You Dont Know How Much Milk I Like in My Cereal
Cole Saladino/Thrillist
It's 4pm, Th afternoon. I'grand hunched over the 13th (!) bowl of Cinnamon Toast Crunch I've had in iv days. My brain feels every bit soggy and limp as the little squares soaking in the milk beneath me, and on a scale of one to GERRREEEEAAAAAAAAAAT, my stomach is a solid "You lot're on your own, dude." This is life on the Cereal Cleanse.
Terminal week, in response to the semi-contempo and doubtable-at-all-time "millennials-hate-cereal" coverage, I embarked on a regimented, cereal-exclusive diet for vii days. That'due south 21 breezy meals of merely my favorite Well-Balanced Breakfast™ in a bowl. My goal was to bring awareness to millennial awareness of cereal, and too, I just wanted to see what would happen. Guys, I went full coo-coo.
Twenty-four hour period 1, Monday: I'm living a blest life
I'yard belatedly for work, and then I brainstorm my commencement cereal-only day on the subway with Froot Loops (every bit dramatically recreated above). Normally, I consume approximately ii,000 calories a day. To keep my diet stabilized, I want to match that number as best I can. This ways I demand to eat about 13-15 measured standard serving sizes of cereal with a half-cup of skim milk each and every twenty-four hours. I also program to add together in fruit to one meal a day. You know, and then I don't dice.
I experience fine. For lunch, I throw caution to the wind and swallow two bowls of Cinnamon Toast Crunch. I'm living a blest life. For dinner, I have more Cinnamon Toast Crisis (CTC from hither on out). I've had ix bowls of CTC today, fell well nether my average daily calorie count (I'm striking about 1,400), and feel satisfied. This is great. I get running, like I usually do on Mondays, and head to bed smile with a spoon in my hand and milk in my spoon. I'll have to launder my sheets tomorrow. I'm pleased with what life and cereal are giving me. Which reminds me I need to selection upwardly some Life cereal at some point. Information technology'south a classic.
Day 2, Tuesday: I still feel pretty good!
I feel a little sluggish in the morning time, but my free energy's quickly rejuvenated when I crack open a fresh box of Lucky Charms for breakfast. I accept ii bowls, and hum on pure, high-fructose Irish luck until lunchtime, when I toss back ane basin of Special K with some assistant slices. Overall, I'm feeling pretty good, and I think this is a damn fine idea. Though licensed dietitian Jennifer Christman disagrees.
"A lot of mass-produced cereals are fortified with many of the vitamins and minerals you demand," she tells me, "but in that location'due south no style you can get everything you need without a well-counterbalanced nutrition." She says this very gently, after politely laughing at me. Though, with my current intake, I get almost fourscore-120g of poly peptide in my skim milk, which is correct where I need to be. Also, my calcium intake is a-booming. My bones accept never felt girthier.
This night I swallow a bowl of Kix. A actually weird, sugariness gustatory modality overwhelms my mouth as I settle into sleep. Part of me thinks it'south simply my new toothpaste, another thinks information technology might be foreshadowing. That similar, maybe this cereal matter was a bad idea. In the middle of the nighttime, I grab a scattering of CTC on my style back from the bathroom. It's notwithstanding adept. My fears are assuaged. For at to the lowest degree one more twenty-four hour period.
Day 3, Wednesday: I crave fruits and vegetables
I eat my morn meal with two millennial co-workers who were inspired to take up the spoon with me in solidarity. The support feels good. But, I discover myself suddenly repulsed by CTC, delicious as it is, because I've eaten like, 2lb of it in the by 48 hours. I eat Frosted Flakes instead, then Special Grand with fruit again for lunch, and an extra bowl of Raisin Bran, to keep me regular. Cereal has kind of lost its taste for me, though. I'm actively craving fruits and vegetables. I tell Christman my symptoms. "Hither, y'all are probably experiencing food fatigue -- your trunk is trying to intuitively tell you lot what it'south lacking, what information technology needs," she says.
The time I spend eating has drastically reduced, every bit cereal is a quick meal. I am more productive. For dinner, I consume Cap'northward Crunch with soy milk, which apparently, was Prince's favorite combination. I do this while listening to Majestic Rain. RIP to a fellow cereal connoisseur. I welcome the soy milk, every bit I experience sick from the corporeality of dairy I've consumed. I have trouble running, and become home early. I weigh myself before I go to bed -- I've lost 2lb. My mouth is torn up from repeated Cap'n Crunch lashings. I swear the cereal off, every bit my immune system is lowered, and I cannot take the take chances.
Twenty-four hour period 4, Thursday: Focusing is a thing of the past
It is the halfway point of my oat-filled hero's journeying and I take hit a wall. Weird things are happening. I'thousand having a hell of a time focusing. I notice myself standing upward and walking effectually. I talk to people I don't unremarkably talk to, and my words are senseless. I force myself to swallow apparently Rice Krispies. I do and so without milk. The sheer amount of milk I am ingesting is making me experience nauseated, every bit I unremarkably simply consume dairy in my coffee. I feel like Manny Pacquiao is using my gallbladder every bit a speed bag.
