March 4, I kicked off the 21 Day Sugar Detox, or the Whole 30 on crack as I like to call it, through balanced bites.
My weight loss has slowed substantially since the holiday season and while I could tell my body composition was changing, its been fairly discouraging to see the scale stuck in one spot (or creeping up in the wrong direction).
There hasn't been anything inherently wrong with my diet. I'm sticking fairly close to my paleo(or primal) 80/20 rule, but that 80 has been comprised of a lot of fruit and nuts (paleo sugar!!!) and some not so careful label reading. Thus the stall in a year's worth of infinite progress.
Which brought me to the sugar detox.
I unknowingly chose both the best and worst time to attempt the 21 day sugar detox.
A back injury half-way through, kept me from my beloved Crossfit stumptown, but my 25th birthday brought the temptation of booze and sweets on several occasions.
However, in spite of temptation the detox went well. I did allow some cheats, but they were methodical and planned out, not the source of giving in or stress.
In 21 days, I lost 5.5 pounds and dropped a pant size, which is GREAT.
BUT
More importantly, I learned some valuable things about my emotional response to food and
kicked(or slowed) some bad habits.
- Ode to artificial sweetener!
- The plague of diet soda had crept back into my life, almost on a daily occurence. Something about diet dr. pepper just brings joy to my life. But as my sister would say, its cancer in a bottle, so I said buhbye to it this whole detox. BAM.
- GUM. I swear I am a serial gum chewer. I chew a pack a day, constantly smacking my jaw up and down, popping winterfreshy goodness with my tongue. Its absurd. Somehow, I managed to nix this habit through the whole detox (save one "I just ate fish" necessity).
- Fruit was my go-to snack
- I come home from work, I go straight to the fruit bowl for an apple, orange or banana. Same story if I'm hungry at desk. Sometimes is dried cherries, apples, or banana chips. Never carrots or celery.
- I had to come up with new snack ideas
- Green Apples with homemade sunbutter
- hard-boiled eggs
- sliced ham or turkey lunch meat with carrots or celery
- Or just drinking tea or water, because I wasn't hungry, I was bored!
- Stress equals sweet-tooth.
- Anytime I got overwhelmed or stressed I discovered my initial response was to walk straight towards the treat door for some dark chocolate or really whatever I could find.
- The detox forced me to find other ways to unwind. Now, I make a cup of tea, take a walk with the dog, or practice my piano to quell the crazy.
- Emotional Balance
- I've always known that the less sugar dependent I am, the more balanced I feel, but I never realize to what extent it is until I remove sugar completely.
- After the first week, allowing my body to adjust to the fact that I wasn't going to get that banana or dark chocolate fix, I started to feel better. My energy was up, my sleep was deeper, and the fact that I couldn't make it to the gym was far less emotionally-disastrous than it would have been a month ago.
I broke my sugar fast this weekend at my family birthday celebration with some delicious peach crisp my lovely sister made for me. So sweet, so good, but I couldn't finish the helping I was served. Truly a treat, instead of a staple. I'll surely incorporate fruit back into my diet, but with more moderation and care than previously exercised.
