Temptation, get thee behind me

We've all heard of taking a mental health day. This week I'm taking a physical health week. As I mentioned in a recent Note (May 14, 2011), for some time now I have been badly abusing my body with various "poisons" -- heavy doses of sugar (which, as a hypoglycemic, I'm not supposed to eat at all), caffeine (I've been consuming more and more diet soda, and coffee, which I didn't drink at all for 63 years, finally entered my diet about a year ago, when I discovered it worked better than anything else at keeping me alert when I began to drag...but it disagrees with my insides), lots of carbs, lots of greasy fast food. I was eating poorly because I was tired of the effort involved in eating well, and I needed all the poisons to keep me going.

I decided it was time for a change when I realized I had just had half a cup of coffee, and a slew of cookies, and I still felt like putting my head down and going to sleep, still lacked the energy to do what I needed to do. So o.k., if the poisons weren't going to work, maybe it was time to eliminate them altogether, try to get back on the straight and narrow of good eating habits. But I knew that would require a chunk of time when I could put my head down and go to sleep, whenever I felt the pull of an unhealthy pick-me-up. In other words, a chunk of time when I didn't have to go to work.

So here I am, at day five of my Great Experiment -- which actually seems to be taking the form of the Great With-drawal. No sweets, no coffee or diet Dr. Pepper, no McDonald's burgers, no bagels with cream cheese, no corn chips, not even any proper bread, but rather, a gluten-free, wheat-free loaf made out of various forms of rice and tapioca...which actually isn't too bad, if you toast it. Haven't really missed the coffee, miss the Dr. Pepper a lot. Day before yesterday I felt lousy, yesterday I felt terrible, today is actually a little better, though I still have no energy. The hope is that ultimately this jetisoning of all those things that taste good but are bad for you, in one way or another, is going to help me feel noticeably better, so that I can work up some enthusiasm for life again.

It's also great, not having to go to work (although as a matter of fact I did go in this morning for my regular Children's Hour, which is the subject of my next missive). I am so ready to be retired.