Friday, November 23, 2012

Post-Thanksgiving Shakeology Cleanse: Day 1

I had read about the Shakeology cleanse about a month ago.  To put all my cards on the table, I love the way I feel taking Shakeology once every morning for breakfast and have noticed many positive changes.  But the idea of taking it 3 times a day and limiting my calories seemed absolutely nutty.  I am a person that loves to study nutrition.  In fact, I have a nutrition guide with calories and information for most items sitting near the kitchen as we speak.  So, I had to look into this.  Neither of us weighed in or measured anything beforehand as we really are looking at this as a health change and clease --not a diet.

My wife started taking Shakeology every morning as well and she agreed that trying this 3-day challenge after Thanksgiving while we were both off of work would be best.  I couldn't agree more.  So let's explain today -- day 1.

We woke up at 5:45am and started making our green tea.  Followed that with our chocolate Shakeology.  We mixed the 2 scoops together with 16 ounces of water and 22 ice cubes -- dividing the contents equally.  Not having the almond milk and strawberries that we were used to was a major change but we believe that our taste buds have made improvements over the last month or so while using the product.  We also bought gallon jugs of water each for us to finish every day.

At 9am we each had a piece of fruit.  I went with an apple and she went with a banana.  The hardest part was here as you are functioning for another 3 hours on just a piece of fruit but it keeps you anticipating the next meal.  A little stomach growling isn't bad, right?

We mixed our next batch of Shakeology at noon, the same way, in our wonderful Vitamix.  We followed that with our green tea.  Now, to clarify the tea, we have been adding Stevia which is also a component in Shakeology, so we felt that wasn't cheating.  Around this time, the wife started getting headaches.  Persistent and located in the front and back of the head but she endured.

At 3pm, we had our next Shakeology mix.  We also took the advice of another person that he replaced his snacks with half servings of raw unsalted almonds.  It comes out to about 14 of them.  Getting to chew the almonds added a little satisfaction as you feel you are biting into something.

For our final meal of the day at 6pm, we grilled up 4 ounce chicken breasts (one seasoned with salt and pepper while the other included garlic, paprika and cayenne pepper.)  We placed that on a bed of 2 cups of spinach and 1 cup of romaine lettuce with 2 tablespoons of dressing (light honey mustard and the other light caesar.)  I can honestly say that this was the most satisfying meal of the day.

We both slept extremely well that night, but her headaches followed her to bed.  Mine started gradually before bed at 8:30pm.  But at no time were we hungry.  This is a shocking fact that really says a lot for what Shakology does as an appetite suppressant.  Pretty amazing.  I can also note that we were both extremely emotional... don't know if that had to do with what we were watching on television all day or if it is a side affect.  We were pretty much couch potatoes all day.  Day 2 should be pretty intriguing but I'm expecting some struggles as I have heard some similar notes.

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