You think I'm crazy don't you? Well I'm not, and I'm not going to do some drastic fad diet and starve myself, then binge eat my one meal a day. I'm going to begin juicing. Again, I swear I haven't gone off the deep end.
I've been doing a lot of research about food. If you haven't picked up by now that I like to be informed about things, then I don't know what blog you've been reading! lol. We tend to look at food as just a necessity to life, and I admit that is how I've looked at it for a long time too. The fact is that yes, food is necessary, but what food we consume is a choice. We can choose to consume a McDonald's Double Cheeseburger, or we can choose to consume a Chicken Salad with Raspberry Vinaigrette. We have options, we just don't always take advantage of. For me taking advantage of my options has been a big part in my healthier life style, but I think there was room to improve.
I've been watching a lot of documentaries about food, and what we eat. Some have been a bit more...um...earthy than I would choose to be, but I've learned things from all of them. For instance I would say that about 90% of the fresh fruit and produce that I eat now is USDA Organic. I'd also say that of everything else that I purchase, meat, processed food, etc. about 45% is also USDA Organic. I also have begun purchasing more "All-Natural" items, not even just for me, but I've even got my cat using natural litter now, and eating "Natural" cat food! I've even become an independent sales represenative for Wildtree, a company that makes simple, healthy, and natural, blends, spices, and culinary blends. (Visit my Wildtree Website to learn more!) Why the change? Well several of the documentaries I watched pointed out that we are using pesticides, and growth hormones in our foods. Things that are intended to kill other living creatures, and make our food larger and better looking. These chemicals contain ingredients that we wouldn't eat normally, but we are putting them in our foods and then eating them anyways. To me it began to make sense, why do I want to eat chemicals that we don't know the effects they will have on us in the long run.
One documentary I saw called Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead really stands out to me though. You can now watch this documentary for free on Netflix, and YouTube. In this documentary Joe Cross decides to go on a 60 day juice cleanse because he is overweight, fighting medical conditions, and unhealthy. Not only did he have amazing results, but an individual he met on his journey also began a 60 day juice cleanse and had similar results. Health problems were solved, weight was lost, energy was gained, and live was given back to these individuals. It really is rather amazing to see. So this got me thinking, why juicing? Could you have just eaten the vegetables that you juiced and had the same result? Yes, it is true, but how many of us really are able to sit down and eat 2 apples, 1 whole cucumber, 4 celery stalks, 6-8 leaves of kale, half a lemon, and some ginger. Juicing gives you the best of both worlds, you get the nutrients and vitamins from fruits and vegetables, but not all the filling fiber. No one eats as many fruits and vegetables as we should be during the day, and this is a great way to help us get what we need. I found a video of Joe Cross speaking about the health benefits of juicing in case you want to hear more about it, but don't want to spend all the time watching the documentary.
So I've decided to not do a full juice cleanse, but a partial one. Breakfast, lunch, and two snacks are going to be juice, dinner will be a regular meal. The reason I'm choosing to still have one solid meal is because I don't want to seclude myself from friends, and social events. I fear that if I did juicing all the time, I would be secluding myself from chances to go out with friends and spending time with them. I'm going to begin this cleanse tomorrow, August 1, and go to the end of the month...or as long as I can stand it. I've gotten the ok from medical professionals to do this so no worries there!
Why am I doing this? Well simply put, although I'm healthier than I have been, I still think I can be doing more. I eat a lot of fresh produce, but I know I'm still not eating enough. I know I'm healthier, but I'm still not ideally healthy, and I know that I still need to lose quite a bit of weight too. So I figured why not, this isn't a fad diet, this isn't taking a pill or anything, this is changing the way you eat and it's what I've done since the beginning of this whole thing.
So tomorrow I say goodbye to many solid food, and embrace juicing my food for a while. I'll keep you posted on progress, and life in general as always. =)
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