21 Days of Cleanse: Epilogue

It's over.  I'm done.  I officially finished at 1:30 PM Monday when I ate the piece of bread that came with my salad. 

I weighed in at 183.6 lbs on Monday morning, making it nearly 20 lbs lost in all.  To be precise: 19.6.  I decided to not continue, because, frankly, I just got sick and tired of being hungry.  Even though I didn't make my updated goal of 180 lbs, losing 20 lbs in 3 weeks is a pretty great accomplishment.  It's nice to go home and have an actual dinner.

So now the battle is: how do I keep it off?  I don't expect to gain it all back in, say, 1 month, and in fact I think I can keep most of it off through November.  I do quite a lot of yardwork over the summer, and mowing the lawn weekly is already quite a workout.  It takes me 2 hours, and I have a simple push mower.  It's quite humid here and I sweat profusely from June-September.  My appetite is also much smaller, and I eat far more fresh fruit and vegetables.  My dessert habits change, as well.  I don't want as many cookies or cakes, but that may be offset by my ice cream intake.  I also have a habit of buying a mint Oreo Blizzard every time I pass a Dairy Queen.

 My short-term plan is to eat a lot of salads, and just smaller portions, in general.  Long-term, I will try to limit my dessert intakes and keep eating fresh stuff.  I have this paralyzing fear that I'll eat something unhealthy, like a chili dog, and then wake up the next morning and be back at 203 lbs. 

So far, I've been doing well.  It's Thursday, 3 days after the end, and I weighed in at 183.2 lbs, meaning that I've even gotten smaller, albeit not by much.  At this point, I've added bread, tomatoes, oranges, dairy, and sugar back into the diet.  I have not yet added red meat, corn, pasta or starch back in.  I was trying to stay away from sugar for as long as possible, but I saw these Polish chocolate wafers in our pantry that I bought in March and haven't eaten since my mission.  I justified it because it's less sweet than American candy, so how much sugar could be in there?  I ate the whole package like a wood chipper, crumbs flying off like sawdust.  My biggest craving is pizza - and we're having homemade pizza tomorrow night.

For those of you who asked about the logistics of the cleanse, the book is written by Dr Alejandro Junger.  It's pretty much this:

Smoothie in the AM
Proportioned meal for lunch
Juice in the PM

You can't have certain foods:
Tomatoes
Oranges
Corn
Potatoes/starches
Gluten (anything made from wheat or corn flour)
Sugar
Pasta (again, the gluten)
Dairy
Red meat
Other things which I'm forgetting

The principle is that these things, while most of them are healthy, take a long time to digest or have toxins, blah blah blah, I didn't read the book.  But it worked for Neil, so I figured it would work for me.  So I made Mel read the book since she reads like 20 books a week, and told her that she was in charge.  I ate what she told me to eat and she made everything for the first 2 weeks. Most of my meals were still pretty tasty, although they didn't have that "rich" taste that, as red-blooded Americans, we have come to know and love.  When I was able to indulge in "real" food again, I appreciated the taste that much more.

The book emphasizes how much better this diet will make you feel.  Since "feeling good" is subjective, it's hard for me to say.  I definitely felt better, some of the time, but other times I was pretty miserable.  Also, I changed a lot of other habits, like I woke up earlier, worked out, and went to bed earlier.  Did I feel better because of the working out and sleeping, or because of the diet?  Maybe a little from both columns.

Lessons Learned:
1.  I can sleep when I'm hungry
2.  Healthy food can be good, but it requires a different palate and significant seasoning
3.  Unsalted almonds are money for snacking
4.  Part of life's pleasures is in the food
5.  This was a very quick way to lose weight and I'm very glad I did it

Point 4 above is really coming into play now.  I'll see something that I want to eat, like ribs or brownies or whatever, and my first thought will be "I shouldn't".  But then, what kind of life do I want to live where I don't get to eat these foods?  If it means that I gain 20 lbs each year and I have to do a 3-week cleanse annually to maintain my weight, then so be it.  I'm not giving up my ribs and brownies!  Everything in moderation, of course.

Another motivation for this cleanse is that it's almost beach season.  When I was in college, I looked goooooooooood shirtless.  Maybe I was still pretty skinny, but I had 6-pack abs, a decent tan, and proportional guns.  When I worked out, my goal was to look goooooooood.  Now, my goal has totally changed--I'm trying not to look so disgusting.  I feel like I'm less disgusting, so that's a win right there.

Anyway, this was a good experience.  I lost weight, and now the tailored shirts I bought in Thailand fit, and I haven't worn them in 2 years.  I've gone down a belt loop.  My size 36 pants are almost too big.  I figure I'll have a skinny wardrobe for the summer and a fat wardrobe for the winter.  Right now, I'm planning to do this again next April.  If by some miracle I'm still hovering around 190-195, I may push it back a year.

Below are some before/after pictures for your viewing pleasure.

 Day 1. Look at that belly!

 Day 8 - Amazing how most of the belly disappeared so quickly

Day 22 - The belly looks the same (if not slightly bigger) as Day 8, but my neck and face are slightly skinnier