It is never too late!  It really is never too late to makes changes in your life?  Changes in the way you think, what you eat and how you feel.  That is what I have discovered over the last eleven weeks.   I have tried so many times to improve the fibromyalgia I have lived with for 20+ years.  After so many failed attempts, I just gave up.  I decided I felt as good as I was going to feel and all I could hope for going forward is to not get any worse.  Now I think HOW STUPID WAS THAT?   Well maybe not stupid but I was so wrong.  It isn’t too late to change the way I feel and I am living, breathing, feel-good proof of that.

My pain level is at a 2.  A TWO!!!!!!!!!  The changes I made in my eating habits were drastic but I am at a 2.  In just eleven weeks I went from an 8 to a 2.  Any person that is reading this can make an improvement in the way they feel.  It is not too late.  Little changes can yield big results.  No matter what you are suffering from or where your pain level is, it can be done.

Today may be the day you should make an appointment with your doctor to discuss an alternative treatment.  Maybe you follow my lead and find a doctor that practices alternative medicine and get another perspective on your condition.  Perhaps you can research supplements to see if one that I have discussed might be right for you.  Make a small diet change.  Cut out wheat, cut out sugar, maybe change from mostly soft drinks to mostly water.  Stop at your local farmer’s market and buy some fresh vegetables to eat this week.  It doesn’t have to be a major change but do something.

Do something just for you.  If you think that it is too late, you are so wrong.  I use to tell myself that I would love to get up one day and feel like a “normal” person, even if it was for just one day.  Well today I did that and it felt great.

I do want to give you an update on my co-workers and I after completing eleven weeks of healthy eating.  Lisa has lost 30 lbs for a total of 40 since January.  She feels so much better and she loves telling everyone how much better healthy eating feels.  She is following a Gluten Free diet and loving life.  Biggest problem she is having now is her shopping.    She cannot be trusted to go shopping and get the right size clothes for herself.  She can easily wear a 10 now but she comes in with her “new” pair of size 14 pants that are clearly way too big for her.  She is banned from shopping on her own from now on.

Jami wasn’t really over weight to start with but she is down to the weight on her driver’s license.  That was a loss of about 5 lbs and she couldn’t be happier.  She gets up every morning and runs before coming to work.  She simply eats healthy food and drinks lots of water.

I am down 27 lbs and my fatigue is better, my pain level is better and the inflammation in my body is much improved.   I continue eating the yeast free/dairy free diet and I don’t really even miss the things I was sure I could never give up.

For something fun to do this week, get out your driver’s license and see what you have listed for weight.  Jami got back down to her driver’s license weight and was so excited.  Lisa and I on the other hand, don’t expect to achieve that goal….but then again, it is never too late to try.

I want this blog to be an inspiration to each of us to improve our pain level and better deal with this diagnosis so until next week, please sign up at www.lindygolden.com to get email updates of my blog.  Next blog I am going to write about what started this new journey and changed my life.

I can’t wait to write this blog.  I have had a couple good things happen this week and weekend that I wanted to share with you. First let me say that I just finished nine weeks into the journey and I continue to do so well.  My pain level is down to a 3 and to tell you the truth, I considered actually making it a 2.  I would say 2.5 and how exciting is that?  Coming from an eight to a three in nine weeks  is nothing short of a miracle for me.

I wonder how many fibro patients are like me.  They worry about everyone else and put taking care of themselves on the back burner.  The doctor told me nine weeks ago that eating healthy would better enable me to cope with the stress in my life and that less stress would equal less pain.  I immediately thought yeah, right!  Not only do I work a high stress job that requires long hours but I feel like I was put on this earth to take care of everyone that I come in contact with that needs me.  Probably a lot of people that don’t even really need me (or maybe even want me).  I don’t talk much about me when I interact with people; instead I usually focus on them and what their problems are.  This brings me to the first of the good things that happened to me this week.  I ticked someone off this week (imagine that) and they told me I was heartless.  I looked at them and thought, really, are you kidding me.  I can think of a hundred adjectives to describe me but heartless would never, ever make the list.  I am the one that always says hi, glad to see you, I am fine and then immediately proceed into a conversation about you trying to determine what I can do to help you.  I have laughed a lot about that comment and maybe the laughter has helped improve my pain level but it did get me thinking.  Yesterday I went to a birthday party and saw several people that I had not seen for a few months.  As we were exchanging hugs and asking each other “how are you”, I would say great, I feel great.  It happened to dawn on me that I have said that for 20+ years when I didn’t feel great at all.  I didn’t even feel good most of the time.  It was always easier to get into a conversation about them than to start talking about me.  But yesterday it was different.  I said I felt great and actually meant it. What a blessing, I was giddy inside.  I FEEL GREAT!

