My 10-day cleanse, Day 4: “Oh yeah, it’s rollercoaster time” (with apologies to Ohio Players)
I miss food.
The thought popped into my head on Day 4, when I was driving my two kids home from our bi-annual teeth cleaning. It was sneaking up on lunchtime, and my daughter asked — as she does pretty much every day — “what can I have?”
As I was running through her options: PB&J, Annie’s Shells & Cheddar, chicken tenders paired with a variety of fruits and vegetables, etc., I realized that I was envious of her ability to ask the question. I wasn’t pondering all the options for my pending lunch. It didn’t matter what I wanted to eat. I knew exactly what was waiting for me: a Day 4 smoothie made with kale, spinach, apples, peaches, mixed berries, flaxseed and water. Whatevs.
I hadn’t started the day this way. My day, in fact, had begun with a little happy dance. My vertigo was still gone; there was no dizziness causing me to fall back onto my bed within seconds of getting up. And my bathroom scale showed a 4.5-pound loss. I felt rested. Energized, even. I made my breakfast smoothie and sipped it contentedly as I worked. I feel great, I thought at the time. This is getting a little bit easier every day.
Yet now it was a mere four hours later, and my crank-o-meter was turned up to 11. Suddenly doing this cleanse for six more days seemed impossible.
I miss bread. I miss goat cheese. I miss FOOD!
Not just food itself, I missed everything surrounding the act of eating. I missed sitting down at the table and using a knife and fork. Even a spoon would do!
Despite the facts that my previous food habits had landed me firmly in my Wii Fit’s Obese Zone with a near-debilitating bout of Meniere’s Disease, and just three days of cleansing had knocked down my vertigo and tinnitus dramatically, I was wallowing in self pity…over lunch.
How ridiculous I was, internally raging at the unfairness of having nearly a week left of smoothie recipes that were improving my health and reducing my weight. I was just so bored of it all. Another six days felt like an eternity. Clearly, my struggle on Day 4 was mental far more than physical.
The upside? When I (grudgingly) drank my lunchtime smoothie, it wasn’t long before the Feelings Rollercoaster leveled out and started climbing back into the light. I felt upbeat enough to MacGuyver a solution to my “I want to use a fork again” wish: a giant bed of greens (extra-extra-light on the dressing) from J.J. Smith’s list of approved snacks that I enjoyed — in a bowl, with an actual utensil — alongside my dinner smoothie. While sitting at the table. Bliss.
And at some point after dinner, it occurred to me: Day 4 was the first day in more than a month that I hadn’t experienced a wave of intense exhaustion, the type that forces me to stop what I’m doing and lie down. There’s no doubt this cleanse is helping me physically; the trick now is to not let my mental lows get in the way. Not for the next six days, at least.
Overview of Day 4:
Meniere’s Symptoms:
- Dizziness/Vertigo: None
- Tinnitus: Mild
- Fatigue: None
Cleanse-related symptoms noticed: hunger (moderate), irritability (high), coldness (moderate)
Grade for the day: B–
