3 Day Cleanse

Shawn & I just finished a three day fruit/veggie/nut cleanse. This is the first time Shawn has ever participated in something like this with me past one day. I was very proud of him.

The kids were free to eat normally for breakfast and lunch, but at supper it was vegetarian fare for them too. It was pure misery at the dinner table. What do you mean no meat or dessert? The cut-up mango and strawberries I offered them after our meal were eaten reluctantly.

We used this opportunity to talk about how blessed we are to have fresh produce and how people in other countries would give anything to eat these meals that felt so spartan to us. We talked about being grateful for our usual fare and not taking it for granted.

It was a very relaxed cleanse in the way that we allowed starchy veggies and some butter to help it go down in addition to the usual garden veggies and fruit. I limited our nut consumption to unsalted versions and almond milk. Still, we both felt the sacrifice of not having our other food groups with headaches, tiredness and just plain lethargy. The whole family was glad when it was over, including me.

I laughed when Shawn complained that his lunch looked like a produce department!

In the middle of this regimen Shawn asked me, "Why are we doing this anyway?"

"We're detoxifying," I told him, "The discomfort we're feeling is from the toxins leaving our body."

During times of temptation (one was a staff BBQ) I shared one of my coping skill with Shawn.

"Now remember," I coached him, "We're grown adults and we can have BBQ hamburgers and other stuff anytime we want. We're just choosing not to have them during these three days."

I was impressed because Shawn actually stuck with it! I only caught him cheating once by opting to eat cheerios for breakfast on the last morning.

"I thought I was going to throw up at the thought of eating vegetables or fruit for breakfast," he confided.

Today we were free to resume eating normally and it felt really good to have all our food groups again. Dinner was downright festive as we dined on wheat pasta with ground turkey meat sauce. My family even enjoyed the strawberry/banana ice cream I made for dessert using almond milk cubes, a bit of maple syrup, almond milk and frozen fruit. Yumm!!!

We are so blessed in Canada with an abundance of a huge variety of foods. I think modified food intake for a limited amount of time is not only good for the body, but good for the soul. You are never so grateful for what you have until you cannot, or choose not to, have it.