Petra's Healing Journey

Forgive me for I have sinned, it’s been some time since my last confession 😔

After my lump started shrinking, I got a bit cocky, and most certainly complacent, and gave in to temptation here and there, indulging in the only things I really struggle with not having – coffee and cake 🍰

As a die hard sugarholic, this diet hasn’t been easy, and self control has never been my forté. And having several extraordinarily good bakeries on my dog walking routes, staying away from them has been a challenge in the extreme.

So when I realised my treatments were working I decided I deserved a treat.

While I think that was completely valid, it wasn’t just one treat, it was several, and I’m pretty sure it slowed down my tumour shrinking. I think I was hoping that maybe it was the other treatments that were responsible for my lump getting smaller, but in truth I think it’s a combination of several, if not all of them.

I knew that eating sugar would knock me out of ketosis (which is only achieved when the body is burning fat as it’s primary energy source as there are no sugar or carbs to burn), but I thought it would knock me out for a day or two. I was wrong.

I bought keto sticks, which are just like pH paper, you dip them in your pee and then compare it to the colour chart. Beige is normal, mild ketosis is pink, through to burgundy for full on keto-central.

I was burgundy for the first few days and then I decided to see how long a treat kicked me out of keto for. I had decided I could have a treat once a month, and had planned a day out with my daughter, so I indulged in an oat milk latte and a raisin and pistachio croissant from a new bakery that’s opened nearby that constantly has a queue, so I figured it must be really good. I sat down at a table outside and waited patiently for my heavenly morsels to arrive.

To say it was a disappointment doesn’t even come close in describing my much awaited for indulgence, the coffee was luke warm and tiny and the croissant was cold and hard. I sent the coffee back to be reheated, which they replaced with a fresh one the same temperature. The sensible thing to do would have been to see it as a sign and walk away, but I was hungry and I hate wasting food so I ate it. It was incredibly underwhelming, and didn’t knock me out of ketosis for a day or two, it knocked me out for a week! 😳

Which means that the several treats I had previously, probably knocked me out for a month 😔

Woe is me.

So I made a keto friendly cake, with monk fruit sugar, which was a disaster! It smelled like washing up liquid, and didn’t taste much better.

I’m going to buy some erythritol next, which has no taste or smell, and try and make a cake with that and have that as a treat. It’s just not worth being out of ketosis for a week for 5 minutes of pleasure.

Sugar addiction is a very real thing.

I’ve been addicted to heroin, GBL, cannabis and sugar, and I think sugar is the hardest one to let go of. It doesn’t seem to matter how long you go without it, the craving is still there, and it’s everywhere.

It should be illegal 🚫

Along with all the other harmful ingredients in our food that provide no nutritional benefit whatsoever 😑