Why Detox? The Story of a Convoluted Breakup

Today is the first day of the rest of my life. I say that not in a cliche or insincere way, but a very literal and personally explosive way. I've decided to do a detox. Not a Master Cleanse crazy detox, but a healthy and reasonable detox.

When I tell this to people, there are two questions I get right off the bat.

1- Which detox are you doing?

That one is easy. I'm doing Dr. Mark Hyman's Detox Box (click on the image to buy it from Amazon). Dr. Hyman was the former co-medical director at the Canyon Ranch in Lenox, MA, a place I've dreamed of visiting for years. It's the gold standard of health spas. If you are willing to fork over the $5,000 fee for a week, you'll be treated to regular massages, yoga classes, hikes and the healthiest meal plan of your life. Sounds dreamy, right?

Without getting too boring, this detox box focuses around resetting the flora and fauna in your gut and eliminating any possible allergens. Though the meal plan is limited, I am able to eat lots of fruits and veggies and even a little bit of fish. This is by no means a starvation plan. It's a "learn how to eat normally" plan.

2- Why in the world would you go on a detox?

This answer gets complicated. Three parts more complicated.

First it comes down to this: I'm a food slut.

There was no price too low or no food too nasty for me to say no to infiltrating my body. What? I can order two everything bagels with scallion cream cheese for the price of one? Sure! That 1 lb bag of peanut butter M&Ms wants to be eaten all in one day or, nay, one sitting? Go on and jump down my throat, boys!

That is how I ended up seriously overweight.

Not TLC special programming overweight, but I'm at a weight that I never thought I'd see again. I said again because I've been on this weight roller coaster my whole life. The last time I went to Weight Watchers and lost more than 40 lbs. with my awesome, sexy husband, I promised that I would never see that weight again. As of last week, I was within 15 lbs of it.

I now weigh ..... AHA! Caught you. You didn't think I would let that slip this early, would you?

Weird Al Yankovic - I'm Fat
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So that's a large part of it. This detox, I'm hoping, will help me lose a little bit of weight while I learn to eat how humans are meant to eat--nothing from a box, nothing coated in sugar and certainly nothing that can be ordered by phone or internet.

Here's the next part. I am nearing the age of motivation: the big 3-0. Blerg. The age when health problems become nearly irreversible. And both sides of my family have every disease you've ever heard of related to unhealthy living: heart disease, cancer, diabetes, high blood pressure, gout. You name it, and my fat butt has the potential to get it.

Plus, there's the sociological pressure of 30. I can hear it now. "Oh, quit your whining. 30 isn't bad at all." That's where you'd be wrong.

Though my circumstances are better than most, I'm approaching 30 in a body and in a life I'm not happy with. I'm overweight (have i made that clear yet?), I don't have a full-time job (though I'm always looking! check me out at elizabethmayo.net) and I'm still living under my parents' roof...technically (more on that in another post).

I am completely grateful for everything I have; my wonderful husband, my flexible and understanding freelance jobs and my incredibly understanding parents that have supported me through a lot. But I am not in control of my destiny right now, and I hate that with a bile-y vengeance.

I think the detox will help me with all of that. My brain says, if I can get control over the one thing that I haven't had control over for my entire life, then maybe everything else will fall into place. I've come up with worse logic for dumber stuff in the past. Maybe if I sleep for two weeks straight, I'll stay UP for two weeks straight!

Here's the last part. You may remember my gluten epiphany.

Over the last 6 months, the connection between anything made with wheat and my obliterated immune system had been proven beyond a doubt. It took a 2-week elimination diet to figure it out. If I eat gluten now, I get serious side effects ranging from mud butt to nearly instant congestion. After so many years in our relationship, my body decided to break up with gluten.

It was my first breakup with a food, and my brain had no control over what my body demanded. Sure, I'd decided not to date certain shellfish foods and any item I had a "consistency issue" with (bananas, avocado for a while, any unidentifiable meat) was off the table. But gluten was the one who comforted me when I was sad, celebrated with me when I was happy and fought on my side in every argument.

Gluten was my true love.

Or so I thought, until it beat me up every time I ate it.

Once I eliminated the glutes from my life, I thought Hey, this is it! I'm going to lose a ton of weight! Not so fast. My weight didn't budge. This was not the best breakup of all time, where I would get skinny and be ready for the next food obsession that came my way.

I assumed I had to have other food allergies. The detox diet was the best idea I could come up with to figure out exactly which ones. Plus, paying for an allergist on my health plan is simply not an option!

If I haven't bored you to tears (or at least dried your eyesockets out with all the screen staring you've done to read this post), I hope you'll come along on the ride with me. I'll be writing regularly about this, and I hope to be posting some video blogs as well just to break things up. Aside from wanting to lose weight, be healthier and get my life back on track, I'm hoping that my detox experience will inspire others to do whatever they really need to do to change their lives for the better.

VIVA LA BODY REVOLUTION!