And the next good think that happened to me, thanks to my friends on Facebook, I figured out how to swallow my Cod Liver Oil.  It works great.  Can you believe there is even a youtube video on how to take Cod Liver Oil?  Lisa and I watched it and took out a big spoon, held our noses and down it went.  That worked so much better than mixing it with yogurt.  Here is the link if you are interested http://www.thehealthyhomeeconomist.com/video-how-to-best-swallow-cod-liver-oil/.    If I could encourage each of you to take one small step toward a lower pain level and better control of your Fibromyalgia, the Cod Liver Oil would be my tip.  Not only is it an anti-inflammatory, but the other health benefits are numerous and it is something that requires very little effort.  Let me know if you already use it and how it has improved your health.

Until next week, please sign up to receive email updates of my blog.  And by all means, please continue to leave comments.  One little comment or idea from you could be all it takes to lower someone else’s “Fibro-Meter”.

I am two months into this journey, can you believe it?  When it first began, each day seemed like an eternity and now the days are just flying by and I am reaping the benefits everyday.  Yes my pain level is still at a 4 but my energy level has improved by leaps and bounds.   The reality of living with Fibromyalgia is that most likely we will never have a pain free day but a 50% improvement is huge.

I wanted to share the results of my doctor visit with you.  It has been 2 months since I last met with her and about 7 weeks since I started the detox.  She was very surprised with my progress.   She immediately noticed my weight loss which turned out to be 20 lbs and just icing on the cake for me.  I explained to her that my pain level had improved by about 50%, my blood pressure was down to 119/72 and my BMI was down 3.5 points.  We discussed all my concerns.  She explained that since I did the yeast detox and have been following a yeast free diet, she feels like the yeast should no longer be a problem.  I asked her about adding some fruit to my diet and she agreed that would be fine.  She told me to consume fruit like I do the starchy vegetables and limit them to 3-4 times per week.   She thinks adding fish oil (which she recommends liquid cod liver oil) to my diet could improve my pain level even more.  I still have quit a bit of inflammation in my back.

Now let’s talk about this liquid cod liver oil.  She so highly recommends this form of fish oil and the people in her office are convinced it is the best but I am having a hard time convincing myself.  The bottle said that it is the oil from the cod’s liver prior to any processing and I am thinking that was not really intended for this girl.  The bottle said 1 teaspoon but she told me I should take 1 Tablespoon.  Lucky me! She also said I could have one container of yogurt each day and I could mix my oil with the yogurt to get it down.   Now if she says to “get it down”, it ain’t good.   I hurried to the store and got my favorite strawberry yogurt and got home and realized this wonderful oil was lemon flavored.  All week I have looked at the bottle, which needs refrigerated.  I have even taken the bottle out several times, but I have yet to break the seal.  Tomorrow is the day.  Lisa, my co-worker, bought me some lemon meringue yogurt so tomorrow we are both going to try the cod liver oil in our lemon yogurt.  Heck yes I am dragging her into this.  She said she didn’t want me to go through this alone so I am very generously going to share it with her.  I will let you know next blog how this is going.

My tip for today comes from my most important mentor.  I have learned this and so much more from J.B. Glossinger, my Morning Coach and my friend.  His daily coast cast has drastically changed my life.  He recommends we make improvements 1% a day.  Just 1%!   We can all do this.  Just making one little change in our diet, our level of exercise, or our attitude can make such a difference in the way we deal with fibromyalgia and in the way we manage our pain levels.  The changes we have discussed in my blog have been drastic and the results have been also but if each person reading this will just start today by making one small change, before we know it another two months will have passed and the results could be huge.

