A Cleansing Diet Can Help You To Detoxify & Lose Weight Quickly, About 2-4 Pounds Per Week. If You Are Fasting, Following a Detox Cleansing Regimen 7-14 Prior to Starting the Fast Will Help Reduce Discomfort & Kick Start The Weight Loss - Detoxification Process.

by Robert Dave Johnston

When I talk about a cleansing diet, I am referring to a calorie restriction menu that will help the body purge itself of toxins in the bloodstream and digestive system. This regimen can also help to initiatet weight loss, approximately two-to-four pounds daily.

In this page, my discussion will focus on using the diet in preparation for fasting for weight loss and detoxification.

If you have been eating poorly and/or excessively, your fasting efforts will go a lot further if you prepare your body for 7-14 days prior to the fast via a cleansing diet. This means removing from your diet any and all junk, greasy and sugary foods that you are accustomed to eating.

The removal of these toxic foods will send your body into ultimate detoxification mode, and it will work hard on your behalf to eliminate the filth that keeps you from experiencing optimal health and wellness. Of course, usual offenders that must be eliminated in this cleansing diet are sugars, starches (enriched flour) and saturated fats.

These include but are not limited to pastries, candy, white rice, white bread, soda pops, butter, frying oil, cheeseburgers, pizza, etc… Stay away from then for 7-14 days before you start fasting. If you are going to use this cleansing diet without fasting, you can follow it for as long as necessary; 30 days is average, although I have heard of people who stay on it for several months for continued weight loss and ultimate body detox cleansing.

Cleansing Diet: Banned Foods

• Salt - most people get plenty of it from the foods that you eat. When I first started the cleansing diet lifestyle years ago, I was kind of shocked to see that salt was banned. I spoke against it actually.

  I have come to realize that the foods we eat all have sodium, and that a healthy adult really has no need for 'salt' except to make the food taste better.

  In addition, when I stopped using salt, I immediately dropped like 15 pounds. It was mostly water weight, but it showed me that I was retaining a LOT of liquids, and that was greatly due to my abuse of salt and seasonings.

• Sugar - absolute trash, toxic to the body... good for nothing - stay away! I could write pages and pages about sugar. I am sure that you yourself can admit that this is one of our greatest (if not our greatest) enemy. I mean it. Enemy. Any prolonged return to sugar will, sooner or later, result in full-blown intoxication of the bloodstream and digestive system.

  

  I don't kid myself by thinking that "I'm cured." I still am susceptible to sugar and to binging. What keeps me free and clean is NOT to put sugar into my body... period.

  I can't draw the same conclusion for you, but I am certain that you probably have your own stories to tell about sugar and how it has affected your weight, life and health.

• Fried Foods - Absolute filthy grease fest that leads to obesity and other diseases.
• Cheese - Cheese is great but it has way too much fat. For the time being, steer clear. Later on, once you finish the cleanse, you will be able to have treats from time to time. So don't let the mind start telling you that your 'life is over' because you can't eat this or that. Just tell the mind to shut up and keep moving forward. Works like a charm for me.
• Dairy Products - dairy has a lot of fat, is high in sugar content and has been known to cause digestive system inflammation. But I'm not totally heartless. Stick to non-fat milk, how's that? Anything above non-fat is banned during this cleansing diet.
• Red Meat - I personally don't have anything against red meat. In fact, I have been known to eat a piece of meat on rare occasion.

  Right now, we are banning it because it has a lot of fat, and because I want your digestive system to be given easy food to digest. Later on you can have a piece of meat here and there if you want. Right now, for the purposes of this cleansing diet... it's banned.

• Alcohol - Alcohol is packed with empty calories. Calories with ZERO nutritional value. And booze turns to sugar. Bad all over. If you drink frequently, cut it down to a minimum.

  You're doing this cleansing diet for your health and to reach a goal that is important to YOU. If you have to go a few days without drinking, your arm is not going to fall off. You'll live. A cup of wine with dinner is fine, but nothing more than that at this juncture.

• Butter or Margarine - As they say in New York, "Forget about it!!!" Butter and margarine are pure fat and we don't want it.
• Fruit Juices - If you read the label of most orange juice brands, you will see that the sugar content is through the roof. Yes, it is natural sugar, but sugar nonetheless.

