Friday, January 8, 2016

When Life Gives You Lemons... Make Green Juice!

One of my goals for 2016 is to lose some weight and get in better physical shape! I have been working on this goal for a few years now, and I am constantly going up and down. Well the last 4 months or so I have been steadily gaining weight, and just not feeling well. I have had some medical tests come back showing that things were just not right with me as well. As I kept visiting the doctor, we kept noticing issues in my blood work, but nothing that pointed to a definite diagnosis. 
As the doctor threw medicinal solutions at me and said, "I don't know if this will for sure fix your problem, but let's just try it." I asked myself... "do I want to be some medical guinea pig?" I didn't want to just try some medicine as a shot in the dark... especially if we didn't have a conclusive diagnosis... so I started doing some reading (I am sure doctors hate google!)... and I came across a website... Reboot With Joe. 

Joe made a documentary called, Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead, and wrote I book. I watched the film, read the book, and began thinking about all the things he said. It wasn't something I had never heard before, but it was the first time I had seen the information presented in that way. So, Joe's idea was to juice for 60 days. He had some health issues and well... was just Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead. While I may not be what someone would consider Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead... I am slightly overweight and feel totally bleh most of the time. So Joe's results really made me curious. After Juicing only for 60 days Joe felt great! He looked great! He was off his medicine and was just doing great! And he had inspired me to see if this could be something I could do. 
The idea behind a Juice Reboot is to reboot your system. We fill our bodies with so much processed junk and sugar and just way to much food! So by rebooting and drinking only fruit and vegetable juice then the body can stop going crazy trying to process a whole lot of junk that we aren't even designed to process and start to remember what it's like to process food the right way again... (that's my super short explanation... check out www.rebootwithjoe.com for the whole scoop). 

Well then, I was ready to give this a shot after I read the book and watched the film. I mean I had tried everything else I could, and I knew I wanted to try something and not just feel like I was getting no where. While a 60 day reboot would be somewhat extreme especially for me, starting with a 15 or 30 day reboot was much more manageable and according to the book, ok to try without a doctor's supervision. So I recruited my Dad (always one of my biggest fans and supporters) and watched the film with him and we decided we would both give the 15 day Reboot plan a try and then see how 15 days went before deciding whether to go longer. My biggest hopes for what I wanted out of the 15 days was to lose some weight (not gain anymore!) and to see a significant difference in how I felt (ex. more energy, less symptoms I have been experiencing etc.). I was ready to get started! 

So then what does a 15 day Reboot look like? The idea is strictly fruits and vegetables. No sugar, No grains, No Dairy, No Meat.... All things I love!!!! But also where I have gotten into trouble eating so many things that just really aren't good for my body! The Reboot begins with a 5 day transition period. Which I wasn't sure how I felt about at first. I kind of just wanted to jump right in to juice, but the plan suggested starting with some soups and salads as well to ease into the juice only diet. Then the last 10 days is juice only, and if continuing with days 16 - 30, those days would also be juice only. 

How has the Reboot been going? Well, I am on day 5 of the 15 days. This day brings about the end of the transition period. I have really enjoyed the transition period even though I wasn't sure how I felt about it. The vegetable soups and the salads have been so good! I am glad to have these ideas to add to my arsenal of recipes for after the Reboot is over! Generally, the day has begun with 8oz of hot water with lemon and ginger, then Breakfast has been a smoothie made with leafy greens and some fruit and water/coconut water. Then mid morning is a juice made with mostly vegetables and fruit... no sugar or anything added but the fruits and vegetables. Then lunch has been soup or salad mostly. I made an acorn squash and apple soup and a green veggie soup... and all the ingredients in the soup are vegetables and some seasoning with vegetable stock. The Green soup is absolutely my favorite!! I will be making it again and again! The afternoon snack is another juice, and dinner is usually soup or salad again. The prep work was a little more daunting then I thought but it was manageable and I have honestly enjoyed everything I have eaten or well... drank. 

After 5 days I wasn't sure what the results would be. Really, I didn't know if I would even make it 5 days. But, I can say I did make it 5 days! Day 1 was tough... I felt sluggish and slow and had a headache. Day 2 was harder... the cravings were hitting me hard. Day 3 - Day 5 have just been getting better and better. I feel better, I don't feel as tired as I had been feeling before I started the Juice Reboot, and believe it or not I am not hungry. I thought with just fruits ad vegetables and juice I would be starving! SO, what about the weight loss... well on day 5 I have lost 5 lbs! I know that it comes from making such a drastic change and water weight and blah blah blah... but you know for me this is huge. I have been doing everything I can the last 4 months to lose weight and just gaining, and to actually do something and have lost some weight is a huge motivator for me! Maybe I have just woken up my metabolism enough that I can keep making a positive change. 
Things I have learned from this first 5 days: 
1. I eat way too many little bites of everything throughout the day. I realized that I am a constant grazer! When I make the kids breakfast, I take a little bite. When I pack lunches, I take a little bite. When I walk through the house and see food, I take a little bite. And often I do it without even thinking!

2. I crave sugar like an addict! Breaking this addiction of sugar is going to be huge! I love sweets and chocolate and baked goods and all kinds of things! I love to cook them and I love to eat them. While these things are ok in moderation I think the problem becomes when out body craves them and we can't say no or we don't recognize when we have had enough. What has been hard about this is we just came out of the Holiday season and my house still has all kinds of treats laying around. Walking past the treats and not having one is soooooo difficult, but I have managed it so far and the cravings are definitely less intense. 

3. Eating food is connected to my emotions. I am an emotional eater. There is something satisfying about eating certain foods. The feelings I get when I eat some foods is what I am addicted too more than the food itself. So many things that aren't good for me are like comfort food, or what I like to eat on a bad day, and I realize that it becomes my go to solution. I tell myself that I deserve it or that I don't have time to make something healthy so I use my go to comfort food solution as a quick and easy option, and then I fill my body with junk. This is the hardest habit to break. I want to eat so many things that I absolutely know I shouldn't and even 5 days in not busting out the chips and salsa, or eating a slice of pizza or my favorite fast food meal is difficult. 

4. I eat because I am bored. Munching on food because I think I am hungry when really I am just bored is something my eyes were really opened to. These last 5 days I have just kept my water bottle near by and when I think I am hungry I drink a bunch of water and realize I wasn't really hungry I was just bored! I also need to clean up my snacking choices to be more plant based things vs. processed things. 

I would say so far this is working. Five days in and I am feeling pretty successful... I loved the quote, "when life gives you lemons... make green juice!" because I feel I had given my life lemons by eating such junk and getting my body to the point I am/was at. So I decided to make some green juice, and it tasted really great! Cheers to the next 10 days! 

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