TW for Depiction of eating disorder/body dysmorphia
The Cabbage Soup Diet: How I lost 20 pounds in a month!
Ingredients :
1/2 head of cabbage chopped
1 cup celery diced
1 cup white or yellow onion diced
1 cup carrots diced
1 green bell pepper diced
2-3 cloves garlic minced
4 cups chicken broth
14 oz can basil oregano, garlic diced tomatoes
1 teaspoon oregano
1 teaspoon basil
1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes
few shakes of black pepper
1/2 teaspoon salt optional
Week One
Treat yourself with a handful of blueberries. Drink a cup of black coffee, savor its bitterness. Go to school. feel the bulge of your thighs. Run your hands along the stretch marks on your hips. This will be worth it, you think. You are worth it. At lunch, as you sit with your thermos and your apple, tell your friends how good you feel, how clean. Tell them until they believe it. Tell them until you believe it. Keep going.
Week Two
Start your day with a baked potato, plain. Have a bowl of soup, two, three. Have a cup of black coffee. Relish in the fullness in your stomach. Feel your collarbones, your ribs, your cheekbones. Squeeze your gut, imagine the fat oozing out of your pores. Squeeze until it hurts. Squeeze until you’re empty. The roiling feeling in your stomach is the sludge leaving your body. Your insides are brown and dirty, full of toxins. When you’re done, you will be shining and pink and clean. You should be proud. You’re investing in yourself for once. You deserve this.
Week Three
No starches this week, only fruits and vegetables. Have an apple cut into sticks, pretend they’re french fries. Have a plate of riced cauliflower, pretend it tastes the same. Feel the warmth of the soup pouring down your throat. It’s just as good, you say. I feel amazing, you say. Your hands will be shaking constantly. Your head will always be reduced to a dull, throbbing, ache. You will feel a gnawing in your stomach, as if there is some sort of creature eating you from the inside out. Ignore this. Lean into the tremors that wrack your body, the constant headaches, the emptiness in your stomach. It means it’s working.
Week Four
Your friends say they’re worried about you. Your friends never cared about you. Your friends hate you. Your friends think you’re weak. They are wrong. They are the weak ones.They will never understand strength, or discipline, or sacrifice, not the way you do. You are different. You are worth it.
Congratulations! You’ve completed your one month cabbage soup detox! Reward yourself with a scoop of ice cream. No, have two. Have the whole pint. Have a loaf of bread, a bowl of mashed potatoes, a bag of tortilla chips. Have those cookies you’ve been eying all week. Have a bag of trailmix. Have an apple, mealy bits and all. Have the pad thai your brother left in the trash last night. Have whatever you want. Ignore the nausea, the guilt, the pain that shoots through your stomach. You’re okay. You’ll always have next month.
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