I don’t want it. Or any other fake sugar.

On February 12th I quit sugar. No, let me rephrase that. I cut out refined sugars. At first I had cut out honey and syrups getting my sweets from fruit only. But after two weeks of a living hell, I decided honey and pure maple or birch syrup would be nice. The first six days were great. I was having fun with my detoxing — I would wake up in the night sweating, shaking and feeling dizzy. The effects were wild to me. It was literally breaking an addiction I knew was strong, but did not know how much it was impacting me. But soon, it changed into something that was no longer interesting and fun but painful and exhausting. I started to get a very bad pain in my face and my ears. My ear clogged up and everything sounded muffled. The babies were crying upstairs and I could hardly hear them. They were getting sick-ish too….were they detoxing like me I wondered? I ended up taking them to the ER once again, and the three of us got a nose swab. Both of their tests came back positive for RSV where mine did not. They said I didn’t have an ear or sinus infection and that they suspected RSV despite the results. Days turned into weeks and I was miserable. The pain in my head felt similar to a migraine but it was moving all around my face. I tried everything I could think of (except garlic oil!) — I went to the doctors three different times…..no one had any answers for me.

Interestingly enough, someone we know went through a similar experience when they were eliminating refined sugar. I felt a surge of strength. I was encouraged to keep going, even though the pain felt truly unbearable. I didn’t get relief until just recently. We ran into a friend who happens to be a nurse practitioner – she recommended I try a few different nasal sprays and Claritin. Within 3 days I was relieved of the unbearable pain and spent the next week waking up each morning with excitement that the pain was continuing to subside.

During the 5 last agonizing weeks I am feeling very proud of myself. Eventually I’ll get off the honey train (because I’m a freak for sweet and I’ll always over do it) and allow my body to heal fully. Even if I still am freaking out that this means no more eggnog at Christmas time, and every other day that I use as an excuse to eat tons of sugar. But until then, I’m gonna eat homemade yogurt with blueberries and honey every night before my fasting time and at least for the next few weeks thank God my teeth no longer radiate pain.