  You can have one glass of juice in the morning during the cleeansing diet, but you need to water it down 50/50. Drinking straight juice at this phase is basically like injecting blubber directly into your belly. Stay away. Drink veggie juice instead...but make sure that it is the low sodium veggie juice. :-)

• White Enriched Bread - That stuff is like dropping a ball of cement into the stomach. White flour, doughy garbage really is terrible for human health. I was going to ban all breads for the cleansing diet, but I remembered that the Ezekiel brand (green bag) is actually very good. You can eat one slice here and there as partial replacement to your carbohydrate servings. We'll get into all of that in just a minute.



• Junk Food of ANY Kind - I think that it definitely goes without saying that junk food is out. And not just out for a little while in this cleansing diet.

  Hopefully, junk is out of your life for good. That crap is like wearing a ball and chain. It enslaves us to cravings that are never satisfied and only get stronger and more violent.

Foods to Limit During Cleansing Diet

• Fruits (Stick To Strawberries or Cantaloupe)
• Tomatoes
• Peas or Corn
• Olive Oil

Starting The Cleansing Diet

Starting immediately, eliminate ALL of these foods and beverages from your diet... period. This is the beginning of the process. For now, continue to eat whatever else you have been eating EXCEPT for the foods that are listed above. I want you to take a full step forward and discontinue eating any and all junk, not just during the cleansing diet, but for good.

That's the whole point of our work together, right? To help you achieve measurable improvements in your health. So cut it all out. Do not eat even a little of them anymore. I mean Nothing, No More, Finito, Nada! You are taking the monumental step of removing ALL toxic foods from your diet.

I use the word 'monumental' because, in truth, you are now in the minority.

The majority of people live their whole lives and NEVER confront their eating behaviors. So, by following this cleansing diet, you are taking a big step forward in the transformation of your life and health.

Eat SIX Times Daily

I would strongly encourage you to observe the banned foods list during the cleansing diet, as well as change your eating structure to one of six smaller meals. This method will accelerate your metabolism, meaning that the body can process and expel toxins faster and more efficiently.

But, don’t worry… this cleansing diet doesn’t have to be hard. The six-meals-per-day structure includes breakfast, mid-morning snack, lunch, mid-afternoon snack, dinner and evening snack. The metabolism is like a fire. Let me give you an analogy to illustrate.

Imagine that you were stranded in a very cold place and need to keep a fire burning to survive the night. Would you be better off dumping a huge amount of firewood at once, or would the fire burn longer and keep you warmer if you added small amounts of wood frequently? Of course, the answer is the latter. The more frequently you eat during the cleansing diet (observing the banned foods list), the better you will feel and the more energy you will have.

Consequently, the metabolism will work evenly and continuously, which results in faster weight loss and elimination of toxins. Having larger meals with less frequency is like dumping a large amount of wood into the fire. You will get one heck of blaze initially, but it will die out sooner and not provide as much heat (energy) as it would if you added wood more sparingly.

This is what causes the monster cravings that keep people trapped in binging and overeating for years. If you want to disconnect the cravings and succeed in your cleansing diet, eat more frequently. To help you see how this works, here is a sample menu from a typical day in my life:

Sample Cleansing Diet Menu

1 Cup of Oatmeal with 1 Cup Skim Milk, a Handful of Raisins or Plums
Three Egg Whites mixed with, 3 OZ Ground Turkey
1 Cup of Green Tea with Stevia

Mid-Morning Snack 10AM

1 Apple or Pear Mixed With One Cup of Nonfat Yogurt (Plain) OR, ONE Apple, Pear, Banana or Other Fruit

Lunch - Noon

Big salad with lettuce, tomato and other veggies you may like. For dressing, use olive oil (no more than 1 teaspoon) and balsamic vinegar.
1 Envelope of Low-Sodium Tuna
1 4OZ Baked Potato or Sweet Potato

Mid-Afternoon Snack 3PM

Same as before - I usually have a piece of fruit mixed with yogurt. At this time in the afternoon, I also drink another cup of green tea. Green Tea has energy-boosting and body-heating properties. It will help to give you a pep as well as calm hunger pangs. In addition to green tea, seltzer water (sparkling water/club soda) is great to navigate hunger.

