Juice Diet

There isn't anything magical about juice. You lose weight by eating less than your body needs to maintain its current weight. If adding juice to your overall meal plan helps you achieve your calorie deficiency then by all means, drink up, and enjoy. On the other hand, looking to a juice diet as a replacement for science isn't a good idea and a waste of money.

Mudler wrote: »

Not permanently I should add, but short term, to balance your diet again

You don't balance your diet with juice. You balance it by eating real food. Weight loss does not need a jump start. You just eat less calories and move more often. Period. Like someone else said, juice isn't magic and no, it doesn't replace food - short term or long term.

I have done a juice fast and also the Master Cleanse. The juice fast was ok. I did it for 3 days. It's messy and takes a lot of food to make a small amount of juice. The juice tastes ok.

The Master Cleanse was amazing. I highly recommend it to anyone solely for the experience. You are allowed all the lemonade you want. The lemonade is made mixing fresh squeezed organic lemons, honey and cayenne (as much of each as you want/can tolerate for the cayenne) into water. You also take a colon cleanser... you poop a lot. The first day is easy. By the end of the second day I was crabby and got a headache. By the end of the third day the amazing experience kicked in. I could think more clearly than I ever have. My vision was better, I could hear better, my sense of smell was amazing. I think this would be the case with any fast, but this is the only one I've tried. By the 5th day I did need to eat. I wanted to last 7 days, but by the 5th day I was dizzy and weak. This is not something to try when you have obligations or need to maintain a physical lifestyle. I lost 10 pounds. Another benefit was that my stomach shrunk. I was full after less than half of what I normally would eat. This lasted for days.

Good luck to you!

Mudler wrote: »

Yeah but they (not necessarily me) would argue that science tells us that eating the correct nutrients will replace the so called 'food' you buy in the supermarket

People could argue science as much as they wish but at the end of the day, your body needs a certain amount of nutrients which you could get without the expense of any special juice diet.

Mudler wrote: »

Not permanently I should add, but short term, to balance your diet again

What is it about a diet that needs or should be balanced? The reason I asked is because I don't want to see you or anyone else getting caught up in marketing terms which yields little to no value. If you are following MFP, the system recommends a balanced breakdown of your calories. The "Custom" feature allows you to change the nutrients percentage if a better balance is needed. I don't see any juice diet doing anymore for you than you can do for yourself.

jennyredfern wrote: »

I have done a juice fast and also the Master Cleanse. The juice fast was ok. I did it for 3 days. It's messy and takes a lot of food to make a small amount of juice. The juice tastes ok.

The Master Cleanse was amazing. I highly recommend it to anyone solely for the experience. You are allowed all the lemonade you want. The lemonade is made mixing fresh squeezed organic lemons, honey and cayenne (as much of each as you want/can tolerate for the cayenne) into water. You also take a colon cleanser... you poop a lot. The first day is easy. By the end of the second day I was crabby and got a headache. By the end of the third day the amazing experience kicked in. I could think more clearly than I ever have. My vision was better, I could hear better, my sense of smell was amazing. I think this would be the case with any fast, but this is the only one I've tried. By the 5th day I did need to eat. I wanted to last 7 days, but by the 5th day I was dizzy and weak. This is not something to try when you have obligations or need to maintain a physical lifestyle. I lost 10 pounds. Another benefit was that my stomach shrunk. I was full after less than half of what I normally would eat. This lasted for days.

Good luck to you!

What made you use honey over Maple Syrup? Most books and articles I've read have strongly advised against the use of honey in the Master Cleanse and only using pure maple syrup. I've been thinking about doing it, but I just can't see it working for me with my schedule.

Or - I know this is wild and crazy - you could try eating real food at a calorie deficit (if you want to lose weight) and eat foods rich in macro/micro-nutrients. It doesn't have that magical "silver bullet" appeal that a juice diet does, but everything that works doesn't have to be radical and ruin your underpants.

Mudler wrote: »

I'm 52, I love crisps (potato chips) I love Coke, i love crappy fast food. I've been poisoning myself with all this rubbish for decades. The results of which brought me to MFP in the first place and I'm willing to bet a lot of other people as well.

So, my body is full of salt, sugar and probably far more poisons than i know of. So, a diet, any diet that re balances surely would be a good thing?

Longer term, a balanced eating diet without all that other stuff would be desired but for short term to re balance surely it wouldn't be a bad thing?

You can eat a healthy diet. That will help!

Your body isn't full of poisons it doesn't need. It gets rid of anything it can't use or doesn't want. If it cannot get rid of these things, you will eventually require a doctor. Juice won't help.

