When I originally pitched this article to Jen, I pictured myself as a little guinea pig. I was going to replace alcohol, men and cigarettes with raw food, juicing and Booty Camp.

I signed up for Booty Camp Fitness, whose entirely pink marketing campaign was enough to deter me, but I ended up loving it and feeling a sense of nostalgia for pink camouflage. I also ordered a juice cleanse, and tried the Nutrition in Motion diet.

After all, who doesn’t want to do something called a fire hydrant in Christie Pitts park while hipsters smoking weed and sipping PBR stare on? If you have lazy narcissist tendencies like me, and you need someone to yell at you a little bit, but then tell you you’re amazing two seconds later, Booty Camp will work for you. At the end of it, I wasn’t exactly “before” and “after” material, but I felt tighter and could do a lot more pushups than…well, before. With all seriousness, I can say that feeling strong made me feel more mentally sound than I have in a long time. Dr. Oz was right after all.

Then came the diet. After ordering a juice cleanse for my boss on the phone, I started speaking to Rebecca of Nutrition in Motion (NIM) Nutrition in Motion (NIM) and she kindly offered to give me a five-day raw food delivery to try. What? Three perfect little meals, delivered to my doorstep, kept cool with ice packs, and complete with a little menu on top? Don’t mind if I do. The first day, I left work and was so excited that a little raw food fairy left my cooler bag right in my hallway. This is a lazy chef’s dream! I opened it, and the tiny little Polly Pocket-size portions of food scared me a wee bit. It was all kind of airline-portioned food, but tasted way better. Lunch, for example, could be a raw lasagna, which was like a two bite brownie, but pasta, but also not that. Maybe this is the way Gwyneth Paltrow lives.

Come 4 o’clock, I just about ripped apart the little almond cocoa ball that was your daily dessert. After a few days of this, I felt really good. I would definitely go back to the NIM raw food delivery if I needed to lose weight really quickly like Beyonce for Dreamgirls, but with way less caynenne pepper and water. You get an A, NIM. I liked you. If I win the lottery, you are mine for life.

This bite-sized diet and booty camping was complemented by daily juicing. Rather than squeeze my own fruit, I went with a wonderful company from LA called Ritual Cleanse. While there are many local juice cleanses in Canada that are probably great (NIM has one called Total Cleanse that I’ve heard is awesome) I wanted to try this specific company out because getting juice sent from California seemed both glamorous and bonkers.

Essentially, a forty-pound box arrives loaded with kale, apple, ginger juice. You crack one open every 2 hours for 3 days. Easy enough.

But because I am a massive idiot, my pre-cleanse day consisted of going to a microbrewery the night before an insane heat wave; Day one may have been the second worst day of my life. I came home from work and lay on my bed in the dark and actually moaned to my roommate to see if I was dying.

Day two came and I was less moaning animal and more like “Oh hay mango pineapple juice where have you been all day?!” Day three came and I was feeling good, energized and like I’d accomplished something. Night three came and I was dreaming of a sweet, sweet bowl of steel cut oats and berries chased down by a coffee. While I have to say this was extremely challenging, especially in the summer when you are working 9 hour days and getting home to prep a side project, it give me a sense of buoyancy, lightness and clarity (after the initial ferocious hunger subsided). While living off juice is clearly not realistic for longer-term solutions, it reminded me how dependent I am on things that are terrible for me. Who knew I had a heroin-like addition to caffeine?My lovely man friend at one point said to me, “You can’t live off juice and sex, I don’t think.” Well, for three days I did, and I’m still here to tell the tale.

So clearly, given the remark above, I did not swear off men. I met a nice one just after I swore off them. True to my own form, I flung myself into it quickly, as I do, and am trying to now figure out what it actually all means in terms of a longer-term relationship. Same with exercise, same with food. I am starting to realize that with most life decisions, whether related to your muffin top, diet or romantic life, extremist measures crash fast. I’ve fallen off the bandwagon with everything since I tried to make Molly 2.0. But after finally deciding the write this, I’m committing to myself to do the squats, drink some kale juice every once in a while, and date a man, but remind myself that it was the turtle who won the race and not the sneaky hare.

~Molly McGlynn (pictured, in her natural state of relaxation.)