Next blog I am going to begin giving you some tips to making the little changes in your diet so much easier.  Please sign up to receive email updates of my blog.  And by all means, please continue to leave comments.   I have received so many comments from both men and women all over the world that are suffering every day with Fibromyalgia.  Hopefully we can begin to lower their Fibro-meter also.

Just finished 6 weeks on this journey.  Things are going surprisingly well.  As you can see, the Fibro-Meter is at a 4.  I have reduced my pain by 50% in just six weeks.   More importantly, I have greatly reduced my level of fatigue.  I am so exited.  The 10 day detox is just a distant memory and I am quickly learning how to eat the yeast free way.

My last blog I told you what I can eat on the “bad boy” yeast free diet and I promised you I would outline what you can’t eat this week.  I like to concentrate on the positives.  I know for sure that if I concentrate on the can’t haves, I will feel deprived and anxious.  So I will cover them quickly and then give you a link to the complete diet that I am using.

No sugar or anything containing sugar, no processed foods.  I can have salt but only sea salt and no vinegar except apple cider vinegar.  Of course no breads, pasta or anything actually containing yeast.  Believe it or not, this is a biggie for me.  One of my very favorite treats has always been raw dough.  I love raw bread dough, corn bread mix, cake mix and I always had raw cookie dough in the refrigerator for snacking.  The night before I started the detox I had the biggest hunk of raw bread dough with brown sugar and butter on it.  Oh my, see what I mean about not concentrating on the can’t haves.  Get me a tissue; I am drooling on my desk.  Some things I was surprised were not on the “allowed list” were fruit, condiments, carbonated beverages, alcohol, or black tea.  You can see the complete diet by clicking on this link Yeast Free Living.

I promised you another story that is an update on my co-worker Lisa.  She had her semi-annual doctor’s appointment last week and the doctor looked at her chart and said OK, what are you doing? She has lost 20 lbs and the pain in her knees and feet have completely gone away.  Her doctor was very impressed that she started with the 10-day detox and is now following up with a healthy gluten-free diet.  Now Lisa luckily doesn’t suffer from fibromyalgia but her other aches and pains have vanished and her energy level has greatly improved.

This brings me to my tip for today.  If you suffer from fibromyalgia and fatigue consider speaking with your doctor about the yeast free or gluten free diet.  I know it seems extreme…. And it is!  But just the thought of feeling even 50% better may be worth the sacrifice.  I have had so many comments on my blog and several people have told me that they would like to follow the diet without doing the detox. Both my co-workers and I now know that the diet is so much easier to follow because of the detox.  The cravings for sweats and carbs almost completely go away after the 10 days.  You feel cleansed and by introducing the “allowed” foods over a 10-day period, your taste buds adjust and crave fresh vegetables and good proteins.  The detox is kind of like labor pains.  After a while you forget how bad they were.  After 6 weeks, I forget how bad the detox was.  Heck, 10 days isn’t that long when you have the possibility of a really big reward at the end.

Next blog I will tell you about my follow up visit with my doctor.  I have my appointment this Friday.  I have so many questions about the diet going forward and am very excited to meet with her.  We will discuss my future treatment and I don’t want you to miss any of the information.  Please sign up at www.lindygolden.com to get email updates of my blog.  And by all means, please continue to leave comments.

Well it has been a week since I finished the detox.  I must admit that my pain level is not exactly where I had hoped that it would be.  But by writing the Fibromyalgia blog, I continually go back and re-read what I have already written so that I continue to bring good content.  In doing this, I realized that I have came along way in managing my pain level.  When I started I was at an 8.  I have reduced my pain down 30% to a consistent 5.  I think that is huge after only a little under 4 weeks.  Plus I feel better.  I feel more like a normal person than I have in so many, many years. I don’t feel like I have been drugged in the morning when I get up.  For me this is gigantic and I know that for many people like me out there, it would be also.  So today I want to tell you about the “bad boy” yeast free diet.

