Day 16-
Today's diet:
On waking: Hot water with a slice of lemon.
Breakfast: 1 poached free-range egg on a slice of gluten and yeast-free toast with avocado and salt and pepper. Green tea.
LIVER FLUSH- 300mls of grapefruit on lemon juice, 200mls filtered water, juice of 1 clove of garlic and a small piece of ginger and 2 tablespoons of olive oil.
Morning snack: Almonds, pecans and sunflower seeds. Carrot sticks. Lots of peppermint tea.
Lunch: 4 small triangles of sandwich (at least the fillings were healthy: chicken and tzatziki, egg and lettuce), 3 small sausage rolls, a small square of frittata, 2 crisps, 2 bites of home-made rocky road and 2 bites of chocolate birthday cake. Peppermint tea.
Afternoon snack:  Not necessary.
Dinner: Grilled salmon with brussel sprouts, cauliflower and carrots.
After dinner snack: Lemon and Ginger tea with honey.
At least 2 litres of filtered water throughout the day.
Exercise: 30 minute brisk walk
Sleep: About 7 1/2 hours- woke up once.

Well, as you can tell, I fell off the wagon in a big way today. A 2nd birthday party where I had been asked not to bring a thing was the cause. I guess it's easier to be healthy when you can bring your own food, but when you go to other people's houses and they cook for you, it is rather difficult. Still I could have limited the damage more than I did, but it was all so delicious and all home-made so at least it was free of preservatives and other nasties. There were two surprising results of today's eating though, the first is that it really didn't take much of that kind of food to fill me completely. There were a couple of hours and that was all I ate over that duration and I felt full. My husband didn't restrain himself at all and felt decidedly ill. After all, this is the first tangible sugar we've had in ages.



The other, more positive, effect was to make me realise that I don't really miss this food as much as I thought I did. I feel a bit funny about this. Does this mean that from now on anything unhealthy will make me bloated and ill? Does this mean that I won't enjoy coffee or chocolate or red meat or wine ever again??? Doesn't bear thinking of. I'm sure I would lead a much healthier life, but I would still like to enjoy those things, just far less often than I have in the past.

We will see, I have planned Day 22 to be my 'Day of Decadence' between the Detox and the Maintenance Program and plan to have a coffee, a chocolate and probably some kind of red meat with dinner.

On the plus side for today, I managed to go for a lovely 30 minute brisk walk in the morning and do my liver flush when I came back. I completely forgot to do the breathing that went with it and rather than lying down for 2 hours afterwards, I got to sit in the car for an hour and a half as we drove to the birthday party. I also received compliments from the people at the party about the way I looked and was told I was 'glowing'. So that was nice, I'm happy to have some positive reinforcement. There was a lot of curiosity about the Detox, so I told anyone who asked whatever they wanted to know and a few interesting facts came up. One of the guys there actually gets gout, so I was able to share what Joshi had written about that as I found it surprising.

There are two reasons why we are avoiding fruit and veg from the deadly nightshade family (potatoes, eggplant, cucumbers, tomatoes, peppers(chillis) and capsicum). The first is that they are all related to the poison-ivy family, so are potentially poisonous to the body and specific food intolerances to these sorts of foods can build up over years. The other reason is that they are very acidic and particularly tomatoes will cause your body to absorb calcium from your bones to neutralise this acidity, making you vulnerable to osteoporosis. Also the chemicals and nutrients they contain encourage a build-up of uric acid, which is what causes gouty pain. Joshi also states that "An excess of spicy foods, red meat and red wine also has the same effect." My husband isn't keen on this information, he puts chilli on everything.



The information regarding osteoporosis is also very interesting, and Joshi discusses other causes of this disease later in the book, I'll write about that tomorrow.