For the last four weeks, I’ve been doing a detox program. No wheat. No soy. No corn. No dairy. No peanuts. No sugar. No alcohol. No caffeine. It sounds rough, I know. But it wasn’t. It was actually quite easy, right up until Friday night when I decided, at a wedding, that I needed a glass of wine. (I blame the wedding for the lapse.)

Then the next morning, I had coffee, corn tortillas, and oatmeal cookies because…well because I’d already blown the detox. Then that night – Saturday night – I was so tired. I started falling asleep around 8:00 in the evening. There was no reason for me to be that tired, so I’m thinking the food I’d eaten that day had something to do with it.

I’ve realized over the last month that what I eat really does affect my body. It affects, not just my weight, but also my energy, my digestion, and generally how I feel.

I like doing the smoothies, sometimes even as meals. They taste good. I like eating avocados, bell peppers, berries and almonds as snacks. I enjoy going to bed without what feels like a big lump of rock or gas in my belly each night. During the last week, I even started sleeping better, which is huge for me.

So Sunday morning, on what should have been the last day of the detox, I got right back on the plan. It’s nothing drastic. It’s nothing I can’t continue doing. I’m still eating out some and eating the stuff my mom makes. I’m just making different choices and asking Mom to cook with brown rice instead of white rice and not use butter and such in what she prepares for me. It’s been more than doable.

Maybe here and there I can allow for the occasional slip – the piece of cake, the cup of coffee, the slice of bread, the bit of queso. But the reality is that I like feeling well. And right now, I feel great.