I survived Day One of the 24-day challenge.* Woohoo!
As a general overview, the first 10 days of the challenge are focused on an herbal cleanse. This means taking fiber and probiotic supplements in the morning and two “gentle cleanse” tablets at bedtime. Diet is kept as clean as possible, avoiding processed foods, sugar, white flour, etc.
I know some of you are wondering, “Just how ‘gentle’ is this cleanse?” (ahem) At the risk of teetering on TMI, I’ll just say that I’ve been through colonoscopy prep in the past, and this is NOTHING like that. You really don’t spend a ton more time in the bathroom, except to pee (thanks to all the water you’re hopefully drinking).
Okay, back to safer topics. 🙂
When I was first introduced to the concept of the 24-day challenge, I remember thinking, “What on earth do you eat if you can’t have cereal for breakfast, deli sandwiches for lunch, and pizza for supper?!”
As I’ve done the challenge in the past, I’ve picked up meal and snack ideas that have made the process easier. So each day I’ll share a brief overview of my meals and snacks and will also share any overall observations or tips.
So let’s get to it…
Breakfast: 2 scrambled eggs (seasoned with black pepper) and a banana
Lunch: Salad drizzled with olive oil and balsamic vinegar; Tuna mixed with salsa (I’m not gonna lie: The tuna mixture didn’t taste good to me. I saw the idea on another health website, but the tuna flavor was just too off-putting.)
Supper: Clean crockpot turkey chili (Recipe found HERE). Since my husband isn’t doing the cleanse with me, he added cheese, sour cream, and tortilla chips to his chili. My kids ate quesadillas because…well…they don’t touch anything “too spicy.” 🙂
Snacks: A handful of unsalted peanuts with raisins; Celery sticks with almond butter; Apple slices
Tea of Choice: Apricot & peach green tea from a local roaster
Exercise: Deep cleaning the bathrooms (I think scrubbing the shower burned at least 1,000 calories! :))
Energy Level: I hit a little lull in the afternoon (which is typical for me), but overall I felt pretty good. Impressive considering I stayed up late the night before. I expect this to only improve as the challenge continues.
Other Observations:
– Overall, I didn’t feel an overwhelming sense of, “I can’t stick with this diet. It’s awful!” But I also know that motivation is higher early on in the process. We’ll see where I stand a week from now. 🙂
– Some foods tasted good to me (the eggs and chili, probably because of the seasonings I used), but other foods tasted soooo bland. I know this is because my taste buds have gotten used to processed food lately. By the end of this thing, I expect my palate to be fully changed back over.
– It seriously killed me to give my kids animal crackers for a snack, because I wanted to grab some for myself SO bad! It was very eye-opening to see what foods have become my go-to crutch when I’m hungry.
So that’s it for Day One! Off to bed I go. Just hoping all the water I chugged with my herbal cleanse pills won’t wake me up too much. 🙂
*My completion of Advocare’s 24-day challenge is not a personal endorsement of Advocare or any of its products. Advocare’s products may cause adverse health effects in some people and shouldn’t be entered without full understanding and consultation with a physician.
*title photo by Twigy Posts
I love it that you’re blogging this journey. Ryan has done this cleanse before and loved it. I’m too scared to give up my coffee, so I haven’t done it. We do drink spark every morning though!! I’m enjoying your recipe rundown. THat’s a part of it I’ve not seen. WOuld you have liked lunch better using chicken instead of tuna? Or is chicken not allowed?
Chicken is a great idea, Bekah! I’ll have to try that next time. And I know what you mean about giving up coffee. Thankfully the Spark seems to be a good replacement for me energy-wise. Plus I can still get my cozy-warm-drink fix with tea (more on that tomorrow). 🙂