Clean Eating... MY Synopsis

Okay. A day late and a buck short. I mean this both in my delay to actually get this thing on paper; as well as MY opinion for my clean eating cleanse. Let me say, that my general "goal" was weight loss and not "health". Of course I want to be healthy. Who doesn't? But I feel like I am comfortable with a 90/10 approach. I still go to the gym six days a week, calorie count and get in my proteins and vegetables. So eliminating whole food groups entirely, isn't my cup of tea. If you have enough self control to do this, "You go Glen Coco". I won't lie, I got a little high every time my husband ate something unhealthy and I was like nope, no dairy or sugar for me. It's addictive and empowering but all said and done, just not worth what I felt like I was giving up.

I quit early. Yes, shame me, that is fine. I said I would do 30, and I did 20. In my first week I lost 4 lbs. I was like oh my goodness, this is totally worth it. Then I gained back 2 lbs. So I lost 2 lbs in 3 weeks. This isn't a sad thing. But personally, I am not forgoing goat cheese (or a bevy of other delicious foods) for 2 lbs in 3 weeks. Bellow is broken down what I feel the major things I took away from this.

1. It seriously helped the way that I snack. I am a snacker. The reason I think I lost so much in week one is that I didn't have very many dairy free, sugar free, gluten free and organic snacks laying around. In the past, I would grab a pack of fruit snacks and sneak it into my diet telling myself it was only 80 calories. But those were 80 totally empty calories. It also made me snack deliberately. I couldn't just grab something. Small portion or not, I had to be deliberate about the little things that were going into my body.

2. It takes a lot of time and money. If you enjoy food the way that I do, you enjoy a wide variety of flavors. So if I wanted Sriracha, I had to make it. Coffee creamer? I had to make it. Any, condiment, dressing, creamer, sauce, etc... Most of the time you're making it. I have two small kids, a house to clean (yes fully everyday), dogs to walk, errands to run and even the occasional shower to take. In addition to the amounts of time I was taking to make random things, it also took a great deal of money. When we do our "budget" every month, we allocate a great deal of money to food. We enjoy eating really good food. And even with our ample budget, I was more than just tipping the scale. I was pretty far over what we typically spend. A silly example would be coffee creamer. I was spending $15-$20/week on making coffee creamer. That sounds insignificant. But when I am doing the same thing to make everything from scratch, it really started to add up. And the organic, dairy free creamer really wasn't even that good. Sure, the stuff I'm returning to is complete processed crap. But its also just a tbsp of crap a day. If I put 90% healthy organic foods in my body, I can justify 10% "crap".

3. Weight loss. The first week when I saw the scale drop four lbs, I was like wow, I really might be giving up dairy, gluten and all refined foods for the rest of my life. I had a number in mind. It was 6-8 lbs; 2 lbs a week. If I ball parked that, then I would keep extending this lifestyle. Then I gained 2 back and held the same 2 lbs weight loss through week three. Now, I'm not looking for this major transformation weight loss in a month. But I did want a somewhat speedy forward progression. You wouldn't be wrong if you said "Amy, you've only given your body a short amount of time to adjust and make changes. It needs longer." It does. You're right. Im still doing it my way. After I stopped eating "clean". I lost another 2 lbs the following week. As long as you're counting calories and putting mostly healthy food into your body, you will make some progress. Working out is important. But diet is crucial for women and weight loss.

So in the end FOR ME, I could for go all of the hype. I will just continue to evaluate the way I eat and the "small things" I put into my body. Are they empty calories? Or will they fuel me? I'm glad I did it. But I'm even more glad I'm done. :)