Let's start at the very beginning. Afterall, Maria Von Trapp says "it's a very good place to start." I started the Isabody Challenge on December 12, 2011. My schedule looked something exactly like this:
Allow me to explain my OCD color coding. I had four kinds of days throughout the entire challenge: Cleanse Days, Shake Days, "Regular" Days (numbered days), and Free Days.
The first two weeks I really had to ease myself into the whole system--not because I had food addictions, but because I was addicted to those toxic "synthetically manufactured supplements" I mentioned in the last post, and I was full of multiple anesthesia's from a double date with surgery I had at the end of October, and I had had more than my fair share of run ins with Bicardi and his cousin, Corona, in the 18 months prior to starting. During my "Intro Weeks," I simply shot 4 oz. of Cleanse for life in the morning along with an Isalean Shake. I also took many an epsom salt bath (just you wait til I post the pictures of the results of those!) After I got my body aclimated to cleansing again, I started a 9-day system (modified due to the fact I was still healing from surgery and needed calories in order to do my 3 hours of wonderful physical therapy everyday).
Now back to an in depth description of my color coding: A cleanse day is exactly what it sounds like...it's a cleanse day. I drink 4 oz. of Cleanse for Life, every 4 hours. I also have a scooby snack (see "Elixers of Life" post if you don't know what Scooby Snacks are) and a few almonds every 90 minutes. Along with that I drink approximately 120 oz. of distilled water and anywhere from 24-48 oz of Herbal teas. Yes, I do have to make trips to the water closet here and there, but drinking that much liquids never really disrupts my daily schedule. Then again, I am a teacher. We are known for our insanely strong kegal muscles (sorry if thats TMI). =)
Shake Days are the days that I actually drink 2 Isalean shakes. The morning starts out with an ounce of Ionix Supreme (what better way to start the day than sending your whole body into a minor seizure from the taste of this life supporting tonic?), and a cup of "Horse Water." Horse water, which is commonly known as Jurrasic Greens, is a concoction that Sir Aaron Ogden, "aka Boss," introduced me to. It is a flash dried mixture of Alfalfa, Barley and Kamut. I call it Horse Water because well, it smells and tastes just like water in a horse trough. (I actually don't know what water from a horse trough tastes like, but I'm pretty good at inductive reasoning and I hypothesize that it tastes a lot like it smells, and Jurassic Greens smells just like it, so there ya go). If you can afford IsaGreens, I would highly suggest you just use that instead. It tastes much better!!! (Notice I put 3 exclamation points on that statement).
Back to the daily regimen. Now that we are wide awake from our spine tingling supplements, we go work out. At about 7:30am workouts are all done and we indulge ourselves with an Isalean Shake. I'll go into more detail about my actual diet in a later post, but here is the basics of what I eat: I eat all "raw" on these days, and limit my calories to approx 1300-1400. Snacks through out the day consist of fresh fruit, nothing canned or processed! Lunch #1 always consists of a spinach salad of some sort. Lunch #2 is another variety of vegetable (steamed broccoli, roasted asparagus, sauteed bell peppers, balsamic marinated tomatoes, cucumber,onions, etc.). Dinner is of course another Isalean Shake. As with Cleanse days I also take Scooby snacks and almonds about every 90 minutes to 2 hours, and consume a small reservoir worth of liquids.
"Regular Days" are very similar to shake days. The main difference is I don't drink 2 shakes. Everything follows the same protocol except come time for dinner I will eat another meal. This meal usually has some sort of meat (often fish), a whole grain (quinoa is my favorite), and of course, more vegetables. I also let myself snack on whole grains on these days. I love Rosemary triscuits and whole grain granola!
Free Days are a slight variation of "Regular Days." I still drink Ionix, Horse water, and a shake in the morning, but on these days, come approximately 12:00pm, after I have eaten all my healthy stuff for lunch, I eat whatever else I want to until breakfast the next day. The Boss has taught me that cleansing is a lifestyle, not just a "Plan B" pill for eating and partying too much. But with that, he insists that I have a free day once a week to enjoy life. If you don't enjoy cleansing you won't make it a lifestyle, so you have to have balance. I LOVE eating out! I especially love eating different ethnic foods. I use my free day to nurture this hobby of mine =)
Onward to January!!
January is *deep voice* "Deep Cleanse Month!!" You will notice that I did indeed cleanse on New Year's. Some say I am crazy, but to those haters I simply say "I'll send ya postcard from the Caribbean when I'm on the Transformation Cruise." Ok in all honesty, it was difficult, but there are harder things in life than not eating on New Year's.
Following the conclusion of my first 9-day system I had a few regular days (remember those are the days that just have numbers), and then started another 9-day cleanse. This time I followed Isagenix's suggested schedule. Then we had a bunch of regular days because I had a basketball tournament in Fremont, California, and we all know Cleansing on road trips is next to impossible.
February was an exciting month, because I got to really start working out (without wearing my boot), and by the end of the month I was cleared from surgery. For the months of February and March I pretty much just did two cleanse days a week. I did shake days prior to cleanse days to make sure my body had the nutrients it needed to effectively cleanse. I followed them with a shake day to reload my body with the nutrients it needed to complete my workouts. During these months I was simply doing 50 minutes of high intensity circuit training, and 45-50 minutes of low intensity cardio (65% maximum heart rate).
April brought in a slight change of schedule. The Boss man somehow convinced me that I should participate in his Adventure Race. I volunteered at the Moab Adventure Xstream Series race to get a better look at what all this adventure bidness was all about. After seeing those participants I told The Boss that we were going to have to workout harder. A lot harder! So we did. April 16th I started training for the 12 hour Adventure Race to be held in June. With the increased working out, I decreased my cleansing to once a week, and increased my daily caloric intake by 200 calories for each additional workout. I still did the same workouts as the previous months, but added running/hiking/biking to my weekends.
May was crunch time! Only 28 days left of the Isabody Challenge, and only 2 months until the big race. As far as cleansing goes, I finished the challenge with another 9-day system. Workout wise, I continued with my morning workouts, and added running (hills) or biking every other day, during the week, road or mountain biking for 3-4 hours on Saturdays, and hiking on Sunday. (Perhaps this might help some of you skeptics understand why I was so tan in my after pics.)
In June...oh wait! That's The END! I finished the Isabody Challenge on May 28, 2012. Ironically enough, May 28, 2010 was the date that I lost control of my life. It was 2 years to the day that I got it back. I don't consider it a coincidence... more of an omen, really.
Obviously there are some minor intricacies that need expounding upon (cleansing aids, workouts, diet rules, etc.) which I will continue to post about, but this here is the foundation for how I achieved what I did. I hope it helps all you aspiring Isabodists =)
1 comment:
Hi I would love to know more about how you managed your exercise and cleanse days. All the reading I've done thus far indicate that you shouldn't over exert yourself on a clease day ie. 10km run IS over exertion. So if you are training everyday how did you incorporate this?
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