This sight is thankfully less familiar to me than it was 21 days ago.
Well the 21 Day Sugar Detox is over and I for one am glad. I’d like to tell you that it cured me of all sugary things, but it did not. And…I fell off the wagon more than once (accidentally sometimes – sugar is in lots of non-sweet foods) and on purpose, hello apple pie. However I lost 4 lbs and though I didn’t really need to lose weight it’s definitely an indication of how much sugar was in my diet (I changed nothing else about my diet during the detox). I also crave it much less than I used to and when I did have something sugary I found it didn’t actually taste that great which was strange.
I learned that sugar brings comfort, escape and that quite often I used it as a reward or as solace. Kids being crazy? Just pop a donut hole in my mouth. Done cleaning the house? Well that deserves a brownie. And so on.
A couple things I did that seemed to get me through:
Stevia: The natural fruit sweetener you can find in the sugar aisle. I would add a little (half a packet) to green tea and that gave me a bit of a sugar fix.
Frozen berries: I ate a lot of these, especially frozen blueberries – they’re naturally very sweet and when frozen you can trick yourself into thinking you’re having dessert. Sorta. 
More water: I am very bad about staying hydrated. Very bad. Apparently many times when you feel hungry you are actually thirsty. When I felt full (I was less likely to cave).
Breakfast: I started eating breakfast regularly, something I’ve never really done. I made sure there was always yogurt and hard boiled eggs ready in the fridge. When I started the day full, I didn’t fall apart mid morning and get a pastry.
Anyway, this week I am embarking on another detox, provided to me by Evolution Catering, who specializes in delicious prepped meals delivered to your door. Once a month, they do a detox menu which consists of a menu free of dairy, grains, red meat, sugar and wheat. So for a week I’ll be trying this out. One thing I found was that when I didn’t have sugar, I really really really wanted bread and that’s what I used to compensate. So now I’ll be cutting out bread too. Yikes. Then again I checked out the menu and it’s hard to complain about tonight’s dinner – salmon in Papillote served w/ spinach, zuchini, cherry tomatoes, dill and shallots or tomorrow’s lunch – the health nut salad, with lettuce, avocado, bell pepper, kale, almonds and lemon vinaigrette.
Evolution Catering's Detox Menu. Delivered to your door!
If you’re in the Bay Area, you should give Evolution Catering a try. I do a fair amount of cooking but with three kids, I am not immune to a take out menu. Evolution Catering brings healthy, tasty, ready to heat food to your door. And at reasonable prices.
I enjoyed reading your post. It is a huge achievement to get sugar out of your diet because it has absolutely no health benefits. They don’t call it “sweet poison” for nothing!
Getting the ratios of carbohydrates, protein and fats in each meal is the way to reduce sugar cravings. It’s a matter of experimenting to find out what suits you. When you body is nourished in this way you lose all cravings. Metabolic Typing helped me discover what I needed to eat to stop cravings.
I look forward to reading how you get on with the next detox.