Technically, oatmeal is called hot cereal. I've never heard anyone actually call it hot cereal, but somehow I know that someone out there calls it hot cereal. I am in too much pain to have this debate correct at present, though. I'm certain if I don't switch things up my insides might shrivel like the Grinch'southward heart before he loved Christmas. For lunch, I have instant oatmeal with apples and bananas placed in it, like little nutritious land mines in a field of set up-made, steamy garbage. For dinner, I strength myself to eat Smacks.
"You are probably experiencing brain fog," Christman says. "Your claret sugar is spiking so dropping, you aren't getting the nutrients you need." I'm starting time to remember: is all this cereal also much of a good matter? Have I, like Icarus, flown too close to the sunday, only to meet my wings burnt off in a horrible blaze of Franken Berries? Am I literally going insane right at present?
Day 5, Friday: My outlook is dour
I cannot carry to drink any more than milk, so I eat my Frosted Flakes breakfast serving raw dog, no liquid. I've lost my lucky spoon. It's impossible to get piece of work done, and I experience slightly intoxicated. I crave weird and random foods and flavors. I find myself wanting to gustation ketchup. I aroma a phantom plate of celery. My craving for meat has reached peak levels and as I walk through the meat-filled speciality market Dean & Deluca in Manhattan to become java, my mouth waters so much a guy must follow me effectually with a mop.
Today, I rely on the clemency of co-workers, as several of them run across with me in cereal solidarity at the offset (mayhap bi-annual?) Thrillist Cereal Dejeuner to testify that cereal is very much still alive in the hearts of the immature. I accept Rice Krispies with friends, then exercise my best not to pass out until the stop of the day. For dinner I put bootleg granola -- made by my colleague Elaheh -- in milk with some bananas because I worry I'm going to get gout or scurvy or mayhap both. It counts as cereal, OK?
Day 6, Sat: I never thought information technology would go this bad
I wake up and don't do much for a while. I feel OK, actually. I do errands and then become running. My legs experience as if they are submerged in a bowl of soggy Wheaties -- and I don't go far. Afterwards, I swallow a bowl of Special K. I eat some beerios (cereal -- in this case, Rice Krispies -- with beer as milk) to pregame for the night. I do not enjoy this.
I drank alcohol just once during the week, and felt its effects fast considering I'thousand eating way less than I ordinarily eat. I get out to the bars this item Saturday and feel like myself, possibly, fifty-fifty, a lilliputian more than charming than usual (probably riding the dizzying pinnacle of sugar loftier). I try to drink a beer, but feel weak immediately, and want to go home. When I become home, I swallow a serving size each of Reese'due south Puffs, Cocoa Puffs, Pops, Waffle Well-baked, and Rice Krispie Treats cereal in a big ol' Frankenstein philharmonic bowl. A supercut of 'existent might reinvigorate my quest and push me through the finish line in trademark style, similar Hashemite kingdom of jordan winking at the Philadelphia bench.
I autumn asleep speedily afterwards, clutching my stomach and cursing the day I decided to go spoon-deep in the surprisingly night world of supermarket oats and grains. I cry a little, to be honest. I manage to put up just over ii,000 cals today. A new record high... going out with a bang.
Twenty-four hours 7, Sunday: My brain may never be the aforementioned
I wake upwards. Consume 2 bowls of dry Waff. I think here, at the end of all things, I might take institute some peace in my journeying. Some zen among the hordes of rice crisps and carbohydrate balls and fake marshmallows. Ultimately, I think I proved my bespeak, though, now I kind of forget what that indicate was, or if I even had a bespeak. I give myself a final weigh-in -- I've lost 5lb in ane week, but the mental toll this cleanse has taken surprises me the nigh. I am slower, more air-headed, and less able to focus. I feel like Charlie from Flowers for Algernon, and like him, I hope they let me continue my job when this is all done.
To stop off the Cereal Cleanse, I hit Momofuku Milk Bar for cereal ice foam. As I eat information technology, I reflect back on the 81 (yeah, 81) bowls of cereal I consumed over the last calendar week. I ended up averaging approximately 1,735 calories of cereal a day. I had sugar-blasted highs, and soggy-bottom lows, simply one affair is for certain: I'll probably never swallow Cinnamon Toast Crunch again. All great things, even cereal, should be enjoyed in moderation.
"I wouldn't recommend this cleanse, or nutrition," Christman says. "It'southward not very salubrious. Cereal has a place in our diet, but maybe ane bowl a day. And a healthier selection than most of the kinds you've been eating."
I can only hope I don't feel similar this for the rest of my life.
"If you don't get ameliorate in a few days, contact a medical professional."
Will do.
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Wil Fulton is a staff author for Thrillist. He really just ate cereal again. Follow him: @wilfulton.
Source: https://www.thrillist.com/eat/nation/i-ate-nothing-but-cereal-for-a-week-heres-what-happened
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