that darn wagon and me

i hadn't intended to come back here to post, as this blog was purely for the juicefeast experience, but what i have to say is relevant. so here goes.

there are days when i feel like a fraud. i don't feel i can call myself a raw foodie when i just ate cooked food for the third time this week. so i feel the need to publicly state that i'm struggling to stay raw. again.

the battle with cooked food

i worked out part way through the juicefeast that drinking juice for 92 days wasn't going to stop my cooked food cravings. the juicefeast would give me time to explore my relationship with food and work out some of the pyschological hangups, but it wasn't going to be a miracle cure. but, you know, i was dealing with it. so far so good.

then i completed my juicefeast, calling it quits after just over two months, when i saw that my heart just wasn't in it and i was starting to pick at food. i eased myself back into eating, with lots of fresh fruit, salads, smoothies and a firm commitment to eating raw for health reasons. and let's not forget that amazing energy you have on a high raw diet.

falling off the wagon

but then we had house guests. and then there was a family get together. and then whatever other social occasion. and each time i thought "i'll just have a little cooked food today, to keep thing's easy" and fully, genuinely, intended to keep going that way. then somehow, it all fell apart. and now, two months later, i'm eating way too much cooked food. i eat mostly raw most days, but i also binge out on rubbish. in the past two months i've eaten ice-cream and crisps, of all things, and lots of not-that-great cooked food. it's crazy! but i'm not going to get myself in a mess over this. 

the all or nothing option

i read steve pavlina's update on eating raw and felt consoled. a slight aside here, i didn't know he'd continued to eat raw. i thought he'd done an experiment and then gone back to his usual diet. so i was quite impressed to wander back over to his blog and discover he's now pushing himself to stay 100% raw. anyway, the point is, that it's often easier to stick at 100% raw than to dither at 80% or do the"'i'll just eat this cooked food tonight because i'm eating out with friends but i'll be back to 100% raw tomorrow" thing. i guess that differs from person to person. i compare it to the casual smoker, or the innapropriately named 'social smoker'. some people can smoke like a chimney for the duration of a party night out then not touch a cigarette for months. yet the majority of people would be buying a packet of ciggies the next day because the nicotine had already got a stranglehold. cooked food is just as insidious. once the wheat starts to leave your body you get that sickness which you either ride out as detox or you cave in and have some more to appease the beast.

yo-yo side effects

i still eat plenty of fruit. i have green smoothies a couple of times a week and eat a big raw salad for lunch and dinner most days. but because of the inconsistency i don't feel as well as i should. i get lots of detox headaches after a cooked food 'binge' - especially wheat, i've found - and i'm putting on weight again. so it's time to rein in. i get so frustrated with the yo-yo-ing. i've read a few things recently which talk about falling off the wagon and they all come to the same conclusion. and it's something i know, inside, to be true. recognise you've fallen off. dust yourself down. get back on again. no guilt. no recriminations and no "if only"s. just get yourself a juice or a green smoothie and start planning a few days' worth of raw food.

so that's what's happening in the loulou household. we've got a week of juices, smoothies and salads coming up. i'm making some teriyaki almonds and we have a cupboard full of conscious chocolate, so i have treats available for those tricky moments.

wish me luck.