Saltwater Cleanse and Noodles – Whole 30 Day 1 Recap

Tracy and I decided over the weekend to give the Whole 30 program a try. I talked more about it here, but basically we’re eating clean and cutting out sugar, grains, dairy and legumes for the next 30 days and see how we feel.

I started playing around over the weekend eating most of my meals according to the whole 30 rules. It was surprisingly easy and flavorful. I also did some shopping over the weekend stocking up on veggies, meat and eggs.

While I was looking for tips and recipes online, I came across something called the “Salt Water Flush”. The basic idea is that you force a quart of salt water down and it flushes through your intestines, cleaning you out along the way. While this wasn’t something addressed in the Whole 30 plan, I thought what better way to be off to a clean start Monday Morning?

I’m glad I did it but it was so uncomfortable and nauseating, I’m not sure I’d do it again. If you want to read more about it, I recommend this page here.

IMPORTANT: If you are thinking of giving this a try, please read through all the information available and consult with your physician.

For me, it worked as described (I won’t get into any details here), but left me a bit nauseous, and with no appetite until about noon. Once I ate a little breakfast, I was fine

Breakfast

My first meal was pretty simple. I had 2 scrambled eggs and 1/2 a small avocado.

Not a big breakfast and not much in the veggie department. I knew I had to step that up at lunch. I headed to the store hoping to find a julienne peeler to make zucchini noodles. No luck finding one, which is why I ended up using my regular vegetable peeler to make wider noodles along with a homemade meat sauce. It was delicious. The whole Zucchini Noodle recipe is here.

 

I was pleasantly surprised by how well it worked. It tasted just like a regular, flavorful pasta dish. It filled me up but didn’t leave me ready for a 3 hour nap the way a regular plate of pasta would.

I was by myself yesterday, fixing food just for myself, but I can’t wait to make this for the rest of my family. It was just as quick as making regular spaghetti and meat sauce but tasted even better. (And obviously it’s much better for us too).

 

For dessert I tried one of the Larabars I picked up at the grocery store. I’d never tried them and wanted to see if this was something I wanted to keep around for food emergencies. They would travel well and I could keep one in my purse.

I bought a few different flavors at the grocery store and tried the key lime one. It tasted pretty good, but something about the smell put me off a bit. It smelled to artificially limey… kinda hard to explain, but I’m glad I don’t absolutely love them. They’ll be great for food emergencies to help me stay on plan in a pinch, but not become a regular indulgence.

Around dinner time we had big thunderstorms rolling through. The light was so bad, I didn’t get a chance to take pictures. Since I had a late and rather large lunch, and 1/2 an avocado to use up, I kept things simple. I grabbed two pieces of ice berg lettuce that were sitting in the fridge and filled them with anything I could find. Leftover chicken, mashed up avocado, some diced tomato and some cucumber. I wrapped it all up and ate it. Yummy and filling.

I’m also trying to go to bed a little earlier. During the summer our sleep schedule gets all out of wack and we become night owls. I’d like to make sure I get at least 8 hours of sleep a night and go to bed at a decent hour. So far, going to bed isn’t a problem, but falling asleep before midnight is a different story. It’s a work in progress and I’ll let you know if it starts to improve as part of this program. I’d love to sleep more soundly at night and not wake up several times.

That’s it for day 1. I hope you find this helpful and that it will inspire you to cut some processed food out of your diet, or maybe even join me in eating clean for 30 days.