1. You should know your fasting blood sugar levels (first thing in the morning) before you begin a cleanse.
If blood sugar levels are normal, including fruit juices as a midafternoon treat during a cleanse is fine. Otherwise, restrict higher sugar content ingredients in your juicing plan. Pre-diabetic or diabetic persons should work with their personal health care professional closely during any cleanse.
Knowing your fasting blood sugar levels before you start a cleanse will avoid unpleasant surprises. Ideal fasting blood sugar levels are between 83mg/dl and 90mg/dl. Above 90mg/dl or below 70mg/dl are considered pre-diabetic and/or hypoglycemic. In short, consult your health care professional if you have issues with high or low fasting blood sugar levels before undertaking any major changes to your diet.
2. Right in line with knowing your blood sugar levels is knowing if you have high levels of yeast (candida) in your digestive system.
Candida overgrowth is one of those ‘controversial’ conditions that some medical professionals do not yet acknowledge, but many more are coming to agree that it is a serious condition with every passing year.
There are several tests which can be done to determine if you have overgrowth of candida albicans in your system, including blood, stool and urine tests. If you have candida overgrowth, the sugar content in fruit juices will feed the yeast over-growth in your system and can lead to exacerbation of the condition.
This can lead to brain fog, bloating, and many other symptoms. Some triggers of yeast overgrowth are the use of antibiotics, particularly prolonged and/or repeated use or constant craving or eating of sweets, and simple carbohydrates. Avoiding contributing to yeast overgrowth is another excellent reason to focus on low sugar content juices during a juice cleanse and limit higher fruit content juices.
3. Understanding that juice cleansing is not fasting.
The idea of a juice cleanse is to nourish the body with nutrient dense juices while eliminating solid foods which require the body to do more work and expend more energy to digest.
By giving your body a break from digesting solid food, you give your cells a chance to do needed repair work and to break down and eliminate toxins. An important key to this process is increased elimination. This is accomplished by consuming one to several quarts of fresh low sugar content juice daily and consuming a minimum of one additional quart of fresh water daily.
Adding herbal teas and more water, hydrating mineral salt and baking soda soaks to help hydrate, alkalize and nourish the body; and enemas to further support elimination, provides additional support to the entire body during the healing process. Increased elimination provides a pathway for cells to regenerate, repair and remove cells which are being replaced.
4. Because juice cleansing is all about hydration and elimination, enhancing the elimination process leads to better outcomes and better health.
Cleansing is about removing the old debris and cleaning house, which means it’s all about elimination. This is why it is vitally important to keep the fluids moving through the body while cleansing. You need the nutrients in the juices to feed the cells so they can do the work of repair and elimination and you need the fluids to help flush the toxins from the system. For the best results use all the elimination support processes to give your body extra support during and after a cleanse. Some examples include hydro-therapy (hot and cold showers), enemas, body brushing, Epsom salt baths, and sauna or steam room therapies.
5. Juice cleansing can cause mood swings, tiredness and irritability, especially as you detox – plan accordingly.
Most of us have no idea how much we rely on food, caffeine, alcohol and sugar to control our mood until we do something like a juice cleanse. Suddenly we discover that our mood is not as sunny as we thought, or our temperament is not as predictably cheery as we’d told ourselves. This can often catch us by surprise, and if we are not prepared for it, lead to an abrupt halt of the cleanse, or at least serious contemplation of giving in and giving up.
Knowing these mood swings and abrupt emotional upsets can occur allows us to set ourselves up to be prepared and to practice being gentle with ourselves. It also gives us the opportunity to let those around us know that we may be ‘grumpy’ or less than fun company in advance so that we (and they) can handle it when it happens.
Of course, for some of us this really won’t come up at all – but if it does, having a plan to get away to a quiet spot, take a walk or a hot bath or spend some time journaling and working through the feelings can make all the difference. It can also lead to great insights about what is running our lives that we were not aware of, and what we really want and need from day to day. Self-care is a very much over-looked part of a healthy life in our culture, so be proud of yourself for getting better at it, even if it looks a little messy on the way.
Keep reading to see how to reduce the mood swings, physical symptoms and distress of detoxing and you may not even need a special plan to help you cope.
6. There’s no reason to feel uncomfortable or suffer from pain when detoxing – here’s what to do to feel better fast.
The fastest and best pain relief method I know, bar none, is a coffee enema. It may sound strange, or even bizarre to you if you’re unfamiliar with the power of colon hydration and cleansing for overall well-being and improved health, but it’s an absolute first line of defense for me, especially during juice cleansing.
