Clean Cheating

My Naturopathic Doctor was making fun of me the other day. 

I guess it's all relative, but she was like, "Adrienne, bad eating to you would be clean eating for someone else.  There's got to be another reason for the weight gain other than what you are eating...I think it's stress related, but we'll need to investigate."

That could be true, but, this journey, my journey, is about this girl and her pursuit of health and life-giving choices.  So, yes, I suppose when I "splurge" on 5 brownies made of raw figs/dates/walnuts/cocoa/agave it's healthier than choosing 1/2 a box of Little Debbie's or something.  Or eating all but one bite of a Persian Key Lime Tartlet by Hail Merry might be better for my body than wolfing a piece of Key Lime pie by a certain female chef who has recently been diagnosed with diabetes for eating her own recipes...but not really.  Because sugar is sugar is sugar...and just because that tartlet doesn't have my key allergens in it doesn't mean it's necessarily a "better splurge"...anyway...

Maybe I do choose healthy binge food, but the key word there is binge.  No matter if my choice yesterday was 2 cups of popcorn, 3 Tbsp chocolate chips, 2 large "ants on a log", a dozen corn chips with salsa, and that tartlet, it's the why that gets me thinking...

I have noticed a pattern when I eat clean for 6 days and then have a couple of "whatever I want" meals on the 7th day, I feel great in general.

However, if I try to push it through more than those 6 days, like say a week and a half or two, then I have a "crazy day" and eat, or at least think about eating, outside the box, that is, my box.  I have also noticed that a "crazy day" is often the unforeseen prelude to that time of the month.  Case in point, apparently.

The part that makes me cranky, though, is I feel I've let a few friends down.  Several friends have given up sugar and white stuff for Lent and I've been encouraging them on their journeys.  They may or may not go back to eating from whence they came once Easter arrives, but for me, it's a lifestyle, not a 6 week change of course, so I'll still eat the same way.  Yeah, I had a rough go over the holidays and my birthday, but my goal and lifestyle are clean eating 90 - 95% of the time.  Not for legalism sake but because I know my body loves me when I love my body through healthful choices. 

Anyway, I feel better now and know what my trigger was.  I did give in, but this isn't legalism, this is love and I'm back to my 3 meals a day for a while because eating that way gives me plenty of energy.  And 6 days on, one day off...that helps keep my mind straight.  Glad Lent is set up that way anyhow.

It's all just one day at a time.  I'm just grateful for God's grace and strength in the journey...