My mug holds a pint (600ml). I love my mug being so big as it means I don’t have to get up so often to refill it when I’m busy or on a bad health day. It’s big enough that I can use one of my metal straws in it without feeling silly when my hands are being attacked by fybro, and it also means I cut down the my sugar intake as I only had 3 teaspoons instead of what would have been 4 or 5 in the same amount of coffee in a smaller cup.

However, I would drink 5-6 of these a day. theres 5 grams of sugar in a teaspoon, that’s 15 grams per cup, 75 in a day and 525g in a week. It’s starting to add up now right. Around half a kilo of sugar a week!!! just in drinks. That doesn’t count the 2 Litre bottle of Coke and bag of jelly sweets I would go through in a month  or the biscuits and whatever else.

Telling myself “It’s not as bad as others”, didn’t make it any better and once the realisation hit me a change had to be made. OF course like many of us I was dragging my feet. I wanted things to be perfect, the timing and the stores in the cupboards etc etc etc. At the end of the day they were excuses. We all make them especially if we are perfectionists or have a fear of failure or even a fear of success for that matter. Whatever comes up is going to make it that much harder as we are fighting a battle with our heads as well.

Our brains work to save us from ourselves. It learns certain behaviours from our actions and self talk. Think of it as an AI that has learnt sentience through the mistakes of humans and wishes to save us by destroying us. When we decide to give something up that makes our brain feel good by sending the right chemical reactions through things like processed sugar and caffeine our body reacts like its coming off a narcotic or opiate (not quite as violent but the same principle). It will send you signals that this is not ok and it needs more. When that doesn’t work it will send you pain and also brain chatter that will try to put you off or derail you by talking you into what seems like a healthier and better alternative which turns out to be just as bad.

I stopped sugar 5 days ago and tea and coffee a day later. What I can tell you is this. The first couple of days I was fine. Didn’t miss it. Any of it. My body still had enough of these in it’s system to not really worry about the lack of intake. My head though on Day 3 starting with a niggling, annoying background headache right behind my third eye (middle of my forehead), it reached round to my temples and stretches down towards my back teeth.

2 nights ago it appeared to be turning into a migraine.  So I took my migraine medication and went to bed. Slept for 8 hours solidly and when I got up all was well. Except I had the boo hoos for absolutely no reason, out of the blue my jovial and happy it was Pi Day mood, turned on its heel and gave my poor partner the full force of its angst in that moment.  There were tears and I took myself off to bed and hid under the blanket. Later I got up and was fine again and have been ever since.

From then until today though this annoying pain in my head won’t budge. If anything today it is moving around from spot to spot like it’s testing the boundaries to see which one is going to give out first. A bit like the Raptors in Jurassic Park. It’s always in the middle of my forehead but every few minutes it is moving, from side to side or temple to teeth. It’s just being plain aggravating.

According to all of the front page of the google search I did this will continue for a couple of days yet. One thing I didn’t realise but should have because “Duh”. White flour is a serious issue as well with the sugar side of things due to it being a processed carbohydrate. So the pasta I had for dinner last night was probably a very bad idea.  It may have extended the withdrawal process further as probably did the wrap I had with Tuna and lettuce a couple of days ago. I’ve never been a huge fan of potatoes so that’s not such a big deal and if i start using the brown rice I have sitting staring and judging me from the cupboard every time we grab the white rice, I may start feeling alot better.

However this goes, for me it is worth it. My body needs the break. I need to start somewhere on the road to wellness and my journey starts here with the getting rid of sugar and caffeine from my diet. Once I’ve gotten the hang of this then Red Meat and Pork is next on the hit list. However I am not doing that until this is at least a month done without any more withdrawal symptoms.

I will do a weekly update and also write more about the technical science stoof to do with detoxing from sugar and caffeine. For now though I really need to just curl up in a ball under a blankey and rest and remember that one day my body will thank me for this..