Six ounces of chicken, fish or ground turkey (I like to make turkey patties) Large salad as the one eaten for lunch
Steamed Broccoli, Cauliflower and Carrots (most supermarkets have prepackaged vegetable combinations that are ready to steam and eat).
4OZ Baked Potato or Sweet Potato OR 4OZ of Whole Wheat or Whole Grain Pasta OR 4 OZ of Brown Rice

Evening Snack - 8PM

Big salad with 3OZ Chicken, Fish or Ground Turkey - No carbohydrates.
A piece of fruit with Non-fat Yogurt
Cup of Chamomile Tea - Chamomile tea is great to drink at night because it will help soothe hunger as well as calm you and get you ready for bed.

Water Fasting For The Evening

In this cleansing diet, you should not eat anything at least two hours prior to turning in. Sometimes I also take one 500 mg tablet of Tryptophan at night to help me sleep. Tryptophan is an awesome amino acid that helps to stabilize mood.

At this point I'm done eating for the day and drink only water until 8AM the following morning. Again -> NEVER EAT FOR THE LAST TWO HOURS BEFORE YOU GO TO BED. Do you ingest a large portion of your daily calories a few hours before bedtime?

When you eat large portions of food shortly before you go to bed, many of those calories are going to be stored as fat.

Unfortunately, some people eat very few calories all day long, then gulp down a large dinner – and then munch on snacks all evening before they go to bed! Throughout the day they may have ingested 500 to 700 calories, and then 2,000 to 3,000 calories right before they go to bed. Bad idea!

Tape your mouth shut if you have to. But eat no more!

A Proper Cleansing Diet Can Produce The Same Weight Loss and Detox Cleansing Benefits Offered by Total Water or Juice Fasting. And It Does This By allowing The Person to Eat, Although At a Notably Reduced Capacity

The Big Picture

Let's take one more look at what we have outlined:

Sugar is out. Salt is out. Flour (enriched or ANY other type) is out, saturated fats are out, eggs are out (Egg Whites Only) bread, ice cream, pastries, cakes, bagels, cold-cuts (even deli), milk, alcohol, sodas, coffee/caffeine... they're all out.

Red meat is out and so are any other fatty meats as sausages, ground beef and hot dogs.

All bread is out, except for a single whole wheat piece here and there. No butter, no mayo, no mustard, no olive oil, no salad dressing (except for olive oil & balsamic vinegar). Fruit juices can be drunk is small quantities, and they have to be watered-down 50/50.

I am not saying that this is the ONLY WAY that a cleansing diet can be done, but I am absolutely certain that if you follow thes path, you are going to attain remarkable (and measurable results), just like I have time and again over the past 15 years.

Cleansing Diet Side Effects

Many who embark in a cleansing diet are obese and, in reality, food addicts. I certainly was. And when you remove the 'goods' (the drug of choice) and the hours start to go by, the chills, nausea, mood swings, hallucinations (very rare), fever, vomitting, diarrhea and migraines emerge, symptoms very similar to those experienced by a person detoxing from drugs.

Detox symptoms while on a cleansing diet can persist for as long as 30 days. The good news is that their intensity will begin to wane after roughly 14 days, and rarely if ever does a person experience all of the ones that I've listed. Hunger is, by far, the most prevalent. The others will come and go, but will usually be at their peak in during the first two weeks.

What you have to keep in mind is that, even though you are feeling like crap, you are actually getting better. You must reframe your thinking and constantly remind yourself that the discomfort and hunger you are going through is going to help you detoxify, heal, lose weight and rejuvenate. That is the winning state of mind.

It may not feel like much at first; you may have a lot of weight to lose. That is fine. Because at this moment, you are taking suggestions and learning to do things differently, for the benefit of your health, and for the benefit of all the people that love you and count on you in their lives.

The most important ingredient is willingness and relentlesness. You have to put on blinders like a horse. Look at absolutely nothing but the goal that you have before you; remind yourself of the reasons why it is important for you to reach it. Put it in writing and look at it constantly.

Life Impact

You will realize that what matters above all things is the newfound sense of peace, joy and wellness that you will feel. Doing this cleansing diet for 14 to 30 days can truly transform your health. Moreover, it will give you tremendous insight about who you are and what the weaknesses are that try to keep you from reaching your highest potential.