THE 24 Day Challenge

I have decided to do a 24 day challenge...AKA detox cleanse.  I did a cleanse a couple years ago and really found it beneficial.  I have a friend who distributes Advocare, which I had never heard of, but she uses it and thinks it's great so I decided to give it a go.

My personal goal is to lose 15-20lbs and keep it off.  I know what this means though I need to work out and I need to eat less carbs. - it isn't just about a one time cleanse.

But the reason for the detox is that I want to "reboot" me.  I feel like I'm stuck in a "perpetual unhealthy funk" and I want out.  You know it's bad when you cringe at hanging out with your "fit" friends just because you feel ashamed.  And when you can't find any "acceptable" picture of late of yourself... it's not good. When did I get so flabby?  So lazy?  This really isn't my personality, I do actually like to work out and yet I haven't in so long besides the few yoga classes I was into for awhile, the occasional jog and the weekly soccer game I don't feel like me.  So as a start and preparation I have gotten off/getting off medications I have been on so my body/my hormones can just be me again which I think is a good start.

One vice I don't think I can give up though is my one morning travel mug of coffee.  I LOVE LOVE LOVE drinking coffee on my way to work.  And everything I have read so far says that as long as I have under 300mg of caffeine a day there are no studies that show it to be bad.  Nevertheless, I do realize that for me caffeine might be a negative influence when it comes to my stress, anger, and anxiety.  So that is something to consider but Phil doesn't want to drink caffeine-free coffee and I don't want to make two pots of coffee so I haven't made any move to rid myself of this vice.

I am giving up sodas again though...for good. I think.

So now I just have to wait for the goodies to arrive in the mail for the detox to begin.  But I have a gym membership so I hope to activate that on Saturday morning.  Phil bought me three personal training sessions the other day so I have those I can use too.  All things are aligning - a little later than I wanted since I had a goal of wearing a certain dress for Phil's graduation and I don't think that's going to happen. :(

So what' my biggest challenge in this whole process?  I think it's two-fold actually.  One half is social and one is work.  The social aspect is that eating healthy takes time and effort and many people don't want to join in.  So eating out or hosting (both of which Phil and LOVE) is a new challenge as well as a concentrated effort to eat what you should and not be tempted or swayed by others - which isn't easy.  Also I seem to have acquired a lot of really young (sorry... you know who you are) really skinny friends who can eat whatever they want and never work out.  Blah well that's not me anymore.  I'm officially old and my weight and lower metabolism seem to be proving it.
The other challenge of course is work.  Not just my "day job" but my freelancing in the evenings and weekends some of those projects become last minute and pressing which means no time for the gym, no time to cook, not adequate sleep and they take a toll.  One thing I'm not good is saying no to freelance projects no matter how time crunchingly last minute they may be. I'm a people-pleaser and pleasing my clients is all too often under ridiculous time restraints that I don't set boundaries up to protect myself and therefore my eating, working out, and sleeping schedule gets all a mess and it is hard to recover.

So that's it, that's the plan. I hope to keep you up-to-date once I begin and let's keep our fingers crossed from excellent results!