Weddingbee Blog

Okay. It’s time to be real about this detox.

It. Is. Hideous.

The food is pretty foul, despite many of their deceptively delicious sounding names. Cucumber, basil, and lime juice? Shudder. Teriyaki chicken and steamed greens? Tastes like bung when made with 1/2 balsamic vinegar and 1/2 agave syrup.

Am I eating chicken? Am I licking a toad’s rear end? Who knows.

Day 1 was quite the tease. A nice salad for lunch, a handful of nuts for a snack, soup for dinner. While it doesn’t sound substantial, it was actually a great day. The salad was yummy, the soup, tolerable. And I likes me some roasted pumpkin seeds!

I could do this.

Yum! Salad with carrot ginger dressing. A recipe I’ll add to my lunch routine from now on!

On day 2, the menu was substantial enough:

7AM (or upon rising): Glass of room temperature lemon water
8AM: Herbal tea
10AM (breakfast): Raspberry and Rice Milk Smoothie (follow method for Blueberry and Almond Smoothie)
11:30AM: Coconut water
1:30PM (lunch): Detox Teriyaki Chicken and Steamed Greens
4PM (snack): Miso Soup with Watercress
6PM (dinner): Pea and Basil Soup (follow method for Broccoli and Arugula Soup)

1st 1/2 of the day 2’s food

We flipped the times for chicken and the soup, figuring if this was the only real solid protein we’d eat in a few days, we’d enjoy it together, warm, at dinner, rather than have Mr. Peng take a limp cold piece of chicken to work. The “teriyaki” sauce tasted so… blah… that I didn’t eat more than half of the chicken, despite the fact that I probably should have, you know, for the calories and all.

Yesterday was day 3, and a rough day for me, in general. Mr. Peng is actually doing fine on the diet, because he is one of those people with discipline, follow through, and what not. Me? I didn’t do so hot. The good news is that I’m not hungry—I haven’t been hungry once since we started this diet. My typical eating habits consist of 2 cups of coffee with nonfat milk in the morning, followed by a giant sub sandwich ($5 foot long, baby) around 1PM, a Coke around 3, and some sort of dinner around 8. All this eating and drinking 6 times a day really makes it impossible to get hungry, even if I’m choking down half of whatever it is, and eating a handful of blueberries or nuts in place of the other half of the meal/shake/juice.

Drank 1/2, trashed 1/2, scarfed a handful of blueberries instead.

I’ve been whining. I’ve been moaning to everyone that comes within a 2 foot radius of me that I just want a friggin’ double cheeseburger. Or just a bowl of rice doused in soy sauce. Or a salt lick. I don’t miss the fat, the substance, any of that. I. MISS. SALT.

I’m angry that I’m doing this. I know that it sounds so silly, but I’ve come to realize how preciously I value my meals. Getting lunch is the only time I really leave the house during the day (other than driving Mr. Peng to work). The act of thinking about what I want to eat, leaving the house, purchasing it, and coming back to eat it in front of my computer, is a ritual I really really love. I think it’s because it’s the only thing that really varies during my weekday. Subway sandwich? Huge cup of polenta with olive oil and parmesan? A huge onigiri doused in soy sauce? Samosas from Vik’s? Oh, the possibilities.

And then, dinner. I LOVE cooking. I love going to the store, choosing ingredients, and coming home, filling the house with yummy smells for a yummy dinner. Cooking is a ritual, and sharing a warm yummy meal with Mr. Peng is a part of my day that I value.

But on this diet, I feel like a large portion of my time is spent preparing this food, that in the end, tastes like dishwater. Dishwater that someone peed in.

We’re heading to Sonoma this weekend to spend time with some friends, so we’d always planned to do the diet for 5 days, break for the weekend, and then do a round of 5 days next week. But honestly, I don’t think I can do it. I’ve come to realize that meals are what really give Mr. Peng and I time to bond. I either meet him for lunch some days, or we share a really great home cooked meal for dinner. But this week, meals have been more of the “choke it down and deal with it” variety.

Mrs. Coconut made it 4 days, and I can see why she hit the 4 day mark and left it at that. We’ll go one more day, but you can bet your tushie that when my girlfriend rolls into town tomorrow night, I’m gonna eat the starchiest, saltiest, meatiest and cheesiest thing I can find on the menu for dinner.

I haven’t failed quite yet. But my tolerance for any more of this is very, very low. I’m way too grumpy to notice if my body is feeling any better, or not.

What’s the best time of day, for you? Like me, is it mealtime, or do you find much more joy in something else?