Thank God for Peppermint Tea!

Thursdays are supposed to be all about my coke addiction and things that I’m trying or are helping me kick the habit. So in that spirit, I can’t help but think how grateful I am to have peppermint tea.

Back at the onset of all of this, I got some peppermint tea so that I could have something to drink on my cleanse besides lemonade. When I later discovered that caffeine was having such a detrimental effect on my hands, I used it as a coffee substitute. It has also been immensely helpful to have on the days that I’m trying not to drink coke but desperately need something with flavor.

Why Is It So Stinkin' Hard to Drink Water?

Water. It’s the stuff life is made of. Our bodies are comprised of an overwhelming percentage of it. It is Earth’s most precious natural resource barring oxygen. It’s pure goodness and so very useful for a multitude of things. Why, then, is it so blasted difficult to drink?!?!?

I try to drink water, I really do. But it’s really a challenge for me. Water is so bland, so tasteless, so….water. It’s not even that I don’t like water. Water that comes from my well is very good as water goes. I won’t touch city water with a 10-foot pole, but that’s city water—you can hardly even call that stuff water, if you want my opinion about it. Good, crisp well water, however, is quite nice. It just doesn’t taste as good as practically anything that has sugar in it is all.

One Step Forward, Two Steps Back

I cheated today. I had Dr. Pepper. If I had been smart, I would have taken a bunch of water with me…or drank the La Croix that I did take with me. But no, I didn’t do that.

It started innocently enough. We had to go pick up my step-daughter for the weekend, which is a 2 hour drive one way. I wanted something with some flavor and that would last the trip, so I rationalized that Sprite did not have caffeine. I got a fountain drink and sipped on it.

Then, once we got M, my step-daughter, we needed to pay a visit to my niece since we’d have to miss her birthday party this weekend. We knew it would be late getting home, so we opted to eat at the cheapest place we could think of—Taco Bell. 6 people for less than $20…you can’t beat it. I got one large cup to share with the whole family. We put Dr. Pepper in it.

Know When to Hold, Know When to Fold

I want to apologize for going on hiatus the last couple of days. I’ve not felt well at all and it’s been all I can do to sit up long enough to do my work, much less try to blog. So, that said, I’m a little bit sad, a little bit mad, a little bit frustrated, and a little bit glad. I had to break the cleanse last night.

Now, to be fair, my heart was never in this. I wasn’t doing it because I wanted to; I was doing it because I had to. Because my Coke habit had gotten way out of control, as had my coffee habit. Then the thing with my hands…I’ve been making myself sick and I had to try to undo the damage and get started in the right direction.

However, it looks like that as wonderful as the Master Cleanse was for me last time around, it was not the answer this time. I’ve felt bad the entire time, and yesterday was the worst. If it were just headaches or nausea, I could have dealt with that and continued. But I was severely dizzy all day yesterday. I had to go to town and got scared a couple of times that I might pass out while driving. I made it home fine, but the dizziness only got worse.

Something’s Not Right

Finally, I checked my blood pressure, since I am prone to having lower blood pressure anyway. In fact, I believe the only reason I’m not on low blood pressure medicine is because I smoke and have tons of caffeine. Even with that, my blood pressure stays in the perfectly normal range most of the time. But last night, it was abnormally low—and every time I’d check it after that, I’d just be lower.

My husband and I decided that I must have something to eat to get my blood pressure back up. Knowing that breaking the cleanse the wrong way will result in severe stomach pain and nausea, I thought that maybe just licking on a spoon of peanut butter would help…but I couldn’t get it down. So I opted for a bowl of chicken noodle soup, which has tons of sodium in it. It brought my blood pressure to just within normal ranges, but not much more.

As much as I really wanted to be done with the cleanse, I also didn’t want to give up before it had time to work. Plus, I have all this syrup and just bought a ton more lemons yesterday. So I’ve spent the day trying to rethink my approach, not sure as to whether I should continue or not. Then, about an hour ago, my blood pressure pretty much made the decision for me…it was lower than it was even last night—I could barely stand up properly.

Being Flexible

I’m not entirely sure yet what I’m going to do. All I know is that if I try to continue this cleanse with it bottoming out my blood pressure, I’m going to end up really sick. I have to eat at least a small meal every day. So I think what I’m going to try is to continue drinking the lemonade throughout the day, but allow myself at least one reasonable meal per day. I know I won’t get near the cleansing benefits—I may not get any at all—but it would be stupid to continue in this manner knowing that I could pass out any moment from low blood pressure.

