Wednesday, May 19, 2010

Juice Feasting Diary - Addendum

I need to add a couple of notes about juice feasting. It's not something that you just jump into without researching it. . . When you begin juicing, your colon shuts down because there is no fiber in your diet to activate your colon. However, your body will be dumping toxins into your colon, so you need to be doing enemas or colon hydrotherapy to get those toxins out of your body. Juice feasting gives your digestive system a rest and lets your body concentrate on cleaning out the toxins.

Another thing that you need to be careful about is coming off a juice feast. Since your colon is basically shut down during the juicing, you need to reactivate it slowly, two different ways of doing this is with prunes or drinking green smoothies. Depending on how long you've been juicing is how long you spend coming off the juicing. Since I only did 7 days, I spent 2 days on green smoothies, and took an herbal colon cleanse formula to get my colon back into action.

Happy Green Health!

Juice Feasting Diary - Ended

I was feeling really good on the juicing, but I just couldn't put down the 1 - 1.5 gallon a day that is recommended by the experts. The most I ever got down was about 3 quarts. I could feel the belly fat decreasing and the cravings were also decreasing. For the ultimate juice feast one juices for 92 days. . . Now I don't know that I could ever do that, but I was thinking that I might juice to the end of May. . . then along came the first clear, warm day in weeks, and I decided I wanted to go for a jog. I made it around the 2 mile circle without passing out. However, the rest of the day I was wiped out!

Conclusion, maybe one should not go for the first jog in over a month when only drinking juice, especially when they're not taking in enough calories (ie: the 1 - 1.5 gallons). I had a decision to make. . . Do I want to continue juicing and not exercise or do I want to finally get out and jog? I opted for the jogging. I wish I wasn't such a fair weather jogger, but I am and now that it's finally getting warm. . . I want to RUN! So I finished my juicing in favor of jogging.

I will juice again. . . Maybe not this summer, but I definitely know that I will do it again especially when I need to reboot when my eating habits have gotten a bit out of control. I know that I can do it! and it was not that hard.

Sunday, May 16, 2010

Juice Feasting Diary - Update

I've been juicing for 6 days now. . . I have had an occasional avocado or a couple of pecans in the late afternoon once or twice, but other than that, just juice. One day I juiced 1/2 a watermelon and drank that for lunch. It was Sooooo yummy! Mmmmmm. I love watermelon. I put the watermelon flesh in the blender seeds and all, blended, strained through my nut milk bag and drank the juice for the whole afternoon! Hudson even drank some with me and loved it!

It's interesting that I've not really craved anything. In my research, they mention how juicing is about freedom. . . freedom from food. I thought, sure... But it's true, I walk through the kitchen and know I can't eat anything, so I don't. I don't have to worry that if I eat something that I will eat too much. . . or not be satisfied. I feel free from making decisions about food because my decision is to drink juice for now.

The "experts" say that you might feel aches and pains from old injuries or from organs that have been overworked by your bad food or drug choices from the past. The only ache that I've experienced is my left knee that I had arthroscopic surgery on 28 years ago. . . I was even surprised to feel the twinge because I haven't even thought about it in ages.

Happy Green Health!

Friday, May 14, 2010

Juice Feasting Diary

I was doing a Green Smoothie Cleanse for 7 days and decided, "Why not? Let's go Juicing." So on Tuesday I began my Juice Feasting cleanse. I've been reading, hearing quite a big about Juice Feasting and I admit it's intrigued me. Supposedly we are walking around carrying with us all the toxic baggage from all the times we took antibiotics and used pharmaceuticals, not to mention all the toxic foods we eat. . . I know that I've done all of these, and I'm just grateful that I never drank alcohol, took drugs, or smoked cigarettes that would add to all the toxicity I am supposedly carrying around.

Why talk about toxicity and Juicing? Because the experts say that a Juice Feast is the perfect way to get rid of this toxicity. Where to we carry all this toxic baggage? In our fat! Get rid of my Toxins and fat at the same time?!?! Yippee! Well, not maybe that excited because the thought of drinking only juice 24/7 sounds pretty intimidating. So I thought I'd let you in on my experience that may or may not convince us both whether or not this is a good thing.

After having limited myself to Green Smoothies and blended soups for a week (ok I did have a salad or 2 and maybe a handful of pecans), I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to try the juice thing. So on Tuesday I broke out the Hurom Juicer and a bunch of veggies that I bought on Monday and pushed through 2 cucumbers, romaine lettuce, celery, kale leaves, an apple enough to make 4 cups of juice. Then I strained it through a nut milk bag to make sure that all pulp was out of the juice.
From Raw Blog

I drank down this yummy green stuff. . . Ok I liked it, but to a novice like my kids, it's not so yummy. I can feel a rush of energy after gulping down this pure nutrition.
From Drop Box

When Juice Feasting you are supposed to drink 1 - 1.5 gallons of juice a day. Well I only made it through 2 quarts! Yep, I survived all day on 2 quarts of veggie juice.

Happy Green Juicing!

Sunday, May 9, 2010

Happy Mom's Day!!

I hope all the Mom's out there had a wonderful Mother's Day. . . It can be a thankless job sometimes, but it's nice to have a day set apart to say thanks to the Mom's that raised us, and have our kiddos say thanks. We don't do it as often as we should. . .

Also, this is a shout out to my daughter Amanda for making the blog looks so cute! Luv you Manda!

Saturday, May 8, 2010

Green Smoothie Cleanse

So a few from our Raw As We Wanna Be group have been doing a Green Smoothie Cleanse. . .. This has been drinking green smoothies for Breakfast and Lunch and eating a RAW savory soup for dinner. Some have substituted a salad for the dinner time, and we have been avoiding nuts and seeds and other fats like avocados as they can slow down the digestive process. We've had some feedback and forth on the yahoo group and most seem to have lost a few pounds and are feeling more energy.

As for Bob and I. . .

Well, he jumped ship last night. He had it in his mind he’d make it to Friday and he did! Whoop! He lost 4 pounds! He can’t comment on how he feels because he’s got a cold that’s bumming him out. . .

As for me, I’m gonna see how long I can go. I might even kick it into high gear next week and do a Juice Feast. I’ll let you know how that goes. One thing I have learned is that I reach for food almost every time I walk through the kitchen! I know it’s pretty pathetic, but I find myself in front of the fridge opening the door to see if there is something that calls to me. On this cleanse, I’ve started telling myself NO! Wow, what a concept. I’ve let myself grab a handful of nuts every time I walk through the kitchen cuz I think they’re healthy, but now I realize that I am eating way too many of them every day and that they are filling me up so that I don’t turn to the greens like I should be doing instead. I’ve also gotten into the mindset that one corn chip isn’t gonna kill me. . . then that turns into probably 10 as I walk back and forth past the bag lying on the counter (that my kids didn’t put away). So guess what? I put it away, and out of sight out of mind really helps. As of yesterday I’m down 4 pounds and would like to get down a few more. . .

Happy Green Health! Let us know how you did, or are still doing. . . Lauri