Detox

One of my goals in coming to Berlin was to start being healthy. I have to say that I generally am quite healthy but the few weeks before we left Ireland I ended up mainlining coffee, eating junk and drinking more than my usual (measly) two bottles of beer a week. And I could really feel it. On my last two days I was basically fending off the mother-of-all migraines with copious amount of drugs and having a dermatitis breakout.

To be honest it was probably more the stress of it all than anything else. The weird thing is (and I don't know if any of you are like this) the more stressed I am and the more crap I feel, the more I feel like eating chocolate and drinking wine. Worst of all I end up feeling like I NEED the double espresso just to get going in the morning.

Anyway, I think it all added up and by the time I got here I was ready to start being nicer to myself. That was after two weeks of guzzling the best German beer and attacking every slice of wonderful German cake and morsel of mare's milk chocolate I could get my hands on of course. So last week myself and Eric decided to cut the crap out - meaning lots of fruits and vegetables, lots of water, no alcohol, no caffeine, no sugar and for some reason no carbs (we are not anti-carb people - it just seemed like the right thing to do).

Now I think that I am quite a strong person, with a lot of stamina, but boy was this hard! (Eric was much hardier than me.) I had terrible headaches for the first couple of days and felt really sick and lethargic. Then the crazed hunger set in where all I could think about was food. Regardless of where I was or what I was doing my thought process would go like this: 'Toast. Banana on toast. Banana on toast with peanut butter. Banana on toast with peanut butter and honey.' Like some crazy mantra! Eric got used to the blank, ain't-nobody-home look that would cloud over my eyes.

Anyway, suffice to say that it lasted four days! In fairness to us, it coincided with our first social outings here in Berlin - dinner with our neighbour upstairs and dinner out with Shaun, Dee's brother. If we had stayed friendless, I think we might have lasted longer! I have to say though that we are both feeling much better after our little detox. And we haven't gone wild since then, only re-introducing carbs (hail the almighty carb!), and some cake and beer, but still eating lots of fruits and veg. A balance which is suiting me much better!