On day five, I cheated.
The coffee pot at work was sitting empty on the counter next to my unused cup. My head was clouded; my stomach growled.
Technically I am allowed no caffeine on this cleanse, but surely one cup of coffee couldn’t hurt…
.
I’m doing something called “The 10-Day Green Smoothie Cleanse”, which is exactly what it sounds like. I have a couple of friends who have done it and absolutely raved about their newfound energy and mental clarity–two words that are never associated with my name unless you’re starting off with “Kristen drank three pots of coffee today” or “Someone slipped Kristen an Adderall”.
I’m also super against fad diets and cleanses, not because I believe they’re inherently evil, but because I’ve basically tried them all and I come out after a week frazzled, hangry, and only a few pounds slimmer. I decided a while ago that I was done with all of them. If looking like a Victoria’s Secret model required me to never even look at pizza again, I wasn’t gonna do it.
That’s right, fat sounds awesome.
But it doesn’t feel awesome, hence the cleanse. I was on my 7th cup of coffee when I heard about it, and the words “so much energy” were enough to convince me. I convinced my roommate to try it with me. We bought the greens, the vegetables, the 20 bags of frozen fruit (did Costco write this book to promote their frozen fruit section?), and we began.
I’m a huge fan of smoothies, so I figured that this would go smoothie-ly (heh). I’d ween myself off of coffee in three or four days (quitting cold turkey would probably put me in the hospital) and the last six I’d go caffeine-free. Plus, during the cleanse, you’re allowed to snack on hard-boiled eggs, almonds, and as many vegetables you want! Over and over in the book, the author states that this is absolutely not a starvation diet. This is awesome, I thought. I won’t even be hungry.
.
By the end of the second day, I was ready to throw the book out the window and eat a raw steak with my bare hands. Just that day I’d eaten five hard-boiled eggs (FIVE) and had enough celery and carrots to feed a multiplying pack of rabbits. The book tells you that this cleanse will break your addiction to sugar and other junk food, but all it did was make me want to cage fight someone for a hamburger. With a hamburger. I wanted it to rain hamburgers during the fight.
The first three days are the hardest, I kept hearing. Your body is just detoxing. Detoxing? Was I that unhealthy before? Then came the realization that while I am allowed to have as many vegetables as I want, there comes a point where I would literally rather starve than eat another carrot.
Me: “I’m hungry.”
Roommate: “Have a stick of celery!”
Me: “I’ll kill you.”
Day four was ok, though I did drink a half a cup of black coffee to rid myself of a headache. My head had been in a fog for the last four days. Where is this mental clarity? I wondered. My roommate was having dreams about eating steak behind my back, and during the day when my mind wandered off, I’d realize I’d been thinking about toast the entire time. Not a boy, not my future travel plans, not the memory of wiggling my bare toes into hot sand—toast.
And yesterday–day five–I leaned my forehead against the cupboard in the break room and I stared at the coffee pot, trying to battle my hunger and prove to myself that I was stronger than coffee. You’ll never break yourself of your caffeine addiction if you can’t give it up, my inner voice told me. “I knnnoooooowww,” I whined. “But oooonnneee liiiittttlleee cup won’t hurt anything.”
Slowly, deliberately, like a child sneaking candy from a forbidden hiding spot, I poured the coffee in the filter and it began to brew. It smelled like heaven. I opened the mini fridge and found French Vanilla Coffee Creamer—angels sang—and decided that if I was going to cheat, I was going to cheat. I used the biggest cup I could find in the office, and I filled it to the brim with piping hot, fresh, vanilla-flavored coffee.
I had about two seconds to savor the forbidden coffee before a slough of customers showed up in my office, and by the time they were gone, the coffee was cold. I hadn’t even finished half the cup. Oh well, I thought. I’ll be good tomorrow.
….except I’m not being good today. As I was writing this, I glanced over at the pantry. I spotted the Costco bag of raw almonds. Almond butter would be delicious, I thought to myself. I’m allowed to have almonds. I stuck a large handful of almonds in my Magic Bullet and blended them. Then I proceeded to dump chocolate chips in the bullet as well, because this is America, and you’re allowed to sabotage your own cleanse with anything even slightly resembling Nutella.
*sigh*
Now my stomach hurts.
I’ll let you know how the last 5 days go.
A Little Kristen 