Day 2

Well, it's day 2 of our fast and I do feel a little worse than yesterday, but not nearly as bad as I expected. I had a slight headache during the night, but as soon as I drank my 20 oz. of water and then my morning juice, the headache was gone. I've been slightly grumpy this afternoon, but it hardly compares to the grumpiness on Monday and Tuesday during the height of my caffeine withdrawal.

The whole experience is really quite strange, because I do feel hungry quite often during the day, but it's not the kind of hungry that makes you feel weak and gives you the shakes. My body has plenty of nutrients, so I don't feel bad at all. It's mostly my mind thinking that I really want to eat something. I've read that this subsides within the first couple of days once your body and your mind get on the same page. And as soon as I drink my next juice, I no longer feel hungry anymore, which still amazes me.

The major upside so far is that I have SO much more energy than normal. Again today, I didn't feel the afternoon lull where I need to choose between coffee or a nap. I can't explain it, but I feel a lot more alert too. It's really great because the fatigue I normally experience is one of my biggest personal challenges, especially chasing two kids around.

Both yesterday and today, I ended up drinking another 16 oz. glass of juice for an after dinner snack. This brings my total to 5 - 16 oz. glasses each day: breakfast, first lunch, second lunch, dinner, and evening snack.  :)

The other exciting thing about my fast is that I've already lost 3 lbs. Weight loss wasn't my reason for fasting, but a little bit of it is a welcome side effect. Prior to starting this fast, I had about 10 lbs I would like to lose. Because I am already fairly small, it normally takes me about 2 weeks to lose 1 lb with exercise and calorie counting. 3 lbs already is amazing!

One last thing and then I must go check on my super quiet, probably-up-to-no-good children. We wanted to pick up more produce last night and had a few miscellaneous errands to run, so in the effort of saving time and gas, we decided to forgo stopping at our usual grocery store, Kroger, and decided to get what we needed at Wal-Mart instead (we'd already gotten many of the veggies in bulk at Sam's Club anyway). I must say, I'm hardly a produce snob or anything, and am still just learning, but I was literally horrified at the state of the produce section at Wal-Mart. Many things, particularly the vegetables, were already soggy, wilted, and going bad. They didn't have a great selection and of what they did have, a good portion of it wasn't marked with a price. I couldn't tell you if anything they had was organic because nothing was labeled. Our Kroger isn't very big, in fact, it might be the smallest Kroger I've ever been in (they are in the process of building a new one - yay), but the produce section is always clean and the produce is always fresh looking. I will never ever shop for produce at Wal-Mart again. O_o  (end rant.)