Tag: slow cooker

Vice Detox

I am currently reading The Wellness Project and right from the beginning she had my attention. One of the first big changes she talks about are her vices, sugar, alcohol and caffeine. If you saw my post from yesterday, you learned that my goal this year is to take small steps in improving my health rather than a life-altering, overwhelming overhaul. As this is something that has been in the back of my mind, I decided to start my own vice detox.

My version is a bit different. I am eliminating coffee completely. I am limiting alcohol to one drink on Friday and Saturday nights only. I’ll get to sugar later after this initial round with coffee and alcohol.

If you know me, you know that coffee is almost a part of who I am. I live by it which is precisely the problem. It has completely control over me. Without coffee, I don’t know how to start my day. At the same time, I know coffee is wreaking havoc on my internal organs. The acid reflux that accompanies my afternoon coffee is unbearable. Just yesterday, when I decided this vice detox needed to happen now, even my morning cup of coffee made my acid reflux flare and I was miserable for the rest of the day.

Instead of running to the coffee maker, here is what my morning now looks like:

Notice, I’m still having a bit of green tea. While reducing my caffeine consumption overall is important to me, eliminating coffee itself is my focus. And let’s be very real, if I didn’t have this green tea, no way would I even make it through day 1 of this vice detox once the caffeine headaches kicked in!

To my surprise, I didn’t try to offset the lack of caffeine with sugar. I was sure I would reach for a lot of sugar and made myself several notes as a reminder. What was also very surprising was that my energy was actually pretty high all day. Yes, I have the caffeine headache. Not terrible but certainly noticeable. I am thankful for a slower work week while I work through this caffeine detox. I’m definitely not at 100% but so much better than I thought!

In other news, if you need an awesome weeknight dinner, look no further than this Slow Cooker Chicken and Mushroom Stroganoff. YUM! With how busy our lives have become, I was struggling with dinners and realized that I needed to start embracing the slow cookers to make sure I was getting dinner on the table. This recipe will 100% be a part of our regular rotation from now on! Delightful!