Clean Detox Week Three

My clean program detox snack box I kept with me at my national sales meeting.

 

Day Fifteen- January 16th:

Had good sleep and got to work and got a ton accomplished. Today went more or less like my other good detox days. I had great energy and focus and got a lot done at the office. For lunch today I had collard wraps with the nut pate I made last night, and I have to say I really enjoyed them. Just as filling as a whole wheat wrap, but without that carb “slump” you get afterwards. After work I got home at a normal time, enjoyed my curried cauliflower soup dinner with Jim, and then headed out to the gym for 30 minutes of cardio, followed by a 30 minute personal training session. It was probably one of my best work out sessions yet, I felt fantastic and full of energy. Afterwards in the evening while relaxing on the couch on my iPad, I discovered kinda by accident some bento box websites and think I’m not totally obsessed. I don’t know if it’s the cleanse and mentally wanting to eat more food, or the fact the food is so cute and organized that’s so appealing. I wasted about an hour looking at photos of bentos, and then fell into a deep sleep around 11.

Day Sixteen: January 17th:

Pretty much same day as I had Monday work wise. Got everything on my task list done and felt fantastic. For lunch I had another grain/bean/greens salad. That seems to be my new favorite thing, I love them. So easy to throw together yet so filling and healthful. After work I went straight to the gym and put in around 45 minutes on the treadmill doing an intense hill workout. Came home, browsed more bento blogs (haha) and crashed by 10:30.

Day Seventeen: January 18th:

Today started great, and ended not so great. Up through around noon at work was fantastic. I was right on track to complete everything I wanted to accomplish. It all went downhill in the afternoon when a variety of projects either threw me massive curveballs, or I was still waiting on information to complete things from other people who I had consistently reminded them of several times a day for the past several days. By the time I left the office at 5:30 pm, I was totally defeated and felt horrible. It made me really, really cranky. Being cranky is not normal at ALL for me, I’m usually a really positive person. When I got home, Jim gave me some space and I kinda just zoned out. I originally had plans to go to yoga, but scrapped that idea and instead opted to just vegetate on the couch all night. So what did I do? I spent probably three hours reading bento blogs, again. What the hell? In bed by 10:30 to start it all over again tomorrow.

Day Eighteen: January 19th:

After today, I realize I need a vacation very, very badly. Today at work was a continuation of the issues from yesterday. The icing on the cake is I started to feel a nasal drip coming on. There’s been a flu bug floating around my office that’s affected seemingly everyone except for me. It was a bad enough bug several people were out of the office multiple days this week. After having a mini-panic attack I was next and I have SOOOOOO much shit to do, I loaded up on vitamin C all day (via a vitamin pill and green leafy veggies, being OJ is not allowed on the program) and I drank a TON of water. By the end of the day my energy leveled out and I felt back to normal, but still had a massive amount of crap to deal with getting ready for my big company sales meeting I’ve organized in Baltimore for this weekend. The end of the day I left the office feeling much like I did last night, just depressed cranky and defeated. I had plans to go to kettlebell class with a friend, and to do some cardio with her after so after my evening soup I headed over to the gym. Right when I pulled up to the gym, I got a phone call from my office that the trip I was supposed to leave for on Saturday morning I now had to leave for Friday night immediately after work due to weather issues. I can’t seem to catch a break. So I did kettlebells (and I’m glad I did), skipped the cardio and then ran home to pack my food/snacks for the trip, all my clothes, electronics, and everything else I would be needing. By the time I sat down for around 10 minutes in the evening it was already 10 pm.

Day Nineteen: January 20th:

After my hellish day yesterday, I arrived at work this morning and received the news that I would in fact have to leave today for a trip I was supposed to go on tomorrow morning. That and by the way, the office is being shut down right at 5 pm so you better get everything finished EARLY today. Yikes! I’ve never been so stressed in my entire life! Luckily I spent the time last night to make my lunch as well as pack lunch and snacks for the trip so I could stick to the cleanse. After work, we went straight to the airport and then to Baltimore via our company plane. I think I finally got to the hotel around 9:30 pm. The hotel luckily had a fridge in the room, which worked perfect for all the cooler goods I brought with me. There was no microwave in the room, but they had one in the lobby which made it quick and easy to heat up my soup for the evening. After my soup and double checking my presentation for the following day, I passed out around 11 pm.

