Green Juice Fast
My husband is on a 15-day juice fast. Last week we watched the first half of “Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead.” It’s a documentary about a man who juice-fasted his way across the U.S.A. to save his own life, interviewing people about their diets as he went.
It affected my husband so much that he is feeding green juice to our kids (who are very excited about this) and to me (not so excited).
I am trying to do the juice fast with him.
So far, this is not fun. I am as up and down as a roller coaster. I woke up yesterday morning feeling more energetic than I have in a long time. Then I was shivering with cold all day, and I randomly burst into tears in the evening. I think my husband’s enthusiasm for the juice wavered slightly at that point.
I can’t remember where I heard this, but the first few days are supposed to be the hardest, while the body detoxifies. That thought is what is making me stick with it a few days longer.
In case anyone thinks this might be noble, you know, fasting and all… if you put a doughnut in front of me right now, I would eat it, no apologies.
(…please??!)
Is your juicer a special one for doing greens? We have a juicer, but it doesn’t do greens very well at all.
It’s a Breville. I don’t think it’s specifically for greens, but it does greens well. The juice actually isn’t that bad, but I just can’t stick to eating ONLY that. I ate some chicken with the kids for lunch today.
Our neighbors watched that same movie a few weeks ago and were drinking the same green juice. Have you watched fork to knife or something like that, on Netflix? That was another they just recently watched. We haven’t watched them yet, Tim is afraid he might never want to eat again.
Michael has heard of Fork Over Knife, but he hasn’t seen it yet. He has a friend who is getting him into all of this. The friend is going mostly vegetarian, thanks to the fork/knife movie. Actually, they’re coming over for dinner soon, and I need to figure out what to feed them!
Thanks for the post, Debbie – I really got a kick out of it :-))) I just watched a short video clip about making juice with greens, beets, etc – do you have any good recipes you want to share? that don’t include berries since they don’t sell them in Egypt? :o)))
I will see if M can share his favorites soon! He has been making them up as he goes.
Hi Debbie,
Your body certainly is detoxifying and it could last for more than a few days. It’ll be rough, but the benefits are great and your body will thank you. It’s tough and it’s not fun! I haven’t done the green juice fast, but I did the lemonade fast for 5 days…totally know what you mean about putting food in front of you… 🙂 I think after day 2 or 3 I was getting the hang of it, but by day 5 I was ready to be done. Josh has done it a few times for the 10 days you’re supposed to. He reaped huge benefits from it.
As far as going vegetarian, there are a lot of different views out there and everyone is very opinionated about it. I would caution you on that, especially with the kids. We all need those good proteins to build/heal our bodies. I would recommend reading Nourishing Traditions, The Maker’s Diet and the GAPS diet. You can go check it out here: http://www.westonaprice.org/ and http://www.makers-diet.net/ and http://www.gutandpsychologysyndrome.com/gaps-diet/
Happy Detoxing! 🙂
Thanks, April! Michael has mentioned some of these, and I’ll pass along the others. There’s not much chance of him ever going vegetarian – no worries about that.
I love this post Debbie. I am actually in the process of deciding how much meat I will eat. Looking forward to conversations about this today. And we can’t wait to see your farm.
Here is is some of my favorite juice recipes.
2-3 big carrots
2 apples
1 beet – greens and all
pear
apple
2 carrots
The green one
cucumber
celery
apples
carrots
swiss chard
Also Debbie, don’t feel guilty about being into this. Angie hasn’t even started a fast. She doesn’t share my enthusiasm. She has watched both documentaries with me but won’t fully engage my being extreme.
We are committed to buying more local food and eating healthier but we have different takes on what this means.
So don’t worry, Angie and the kids are fully eating meat right now. Although she does love my green smoothies.