As I said, there are many versions available on the internet.  I spent two solid days reading everything I could pull up on “yeast free diet”.  Each has its own variations.  I printed off so many but then after just a few days, I decided to pick one and stick with it.  I sent it to my family, my co-workers, and made two copies for me.  One to take home for my husband to read and one to keep with me at all times.  Not sure if that has worked.  Not a day goes by that either one of my daughters or my husband asks me, “can you eat this?”  And usually the answer is always the same.  NO!!!!!!!.   There is no doubt about it, the diet is very restrictive.  The key to this is the same as the key to so many things in our lives, instead of concentrating on what I can’t have.  I concentrate on what I CAN HAVE.  And that is what we will do today.

I can have as much as I want of low carb vegetables such as bell peppers, broccoli, cucumbers, carrots, cauliflower, string beans, tomatoes, and celery. There are so many more but asparagus, beet greens, collard greens, dandelion, mustard greens, rutabaga, and turnips are not going in this mouth.   I can have almost any meat, poultry, or seafood I want.  I can also have the “incredible edible” egg which to me isn’t much different than rutabaga.  Then I can have 100% Extra Virgin Olive Oil, safflower oil, and canola oil along with most all seasonings and fresh herbs. One big thing is that I now need to use only sea salt.  That really is a good thing.  It seems to have a better flavor and the grinders are fun.   I have quickly discovered that the right cooking method and a combination of olive oil and seasoning makes such a difference in the flavor and texture of the food I can eat.

In very limited quantities, I can have high carb vegetables (only 3-4 times a week) such as white potatoes, sweet potatoes, or beets.   Beans and peas also go into this group.  All types of seeds are allowed as are almonds, brazil nuts, cashews, pecans, and walnuts.  The nuts make great snacks and these are all of my favorites.

That is about it.  Restrictive but doable.  I look at the meter and think do I want to be at an 8 or do I want to be at a 5?  Do I want to have more energy and not feel like a walking dead person?  For me it is a no-brainer.

A tip I have for today, start a fibromyalgia journal.  Writing down how you feel and what you are doing at least a few times a week is a great reference when it comes time to look back and access your progress.  Just like with me, a 5 wasn’t really where I wanted to be but when I looked back and recalled where I was, I realized that I was making really great progress.

Next blog I will go over what I cannot have and then I want to share another story with you.  My co-worker Lisa has a doctor’s appointment coming up.  That will be a great measurement as to how the detox went from a medical perspective.   My follow up with the doctor is at the end of this month so we have a lot more coming your way.  Please sign up at www.lindygolden.com to get email updates of my blog or to catch up if you are just joining me.  And please continue to leave comments.    I promise to share every bit of information I can with you.  We never know what one thing might make a big difference for one of us.

It is Thursday night and I have finished the detox.  I am very proud of what I have accomplished and so thankful for all the support I have received along the way.  It has really made a difference.  I have heard from so many of you with ideas on how to keep me going after the detox is complete.  I want to take a minute to fill you in on days 7 through 10.  Day 7 and 8 we could add cooked vegetables.  For me, (I think really for all of us), that meant adding green beans.  I probably could have added more things but the combination of cooked green beans and a salad was just heavenly.  Now I was starting to see my pain level subside, I had gotten over my weakness from the weekend and I was feeling so much better.   I was finally doing something pro active to improve my Fibromyalgia.  Then on day 9 and 10 came the best part.  We could add meat.  Any kind of meat, chicken or fish.  We all brought grilled chicken to work to put on our salad and we could see the end of the tunnel.

The end of the tunnel really had me concerned.  My pain level is down and my fatigue is down.  I need to make sure that I continue on this path.  My thought all along was that I would follow a gluten free, dairy free diet and I had been researching gluten free for many days now so I had determined what I could and could not have.  I can say that after the 10 day detox, I was no longer craving sweets or carbs and I find that so hard to believe but it is true.  I still am struggling with the water almost as much now as I was on day 1.   It was funny because we would look at the gluten free diet and say,  we can have meat, and we can have fruit and we can have this and that.  It was no longer what we couldn’t have but what we could have.  I was still uneasy.  I kept going back and reading and re-reading what the doctor told me.  No yeast, no sugar, no carbonation and no dairy.  I think I was going forward correctly but what if I didn’t and my pain level returned to and 8 or my energy went down again.  I sure didn’t want to mess this up.  Vegetable Juice and Water for 2 days is something I don’t want to ever do again.  It is lunch time on day 10 and I am eating a grilled chicken salad and I decide to Google the following:  Is a gluten free diet the same as a yeast free diet?  First thing that came up was No a gluten free diet and a yeast free diet are not the same.  Oh Crap.  I would say they are not the same.  I started reading foods you could not have on a yeast free diet and started to panic.  My Oh S – - – echoed all over the office.  I am still so glad that I didn’t start out Thursday on the wrong diet though.  I feel like that would have negated everything I went through for the last 10 days.

