My acupuncturist has put me on a liver-cleansing diet for a week. One might be led to wonder, since I don’t drink, why my liver needs to be cleansed, but she insists that it will do me a world of good, and since following her advice has so far cured me of my allergies to any number of unpleasant substances (including apples and cats but not, alas, Antonin Scalia), I have chosen to place myself completely in her hands.
The problem is that the main feature of the liver-cleansing diet seems to be that one isn’t permitted to eat anything that resembles food. No wheat, no sugar, no dairy. No eggs, no beef, no pork, no corn. Bizarrely, no peanuts and no oranges (though other nuts and citrus fruits seem to be okay).
So this is what I have had to eat today: puffed rice cereal with almond milk, carrots with hummus, celery with cashew butter, some dried apricots, and a piece of grilled chicken.
Understand that I usually have Coke and M&Ms for breakfast.
I feel as if I’ve died and gone to hell.
You have.
But think what it’ll do for your abs!
Okay, I’ll bite: why does your acupuncturist feel that she’s qualified to make dietary recommendations?
Well, following her dietary recommendations in the past has improved both my digestion and my sleep, so whatever her qualifications are, I’m going with them. . . . Except I spent about fifteen minutes staring longingly at a Snickers Bar this evening. My liver owes me.
mmmm… M&Ms. I miss those.
Coke and M&Ms! Do you eat them like cereal?
Peanuts aren’t nuts, they’re legumes. Hence the carte blanche with almonds and cashews and their ilk. The orange thing just confuses me, though.
If I were you, I would have Indian food for every meal.
And what’s this about no chocolate or caffeine? What about your constitutional rights as an American, h’m?