Off Topic · OT:Fasting & detoxification (page 6)

Posted by BlueSeats:




Unfortunately I don't have access to those studies, but I'll be sure to give them all the attention that you gave to the citations I presented that challenge the Lipid Hypothesis. But which ones are better than the egg vs bagel, or McMuffin and soda vs Frosted Flakes and orange juice study?


Code, in all seriousness though, thanks for the dialog - you've been a good sport and it's been fun. But it makes no sense for me to go mano a mano with you. I'll just stick to presenting information I find interesting for other's consideration.

However, on the matter of access, if you could pull these studies for me and present them I'd love to take a peek. I'd be most appreciative. Google just won't do.

Contrary to conventional medical wisdom, the Framingham study did not find that a high-fat diet doomed people to a heart attack. A subgroup of Framingham participants was assessed for their intake of saturated fats, dietary cholesterol and overall calories. None had any effect on the development of heart disease.

The idea that a low-fat diet prevents heart disease lives on, despite a 2001 review of all relevant clinical trials. The combined results showed that reducing or modifying dietary fat intake had no effect on heart disease mortality or total mortality .

Hooper et al. British Medical Journal, 3/31/01
-----------------------


The Framingham Heart Study is often cited as proof of the lipid hypothesis. This study began in 1948 and involved some 6,000 people from the town of Framingham, Massachusetts. Two groups were compared at five-year intervals-those who consumed little cholesterol and saturated fat and those who consumed large amounts. After 40 years, the director of this study had to admit:

"In Framingham, Mass, the more saturated fat one ate, the more cholesterol one ate, the more calories one ate, the lower the person's serum cholesterol. . .

We found that the people who ate the most cholesterol, ate the most saturated fat, ate the most calories, weighed the least and were the most physically active."3

Castelli, William, Arch Int Med, Jul 1992, 152:7:1371-1372

The study did show that those who weighed more and had abnormally high blood cholesterol levels were slightly more at risk for future heart disease; but weight gain and cholesterol levels had an inverse correlation with fat and cholesterol intake in the diet.4

Hubert H, et al, Circulation, 1983, 67:968; Smith, R and E R Pinckney, Diet, Blood Cholesterol and Coronary Heart Disease: A Critical Review of the Literature, Vol 2, 1991, Vector Enterprises, Sherman Oaks, CA

Listen, Blue, I could dissect (and part of me wants to) all the flaws in the articles/editorials you've presented and splay them in tatters like the dissected artery of an aneurysm; in fact, as you will admit, I have done so for a number of them, including the infamous bagel/muffin/luckycharm piece. For the handful that were legitimate, you have to weigh them against the legion of similar studies which show the exact opposite. Remember that with measurement comes error and, with a p value of .05, 5 out of a 100 of the exact same study will fail to show a relationship that really does exist -- in this case, the causal relationship betwen saturated fat and increased serum LDL cholesterol. Its entirely possible that a subgroup analysis of one Framingham population revealed unexpected serum chemistries; thats why these studies are repeated so many times - to tease out the true relationship and eliminate outliers. Just think that, for your relatively small medley of excerpts, I shot you a list > 100 articles strong, in a matter of minutes. That list could have been much, much larger. Reproducibility is never a perfect endeavor and one has to recognize overwhelming evidence when one sees it - if only to act at an appropriate threshold to treat.

But leave apart the math. I could move heaven and earth, and we both know it wouldn't do much to sway you - if its not the articles, its the obscure epidemiology, if its not that it'll be some other random reference. You're as stubborn as I am and while, in most cases, I'd applaud you for that, I'm sorry that I can't really put a silver lining on this one. A signifant part of my life is devoted to this cause and the humor of the frosted flake/pop tart/plantain debate is lost, to me, in the sadness that many will die because of either a lack of awareness or a complacent denial of the proven dangers in their diet. So I'll leave it at that. I fully expect that you will continue to post good information and that you will have the integrity to post good information contradictory to your core beliefs when you find it.

Regarding access to those studies, they are the intellectual property of the respective journals so I'm restricted in what I can put up here. You should be able to get your hands on most of them at a medical library, however.

While I hate to have to abruptly leave our riveting back-and-forth, I think we've both said our piece without censor at this point and, honestly, I'm starting to lose interest as well. Regardless, if only to keep my kids from breaking whats left of our house, I have to work up the resolve to stop posting here. As always, its been a pleasure.