So today I want to end by first thanking all of you for your support.  I want to thank my wonderful husband, daughters and son-in-laws.  Most importantly I want to thank Lisa and Jami my co-workers.  They made this so much easier and bearable.  I now know for sure that if you are going to embark on a journey like this a buddy is great.  We talked almost non-stop for 10 days about what we were doing and what we were accomplishing.  Jami lost 4 pounds, walked every day and was feeling great.  Going forward she is going to continue to eat healthy unprocessed foods.  Lisa lost 9 pounds, the pain in her feet and ankles is completely gone and going forward she is going to continue to follow the gluten free diet.  I am glad someone is because we researched the heck out of that one.  I lost 7 pounds, my pain level is down, the fatigue is so much better and that really means a lot to me.  Going forward, I am going to follow the yeast free diet and next blog I will tell you more about that bad boy!. Now… the real journey begins.

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Friday and we are into day five. On days five and six we are allowed to add any color raw vegetables.  For me this means adding different colored peppers and carrots.  Jami and Lisa added Cauliflower, colored peppers and carrots to their salads.  I am also adding lettuce today and for the first day at lunch, I will be eating a salad.  In fact, we are going to try going out to Subway.  But first, a major hurdle.  Now Friday is a big day at work.   Every Friday our boss goes out and gets us donuts.  He is so good about getting the exact ones each of us like.  We decided yesterday that we needed to tell him about the detox because we didn’t want him wasting his money on donuts we wouldn’t eat.  That sounded good didn’t it… in reality, we knew the donuts showing up might be more than we could get through.  Lisa told him about our adventure Thursday night and he gave us the “look” which means he thinks we have lost it yet again.  I know he wishes he had a dollar for every diet one of us has tried and I know he thinks this is just another diet that we will never stick too.  What I know for sure is …. this time he is wrong!  I can feel the momentum shifting and we are going to succeed.    I got to work first on Friday and he came in and asked me what he should get for us.  I told him green peppers would be good and he brought us back the best green peppers.  They tasted like they had just been picked out of the garden. He also brought back donuts but he put them out of our sight ( and smell range).

It is Noon and we are still thinking about lunch, Jami decides to eat the salad she brought and go for yet another walk so Lisa and I decide we will just go down to Subway, get our salad and eat there.  I quickly began to wonder what we were thinking eating in a restaurant so early in our journey.  We walked into subway and the smell of the fresh bread about knocked us over.  Really Lisa, can we do this?  We wait in line and every sub they make looks so good.  Heck I would have eaten the flatbread sub with nothing on it and I don’t even like the flatbread.  We finally get to the counter and get our salad.  It was only $4.00 for my salad which consisted of lettuce, tomato and green pepper.  Yes, the exact same thing I had back at the office for free.  Plus I had stuck my own salad dressing in my purse so I used that.  We bought a bottle of water got a table by the window and ate there.   Looking out the window distracted me from the smell of that bread baking.  Does anything smell better than fresh bread baking in the oven?  The reality of this lunch was that I paid almost $6.00 to prove that I could eat out and stay on the Detox.  It was so worth it.

Finally I am home for the weekend.  I think Saturday will be much easier at home.  I usually eat much less when I am busy at home and not under the office stress.  I stopped at one of our favorite Italian restaurants and got Randy and I large tossed salads with house dressing (vinegar and oil) for dinner.  It is just lettuce and tomato but it was delicious and after I ate it, I quickly went to bed again.  I have been asleep by 8:00 p.m. every night this week but it has helped me get through the week.

