Musings
an Online Journal of Sorts

By Alyce Wilson

Since Sunday, I've been on a detox diet that I read about in Bust magazine. According to the information, you can tell if you need to detox if you have the following symptoms: skin rashes, redness or pimples; strong body odor, frequently sore or swollen lymph glands or tonsils; dull backache over the kidney area or on the right side near the liver; a coated rather than pink and clear tongue; recurrent nausea or constipation; unexplained headaches; or pain and fatigue. I have only a few symptoms on the list (pimples, unexplained headaches and fatigue), but I thought it couldn't hurt.

The diet is as follows: 1) Eat only seasonal, organic fruits and vegetables such as greens, broccoli, beets, squash, apples and pears. 2) Limit yourself to whole grains such as brown rice, quinoa, millet and amaranth. 3) For protein, keep it low fat with legumes, lean meat and fish. 4) Eliminate sugar, refined foods, coffee, booze and cigarettes. 5) Drink 2 to 3 cups of nettle tea per day as a tonic to help move the toxins through the liver. 6) Drink at least 8 glasses of water a day. 7) Get active and sweat for at least 15 minutes a day. 8) Meditate by sitting quietly and focusing on your breath for 15 minutes a day. You're supposed to do this for two weeks.

The Gryphon and I went shopping last weekend at Trader Joe's, thinking they would have much of what we wanted but they're primarily an import store not a health food store. Still, we were able to get plenty of organic produce and some organic oats.

We stopped them at a second store, a small natural food store and bought some more grains, nettle tea and some more organic produce.

For the past week, The Gryphon has been wonderful, coming home from work and cooking things for me that I can heat up for dinner the next day. (He gets home too late to cook for me that night). It's not that I don't cook, but my schedule makes it difficult to do so, especially this last week when I've been working on completing the next issue of Wild Violet.

The new diet was difficult to get used to at first. This is now a typical day. For breakfast, I have oatmeal with some fruit on top, namely, a very delicious fruit compote of apples and pears prepared by The Gryphon. I have a cup of nettle tea with breakfast. Midmorning, I usually have a piece of fruit as a snack.

For lunch I have a sandwich made from whole wheat bread, some salsa, a couple slices of tomato and some lean turkey. I'll have a vegetable as a side, either a salad with some olive oil drizzled on top or some organic baby carrots. Often, mid-afternoon if I'm getting peckish I'll have another piece of fruit or maybe a glass of vegetable juice or some other 100 percent juice.

Dinner will be something The Gryphon cooked. Earlier in the week it was tilapia with eggplant, squash and tomatoes, with a half cup of brown rice. Later, he cooked some acorn squash so I added that a couple nights. And when the fish ran out, he made chicken with a spice rub, as well as baked some yams. I had that with brown rice. I have another cup of nettle tea.

At some point in the evening, I have an evening snack. The Gryphon made a delicious pea soup, and a cup of that does wonders. Last night I finished off the day with an orange.

Actually, not only is this a healthy way to eat but I feel full for most of the day, whereas before I used to eat smaller meals and then more snacks of light snack items. They were things I didn't think were terribly unhealthy, like rice cakes or a cup of light applesauce or sugar free JELL-O, maybe a Kashi bar.

Fortunately, I don't have a problem staying off caffeine and alcohol. I'm no longer a caffeine junkie, although I sometimes get in the habit again. And I rarely drink during the week unless we have some beer left over from a party.

The hardest thing has been the dairy, because I love cheese and yogurt. It's hard to not eat them. When the two weeks is over, I'll definitely go back to having two servings of dairy a day.

It could be my imagination, but I feel like my complexion is getting a bit better. I also feel like I have more energy. So far so good!

Copyright 2005 by Alyce Wilson

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