If you want to do a juice fast, just do it. You don't need anyone's permission.

jennyredfern wrote: »

I have done a juice fast and also the Master Cleanse. The juice fast was ok. I did it for 3 days. It's messy and takes a lot of food to make a small amount of juice. The juice tastes ok.

The Master Cleanse was amazing. I highly recommend it to anyone solely for the experience. You are allowed all the lemonade you want. The lemonade is made mixing fresh squeezed organic lemons, honey and cayenne (as much of each as you want/can tolerate for the cayenne) into water. You also take a colon cleanser... you poop a lot. The first day is easy. By the end of the second day I was crabby and got a headache. By the end of the third day the amazing experience kicked in. I could think more clearly than I ever have. My vision was better, I could hear better, my sense of smell was amazing. I think this would be the case with any fast, but this is the only one I've tried. By the 5th day I did need to eat. I wanted to last 7 days, but by the 5th day I was dizzy and weak. This is not something to try when you have obligations or need to maintain a physical lifestyle. I lost 10 pounds. Another benefit was that my stomach shrunk. I was full after less than half of what I normally would eat. This lasted for days.

Good luck to you!

This sounds awful

Juicing was the ONLY thing that helped me lose weight (almost 20lbs and massive amount of inches loss and bodyfat decrease in 2.5-3 months--then the scale loss stalled). I juiced (predominately organically grown veggie juices and NEVER fruit juices--I would organic eat fruit instead) exclusively for two meals and had one nice sized "real" meal per day and two healthy snacks. I stopped eating out, with the exception of Thai Food, every other week or so. I stopped eating red meats and pork, stopped eating "processed foods" as much as earthly possible, stopped drinking coffee, only drank water (besides my juices), stopped eating dairy (I would use non-soy vegan sources for my dairy and meats/protein and I would also eat wild caught tuna and fish and an ocassionally. I'd eat organic local farm raised eggs. What happened to me during this 2.5-3 month period? I had energy like crazy, my blurry eye-sight got so much better, I stopped wearing my glasses, my hair, nails and skin were radiant, I slept so much better and even my shoe size when down a whole size, I dropped 4 pants sizes in this time too and started exercising like crazy and hurt my foot and then my knee. Since being injured I stopped exercising and began to eat like I used to (eating out more than cooking at home, eating junky foods, restarted drinking coffee with lots of cream, and basically went back to eating the way I was before I started "juicing" and within 6 months--I regained the weight I loss PLUS 10lbs and have been struggling ever since to lose this weight!

Conclusion (this is from someone who has real experience with it), my juicing two meals per day and eating one meal and two healthy usually fruit, nuts and good really healthy snacks--eating exclusively organically grown stuff ). It works--but it was SUPER expensive and time consuming and messy and got to be chore like (mundane) and a hassle making and cleaning up the mess. It's not sustainable, which is way I haven't gone back to doing this...it became a dread for me. If you are willing to do this forever, it will work...if not, if you go back to your previous lifestyle of the S.A.D. (standard American Diet)...you'll regain all of your loss and a bit more.

I haven't juiced, but I did a 10-day green smoothie cleanse to jump start healthy eating again after I fell off of the bandwagon. I did it precisely because, despite eating pretty well otherwise, I was snacking too much on chips, pretzels and candy. It sucks for a few days (detox isn't comfortable), but there was a noticeable difference in digestion, skin, and my ability to get up in the morning - within a week.

From what I've read, juicing isn't great compared to doing smoothies because when you juice, you are stripping all of the fiber away, meaning that instead of digesting slowly, the juice (and sugar) is going to hit your bloodstream right away. Fiber also helps to keep you feeling fuller longer. Some people swear by it, but personally I feel like green smoothies get me through the day better than juice, which I really don't drink it at all anymore, anyway.

The biggest problem is that it's not something long term, and weight you do lose is likely to come back once you're eating properly (at a caloric deficit). I've spent the last 2.5 months mostly focusing on my food intake, weighing and measuring everything, and I've lost 20 pounds. I didn't need to "jump start" anything. I'm still eating things I like too. If I couldn't have chocolate, beer, or my homemade skyline chili I would hurt someone. I just don't gorge myself on any of it anymore.

I am definitely not an advocate of juicing cleanses. They "work" for some people. Though I have yet to find someone who got results from juicing that couldn't be obtained by not juicing. I believe in eating a healthy balanced diet over a long period of time to lose weight and feel healthy. Your body will get rid of toxins on its own, you don't need to shock it by depriving it of nutrients. I feel whatever "diet" you are doing you should be able to continue doing for the rest of your healthy/happy life. But those are my own personal opinions.

**I have nothing against juicing itself if it is incorporated into a healthy balanced diet. I don't agree with using juicing as a cleanse, etc.