Day Twenty One - The End of the Cleanse

Breakfast: Soy Yogurt and Granola
Lunch: Gluten Free Peanut Butter Sandwich
Snack: Grapes
Dinner: Salad and home made potato wedges
Dessert: Cherries

We're done!

I am not going to lie - we celebrated at midnight with champagne and a buffalo burger. And it was one of the best burgers I have ever had. MAN have I missed meat. I tell you I was a Vegetarian for two years in college, I do not think I could do it again.

So, before Adam and I cracked open the champagne we discussed the past three weeks. We are both so glad we made it, and have learned a lot about ourselves and our eating habits as a result. To recap the cleanse, if you are just tuning in, check out my blog post on I Look Good.

Basically for the past 21 days Adam and I have had no meat/meat products, no gluten, no caffeine, no sugar and no alcohol. Well, there are naturally occurring sugars in fruit so of course we had that. And we decided to limit our alcohol to one weekend night a week as opposed to basically every day as we had been doing. Other than that we stuck hard to the limits of the cleanse.

We both agree we feel better physically today than we have in a long time. We have been eating SO many fruits and vegetables and I look forward to continuing on with that aspect of the cleanse and working some lean meat into the mix. I also plan on permanently giving up caffeine because I feel great without it. I wake up earlier than I ever have and feel wide awake. When I get to work I am way more alert than I ever was when I arrived blearily sipping a large coffee, waiting for it to kick in. I don't feel the usual afternoon tiredness I used to feel before my 3PM Diet Coke!

I also plan to continue on with the dairy-free aspect of the cleanse and the sugar-free aspect of the cleanse at least until the end of the summer. I like how I feel when I don't eat junk, and as far as the dairy a host of problems that my doctor has previously ascribed to IBS have disappeared over the past three weeks and I have a feeling it is because of the lack of dairy. I know - ME who loves the cheese more than anything may have to be satisfied with just having a little bit now and then. So sad. But not having to wake up in the middle of the night, run to the bathroom and pray for the sweet release of death has it's merits.

The cleanse has also given us a chance to try foods we previously had not. Not everything went over that well - I think it's safe to say neither of us really cares for Gluten Free Bread or Gluten Free Pasta that much. But we ended up loving foods like quinoa, soy milk, tofu and polenta. The tofu in particular was such a pleasant surprise. It's so versatile! Even though the cleanse is over I plan to incorporate many of the recipes I have used over the past three weeks into our meal plan going forward. So while we didn't leave the cleanse vegans, we did leave it as people who eat significantly less meat.

I also feel a lot more thoughtful about what I eat. What am I eating? Where did it come from? You just feel better when you eat something you made, from good ingredients like fresh vegetables and good-for-you foods. I mean I am not looking at my salad waxing philosophical "What is the meaning of life?" but I care more about what I eat which is always a good thing.

For a list of my cleanse posts as well as links to what we ate and recipes we used, click here

So that's that. 21 days down - countless days of a new outlook to go!