Halfway Through the Cleanse

I'm at the half way point of my twice yearly dietary cleanse which helps me get my eating (post holidays) back into a healthy groove.  As usual the first week wasn't bad at all.  Jill - the nutrition counselor that my wife and I follow the advice of -  plans our meals during our cleanse: What foods we'll eat, what our snacks during the day look like, and ensures, or tries to, that I drink all the water that I'm supposed to.  (Which doesn't always happen.  Long story, but it's a rarity for me to drink enough water during the day).  So, week one is in the books and I feel good.

The first week was full of whole foods, lots of vegetables, and everything was as minimally to non-processed as possible.  No caffeine, no alcohol.....just water.  Everything is done with a focus on detoxifying the body.  This weekend, however, began the 3 day period of raw foods and juicing.

I'm not opposed to raw foods - heck, I like apples!  And juices?  Sounds yummy. 

Here's an excerpt of my Saturday menu:

Day 7 Juices

8am: Energizer: apple, ginger, beet, lime juice
10am: cucumber, spinach, parsley, spirulina, kiwi, lemon
12pm: carrot, apple, beet, grapefruit, ginger
2pm: cucumber, carrot, celery, kale, parsley, lemon
6pm: carrot, apple, celery, zucchini, lemon

Wait, I'm juicing kale?  I don't even know what kale is!  Well, that's not true, I do.  But I'm pretty sure I don't want to juice it.  And can I just say that my 1000a juice yesterday was, well....how can I put this delicately?.....a little tough to take.

I should have taken a picture of it - it was green, sludgy.  The image is forever burned in my brain.

I'm really poking fun here (mostly) as a lot of the above mentioned juices are actually quite tasty, filling, and I still have energy and mojo.  When I say I'm "mostly" poking fun, it's because there are a couple things on there that I just had to substitute. (I'll leave it to you to decide what got tossed off the recipe list).

In the end, however, I'm feeling good - had a good session on the bike trainer the past couple of days, and I'm headed to the pool shortly.  And with less than a week to go I know that I'll be feeling refreshed and will once again have a firm grip on my diet and the ridiculousness of the holiday season consumption will be behind me.