The cute cashier at my local Whole Foods knows me now, and we talked about detoxification yesterday as I strolled out with my sack of organic lemons. As I was pulling out of the parking lot in my messy, about-to-fall-apart car, the Grateful Dead was on the radio. I blasted it.
And then I thought: “You are such a fucking hippie right now. You should blog about this.”

I haven’t eaten solid food in three days, nineteen hours, and forty-five minutes. In its place? Teas, salt water, and a concoction of water, lemons, maple syrup, and cayenne pepper. Yes, it’s the 10-day master cleanse. I should have blogged about it from THE SECOND I started it – because the changes and thoughts that have been occurring to my body/mind/spirit have been disturbing, challenging, and [per the usual] quite hilarious.

I had been feeling heavy, tired, and severely moody. Most of you won’t see the moodiness, but trust me, it’s there. I was having a hard time saying “no” to the things that I knew I should have been resisting. So I researched online and watched YouTube master cleanse video diaries and bought books and read message boards. I started Sunday night, after having gorged myself of Memorial Day weekend awesomeness. My hopes? That by detoxing all of the icky stuff out of my system, I wouldn’t crave those things no mo’.

The first three days are supposedly the worst, and my experience was no exception. I’ve thought about quitting this once every couple hours up until today, Day 4. I get hungry – but only for a couple minutes at a time – because the “lemonade” has enough in it to satiate hunger. I just get bored, more than anything else. The headache at the end of Day 3 was both treacherous and amazing. It was a throbbing, splitting headache – but all I could think about was being able to get through it without medication. I looked at it like my drug was food, and I was in rehab. I felt better than ever this morning — I intended on waking up at 5:30am, and woke up at 5am, NATURALLY. Today I have felt lighter and more energetic than I have in a while.

That said — I miss the diversity, textures, and richness of real food. I dreamt of cherry cobbler on the night of day 2. (I don’t even like cherry cobbler!) They say you crave the foods you are detoxing when you are on the cleanse, so I assumed I’d be craving sweets, like chocolate. I don’t think I’ve craved it once [yet]. Rather: CHEESE. I must have spent a lifetime engorging myself on mozzarella cheese; that is BY FAR the thing I’ve been craving the most. It’s crazy. For maximum benefits on the cleanse, you go for ten days. (You can go as long as forty, but even Jesus would be like, “Fuck no! Did that. Gimme some fish.”) I will be going for eight. I need a couple days to transition into solid foods before Jeezikah’s wedding next Saturday. Last thing people want is a puking bridesmaid, am I right?