swings are inevitable. Crankiness? A given. I'm just hoping once the first few days are over, we'll remember how much we liked each other before all this began.

I posted our impending challenge up on Facebook, and was surprised by how many people contacted me either on that day, or privately since that day, asking me to blog about our experience with the cleanse. I was even asked by several people to journal daily. I would love to do that, but I can't guarantee I will be able to blog every day. I will most certainly try, though, and can almost see myself being able to post everyday -- since I won't be spending time eating or feeling slothy from what I ate earlier that day, I should have all kinds of new free time on my hands. Awesome!

So, in light of the newfound health adventure we will embark on in 4 days, I will amend my usual closing (love, peace, and chicken grease) to love, peace, and veggies. Not nearly as catchy, but gotta kickstart that positive thinking now! Until next time ...

Love, peace, & veggies to all.