Just like a chocolate milkshake only crunchy!

or is it?


I have now completed 7 days of the Dr Junger "Clean" cleanse (21 day total). To the bewilderment of Kept Ninja, I am quite a big Goop fan and really enjoy Gwyneth's tips and recipes... so a while back I read about this cleanse she does once a year and I decided to read for myself and give it a try. Disclaimer: I don't pretend to be an expert on the topic, nor am I advising readers to try it - this is just my experience!


I ordered the book and the program from the US and decided to wait until after our assault on the States, but just before Jono and Mads' wedding, for optimum results. To my relief, eating our way around the East Coast only impacted the credit card, not the scales... but the damage had been done in the last 12 months with minimal sporting activities and too many large, hot lunches... time for action!


The program in a nutshell:


Intake: one shake for breakfast, solid meal for lunch, and one shake for afternoon tea... snacks for dinner if you need, and vitamin supplements.


Eliminated Intake: oranges, strawberries, banana, dairy, eggs, wheat, beef, pork, soy, peanuts, corn, butter, alcohol, caffeine, refined sugar, chocolate... that's the list simplified.

Choc Shake

My Intake: as we understand about half of the food products in the supermarkets here in Japan, I've had to keep it very simple and bland... my lunches are either chicken or salmon, with spinach, broccoli, asparagus, onion, garlic, mushrooms, pine nuts and brown rice... combinations vary. The program comes with great menu ideas but we struggle to find things like quinoa, agave nectar and legumes here in Japan... lamb and turkey are also a struggle but we've now ordered some from 'The Meat Guy'! We can add blueberries to the shakes - I chose chocolate flavoured... it's ok... if you don't keep mixing it you end up with "sand" at the bottom... hence the "crunchy". For snacks I eat almonds, walnuts, carrot sticks, avocado and we are going to try to make hommus as soon as our package from the Meat Guy arrives! I drink about 4 litres of water a day... and 4 cups of green tea.

A typical lunch

The goal: The program aims to eliminate toxins from your body - toxins that get in via food intake (preservatives, etc), air intake (pollution), and exposure to chemicals in everyday life (creams, cleaning products, etc). The expected improvements are the end are: clearer head, less headaches, healthy gut, less colds and viruses, reduced puffiness, reduced dark circle (yes please!), reduced allergies, reduced cravings, better skin, smaller pores, less stiffness in joints, better mood control... the list goes on! read more here if you're interested: http://www.cleanprogram.com/


Week 1 Results:


Weight: At day 7 I am down 3.4kg.


Mood: I was suffering from jet lag at the same time as starting this but I've generally been very happy and alert at work... less chirpy whilst walking home through a food court at the train station. Extra energy to exercise, which is new.


Observations: I feel pretty proud of myself and my will power (so far), my pores on my face have definitely reduced... still have dark circles... but I'm hopefully that by the end of week 3 they will be gone! and yes, the weight loss is a bonus.


Exercise: I've done 4 workout DVDs and one 4km run... you can't over do it otherwise you see Tweety birds :P

My collection

Principles I'll take away from this: shakes are easy for your gut to digest - give it a break every now and then; a 12hr break between dinner and breakfast is good for you gut to recover; dinner doesn't need to be the biggest meal of the day - you're going to bed, so why not just have hommus and carrot sticks? (as long as you eat enough calories midday).


Things I miss the most: CHOCOLATE... there is a half eaten fruit and nut chocolate block in our cupboard and Kept Ninja can't eat it cos he's got man flu... it's haunting me! Red wine - I haven't felt like a drink but we always miss what we can't have! Peanut butter - even Skippy's, which is just a fraction as good as Kraft Crunchy peanut butter, is tempting. That's about it... so here's hoping those cravings settle by Week 3!


xoxo
Karate Kate