Day 6: Day 1?

Today was a disaster, my friends. Even hearing my own name made me crabby. That could be my fit-throwing brain again, or it could be that I've been cheating and I didn't even know it. 

Turns out the ham I've been eating for breakfast almost every morning has been cured in sugar (I shouldn't be surprised. Sugar is added in almost everything we eat nowadays). I bought it before I started the Whole30 and had assumed it was on plan. Today I discovered that it isn't. Not even close. I'm so disappointed.

I have to start over.

I feel like "disappointed" doesn't even begin to describe what I'm feeling. I feel defeated. Frustrated. Angry. Sick to my stomach. Like everything I have done--all the hard work, all the blog posts, all the meal planning, all the abstaining from trigger foods and being so, so careful--has been a waste. I almost feel like a total fraud.

So now what? I figure I really have two options: 

            1. Pretend, justify, and keep going onto Day 7 tomorrow. After all, I can just stop eating that                   one thing and move forward. No one else needs to know about it. It's just ONE thing I was                   eating and I didn't even know it was off-plan, so why should I start over?

            2. I can be honest with myself and realize the truth of the matter: I started this to detach                           myself physically and psychologically from harmful and inflammatory foods. If I kept                        going like nothing happened, I could be cheating myself out of the full potential benefits of                  this program.

I toiled over this for a long time. I cried and I got mad and I complained to my husband who told me whatever I decided to do, he would be behind me 100%. Eventually, I decided the best thing would be to start over at Day 1. 

So tomorrow, I begin again. Round 2. This is still a gut-wrenching choice, but it's the right choice. I'm coming to grips with it. In the end, I know I'll be grateful. Right now, I kind of wish I would have eaten that Wendy's when I had the chance. . . 

Ok, ok. Not really. The benefit to having a week's worth of "bonus" Whole30 days behind me is that I have a perspective on the positive changes that improving my diet has brought me, despite my little mishap. I am still optimistic that things will continue to improve.