Even a simple baking soda and pure water enema will work wonders, if you aren’t up for a coffee enema quite yet.
The Gerson Institute uses coffee enemas for pain management for cancer patients, that’s how powerful they are. For everything from joint pain to head aches, body aches and soreness to overall fatigue and stiffness, nothing provides faster more dependable relief than a coffee enema.
And, most of the time the relief will last for hours – sometimes right through to the next day. So don’t simply suffer with headaches, back aches, hip or knee or joint pain, or feeling achy and sore all over. Learn to give yourself an enema and you’ll experience amazing almost instant relief from any detox pain.
An added bonus of using enemas during the cleanse is that enemas increase the rate at which we lose the weight by clearing the colon and improving elimination. The best results are achieved by including enemas every day or at least at the beginning and end of the cleanse, not just for better results in weight loss but for improved health through improved elimination of toxins.
7. Juice cleansing takes commitment and self-discipline, use these tools to inspire and motivate yourself to stick with it.
Juice cleansing is super easy for some people and not so much so for others. To really succeed with it, you want to spend the time to get clear with yourself about the reasons you are choosing to do it and to pre-select rewards and bonuses for yourself as you move through and complete it.
This could be as simple as giving yourself a present of something you’ve been wanting for some time but haven’t had the time or incentive to follow through on – a new book from a favorite author, a day trip to the beach, a massage, or an intimate afternoon with an old friend.
Whatever it is, make sure it is something really special and pleasing for you. It doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks of it – or even if they know about it. What matters is that it feeds your sense of well-being and feeling nourished and cared for.
Use the motivation of each day as you go through the cleanse to propel you forward. Each day you complete is one day closer to day 5 and the grand finale. Use those accomplishments to spur yourself onward. You might want to do a weigh-in each day or on day three to help you see your progress and get more inspiration. If you’re following the Power 5 Cleanse instructions, the pounds will be falling away and you’ll feel excited to continue even when you are longing for the end and that first bite of solid food.
8. Juice cleansing can help you reset behaviors that need to change to improve your health and quality of life. Use it to reduce and/or eliminate unhealthy foods or practices.
The best way to use a juice cleanse for long term positive results is to plan a strategy to develop new rewards and habits as you complete and come out of the cleanse. One way to do this is to decide ahead of time which new rewards you want to give yourself as you go through the cleanse and what you can choose to pamper yourself with on a regular basis afterwards.
There’s no need to completely eliminate all of your favorite foods which don’t fit the new healthier lifestyle – but making them special ‘cheat day’ treats that can only be eaten when dining out is a great way to allow yourself the occasional indulgence without falling back into the routine of regularly eating those ‘old favorites’. This lets you find new rewards that are not food based as well as giving yourself the occasional splurge so you don’t feel deprived.
9. Why planning and preparing instead of jumping in head-first can bring better results.
Some of us are just impulsive, and our lives work well this way. But most of us have more obligations than we’d prefer, and are not simply free to fly off on a vacation at a whim, or to completely change up daily routines without making arrangements for some of our obligations to be met by others.
A juice cleanse, while not a vacation, is a commitment to a set behavior and way of life that will last for a set period of time. The limited duration makes it easier to accomplish and to think of taking on than an open ended change that has no end point we can see, but that doesn’t mean it won’t have its own challenges.
While some people love to cook for others while doing a juice cleanse, some find the idea of cooking when they cannot enjoy the food a form of torture. So, if cooking for and feeding others is a part of your daily routine, then knowing which of these responses you are likely to have will make a big difference in how you choose to handle the timing and responsibilities you take on during a cleanse. These and other considerations all make planning a good idea for improving your odds of success when you start cleansing.
Planning also allows you to gradually reduce certain foods and patterns in your daily life that you want to eliminate during the cleansing period. Reducing caffeine intake, for instance, means you do not have to go through caffeine elimination headaches which can come from going directly from lots of caffeine daily to none at all.
While there is really no one perfect way to do a juice cleanse, it is true that planning rewards, gradually reducing certain foods and substances like caffeine and giving yourself plenty of time to build up the momentum and commitment to a plan can provide many added benefits to your cleanse and your results.
Regardless of which methods or practices you decide to use, you will find that low sugar content juice cleansing is a fantastic way to remove toxins, reduce weight, particularly in stubborn problem areas, and give your body a fresh start.
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