Is anyone else still interested in this topic of benefits, or lack thereof, of the FDA and AMA recommendations of a high-carbohydrate low-fat diet? Generally I'd think not, but since this thread began with fasters, I suspect their may be a group who are willing to think outside the box for their health.

Here is the NY Times Magazine article "What If It's All Been A Big Fat Lie" by Gary Taubes, the author of "Good Calorie, Bad Calorie". It's too long to post in it's entirety, but here is an excerpt. One thing taubes is good at is helping us understand that while "low fat" of course sounds great, what it's also saying is "high carbohydrate", and carbs are sugars and starches that the body readily converts to sugar. So it shouldn't be surprising that such a diet might be suspect in relationship to diabetes, obesity and heart disease.

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.ht...

It was Ancel Keys, paradoxically, who introduced the low-fat-is-good-health dogma in the 50's with his theory that dietary fat raises cholesterol levels and gives you heart disease. Over the next two decades, however, the scientific evidence supporting this theory remained stubbornly ambiguous. The case was eventually settled not by new science but by politics. It began in January 1977, when a Senate committee led by George McGovern published its ''Dietary Goals for the United States,'' advising that Americans significantly curb their fat intake to abate an epidemic of ''killer diseases'' supposedly sweeping the country. It peaked in late 1984, when the National Institutes of Health officially recommended that all Americans over the age of 2 eat less fat. By that time, fat had become ''this greasy killer'' in the memorable words of the Center for Science in the Public Interest, and the model American breakfast of eggs and bacon was well on its way to becoming a bowl of Special K with low-fat milk, a glass of orange juice and toast, hold the butter -- a dubious feast of refined carbohydrates.

In the intervening years, the N.I.H. spent several hundred million dollars trying to demonstrate a connection between eating fat and getting heart disease and, despite what we might think, it failed. Five major studies revealed no such link. A sixth, however, costing well over $100 million alone, concluded that reducing cholesterol by drug therapy could prevent heart disease. The N.I.H. administrators then made a leap of faith. Basil Rifkind, who oversaw the relevant trials for the N.I.H., described their logic this way: they had failed to demonstrate at great expense that eating less fat had any health benefits. But if a cholesterol-lowering drug could prevent heart attacks, then a low-fat, cholesterol-lowering diet should do the same. ''It's an imperfect world,'' Rifkind told me. ''The data that would be definitive is ungettable, so you do your best with what is available.''

Some of the best scientists disagreed with this low-fat logic, suggesting that good science was incompatible with such leaps of faith, but they were effectively ignored. Pete Ahrens, whose Rockefeller University laboratory had done the seminal research on cholesterol metabolism, testified to McGovern's committee that everyone responds differently to low-fat diets. It was not a scientific matter who might benefit and who might be harmed, he said, but ''a betting matter.'' Phil Handler, then president of the National Academy of Sciences, testified in Congress to the same effect in 1980. ''What right,'' Handler asked, ''has the federal government to propose that the American people conduct a vast nutritional experiment, with themselves as subjects, on the strength of so very little evidence that it will do them any good?''

Nonetheless, once the N.I.H. signed off on the low-fat doctrine, societal forces took over. The food industry quickly began producing thousands of reduced-fat food products to meet the new recommendations. Fat was removed from foods like cookies, chips and yogurt. The problem was, it had to be replaced with something as tasty and pleasurable to the palate, which meant some form of sugar, often high-fructose corn syrup. Meanwhile, an entire industry emerged to create fat substitutes, of which Procter & Gamble's olestra was first. And because these reduced-fat meats, cheeses, snacks and cookies had to compete with a few hundred thousand other food products marketed in America, the industry dedicated considerable advertising effort to reinforcing the less-fat-is-good-health message. Helping the cause was what Walter Willett calls the ''huge forces'' of dietitians, health organizations, consumer groups, health reporters and even cookbook writers, all well-intended missionaries of healthful eating.

Few experts now deny that the low-fat message is radically oversimplified. If nothing else, it effectively ignores the fact that unsaturated fats, like olive oil, are relatively good for you: they tend to elevate your good cholesterol, high-density lipoprotein (H.D.L.), and lower your bad cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein (L.D.L.), at least in comparison to the effect of carbohydrates. While higher L.D.L. raises your heart-disease risk, higher H.D.L. reduces it.