Day Twenty: January 21st:

I woke up early and hit up the gym at the hotel. I really didn’t want to, but I knew tomorrow I’d probably be so tired it wouldn’t happen then, so I wanted to strike while the iron was hot. I did a quick treadmill hill workout, then showered and headed out to pick up a co-worker arriving by train at Baltimore’s Penn Station. In college, I used to live across the street from there, so it was a pretty nostalgic drive for me seeing how the city has changed since I moved back to NY. Once I arrived back at the hotel, my big company sales meeting I organized began. Since I personally booked and planned the entire event, I made sure to order an additional “vegan” meal for myself, which worked perfectly. For our lunch, they brought me a massive salad which I supplemented with some quinoa and beans I brought from home. Later on in the day, there was fruit for snacks which I had with some pre-packed almonds I had brought. During our break prior to leaving for the dinner event, I microwaved my soup and enjoyed that and then we all head out for dinner. It was a little weird not eating with the group, but easier than I anticipated being I was in event organizer mode the whole time. I drank a lot of seltzer since I couldn’t have alcohol either. It was a late, late evening, I wasn’t in bed until around mid-night. Once in bed I had a splitting headache.

Day Twenty One: January 22nd:

It’s the last day!!! We were up at 7:30 am to finish up the sales meetings. I made my own smoothie for breakfast using my portable blender, which held me over until we left Baltimore around noon. It was a long ride home, and at that point I was so exhausted I snuck eating three Oreos on the plane, and then had Jim order me some vegan nachos for when I got home. I was very unapologetic about it too. I made it almost 21, full days including two business trips and barely cheated at all, so I wanted to go out with a bang! Plus, the nacho’s weren’t that bad per the clean program. I already know I’m not soy intolerant, so the soy cheese and meat was ok. So basically all I was adding in was some nightshades and corn chips. Not even 5 minutes after eating, I passed out on the couch and slept (no joke) 14 hours straight. Crazy way to end a crazy month, and my 21 day detox cleanse.

Overall:

It seems I still really enjoy and have been craving salads. I plan on continuing to eat lots of them now that the detox is over. Although I’m totally exhausted now from this past crazy weekend, I’m in hindsight really glad Jim pushed us to do the detox right after New Years. I don’t think I would have had the energy otherwise to not only be as productive as I’ve been at work, but also to get through the stress of the past 3 weeks. The ending of my detox couldn’t come at a better time, I won’t feel guilty at all indulging in a little chocolate after this past week!

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Clean Detox Week Two

My first ever clean program cheat: Treasure Island’s “The Vegan” Gardein Chicken with Pesto Sauce, Broccoli, Morel Mushrooms and Potatoes; My apple carrot ginger juice I miraculously found at McCarren Airport prior to flying back to NYC.

Day 8- January 9th:

Today started off awesome. Woke up way early do to the time difference and instead of going back to bed went to the hotel gym instead. I completed a tough hill treadmill workout and felt amazing. After I enjoyed my smoothie made in my hotel room using my new mini blender (which worked awesome by the way) and my Whole Foods grub. After catching up on emails it was time to go to a press conference, so just before leaving I heat up my soup and put it I. A coffee thermos to sip for lunch after the event. The event and subsequent meetings went great. Later on at the hotel bar around 6 pm I noshed on some hummus and veggies sans drink and was freaking proud of myself for going that long before eating solid food. It all went downhill quick at dinner. It was a prefixed executive dinner and despite the restaurants efforts, handling the fact I was vegan and gluten free was a challenge, never mind the no nightshade or corn thing on this cleanse. I ended up having to eat (if I didn’t in this setting it would have been really rude) gluten free (probably corn) pasta, lots of tomatoes between the pasta sauce and special tomato and avocado salad they made me, and a few bites of raspberry sorbet that more than likely had sugar in it. I feel so defeated. In hindsight it could have been worse (i.e. pizza) so luckily all I cheated with was some nightshade veggies, corn and sugar. I’m going to get back on track tomorrow and extend my cleanse an extra day to hopefully make up for it.

