Thread: Detox products/diets?

Anyone have any luck? These look interesting but have never tried one...

Frankly no. The whole concept of detox was created to sell diet products. Drink lots of water, eat lots of veg, wholegrain and cut out refined sugars. That does work, but it's nothing to do with "detox" it's just looking after your body properly.

There is a "Cleanse" in the book "What If The Buddha Came To Dinner?" that makes the most sense to me than any fad drink or diet out there. I've done this cleanse (note the absence of the word "detox") and it's been amazingly helpful for me.

This will sound weird, but the fad diet - Cabbage soup diet - is actually a really good cleanse. I have used it to kick off a move into better eating habits and it works well for me.

The key, for me, is that it is high in water and low in carbs, sugar and other things which people typically associate with "toxins".

My only suggestion if you are going to do this is to make sure you are actively checking in with your body. Sometimes cravings are because we are breaking a habit and denying ourselves something which we have become accustomed to, other times it's because we truly need what ever we are craving.

{{{HUGS}}}

Thanks ladies. I'm not necessarily looking for a diet, but a jump-start to healthier being.

Well, the "Cabbage Soup Diet" is, as I said, a good cleanse. And it only lasts a week. My discovery was that after doing the diet for a week, I didn't crave high sugar, high carb, high fat foods. Which for me made it a prefect jumping off point.

Not that I am pushing this particular "diet" on you. Just a suggestion about different a way to approach this.

{{{HUGS}}}

Someone at work just attempted a "detox" plan. She began a week ago Friday consuming several pills daily along with a powder that you mix in with water. You are supposed to drink lots of water daily and eat only fruits/vegetables. By day 2 or 3, the "cleansing" begins. Nothing happened to her. She felt the same, although hungry and didn't even drop a pound. By Thursday (a couple of days ago), she resumed her normal rate of eating since she was starving and no weight loss. Her objective also was to jump start her health and well-being.

Do a Vipassana 10-day meditation course. That will do it FOR SURE.

Kash13 is right, put down the "detox kits" and step away slowly. ;)

Your body knows how to excrete waste, metabolic byproducts and toxins just fine. If you want to "detox", don't think about introducing a bunch of weird supplements into your body that it will have to process, instead think about eating and acting in a way that supports your body's own processes, and let it do what it does best.

You have 5 organs/systems that have excretion-type functions:
1. Your digestive tract - If you want it to work at it's best, you need to be getting your 35 grams of fiber a day. If you're having trouble getting there with diet, a daily glass of Metamucil is a *way* better way to help your body do it's thing than an overpriced supplement packed with laxative herbs.
2. Your kidneys. They filter toxins from your blood. Give them 8+ glasses of water a day, to help them do their work. I know I don't like trying to to my job with the bare minimum of resources, and neither do they. (I've seen the paper that says the average person only needs about 6 glasses of water a day, but the average American also gets something like less than 10 grams of fiber a day. Fiber absorbs water. If you are getting 35 grams of fiber a day, but only drinking 6 cups of liquid, well, going to the bathroom won't be much fun.)
3. Your liver. It does a whole ton of things, most notably producing bile for digestion, and processing toxins so they can be excreted through bile or later filtered by the kidneys into urine. There's not a whole lot you can do for your liver directly, but cutting back on alcohol and tylenol is a good idea. If you have reason to suspect you have been exposed to substances that can harm your liver, a milk thistle supplement is something to consider. It has been studied scientifically, and results have been mixed, but it is clear that in some situations, it can have a protective effect on the liver.
4. Your lungs. You excrete the CO2 that's a byproduct of your body's functioning. This one is pretty easy. Don't smoke. :)
5. Your skin. Traces of stuff show up in your sweat (mmm... garlic sweat ;) Exercise regularly and work up a sweat so your skin can do it's thing.

Those things plus eating healthy should put you on the right track.

Detox products are a sham.
If you want to feel healthier, the only things you can do are live healthier.

Cut packaged foods, fatty meats, high fat dairy products, artificial sweeteners, refined sugars, fried foods, alcohol and white flour. Eat more fruits and veggies, take fish oil capsules for Omega 3, a multi vitamin for nutrients, I also reccomend magnesium, vitamin b complex and papaya enzume for healthy digestion.

Don't feel like you can't eat anything or you will focus on it because you "can't" have it. Instead start making wiser choices on what you want.

Yoga is great, as is meditation, and walking. All these physical activites allow you to "tune out" and listen to your body.