Wellness is a great deal about learning to listen to your body and taking action to give it what it needs. Right now, my body needs food. So, as true to form as it would be for me to beat myself up about failing, I have resolved not to. If the goal is wellness, and this path is leading away from that, then it is not a failure for me to listen to what my body is saying. There is something good that has come from this, though…and I’ll discuss that in another post.

The Master Cleanse and New Beginnings

It took me two hours this morning to get up the gall to do my flush, but once I started I was ok. I’m actually feeling pretty good right now. I’m working on my 10^th glass of lemonade and I only have a mild headache. Of course, I’ve been drinking water like it’s going out of style, too, so I’m wondering if that has helped to minimize the caffeine withdrawal symptoms.

I’m actually just a tad concerned that I’m not feeling like I’m about to die. Don’t get me wrong…I am most grateful that the first day has not been like it was the last time. But at the same time, I should be seriously detoxing from caffeine right now and I feel fine for the most part. So I have to wonder if the worst is yet to come, or worse—the cleanse isn’t doing anything.

The Master Cleanse and Hunger

I was not remotely hungry up until about two hours ago. That’s when the family ate. Grilled cheese sandwiches…and they smelled sooo good. C was originally going to make bacon and eggs, but I gave him a look, while calling him evil, that suggested his life may be at risk if he made me smell bacon cooking right now. ;)

Defining Addiction

I’d like to be clear about something before I get too far into this journey. I am not, in any way, trying to minimize serious addictions, make myself a victim, or intentionally publish false or inaccurate information. I do feel that “addicted” best describes my relationship with soft drinks because I feel like I have to have them. And, since Coke is my soft drink of choice, the play on words was too much to resist. But to say that cola addiction is a medically recognized disorder—no, that’s not what I’m doing. So please don’t misunderstand me.

Now that we have that cleared up, I thought it might be appropriate to discuss what addiction really is.

Addictions Come in Many Forms

Street drugs. Prescription pain killers. Alcohol. Pornography. Gambling. Most of us know and recognize these things as forms of addiction. Mine is Coke. Not the white powdery substance you may be thinking—I’ve never actually even seen that stuff in person. No, my Coke is a darkly colored, delightfully sweet, and magnificently bubbled liquid…and I swear, the white stuff could not possibly be more addictive than what I’m using.

Coke is but one of my unhealthy addictions, but it’s the one that makes me the maddest because
it just seems so ridiculous.

I mean, they’ve long known that cigarettes have a chemical that make it difficult for your brain to let them go. That one I don’t feel quite as bad about—at least not from a psychological standpoint. But cola? Who the heck can’t go through their day without at least 6 cans of soda? Me, that’s who!

For the longest time, it was Dr. Pepper. For nearly 15 years it was Dr. Pepper. I didn’t even care for Coke all that much. Then one day several months ago, I got a craving for Coke and we’ve had a shameful love affair ever since. Now, I know that Dr. Pepper is soda, too—that’s why I mentioned it. For nearly half my life, I’ve been incredibly dependent on soft drinks.

An Addiction to Sugar, Caffeine, or Both?

I am a firm believer that high fructose corn syrup—the stuff they sweeten these drinks with—is addictive. I also believe that sugar in and of itself is addictive, no matter the form. I had periods of time that I didn’t drink as much cola, but I did have to have my sweet tea. I could go through a gallon of that stuff in one day all by myself. When I’ve tried to give up soft drinks by not buying them, I default to drinking tea instead of water. Our tea is very, very sweet.

Then there’s the caffeine. Oh, what would I do without my glorious caffeine? I can drink an entire pot of coffee in just a few hours and not think a thing about it. After that, I start in on my Coke. It’s ridiculous! I would bet I get more caffeine in one day than most people get in a week. I know it’s doing nothing for my insomnia except making it worse, but I seriously cannot get through my day without it.

Making a Choice

I’ve been this addicted to Coke and caffeine before. I gave it up—for a while. You can read my story here if you have a while to wade through it. So I know I can come off this stuff, however unpleasant the process may be. It’s staying off it that’s the problem. But I have to. My addiction is doing more than making me fat and keeping me up at night. I believe it may be killing me. And so, I’ve made a choice to begin a journey—and I hope you’ll share it with me.