Reboot with Joe: Days 6, 7 and 8

We’ve now done three full days of juice only. I actually never thought I’d make it this far. Not only that, but I’m actually enjoying it?! Sure, it’s hard. Very, very hard. But it’s not un-enjoyable.

The hardest thing is that while my body is relishing in only drinking juices, my psyche is struggling. I’ve noticed that my eating habits aren’t great. I eat out of boredom. Sam and I eat socially… alot. It’s been a relatively strange weekend, we’ve both been struggling with what to do with ourselves. We’ve come to realise that we spend an awful lot of time thinking about, preparing and/or eating food. A lot of what we do revolves around food. We get breakfast at the markets every Saturday, we generally go out to eat at least once or twice more on the weekends. We buy food (like fresh breads) at the markets to prepare lunches with. And the weekend evenings, if we don’t go out, I’m usually trying out some recipe.

Also, we’re surrounded by food constantly. TV ads, tv shows, movies, facebook, all the blogs I read, the books we read etc. It’s very hard to not crave foods when you see it.

The juice fast effects are fantastic though. So much so that it has finally sunk in for Sam just how much nutrition and food affects our bodies. He told me he’s always known and supported me when I’ve told him this, but he’s never really ‘got’ it. For him, he’s lost quite a few kgs, his asthma is virtually non-existent, and today we noticed while he was cutting up oranges that his eczema hadn’t flared up at all.

For me, I’ve lost 4kg (!!). I’ve lost a few centimetres from around my hips and waist, I need virtually no insulin (I haven’t bolused for a single ‘meal’ in the past three days) and I feel energised. We’ve both noticed that we are happier, like ridiculously happy and we’re both sleeping deeply and not feeling tired when we wake up.

I’m pleasantly surprised that I haven’t disliked any of the juices. I mean there are definitely juices I prefer, but altogether the juices are great. And, even if I’m hungry before the juice I’m always satisfied after the juice.

The prep work is still quite tiresome, but Sam and I are a well oiled machine now. Between, washing the juicer, washing the fruit and veggies, cutting up the fruit and veggies and then doing the actual juicing, we’ve got a real rhythm going! That said, here is a run down of Days 6, 7 and 8.

Day Six

Ingredients prepped for Day Six

I was pretty scared at the start of Day Six. It was the first day of only juicing. It started out well…and ended well! The general program is a lemon and ginger tea first thing, then a juice for breakfast. For the morning snack you have coconut water, then a juice for lunch, afternoon snack, dinner and dessert. The juices are repeated through the day. Breakfast and the afternoon snack are the same juice and lunch and dinner are the same juice.

Carrot, Apple & Ginger

 

We started out the day with a Carrot, Apple and Ginger juice and it’s definitely one of my favourites. The morning snack was coconut water, now Sam and I both know that we hate the taste of coconut water, so we juiced some oranges in the morning to put with it and that made it bearable! Lunch was a Joe’s Mean Green was a bit hesitant at this juice.

Juicing the Mean Green

From reading on the Reboot with Joe community, the Mean Green can be a bit gross. But I loved it. So afternoon was again Carrot, Apple and Ginger and then a Mean Green for dinner again. Dessert was a Pear Pie Delight. And a delight it was! When I first read the ingredient list, I was like ‘sweet potato? who juices a sweet potato?’. We do. Apparently. It tastes exactly like an Apple Pie (in liquid form, obvi).

Juices ready for work!

 

Day Seven

Prep for the Green Citrus

This day started with a Green Citrus before going to the markets. The markets were a bit tortuous with all the amazing smells of delicious food. But we just got in, got our stuff and left. And we were there only about 1/2 an hour, which is a bit of a record for us. We decided to only get three days worth of fruit and veggies, because that is about the limit of our fridge. We had a quick coconut water and pineapple juice (don’t try it, it’s gross) before I had to race off to see an Osteopath about my shoulder (urgh! It’s so sore). And then back home to make our Sporty Spice juice. This was definitely the juice I was scared about the most. It was made up of four beets (four!), 2 carrots, 6 stalks of celery, 1 lemon, 2 oranges and 2 handfuls of basil (makes two servings). I’ve never been a huge fan of beetroot, and the thought of juicing basil didn’t appeal. But surprise surprise, it was actually pretty good. Sam though, doesn’t ever want to see or drink another beetroot (tough luck, Chix ‘Un-Beet-Able comes up tomorrow).

Sporty Spice

 

Afternoon snack was again a Green Citrus and then another Sporty Spice for dinner. The dessert juice was another amazing concoction! It was called Purple Passion. It was supposed to be made up with a lot of blueberries, but we used black grapes instead because blueberries are way too expensive at the moment. The juice was then red grapes, a few blueberries that we had leftover, black grapes and mint leaves. It was so refreshing.

Purple Passion

We both now definitely look forward to the dessert juices!

Day Eight

Today! After a lazy sleep in, the Sunrise Juice was first up, beets, carrots and oranges. I thought it was delicious. Sam, not as much because he’s a bit ‘beeted’ out. We skipped the coconut water today because we were so late getting out of bed (but we did top up our juices with it). Green Lemonade was lunch and dinner. We had the Green Lemonade in the first five days, and I hated it. When I made it last time, I put some of the lemon peel in, and my juicer hadn’t arrived yet, so I was using my vitamix and then straining it through a juice bag. This time, we used the juicer, and no lemon peel, and it was delicious!

We’ve had another lazy day today, just chilling out and cleaning the house. It’s rained A-L-L D-A-Y.

I’m interested to see what the next 7 days brings. On the last day (next Sunday) I’ve arranged to go on a full day horseride, so I’m unsure if I’ll be juicing the whole day or not. I haven’t decided. My thoughts at the moment are to juice for breakfast and dinner and salad for lunch? I’m not sure yet.

Seven more days to go!