Time to Get Tactical

I actually started the plan on Sunday, because I need to be done with the detox after next Saturday, in time for my will-be 5-year-old’s birthday. Even if I skip the chocolate cake, I’m not passing up my dad’s homemade potstickers; there are only so many years left with both my kids and my parents to carry out family traditions. So I’ll start the official detox on Wednesday a day early, be the canary in the coal mine so to speak, and probably add a day to Week 2 so I finish at the same time as everyone else.

So this is how my first day on the Action Plan started: sitting in a dark closet with my screaming 2.5 year old, trying to get her to eat a cookie. She’s a real terror if she doesn’t eat, and she was so busy playing she didn’t eat her breakfast, and I was too busy trying to figure out what I’m allowed to eat that I didn’t notice. Her blood sugar dropped, she lost her sh*t completely, and I had to console her in the pantry with the lights off until she ate. I ended up eating a pear.

For lunch I managed to make some brown rice with curried black beans and an avocado. I had mapped out most of my meals for the week, but already I can tell a general plan for the day isn’t going to cut it. I’m going to need to make all my meals the night before. I’ve taped a copy of the detox foods list to my fridge and I’ve got another in my purse. It’s not the fried foods and dairy that trip me up, it’s things like bananas and eggplants that I can’t believe are no-no’s. I didn’t realize I couldn’t have evaporated cane juice as a sweetener, so that ended up taking out all my planned snacks. For dinner I had some roast turkey with broccoli.

It’s not the deprivation that’s making me cranky, it’s that I don’t like having to think this much about what I’m eating. Also the lack of coffee is definitely taking its toll; I went to the gym today and forgot my socks, and then drove to the grocery store and forgot my purse. I’m going to have to hide an extra house key in my backyard just to survive this week.

If I had the energy, I’d go downstairs and make a coconut milk/brown rice pudding with mango for breakfast tomorrow. But I’m fairly sure I’m going to take my defeatist attitude to bed and eat hummus on a rice cake on my way out the door.

Obviously, today was hard. The Plan was kind of a bitch and now so am I. But if there’s a bright spot, I am glad I started on Sunday, when I’m not trying to deal with the chaos of schlepping my kids back and forth to school and squeezing in some billable hours. Now that I’ve had this not-so-great opening day behind me, I’ve learned a lot about how prepared I need to be and the need to find some snacks. I can now be more focused and tactical (and positive!) tomorrow. I wish I had a more inspiring first day post; I hope yours all go better!