Today was interesting: I started my morning with a scone and a large strong coffee before work and on arriving to the restaurant, felt slightly out of sorts; agitated, anxious, jittery, uneasy.  It was subtle, if anyone were to see me or talk to me, I would have been just fine, but it didn’t feel pleasant.

And I realized I’ve been feeling this way an awful lot lately; my moods, as evidenced in these daily scribbles, have been quite all over the place too while I’ve been tired and groggy on many evenings.

It’s all so subtle, you could easily mistake it for the normal run of things.  After all, I work in a busy restaurant, I’m doing a lot with my writing and trying to simultaneously run a business etc. etc.

But it’s not just that.  I’m convinced that there are three bad boys that are responsible for the majority of my inner unrest: coffee, sugar and wheat.

Coffee

This is a clear culprit when it comes to feelings of anxiety, agitation or jitteriness.  Given that I tend to have one pretty much every single day, it would be interesting to know how I would feel if I stopped for a few days.  Coffee strains your adrenal glands (those little dudes who set your heart racing and your blood pumping to escape the lion that’s chasing you – or when you’re dealing with intense pressure in the workplace) and too much wear and tear on your adrenals will eventually lead to burn out and utter exhaustion.

Sounds like it might do me the world of good to take a break from it.

Sugar

Given I’ve been known to eat chocolate for dinner (on the odd occasion), we all know the extent of my sweet-tooth.  I had it somewhat under control recently until my period unleashed the beast and I went right back to eating copious amounts of biscuits, cakes and Cadburys morning, noon and night.

High sugar intake is largely attributed to mood swings and can also cause also fatigue, skin problems, weight problems, joint pain and bowel issues.  I could tick several of those for myself so I could definitely use a break from sugar.

Wheat

Some of you may remember me saying recently that since Alex went away I’ve been surviving on a large amount of cheese toasties.  And buttered toast.  And bread in general.

But wheat is not our friend; I ate a large pizza last night for dinner and it sat like a rock in my stomach for several hours afterwards.

I rarely get bloated or ill from wheat, but having it every single day, quite often in the processed “Brennans” sliced pan form, is not be doing me any favours.  Especially not if I’m slathering it with butter as well.  (Don’t even get me started on dairy because every time I eliminate it from my diet for a few days, my skin starts to look amazing, clear and bright and glowing… maybe I should have said “Four Bad Boys”…)

It’s not really possible to explore the effects of all these things on my body or my emotional well-being in this daily scribble, I’m already at nearly six hundred words as it is.

But I think it could be time to begin a little detox, both a food-one and a phone-one also given I spent several hours before sleep last night watching Youtube.  I need to keep a little active on it for the business and I need to write these scribbles each day, but I don’t need to spend hours compulsively editing photos or scrolling through Instagram.

So let’s see how it goes tomorrow and if I manage to take a significant break from my daily habits, then this may become a longer-term experiment.  We shall see.

For now though, I really need to stop writing.

Ciao darlings!

Lizzie xxxx