This is harder than I thought.....

So, for those of you who read me out in blogosphere, you know that I have been fooling with the Rice Diet for a couple of weeks now. School has been out for a week, and I haven't had any planned outings which would be impossible to follow this new way of eating. I've been eating rice and fruit for the past four days, and I feel just exhausted. I think that all of the illness from the past school term have really taken a toll on me.

A little back-up in history for the uninitiated.......My first grade class was especially challenging in the health department this year. Before Thanksgiving, I had six major respiratory infections. The "cold machine" was out of commission for a while, but fired back up by March. Luckily, I only caught one cold between Christmas and Easter, but did manage to get a rip-roaring vomiting illness. April ended on a high note with Fifth disease burning through my classroom like the plague (again, I avoided this little slice of heaven). May marked the final death knell with a massive outbreak of respiratory infections, capped by several cases of pneumonia. Unfortunately, I got the last round of plague, and have been fighting my way back for the last twelve days! My head was so congested that I actually perforated my right eardrum!

Now, back to the Rice Diet. I ordered two books about this diet back in April or May, and read them as soon as they arrived. The premise of the diet is very, very good! Detox your system from all of the salt/sugar/crap that you have been eating. Then re-learn how to eat in a moderate, healthful way. Well, that sounds just like peaches and cream, doesn't it? What they don't tell you is how bloody awful you feel while all the salt/sugar/crap that your have been eating makes its way out of your bloated over-fed body!

I have felt like sleeping constantly for the past two days! Some of that may be the residual effects from the cold, but mostly it is from the nature of the foods I have been consuming. You know -- salty/sweet/fatty/salty/sweet/fatty and the cycle could go on endlessly if I didn't try to nip it NOW!!! I also think it's my t/o/m so the binging and bloating are par for the course.

This actually is a very simple, clean way of eating. It totally derails the love affair I have with food. There is no room for guessing, and it is very regimented in what is allowed at this stage of the diet. Literally, all I am allowed to eat is fruit, rice, and rice equivalents. This is especially hard because I still must cook for the rest of my family. There has been some unrest among the natives. Eldest child thinks I am "starving" myself. (I put the kibosh to that one by giving her a large fruit salad, and some brown basmati rice, and she was very satisfied. So no more talk of starving.)

I am dumping fluid like Niagara Falls, and already feel "lighter" despite t/o/m. The food is very basic, but since breaking the salty/sweet/fatty cycle, I find that it is very tasty. It will be interesting to see just how long I can continue this phase of the diet. My plan is to try for at least three weeks. I've made it four days so far, and feel pretty confident right now. We'll see at the end of this first week how I feel about continuing on!