It's Over!

Well, I finished the Ultimate Reset! GO ME! I struggled through Week 3 only because I managed to get pretty violently ill. Let me give you some background, dear readers, and I'll keep it as PG as possible because this story gets gross pretty quickly.

September 2011: Enjoy a lovely honeymoon in Mexico. Don't drink straight from the tap, etc etc, sanitize the shit out of my hands any time I touch anything remotely icky, do what I thought was right in a foreign country. But it's not like we were in the backwoods, we were in effing Cancun. Anyway, we got home on a Friday. I proceed to get insanely ill on Sunday. I mean like...I literally thought I came home with cholera or something. I spent most of the next few days in the bathroom alternately shitting myself to death and projectile vomiting. I managed to make it through the week but barely. I ended up in urgent care because I was so miserable. I lost over 10 lbs in 2 days simply from the not being able to eat anything. Couldn't even keep water down. The doctors never figured out what was wrong with me...giardia? E. Coli? I will never know. Anyways, this hits me off and on every few months. Heat makes it worse so summer was pretty awful for me. In March I got so sick I ended up in the ER for dehydration. The attending doc was surprised I lasted as long as I did without kidney damage (I hadn't peed for TWO. DAYS. STRAIGHT). When I get stressed, it seems that things are just 10 times worse. Enter last week.

Monday was pretty awful. Tuesday was slightly tolerable. Wednesday I called my husband and my mother in hysterical tears because I was thisclose to quitting my job. But starting Monday afternoon, I ended up just feeling nauseous. Tuesday I barely ate all day because I was so nauseous. By Wednesday...forget it. I think I ate just a few things all day and was throwing up at work because I was so sick. Thursday I stayed home but also barely ate anything. Friday was a bit better. I slept and/or spent the most of the weekend on the couch due to feeling so crappy. Sunday I was at least able to eat a few things. I didn't really start feeling better until today. I still have some...intestinal issues, so to speak, but I can actually move around without feeling like death.

I lost about 11 lbs total. I may gain a few back just due to the fact that I barely ate this past week. I feel that I lost a few inches on my waist as well. But the most important thing is that I truly FEEL better. I haven't had caffeine in over 3 weeks. I don't even feel the need for it and am more concerned about the heart palpitations that I would probably get from it. My want for "bad" food is pretty much diminished. I may want that cookie or whatever, but I can take a bite now and be satisfied. I renewed my love for things like quinoa and lentils. I tried new and delicious recipes that are likely to be come staples in my household. I sleep like a freaking rock now. Literally. I move so little that I actually hurt in the morning when I get up because I haven't moved at all. I'm about to start the protein sparing modified fast tomorrow, which is SO not like the Reset. I wish my body liked carbs (I almost wrote crabs...crabs are gross. Both the food and the STD) because I'm not sure how I'm going to handle 15 oz of protein a DAY. Apparently I won't get hungry though, so whatever. Just hoping my kidneys don't quit on me...and/or I don't die. I'll be eating 1000 calories or less a day. It's designed for rapid weight loss though, so I'm hoping that if I stick to the program to a T, I will be done doing this by the summer. Especially since I am also supposed to work out during this too. Well, we'll see...

Overall, I would absolutely and completely and totally recommend the Reset. It really changed my life and opened my eyes to see that food can be good AND healthy. Were the supplements gross? Some of them, yes. But absolutely worth it. I can't even describe my experience...try it yourself!

One last thing: though last week was insanely stressful, it was made better by the fact that I was offered (and accepted!) a new position. I am leaving my job as a therapist and moving to a supervisory position in another agency's community based services program. More money, less interaction with children. Leaving is bittersweet for me because I had such an amazing experience at my current workplace up until October 2012, when everything just seemed to fall apart. I have felt pretty unsupported since then, and something that the Reset taught me was to get rid of negativity in my life. So bye bye, old job, hello new job. (Cue the "Movin' on Up" theme song from the Jeffersons).

Stay tuned on my updates regarding the next crazy eating plan I'm on...