Day 9- January 10th:

After last evening’s disappointment, I tried my best to not repeat the same errors today. I woke up a bit earlier and squeezed in a bonus workout that I hadn’t planned for during my trip and felt great after that. Then it was on to work and walking the show. I had a business lunch, where I ordered a chopped salad with chickpeas and that worked out well. I was also sure to drink a ton of water from my bobble. Where I ran into an issue again was at dinner. Most of our vendors know that I’m a vegan, and in this scenario little did I know that our dinner host for this meal had actually done research prior to our meeting and found a Vegas restaurant with an actual vegan entrée for me (it was at Phil’s Italian Steakhouse in Treasure Island for anyone wondering). For me not to eat this entrée would be been horribly rude considering he made it a point to point it out to me on the menu. So I ordered it. It was mostly clean with the exception of the gardein chicken and the potatoes. I have to say though, it was delicious! Well worth cheating on the cleanse for. All in all I’m really trying not to beat myself up over it. Instead I think I’ll go ahead and try to either extend my cleanse two days, or substitute two days with a liquid only meal plan to make up for the slip ups. I’m trying to consider it an occupational hazard and I’m still pretty happy with how much I stuck to the program, in Vegas of all cities to begin with.

Day 10- January 11th:

I had to get up crazy, crazy early this morning to head back to NYC from Vegas. I didn’t have time to make my own smoothie and clean the blender and pack it before heading to the airport, so I was a bit stressed out about it. After we arrived at the airport, I used my Gate Guru app on my iPhone and learned there was a juice bar in our terminal, so I ran over and got an apple ginger carrot juice, which worked out perfect. By the time I got back to the gate it was time to board and I from there had a pretty uneventful flight back to NYC. I decided to go home and finish up a few work items from there as opposed to headed to the office, so Jim hooked me up and got me a Waffle and Wolf #7 waffle for lunch to have while I worked. Later in the day I fell asleep on the couch, and before I knew it Jim woke me up with a nice bowl of soup for dinner, which was a pleasant surprise. We watched a movie, and then I took some time to put together our lunch for the following day (Deconstructed Sushi Salad from the Appetite for Reduction cookbook, delish!). After popping a melatonin to attempt to get back on an eastern time sleeping schedule, I read Brendan Brazier’s Thrive book and then fell into a deep sleep until work the next day. It was nice to be back on the “clean” schedule.

Day 11- January 12th:

I had an all day sales meeting today with our company Sales Directors, of which I was super prepared for in advance of my trip to Vegas so it was a pretty non-eventful, stress free day. My sushi salad was one of the highlights. It included greens, brown rice and edamame mixed with rice wine vinegar (just like sushi) and topped with carrots, cucumber, shallots, nori, sesame seeds and a green onion dressing. I generally hate salads but I’m really starting to love the greens plus legume plus grain combo in my meals. After work I made a quick stop at home for my dinner soup, and then headed to the salon for a much needed trim. After Jim and I got our meals and clothes ready for the next day, we made giant cups of herbal tea because we were starving. This is probably the first time the entire cleanse I was genuinely hungry in the evening. The tea did the trick, we had the tea, watched a movie, and was in bed by 10:30.

Day 12- January 13th:

Friday the 13th! Today went just like all the others energy wise. I was still crazy focused and productive. I had a great day at work, and after work had plans to hit up the gym, and then go out to dinner with some of my vegan friends at Soy and Sake. I actually got out of work on time for the first time in a very, long time on a Friday and was super excited to go to bootcamp class, but then ran into this on the way to the gym and had to revert home since I couldn’t cross the road to get to the gym. Crazy. I instead skipped the gym and headed out to dinner and had a fantastic meal. Since I knew I was going for dinner in the evening, I had my soup in the afternoon for lunch and switched my solid and liquid meals for the day. By the time I got to the restaurant I was pretty hungry, but proud of myself in that I ordered a giant avocado salad to start (which was AMAZING, definitely getting that again next time I go to Soy and Sake), and I also got a few sushi rolls. Where I failed was I totally forgot to get my rolls with brown rice instead of white rice. I ate them anyway. So that makes cleanse fail #3.  It was also tough not to have any cocktails with my friends, but they were all cool and understanding of my detox and totally supportive. In the end it wasn’t a super late evening, I was home by 11 and in bed shortly after 12.

Day 13- January 14th:

I slept in an extra hour or two and then headed to yoga with a friend, and then to get our nails done in the neighborhood. I had my smoothie prior to yoga, and then Jim ordered us some sushi which arrived when I got home after getting my nails done. I had ordered an avocado salad again as well, but it was so sad compared to what I had the night prior, so I didn’t even eat it. My rolls were great though. Jim accidentally forgot to get two of the rolls with brown rice, which was funny being I had done the same thing the night prior. I ate my two rolls that had the brown rice and was stuffed, so I wasn’t affected but Jim had some really strong sugar cravings after having the white rice. It was pretty amazing to see how easily food can “flip a switch” and make you crave something you wouldn’t have wanted if you didn’t prompt the craving with another food. After the sushi we had a relaxing afternoon at home and watched a movie or two, and then got dressed up and went out to a really rad gallery opening in Chelsea. The gallery closed up at nine, so we were still home pretty early and made it a point to rest up and get most of our errands and chores done tomorrow.

