Health Hacks 2018 The Story so far

So, I’ve been a bit out of touch with how my health hack challenges for 2018 have been going. I may not have got around to writing about them but I certainly have been doing them.

Here’s what I’ve been up to since my last update:

March = No alcohol

April = Drinking 6 pints of water daily

May = No caffeine

March as my month of no alcohol was genuinely easy for me, I don’t feel that I drink alcohol very frequently or that I tend to binge drink when I do either so I was fairly confident about this month – I still chose to add it into the health hacks as I wanted to see if I felt any different from not doing it. After about 3 weeks I thought my energy was a bit better and I had fewer days of feeling a bit fed up and down, which for me is a common side effect after a night out drinking alcohol. During the month of March whilst being T-Total I went to 2 weddings and a house party plus going out to watch the Rugby – all of these events would usually have involved alcohol for me but I felt fine without them – what I did notice was that I was tired and ready to go home much earlier in the evening than I usually would be. After this month I have chosen to keep drinking alcohol on occasion as I enjoy it and the changes I noted were not that dramatic for me.

April – a month of drinking 6 pints of water daily – initially this was easy as I was likely dehydrated (as most of us are) at the start of the month. As the month progressed it became a little harder to do as my body was not craving so much hydration as at the start as I had hydrated myself well at that point. I easily drank 4-5 pints of water daily but then struggled with the last bit, this made me wonder whether 6 pints a day was more than I needed. At the start of the month, I was going to the toilet a lot but after the 1st 10 days this reduced – my body must have used the extra hydration initially to flush out any toxins stored around my body and then once that was done the water was taken into my cells to keep them hydrated. Over the month my skin became less dry and my corn motility test only took 24 hours at the start of the month (which was excellent compared to previous results). A month of consciously drinking more water has enabled me to naturally keep it up as my body and my routine became accustomed to the increase in water intake, I continue to drink at least 3-4 pints per day, sometimes more but I am not consciously counting every drop now which is much easier.

May was no caffeine month, I was a little concerned about how my body would react to the cold turkey of no caffeine as I felt that I drank quite a lot of caffeine on a daily basis: 2-3 cups of coffee, at least 1 cup of tea, 1 can of diet coke most days and chocolate. So I cut out everything including the chocolate – although it only contains a small amount of caffeine I wanted to give myself the full experience and not end up eating loads of chocolate to try and get my caffeine hits! On the 1st day by 3.30pm, I felt exhausted like I’d been awake for 24 hours, so tired my eyes were sore, by 8.30pm I couldn’t take it any longer and I had to go to bed. Day 2 I had a low-level headache (less than I expected) and I felt a bit sorry for myself. Day 3 I felt very depressed and was shocked about how awful I felt without caffeine and what it must be doing to my body if I felt like this without it. I decided there and then that I didn’t want to go back to having caffeine. So far – I haven’t had any caffeinated drinks but I have gone back to eating chocolate! I have supplemented with decaffeinated coffee and tea as I missed drinking them on a psychological level e.g. I like a cup of tea after a busy day or when I feel unwell.

June is daily stretching month, so I’ll be back next month to let you know how that went.

Hazel is a Chiropractor and Owner of 360 Chiropractic. If you are interested to find out how Chiropractic care can help you please give me a call: 07582 907702