Cleanse Shmense.

I am reading the book The Conscious Cleanse (http://consciouscleanse.com/) So far it has taught me a lot, mostly that the food and drink in American society is poisoning us. Just kidding..well sort of. What I have gleaned so far from this self-help book is that all of the preservatives, additives, hormones and other nasty stuff that is put in our food are making people sick, tired and allergic. The book also has explained that people seek medical care for conditions such as high cholesterol, irritable bowel syndrome (that's one of my favorite ailments to discuss) and depression when it could be cured with cutting certain foods/products out of our diets. The actual cleanse is two weeks of cutting out gluten (which is practically in all carbs), sugar (including sugar substitutes like Splenda and Aspartame), dairy, caffeine and alcohol. All of this sounded just fine to me until "no caffeine". WTF? No Starbucks? How will I function? I have been a Starbucks Gold Card carrier since 2009 and single handedly keep the Starbucks across the street in business:) The book said that giving up caffeine gives you a headache, which is the toxins leaving your body, and then you feel so refreshed that you won't even feel like you need coffee when the cleanse is done. Um, ok no. Then they want you to journal about how you feel about not drinking caffeine. Insert expletives here. Soooo, last night I was feeling very stressed about this daunting task of a cleanse. I want to be healthier, I want to try new wellness techniques and the girls that wrote the book are making a lot of sense. But how am I supposed to give up all this stuff for 2 weeks? I was bummed and feeling sorry for my non-willpowerness until I thought, hey now, the two extremely thin, perfect looking cleanse writers aren't the bosses of me! I can do this cleanse the way I want because it's my journey to being well. I decided to pick one thing a week to give up. That way, this cleanse isn't so daunting and I am not so deprived I want to scream at everyone. Next week will be gluten free. Maybe I'll be fine, or maybe I'll start crying at the sight of a bagel and cream cheese...but at least I'll have my coffee. Let me know your thoughts on this cleanse or others, and wish me luck! xoxo and stay well, Merica