Day 14- January 15th:

Jim and I both slept in until around 10:30 am, and as a result we ended up skipping our smoothie in the morning and diving right into our solid meal for lunch. We went to Waffle and Wolf again and got another #7 (which is so, so good!). During the week Waffle and Wolf ran a Groupon special so we bought two of them and redeemed it for our lunch. Afterwards we did some random house chores and then together went grocery shopping for the third and last week of our detox. Since we didn’t do a smoothie in the morning, we had a more substantial “snack” consisting of a larabar and a rice cake with almond butter, but in all honesty we really weren’t that hungry up through our dinner. Just like the first week, I made large batches of two different soups at the same time. I made another broccoli cream soup and a curried cauliflower one. I also took the time to make a nut pate, homemade hummus, kale chips and some other snacks and meal prep while the soups were simmering. I was super multi-tasking like crazy. Worked like a charm, I now have little to no cooking to do all week and it only took me about an hour and a half to prep everything for the week. After enjoying our soup, we had some tea and watched Moneyball, which was a great movie if you haven’t seen it!

Overall:

Holy freaking cheat days.  Or should I say fail week?  I haven’t slipped up this much on a cleanse in my history of cleansing. The two slip-ups in Vegas were tough to avoid, but I’m also beating myself up over the white rice on Friday as well. I’m going to try to make an effort to maybe extend my detox an extra few days so I can make up for it. Not that it’s 100% necessary per the program, I’d just feel better doing it. Another thing I’ve learned this week is salad can be awesome! I previously used to hate salad, but I had some really great ones this week. I especially love adding grains and legumes to them, yum. On the scale, I’m down another pound from where I was last week, which isn’t as huge a drop as the first week but I’m still happy with it.  I did notice that it appears tamari sauce makes me bloated probably due to all the sodium.  Since I had sushi two times this week,  I’m guessing I’m retaining more water than usual and that I actually did lose more weight than I’m showing on the scale.   I’m also really happy with how much I worked out this week despite my crazy travel schedule. I have to travel for work again this coming weekend but it’s for an event I organized so I have control over the food I get, which is good. I’m looking forward to finishing the last week strong, and seeing how I feel by day 21 to see if I continue for another few days to make up for my lost ground this week.

On a non-cleanse related note, I have a bunch of photos I took both at Vegas at the CES show as well as at the art gallery opening this past weekend.  I’m working on posts for both, so stay tuned!  I’m crazy busy with work the next two weeks so once February 1st rolls around hopefully my life will return to normal the the regular blogging can commence again.

Clean Detox Week One

My meal at Smith and Wollensky’s in Las Vegas on Day 7, nothing with a side of sparking water.

As a quick disclaimer, I know how reading about what I did and experienced day by day on this cleanse can be a bit boring. I did weekly recap posts last year, and although it was not my most popular posts, when it came time for me to plan my detox this year I found it to be a very valuable resource looking through all my blog entries on the subject. I apologize in advance if they’re pretty dull, because they are. Thanks for your patience with me.

Day One- January 2nd:

All in all, the first day really wasn’t too bad until we hit the evening. Both Jim and I woke up late in the day and had our green juice. A few hours later we decided to get vegan, gluten free buckwheat waffles stuffed with olives, hummus and arugula from Waffle and Wolf, which was clean program friendly and delicious. Later that evening I kind of went a bit crazy and made two gigantic batches of soup (at the same time, who does that?!) so we could freeze them and have them over the next few weeks. One was a vegan cream of broccoli soup and the other a butternut squash and apple soup. Yum. Hardest part of the evening was in the late evening, around 9 pm when we’d typically want to snack. That was rough. We both snuck one or two rice crackers and felt bad about it.

Day Two- January 3rd:

I woke up right when my alarm went off at 6 am and for the first time in a long time didn’t feel the need to go back to sleep. I’m not sure if this was because of the detox, or from all the lounging and resting I did over the weekend, but it sure as hell felt pretty good. After work I went home and heated up some of the soup I made over the weekend and immediately after having it went to the gym for a spin class and personal trainer session. My energy was pretty amazing. After my workout I came home and made us pesto rice pasta for lunch for tomorrow and felt a little bad for sneaking a few bites but had to to be sure it was al dente. Right? I passed out on the couch at 10 and slept like a baby.

