Whew! I did it. I finished one week of the 21 Day Sugar Detox.

If you’ve followed along, you know that we started eating a paleo diet back in November of 2010. I did pretty well with that until this summer when we found out that Nikki was pregnant. Geoff was in Saudi and, like the good mother-in-law that I am, I ate along with her. Oh it was fun!

But I didn’t feel good. All of the reasons why we chose to change our eating habits came flying back into my face. I was tired, my joints ached, I was gaining weight.

I tried really hard to get back on track. But then came Pinterest with all of those delicious recipes (my baking…nom nom nom board was my most popular) and Christmas and I just couldn’t manage to be more than 50/50 on Paleo. I was slipping into a sugar hole.

Unicorn came back from Saudi and went to a project in Little Rock. I had disentangled from EVERYTHING in my life in order to go to Saudi and I was kind of at loose ends trying to figure out what to do.

I stumbled across the Daring Bakers Challenge. And joined it. Then I found Tuesday’s With Dorie which is a group baking their way thruogh a Julia Child baking book. I joined them. And then I found Project Pastry Queen. I bought the book and joined them.

My thought was that I would bake the items and give them away. But I didn’t know anyone in Little Rock to give them to so I either ate them or threw them away. Both bad choices.

I was back and forth between Arkansas, Texas and Oklahoma babysitting for my friend’s twins and the birth of our glambaby, Aniston.

On February 25th, faced with having to make a quick bread, a rum cake and chocolate tarts for the challenges, I had an epiphany: THIS IS NOT GOOD FOR ME!

It came down from high, I’m sure. 😉

I had seen the 21 Day Sugar Detox and had been leaning towards doing it and it seemed like it was the perfect time. A new group was beginning on March 5.

I bought the program and got started. I’ve done the first week and it hasn’t been too hard. The night of the third day, I got a headache. I was expecting a headache but am still not sure if it came from taking the sugar out of my diet or the heinous winds we had here in Oklahoma last week.

I was flat out tired by days four through six. I expected that, too.

But I was able to stick to the program and eat no sugar. I really do feel better overall. And, I’ve lost 5 1/2 pounds as a cherry on top.

I know I can make it through the 21 days and on into the future. I KNOW how bad sugar is for me. But when I read an article saying that sugar helps to cause wrinkles, it gave me extra motivation to succeed. 🙂

If you find yourself falling in the sugar hole and not being able to climb out, I suggest you give the 21 Day Sugar Detox a whirl. They have a facebook page where you can find support, answers to your questions, recipes and all manner of good things.

What do you have to lose but some pounds and wrinkles? 🙂