Life After My Sugar Detox
Happy Friday! You can expect a full Sarasota/Longboat Key Travel Guide on the blog sometime next week, but until then we’re throwing it back to my good-ole sugar detox days. [insert eye roll here] I’m currently awake (at 4:30am, sitting in the airport finishing up this blog post. Gah! I guess sleep just isn’t a thing for me anymore…) I have spent lots of time on here sharing my thoughts/experience with my super strict 40-day cleanse. And now we’re back for round two! Kind of…
After my sugar detox I wanted to introduce “off-menu” foods gradually back into my diet, and well, that didn’t really happen. At all. What actually happened is that I kind of went sugar crazy and ate whatever I wanted. In my mind I deserved to have anything I craved because I’d deprived myself from it for so long. Six weeks to be exact! And you know what? That’s totally normal when you abstain from all the things you usually love to eat and drink (mainly, chocolate and wine!). Now I’m ready to make some real life changes that will hopefully be realistic, long-term, sustainable changes. Aka, less extreme!
homemade grill pizza with dairy free cheese!
Going forward I’m ready to commit to cutting almost all gluten out of my diet (if I want brownies, or a really good piece of chocolate cake I’m not going to say no. I’ll just try to limit those treats to every once in a while. BUT I’m committed to swapping regular pasta out for GF pasta options like rice pasta and quinoa pasta). As for bread- I’m going to do my best to avoid it. I can see myself having salad pizza on a cheat night (which I’ll allow myself once or twice a week), but sandwiches and bread and butter aren’t in my future!
Dairy has been something I’ve lived without for a while now, that’s not the difficult part. I really notice a difference when I consume dairy (even in the smallest amounts), as soon as the next morning I’ll wake up feeling a breakout from it. Ugh. So anyway, I’m going to keep on being dairy free. It’s a pretty simple way to avoid cystic acne to some extent. And there are finally some decent dairy free ice creams (blog post to come on that soon!), that I will definitely allow myself to have throughout the summer!!
As for alcohol… I haven’t decided yet. I would love to say I’ll only have a glass of wine 3-4 times a week, but I know myself better than that! I feel like my goal here is to be mindful of my choices, so maybe I don’t need a glass of wine every night. Ha, who really does? BUT what I will say is I do a great job now of having a glass of water between each glass of wine or cocktail I drink. I’m committed to staying hydrated and I end up drinking much less when I space my drinks with water because the water fills me up!
The hottest rosé of this summer! French Pool Toy Rosé comes in a plastic bottle so it’s perfect for a trip to the beach or pool!
And now onto processed foods and organic…ugh. What isn’t processed these days?! Honestly! During my initial cleanse I wasn’t allowed any processed foods at all. And I get that, I do. But it’s so difficult! There’s definitely levels of processed foods, like Twinkies are up there at the top and would survive a zombie apocalypse, and then there are brands that are just a little processed, like Siesta chips, which I swear by! I’m going to try to steer clear of Oreos and stuff of that nature, but I’m going to have to buy someee packaged foods. Cooking each meal by scratch isn’t realistic; it takes up too much time!
Ugh and then organic! I think 50% of my produce is organic and the other 50% is regular. I will NEVER buy organic broccoli. That is just asking for trouble. The whole entire head of broccoli is covered in bugs no matter how often you wash it. I mean hellooo pesticides were invented for a reason!
Alight! So what are your thoughts on all of this? Are you pro-diet restrictions or do you have an unrestricted mindset? The moral of the story for me (I guess) is being mindful and keeping to an “in moderation” diet. Although I will aim to cut some things out completely, like dairy and gluten. So yep! Lemme know whatcha think!