Day Three- January 4th:

Had a little bit harder time getting up this morning but once I got going I was good to go, I was super focused at work all day and surprisingly not hungry. I totally skipped my morning snack and had to remind myself to have my afternoon one. My bobble water bottle I think has helped this, I’ve been drinking so much water. After work I fit in a quick cardio workout. I didn’t have to spend a ton of time in the evening getting ready for the following day or with meal prep being everything was already made earlier in the week. So I got to relax a bit. I ended up falling asleep on the couch at 9:30 pm.

Day Four- January 5th:

Again I had a a tougher time waking up but once I was up I was ok. Had a crazy productive day at work. All in all, I’ve been really surprised at how much easier this cleanse has been for me compared to last years. I’m not really hungry at all and haven’t caved to any temptations. I also have yet to get a headache. Jim got his this evening. After work we heat up some of the butternut squash and apple soup I had made over the weekend and had it while relaxing and watching TV, but then I took off for a short while to go to kettlebells class. By the time I got there, all their lighter weights were gone so I was stuck with a 25 pounder and a 20 pounder. I still managed to do the entire workout with those weights, which I was really pleased with! I spent a lot of time after getting ready for work the next day and doing random house chores and prepping our lunches, but did manage to sit down around 8:30 for some R&R. Poor Jim still had his headache up to that point so to help him out I rubbed his head for a bit while we watched TV. I was in bed by 10 and the amazing thing is this entire past week the second my head hits the pillow, I don’t remember much else. I’ve been falling asleep really, really fast.

Day Five- January 6th:

All in all, day five wasn’t much different than the first four. I had a lot of energy, I wasn’t really tired, and I was crazy focused. I think I got more done at work this week than I have in ages. One of the highlights of day five was an awesome split pea soup Jim made us for dinner. Yum. That and the realization I haven’t gotten a headache on this cleanse yet totally made my day.

Day Six- January 7th:

I had reserved today to be a vegetable most of the day and relax in preperation for my trip to the CES Show that I had to leave for tomorrow. So I relaxed on the couch watching United States of Tara on Netflix most of the day, but then pulled myself off the couch to take Porta to the dog park and do some grocery shopping, packing and prep for next week. Though I’m going to be away next week on business, I want to be sure Jim’s got everything he needs stocked up in the apartment so he can still remain successful on the cleanse. One observation I have today compared to the rest of the week, the weekends are much, much harder on this program because you have downtime. During the week since I’m so busy at work, I don’t even think about food. On the weekends when you’re bored, it’s really easy to just want to snack all day.

Day Seven- January 8th:

This morning I went to power yoga and I had a tough time with it. My quads were giving out during all the lunges. I don’t know if it’s a result of the cleanse, or all the workouts I’ve done during the week but I didn’t beat myself up over it. In hindsight I’m really glad I did as much food prep and packing as I did yesterday, because today after yoga I could just relax until it was time to catch my flight to Vegas for the CES show for work. It’s really going to be a challenge to keep to the cleanse while in Vegas but I’m optimistic. I’m well prepared for it at least. I purchased a mini blender I packed with me on my carry on, as well as a ton of clean program approved snacks. Today I also decided to swap my lunch salad and dinner soup and instead have the soup for lunch and the salad for dinner knowing I can’t take liquids on the plane. Worked like a charm. Once we landed I stopped at Whole Foods on my way to the strip and stocked on up some other items, like Imagine Brand Butternut Squash Soup and frozen fruit and almond milk for my smoothies. Immediately after I went for “dinner” with some people to Smith and Wollensky’s. Let me tell you, if there was any restaurant was glad to be in during a cleanse it was a steak house. Since I’m a vegan steak and meat in general totally grosses me out, so I wasn’t hungry at all while there. I instead just participated in the conversation and drank some Pelligrino and had no issues at all.

Week One Overview

I already lost over four pounds, which is pretty astounding. Aside from that, I have a ton of energy, I’ve been really focused, and most of all very positive and optimistic. I feel amazing. One realization I made this week is how much starch impacts my weight. This week I cut out everything aside from brown rice, quinoa, millet and buckwheat and the pounds just peeled off. Knowing this gives me the incentive to try to stick to this even after the cleanse. I’d like to for a change actually look like I spend as much time at the gym as I do, and I know in the end it’s my own fault because diet is half of the equation.