Day 17-
Today's diet:
On waking: Hot water with a slice of lime (ran out of lemons).
Breakfast: Gluten and wheat-free muesli with lecithin, psyllium husks and rice milk. Green tea.
Morning snack: Almonds and pecans. Peppermint tea.
Lunch: Homemade Pad Thai with chicken. Peppermint tea.
Afternoon snack: Miso soup with tofu.
Dinner: Vegetable stir-fry with carrots, broccoli, beans, cauliflower, garlic, spring onion and ginger. Tofu cooked with lemon, salt, garlic, olive oil and chilli.
After dinner snack: Lemon and Ginger tea with honey.
At least 2 litres of filtered water throughout the day.
Exercise: 30 minute brisk walk and 1 and a half hours of heavy digging/shoveling.
Sleep: About 9 hours- woke up 4 times.

Not too bad a day, great because I got to have a bit of a sleep-in and go for a walk this morning. I also managed to widen the trench I'm digging for a retaining wall and it always feels good to make progress on your projects.

But then, my husband is having quite a bad day and the stress & frustration he feels is hard to see. I guess we could both really use some of that stress-busting meditation tonight...

Back to strictly Detox food today and I'm actually glad, I feel better about myself! I was concerned about the lack of dairy in the Detox when I started the program, as I have always been sure that dairy products are the best source of calcium and without them, you are in danger of weakening your bones and contracting diseases such as osteoporosis. But Joshi has a different point of view on this topic and suggests that an overly acidic diet and over-consumption of protein may actually be one of the causes of osteoporosis:

"Since the 1970's our milk intake has steadily decreased and this has been blamed, in turn, for the equivalent decrease in our calcium levels- a decrease which means that one in three women now suffer from osteoporosis. However, according to recent research, the bone loss and deteriorating bone tissue that occur in osteoporosis are not due to calcium deficiency but to the fact that our bodies are excreting too much of the calcium they already have."

"The reasons for this loss of calcium are thought to be the over consumption of protein and a generally acidic diet. Foods such as meat, eggs -and dairy- make excessive demands on our kidneys as they try to eliminate their waste products (urea). During this process, calcium is leached from the body- the calcium that is needed for healthy teeth, bones and body tissue. In other words, rather than protecting against weak and brittle bones and diseases such as osteoporosis, milk could turn out to be their cause."

Joshi goes on to say that consuming too much milk could actually be bad for you and that this may be why American women have such a high incidence of osteoporosis despite being amongst the biggest consumers of calcium in the world. He compares this to Chinese women who get almost all of their calcium from fish and vegetables instead of dairy, rarely developing osteoporosis.

I had never considered this and I am also interested in some of the other issues Joshi has with (cow's) milk. He says that most people who are not of northern-European origin have trouble digesting lactose. It needs to be broken down by the enzyme lactase that lives in our bowels and if we absorb more lactose than we can digest, the surplus travels to the large intestine where is ferments. This can cause indigestion, bloating, cramps, nausea, tiredness and diarrhoea. Apparently more people are developing lactose intolerance as our bodies give up trying to make enough of the enzyme that breaks it down.

I am not sure that I will cut out milk completely, but if I do, I will need to consider iron and calcium supplements, as I don't like goat's milk and soy milk can mess with the hormonal balance within women. So rice milk it is.