Giving up caffeine was not as difficult as I thought. Usually I drink 2-3 cups of coffee a day and most days I also have a can of Diet Coke. The only other beverage I usually drink is water. I went cold turkey on the caffeine - just stopped drinking it on Day 1. That day was fine. Day 2 I had a headache, though not debilitating. The rest of the 1st week, I suffered from some fatigue. But after that I was fine. I drank a lot of water during the fast and in the mornings when I normally would have had coffee, I replaced it with hot water with a lemon slice. I found that I missed having the warm mug to hand since it's so cold out. Probably in summer, I would have been fine without that.
What did I eat?
Breakfast every day was a piece of Ezekiel bread (sprouted whole grain) with a tablespoon of natural peanut butter (no sugar) and a tablespoon or so of natural fruit jam (again, no sugar). Ezekiel bread does have yeast, but this was pretty much the only yeast I consumed.
Lunch and dinner I ate something separate from the rest of the family. This took a lot of extra time for me because my kids usually make the meals and I didn't think it was really fair to ask them to make something separate for me.
Common meals for me were oven-fried sweet potato strips, soups (canned and homemade), whole grain pasta with spaghetti sauce (no sugar), brown rice with veggies and chili. A couple times I had corn tortillas with refried beans and salsa. I only had one stinker of a meal - some expensive wild rice/odd grains mix.
Some special situations included dining out a couple times, hanging out with friends, and book club.
Book Club is known for its deliciously abundant potluck, especially the desserts. I brought something I knew I could eat (vegetarian chili and a big fruit salad) and another friend mentioned she'd have something I could eat (couscous with veggies). I only ate one other thing there and it was a bit of a departure from the Daniel fast - whole wheat scones. They had no sugar, but I did eat lemon curd on them.
I took the kids to lunch one day at Wendy's when we were running errands. I had a boring lunch of plain baked potato and plain salad. If I had been a TEENSY bit more prepared, I could have brought along some salsa to adorn the potato. I never bothered to find any dressings that would work on the fast, though there are some. I just ate all my greens plain the whole time, with one exception.
Friends wanted to go out to dinner during the middle of the fast. They knew I was participating but I didn't want to miss out on a relationship-building time in order to stick to the fast strictly. We went for Thai food. I had vegetarian pineapple fried rice. Since I didn't cook it, I was not sure what was in it, but I asked for no eggs and no meat. The rice was white, which was again a bit of a departure, but it was so far from what I would normally order when dining out, that I thought it was a good compromise. I ate the leftovers for lunch the next day.
Hanging out with friends one night to watch a movie presented another challenge. Usually these evenings involve chocolate! LOL They made kettle corn, which I declined. I brought grapes and natural potato chips, which were good munchies. I also brought hummus and some whole grain crackers (Kashi) but we didn't even need those.
Along with the fast I participated in the 30 Day Nissan Innovation for Endurance Challenge which included 3 strength training workouts and 3 cardio workouts each week.
And the weight loss report? I lost 11.6 lbs in 3 weeks!
I plan to go out to eat on Wednesday!! And have something TASTY with CHEESE! And a Diet Coke! And some COFFEE with FLAVORED CREAMER! :-) :-)
2 comments:
Congrats on the weight loss, Lisa!
I have done this fast before as well and had good results. May do it again, who knows! Way to go! - Janet
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