Ditching the Carbs and Sugar for one week.

 

 

Well, I did it. I survived. (it was hit and miss for a bit there, though!)

I may have cheated a tiny bit. Maybe once or twice. Ok three times in total, but you know what? I’m really glad I did it and plan to carry it forward.

Having read about a super inspiring food plan in Red Magazine this month, devised by the nutritionists at Grayshott spa no less, to fully nourish and rest the body’s digestive system, I decided to give it a try.

I had got to that stage in my diet where my once 95% healthy regime had slipped to about 55% healthy (45% really, really super bad!) I knew that since health and nutrition are issues which are vital to me, my husband, and by default, my 4 children (Sorry kids) I had to reclaim the reigns of my once super-healthy habits and boot out my sugary, boozy, bready, cakey habits for good.

So, because I’m a total loser who has to do everything thoroughly, I bought the Grayshott Spa devised book ‘Gut Gastronomy’ by Elaine Williams and Stephanie Moore from Amazon (instead of just following the small snippets in the mag) and I also bought a book I had been eyeing up for a while ‘Deliciously Ella’ by Ella Woodward as I thought the two books would perfectly compliment each other; I didn’t just want to adopt these recipes and restrictions for 7 days, I wanted to be blown away by the deliciousness of the food AND the results to my overall feeling. I needed these books to prove their worth to me.

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I’m happy to say that I wasn’t disappointed by either of the books. I’ve have learnt so much about nutrition from them too.

Basically, I have learnt now so much about human nutrition that I cant possibly go back to the way I was eating. I cant ‘unlearn’ what I now know, so I’m quite pleased to report that both of these books may have just turned out to be a total life changer. To 6 lives in fact – sorry again kids, but I cant possibly allow you too much sugar anymore!

Now I’m not going to lie, But cutting carbs, sugar, alcohol and caffeine was, quite simply, a nightmare for about 5 days. I had headaches, I felt feint, I felt dizzy and I felt so tired. I think I must have looked pretty rough too because my husband kept looking at me as though I was mad. ‘This is going to make you radiant is it?’ he would ask, as though to wonder when the hell that radiance was going to kick in! I think I was a tad moody too and by about day 3 I felt sick to death of savoury everything. The whole thing just made me feel sick to be honest.

But …

Then, I turned a corner. I turned a corner everybody!

Ok, now for a few truths – I did have one small coffee each morning, but that’s it. And I had toast on day 5. I swear I would have killed someone if I didn’t have just a tiny intake of carbs by that point. Also, I had some red wine at the weekend, but only two glasses.

You may be thinking that that represented quite a few cheats, but considering if was clearly running on caffeine all day long previously, substituted only be beer or wine in  the evenings, washed down with bread and pasta city, I think I did pretty well!

It certainly highlighted just how hooked I was on the bad stuff.

Today is day 7 and to my complete genuine surprise, I have lost 4lbs. Considering this plan of mine actually consisted of tons of eating (albeit of healthy stuff) I am really surprised that I’ve lost a bit of weight. I think it just goes to show how much carby excess I was carrying around!

I’m going to continue as I have been, with just the introduction of carbs a couple of times a week. Because I realised that I do need them a bit for my workouts.

I will share some of my favourite recipes from the books in future posts, and talk more about the specifics of nutrition that I have learned too.

But, just for now though, I wanted to share that these books are my new favourites and have truly resulted in a conquered refined sugar addiction! Woo!

How about you – Are you hooked on the bad stuff too? do you have either of these books?

 

 

2 comments on Ditching the Carbs and Sugar for one week.

  • Urban mumble

    I quit sugar two years ago and it’s the best and probably hardest thing I’ve ever done. That definitely made my skin more radiant. I couldn’t and wouldn’t want to cut out carbs from my diet but I do try to avoid the white refined kind. We just spent one week in Paris where I had white bread and white pasta in stead of the brown variety (I had no choice). The result: I put on 3kg (whatever that is in lbs)! That’s stuff is bad.
    Urban mumble recently posted…How to finally stick to your goalsMy Profile

    • Anna (author)

      Really – 3kgs! Just goes to show. Yes I’m with you re. Carbs – I still have them but just wanted to restrict them as it was part of the 7 day ‘gut rest’ … Honestly, it was hell. I definitely can’t work out often on no carbs. Lesson learned! X

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