Well, I was wrong about Saturday, it didn’t help that I was home and busy all day.  I felt terrible on Saturday.   Not my pain level, it was staying consistently lower than it had been but I was so fatigued that I just couldn’t go.  I stayed in my pajamas all day and slept most of the day.  Oh my, why am I feeling like this?  I didn’t have enough energy to do anything.   Really, I have made it through six days; I am over the hump and now I feel like this.  What the heck is going on?

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Food!  Well sort of.  On Wednesday and Thursday I am allowed to eat any green vegetables.  Randy was so sweet and cut up all of my vegetables Tuesday night so that I would be ready to go Wednesday morning.  I woke up (head still splitting) and ran in the kitchen to eat my first bite of real food.  Nothing says good morning like celery and green onions.  Oh it tasted so good.  For lunch I am eating celery, green peppers and raw cabbage.  I am getting more water down, thanks to a few drops of MIO I am adding to my water. I also broke down and took 2 aspirin-free Excedrin’s.  My doctor thought it would be ok (The Excedrin that is.  I didn’t tell her about the MIO drops)

Moods are improving at work and my pain level is about at a 6.  That is actually some improvement after only 2 days.  Lisa and Jami brought their vegetables cut up in a salad that they were planning to eat with no dressing.   I can’t imagine eating a “salad” with no dressing.  Then we start thinking about dressing.  The instructions for the Detox were vague.  It said no Sugar, no Yeast, no Carbonation and no Dairy and then the “menu” for 10 days.  It didn’t say anything about dressings.  We all did our Google research and decided that we would be ok with olive oil, vinegar and spices.  We found stores in our area that had gluten free salad dressings and I volunteered to go after work to see what I could find.  In the meantime today, Lisa ate her salad dry and Jami used Vinegar & Oil.   This is a true adventure having someone joining me on the detox and I am already so glad they didn’t listen to me when I tried to talk them out of doing it with me.  How blest am I that I have two co-workers willing to take such a drastic step with me.  They both feel that they too needed this to jump start them on a road to healthier eating.  I just know we all three will gain from this experience. I also hope that some of you reading this blog can gain from it too.

Thursday comes and I think my fatigue is starting to subside.  The inflammation in my arms and upper back that hurts me so bad is definitely going down.  I am not sure where it went but it is almost gone.  If only this could really be working.

Home and straight to bed for me for the 4^th night in a row.  Four days of following the detox and taking my anti-fungal medication that the doctor prescribed ( Nystatin 500,000 Unit Oral Tab)  are down and only six more to go.

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So I’ve made the decision to go through with the 10 day detox to begin to rid my body of the toxins that may be aggravating my fibromyalgia and contributing to my high pain level.  As you can see, I’m at an 8 today.  Stress is a major contributor.  My body knows what’s coming and it isn’t happy!

How do I know I have toxins in my body?  Well, unfortunately we all do.    A few years ago when I was searching for anything to help my pain, I went to an acupuncturist.  The acupuncture was not helpful at all but she did have me try a foot detox.  She had a $7K foot bath that she claimed would rid your body of unwanted toxins through your feet.  I watched several people do the bath and they would have black specs and foam, some would even have their water change different colors.  Then it was my turn, my water turned as black as coal and she said it was full of yeast.  At the time all I could think of is that my feet never felt better and then I really didn’t give it much more thought.  But when I recently met with the new Doctor, she explained that in their practice they have noticed that many fibromyalgia patients seem to benefit from a yeast detox.  She went on to explain that if I have a large amount of yeast in my body  my current diet which is high in carbs, sugar and  carbonated soda is feeding the yeast.  This brings us to the start of our detox.

Day one and two of the detox have been hard.  Really harder than I thought they could possibly be.  I believed that because I had made my mind up and I was so determined that the first two days wouldn’t be so hard.  Only Water and Vegetable Juice for the first two days.  Monday started out OK.  I got up and arrived at work early with lots of V8 and tomato juice.   I bought Hot & Spicy V-8 and Campbell’s   tomato juice so I would have variety.  I was just hoping for a quiet day at work.  I thought about taking 2 days vacation because I thought the first two days would be easier if I was home but with my co-workers joining me on the journey, I decided against that.  Between us we have every kind of vegetable juice on the market and we are just giddy with excitement.  We can because we believed we can:  until about noon that is.  If it wasn’t me in the refrigerator getting juice one of them was.  We didn’t talk a lot about it we just kept doing it.  I was really hungry by noon and after all they are helping me so I wasn’t going to let on like I was hungry.   Lisa and I worked through lunch, Jami took a long walk.  I was starving, she was walking.  I can do this, the hunger would pass but how did she have enough strength to walk????

