Tuesday, October 16, 2012

The Soda-Sobriety Chronicles: Day 33

It's been 33 days since I've had a soda.  As my 30 day detox was winding down, I found myself starting to get more liberal with sugar, but I have learned my lesson.  Friday I was baking pumpkin muffins with a cream cheese frosting center.  I thought, "well, the entire muffin only has 12 grams of sugar, so I can take a little bite of this cream cheese frosty goodness and that will be barely a gram or two, right?" So I take a little teeny bite, and almost instantly I had an enormous headache.  Lesson learned.  No highly concentrated sugar/cream cheese frosting mixtures for me any time soon.  

Sunday I was driving home from the lake where I had my walk, got to McDonald's, and I thought, "I really deserve a diet coke.  If anyone deserves a diet coke, it's me.  Yep, I'm going to finally get a diet coke."  But then I found myself driving right past McDonald's without stopping for my diet coke.  I did stop at 7-11 for a newspaper, and again I pondered the soda fountain, but I didn't get any.  

Today I was grocery shopping and there was a Chick-Fil-A across the parking lot from where I was parked.  Without getting into a post about the CEO's political ideas, let me just say that I'm a fan of the diet coke at Chick-Fil-A.  I am slightly embarrassed at what a connoisseur of diet coke I have become over the past 23 years of drinking it.  There's something about the syrup level they use, as well as the foam cups, and the ice, that makes it my hands-down favorite (followed closely by Sonic, which also has foam cups and magic ice).  I'm not a fan of McDonald's diet cokes, to be honest.  Maybe it's the paper cups.  Maybe it's the ice.  They just seem off to me.

(I'm not a fan of diet coke from a bottle, I can tolerate a can, but my most favorite kind of diet coke is from a fountain, with lots of ice.  Just thinking about it makes me a bit misty-eyed.)

Anyway, so I was loading the groceries, and I thought, "ok, I'm going to pull my car out of my spot, drive across the parking lot, to the drive-through, and I'm getting a diet coke.  I'll make it small.  I gotta get a diet coke."  So I drive to Chick-Fil-A and I am almost at the drive-through when a giant pick up truck with a Romney sticker pulled in front of me and beat me to the entrance.  I took it as a sign, sipped my water, and morosely pulled off.

The thing is, I feel so good without drinking soda, and now that I've gone longer than any time since I was 13, I don't want to risk messing that all up, and having to start over.  Because seriously, the first week was hellish.  The cravings were terrible.  Now it's bearable.  I really only miss it about ten times a day, which beats the ten thousand times a day I was missing it a month ago.

So here we are.  Somehow I have managed to go for 33 days without having soda.  I'm thinking it might be fun to go for another 33 days, just for giggles.  I'm kind of feeling like an alcoholic with the whole one-day-at-a-time thing, but it really does work.  Today I said, "nope, no soda today.  Maybe tomorrow."  And if I tell that to myself every day, eventually I will have amassed a lifetime without soda (though that thought scares the crap out of me - a lifetime without soda?  What will I drink when I'm at the movies eating popcorn?  What about if we get pizza?  You can't eat pizza without soda?!?!).

It's nice not only being soda-free, but having so little sugar in my system that I get an instantaneous headache when pure sugar enters my mouth.  

I highly recommend it.




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