A Happy Friday Update

Well I'm nearly through cycle 2. All I have left to challenge back is Gluten Saturday and Sunday, then Soy Wednesday and Thursday. Then I have two more days of Cycle 1 to reset everything and I get to finally go to the cycle 3 I've been planning. So far I've had no reaction to anything, save for a little gas after drinking milk, which is not necessarily a sign of inflammation. I think we just don't digest things well when they haven't been in our diet for a bit. I'm not going to really go back to milk anyway.

While I'm on the topic of Cycle 3 here's what I've worked out so far:
(I incorporated the research I did on Uric Acid diet based cures so I can ditch my sore joints and spine.)

My Cycle 3 ideas: (make/insert charts of foods to buy and where, of pg 243, 245-249)

For all the foods below, “as ingredient” means I’m not adding it back but I’m not going to be hyper-vigilant. “Every other day,” “twice a week,” or “Weekly” refer to eating that item that often and not being hyper-vigilant about it as an ingredient. “Avoid” means I’m going to take measures to avoid it, but if it can’t be helped, so be it.

RE Sweeteners: Add back honey, 2oz dark chocolate (>70% cacao), Cane sugar as ingredient

RE Peanuts: Weekly, but I’m not going to buy peanut butter. Thus I’ll almost never have it.

RE Alcohol: Twice Weekly Red Wine, Weekly Gluten Free Beer, (challenge Dark German or Tequilla)

RE Corn: Avoid High Fructose Corn Syrup, Ear corn Weekly, Movie Popcorn Weekly, Non-GMO gluten free corn chips twice a week

RE Soy: Avoid unless it’s a trace ingredient such as in vitamins or food bar

RE Gluten: Avoid, although I’m going to allow gluten free carbs in moderation (every other day)

RE Dairy: Avoid milk (sub coconut or almond), Cheese in moderation (every other day) + (try goat milk/cheese and raw milk?)

RE Eggs: Add back free range without restriction.

RE Meat: Continue with free range chicken, grass fed beef, game, goat/lamb, and wild caught river fish in 6oz portions.

RE MSG: Avoid (not really mentioned in Virgin Diet)

Continue

with breakfast smoothie/shakes. (easy and I can make time to pack a lunch)
with lettuce wraps and salsa tuna for lunches
4x15 exercises,
parking at far end of the lot & taking the stairs,
to eat within an hour of waking and not after 8pm
getting up two hours early

Things I need to add

Increase exercise (do some research), take burpee challenge

I want feast and fast day’s cycling through the week so I think my 5% will all be on a single day.

Divide the shopping list into three-day increments to reduce waste (no preservatives).

Use small plates, smell dinner cooking, sit down away from TV and enjoy my food.

Wear a pedometer to track activity level.

While writing—burst for 20 minutes then walk around.
While watching TV—getup every commercial break until 8:30 and walk around

Researched ways to reduce Uric Acid:

I literally can’t avoid foods high in purine as there would be nothing left to eat. So add to Cycle 3

1.       Eat antioxidant foods: red bell peppers, tomatoes, blueberries, broccoli, grapes, and so on

2.       Continue to increase fiber: Absorbs uric acid

3.       Continue Virgin Diet oil recommendations: basically oils that go rancid destroy vitamin E

4.       Continue not eating baked goods with saturates fats and trans fats

5.       Supplement with Vitamin C & E

6.       Supplement with Celery Seed Extract: (or roots) long used for gout, rheumatism, arthritis

7.       Supplement with Raw apple-cider vinegar: thought to change blood pH and reduce uric acid

8.       Cherries are recommended but I’m alergic: contain chemical compound thought to bind with uric acid and carry it on out (40 every 4 hours)

9.       Take a uric Acid Cleanse: Solaray makes one, probably others too. (luckyvitamin.com)

Brainstorming ways to make it better/ more affordable

Grow my own sprouts?
Ferment my own veggies?
Make my own kombucha?,
Explore an aqua-ponics set up?

Track where each item is cheapest
Request some stores start carrying my favorites so we can reduce number of trips.

Going forward

I do want to repeat Cycle 1 and 2 once a year.

I don’t want my life to be as consumed by food, journaling, weighing, shopping, as it is right now. This was fine for a season but in cycle 3 it must be second nature. I refuse to make my entire life about physical fitness. I need to find something that interests me for exercise.

Two forms of exercise, start with walking and 4x15 (find pulling exercises to add to my resistance training.) Eventually I’ll need to up my game though, add some stares or jogging and a gym so I can get better variety of resistance. (I still want a total gym though). (http://www.thevirgindiet.com/resources/4x4/index.html)

Today's Health Food experiment was Tumeric--Elixir of Life. 

Taste was bracing but not awful. Price was expensive at around $6.50. As an experiment it wasn't a terrible price but can you imagine buying half a dozen for the fridge. As for how I felt after drinking it???? Well lets just say I didn't notice the word cleanse clearly printed on the label. I blame the fact that it was hour 5 of a 6 hour marathon grocery shopping with my mom. I love the company and I don't mind doing the heavy lifting, but you just have to know the day is sacrificed if we go together. 

We did enjoy a wonderful lunch together--Hula Boy, my favorite Hawaiian BBQ. I subbed in brown rice with my chicken and added a salad, went light on the dressing, went all kimchi/no mac salad. I figured it was pretty healthy. I did sin twice today though. I didn't think about there possibly being gluten in the hot sauce at Hula Boy and when we got to whole foods they were roasting peppers in the parking lot. I had a sample of one rolled in a shell with cream cheese. It was heavenly. Anyway, there's no way to tell if my afternoon fun was from those two sins or from the 'cleanse' function of my Health Food Experiment. I can safely say none of it's in my system now. 

If anyone is considering this diet I'd strongly recommend you do cycle 1 and plan out cycle 3. Instead of doing cycle 2 just go into your doctor and ask for a blood test for food sensitivities. Have them check for IGg and IGc. For one thing, I suspect that I'm a statistical outlier and I'm sensitive to less common foods. The second tier of common foods to cause inflammation is Strawberries, Shellfish, Citrus, and Tree Nuts. Since I know I'm allergic to the first two, I'm nervous that I'm sensitive to one or both of the other. That would mean I just tortured myself for over a month and didn't even eliminate my inflammation. That might explain why I dropped 22lbs in 18 days and then held at that number ever since.  

 Anyway! To end on a happy note!

The audio format of  "On Becoming a Man" is up on Amazon, iTunes, and Audible.com. Links below:

Audible	http://goo.gl/4U2c63
Amazon	http://goo.gl/NXmuAS
iTunes	http://goo.gl/cPbnLC

There most likely will not be a Monday Post in honor of the holiday and my need to catch up on everything. Have an awesome weekend gang.