One big problem off the bat and something you all should know, I do not like, nor do I ever drink water.  It was strictly Sprite and sweet ice tea for me.  The last thing I asked the doctor was can I put anything in my water and she said I should not.  She said all the little packets have artificial sweetener which I definitely shouldn’t have.  Day one ended in misery.  I managed to get down ¾ bottle of water and about 8 ounces of vegetable juice.  I went home and immediately went to bed.  That was my only way of coping.

Day two was more of the terrible same.  If someone even mentioned the “V” word, all three of us would dry heave.  I had to put an end to the Vegetable Juice which left me with nasty water. Dehydration was setting in.  The wrinkles in my face were starting to show, every bone in my body ached and my head hurt so badly I could have cried.  I would have eaten a bowl of sand if someone offered it to me. In desperation I made an executive decision to put a few drops of flavor enhancement in my water even though it was against doctor’s orders. Day 2 is coming to an end with me in bed at 7:30 with an ice pack on my head.  Day 3 and 4 will surely be better.

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Well, today is Friday.  I have thought non-stop about what to do.  I have decided to try it.  I think I have myself in the right frame of mind to do it.  Today I am going to talk with Lisa and Jami.  I am going to suggest they not do it.  Randy and I are going to visit our kids this weekend and I am going to use the two hour drive to tell him all about it.  Unless he has a good reason why I should not try it, I will start on Monday morning.

As you can see, my pain level has been OMG all week.  I think the combination of the stress from my job and the stress from this decision is not helping me at all.  I am beyond lack of sleep.  I am almost not sleeping at all.  I often say that fatigue is the worst of all my symptoms.  I can deal with the pain but the fatigue is horrible.  I practiced my speech for the girls and I am going to do it first thing.  I am going to stop now and will finish today’s blog after I talk with them.

Well, that went well.  I gave them all the speech.  Jami and Lisa are bound and determined that they are going to do this with me.  I feel so bad that they are going to do this.  This is a drastic detox.  Not eating and only drinking water or vegetable juice for two days is extreme in my book.  I know they are doing it for support and I am so appreciative that they are but I do worry about them too.  The third girl in the office, and the one I have worked with the longest, thinks it is too drastic for all of us and wants no part of it.  I did want her to understand that the three of us were going to try this, and wanted all of the girls to know that we were going to be so cranky and so tired for two weeks.  We made a pack that we would not take anything personal and that anyone could stop at anytime.  Mandy and Sarah are so excited that two co-workers are going through this with Mom.  They think I will be so much more successful doing it with someone else.  I think I am truly lucky to have two people willing to help me through this.  It will help me so much.  I am going to stop again and will finish on Sunday after I talk to Randy

Well, I think I spent most of the two hours down and back from seeing the girls discussing this with Randy.  Not only does he think it is a good idea, he will support me in any way he can.  He will even stop drinking Sprite since I have to.  I know it sounds crazy but I will miss my sprite the most.  I am addicted to carbonation.  No carbonation is going to be hard.   I don’t think I told you the four things I have to eliminate from my diet after the detox is complete.  Yeast, Sugar, Carbonation and Dairy.  Honestly this is everything I eat and everything I drink.  I absolutely detest water.  This will be so hard.  I can because I think I can and I am determined to go through with this.

Each of you reading this will be such a help to me.  I think keeping you updated will help me stick to this.  I appreciate your joining me and please share this with your friends and family members.  There are 5 million people in the United States with Fibromyalgia but think of all the people in the world that  suffer from many other illnesses and health issues that would be helped if they could change their diet and life style.  I hope through this journey we can help some of them also.

The journey will begin on Monday.  Please sign up below if you want to receive my blog via your e-mail.  I don’t want you to miss this adventure.  Please post your comments also.  Interaction is always good.