in mid-July, I decided to take a 90 day break from refined sugar to see how that affected my PMS and overall health. The refined sugar moratorium has been going well, but I did have a cupcake last week.

Actually, I had two.

We spent the day at home two Sundays ago, because Hurricane Hilary was making Southern California lose its mind. Pippa baked these Oreo cupcakes that she has been wanting to make for months. She baked them from scratch with almost no help from me. All I did was get our ancient oven to the right temperature and take out the cupcakes when they were done.

First, I told her I was not tasting the cupcakes because I’m on a break for sugar. She was disappointed but understood.

Then, I relented and said I’d have a taste. A nibble. After all, she worked so hard on them.

But by the time the cupcakes were ready, I resolved to eat as much as I wanted because if I try to abstain from refined sugar for the rest of my life, I’ll go crazy, binge on all the sugar, and make myself have an epic PMS hangover again. One or two cupcakes were not going to destroy my health.

I had two cupcakes, and they were DELICIOUS. My ten-year-old is becoming quite the accomplished baker!

But that was it. I slept fine that night, and I haven’t craved refined sugar since that indulgence. A friend remarked that I have incredible willpower, but honestly, I don’t. When it comes to refined sugar, I am exercising zero self-control. It’s just that I ate so much refined sugar during our summer trip to Nebraska, and I experienced such horrible PMS, that now stuff turns me off. Yesterday I went to a frozen yogurt shop and there was one No Sugar Added option. I had it and did not pine after the other flavors, because I don’t want to risk any more refined sugar during this menstrual cycle.

So I broke the moratorium, but that’s fine, because this isn’t about meeting some arbitrary standard or deadline. This is about me building a strong, healthy mind-body connection, and last week, that connection told me to have a cupcake. Now it’s telling me to abstain from refined sugar until I get my period and my hormones hit the reset button. Maybe I’ll have refined sugar twice during my next cycle. Or not at all. I’m playing around and paying attention so I can learn what’s best for my body and rebuild my mind-body connection one day at a time.