What this means is that even saturated fats -- a k a, the bad fats -- are not nearly as deleterious as you would think. True, they will elevate your bad cholesterol, but they will also elevate your good cholesterol. In other words, it's a virtual wash. As Willett explained to me, you will gain little to no health benefit by giving up milk, butter and cheese and eating bagels instead.

But it gets even weirder than that. Foods considered more or less deadly under the low-fat dogma turn out to be comparatively benign if you actually look at their fat content. More than two-thirds of the fat in a porterhouse steak, for instance, will definitively improve your cholesterol profile (at least in comparison with the baked potato next to it); it's true that the remainder will raise your L.D.L., the bad stuff, but it will also boost your H.D.L. The same is true for lard. If you work out the numbers, you come to the surreal conclusion that you can eat lard straight from the can and conceivably reduce your risk of heart disease.

-----
Here is a taubes video lecture. He includes photos and reveals his thought process in researching the topic. probably raises more questions than it answers, but it'll make you wonder.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=...

Posted by codeunknown:


But leave apart the math. I could move heaven and earth, and we both know it wouldn't do much to sway you - if its not the articles, its the obscure epidemiology, if its not that it'll be some other random reference. You're as stubborn as I am and while, in most cases, I'd applaud you for that, I'm sorry that I can't really put a silver lining on this one. A signifant part of my life is devoted to this cause and the humor of the frosted flake/pop tart/plantain debate is lost, to me, in the sadness that many will die because of either a lack of awareness or a complacent denial of the proven dangers in their diet. So I'll leave it at that. I fully expect that you will continue to post good information and that you will have the integrity to post good information contradictory to your core beliefs when you find it.

Code, just to finish up. If the hypothetical was that we had a person who exercised, didn't smoke, had a good mental outlook, and they were eating whole, organic foods, not a lot of carbs, not a lot of hydrogenated and/or refined oils, and the one quibble between us was some small difference in the amount of saturated fat consumed, it wouldn't be worth fighting over either way, because the body would be in balance and it could process and utilize things appropriately.

But when those things are out of whack, then we have a disater looming and we start looking for straws that may break the camel's back. For you that straw may be saturated fats, and in that context I wont try to take that away from you. The person is overloaded and somethings got to give.

But I think the far greater problem is the overconsumption of over-processed, refined foods that make for a volatile situation in the first place. The saturated fats aren't the big problem - if I'm not mistaken consumption is down - but obesity, diabetes, CVD, is up. I just don't get why suddenly the products that worked for millennia are suspect, but all the refined carbs and oils, *the consumption of which closely track the obesity epidemic,* are not.

So, from the high-carb/low-fat contingent we seem to be faced with a logic that goes like this. Fat consumption goes DOWN while obesity, diabetes, and CHD go UP. Carbs go UP while obesity, diabetes, and CHD go UP. Must be the fat.

What???

Yeah, that doesn't work for me, and I think the data will catch up in time as low carb diets are proving themselves anecdotally. But, regardless of the protocol prescribed, so long as people eat nutritionally vapid food in quantities greater than they can burn it ain't gonna work, be it low fat, high fat or no fat.

While I hate to have to abruptly leave our riveting back-and-forth, I think we've both said our piece without censor at this point and, honestly, I'm starting to lose interest as well. Regardless, if only to keep my kids from breaking whats left of our house, I have to work up the resolve to stop posting here. As always, its been a pleasure.

It's all good, man. Alway a pleasure for sure.



[Edited by - blueseats on 08-11-2008 11:09 PM]

If you're going to talk about health and life expectancy, might as well talk about Asian diets and lifestyle, starting with the Japaneses. They have the longest expectancy (or one of the longest ones), and their diet consist mostly of rice, vegetables, and fish. Their longetivity is also attributed to their more active lifestyle compared to Americans. I don't have the passion like you or Codeunknown to look for more articles. You guys made this thread interesting, insightful, and entertaining. Your efforts are appreciated by me.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17406997/

TOKYO - Life expectancy for Japanese women — already the longest in the world — has risen by nearly one year, the Health Ministry said Thursday, citing the latest census data.

Female life expectancy increased to 85.52 years in 2005 from 84.60 years in 2000, Health Ministry official Morio Akimoto said.

The latest figures were calculated based on the fixed census data taken in 2005. The census is taken every five years in Japan.

Akimoto said Japanese women’s life expectancy remained the world’s longest for the 21st straight year, ahead of Hong Kong and Spain, according to U.N. demographic figures.

For men, life expectancy rose to 78.56 years from 77.72 years, the fourth-longest in the world after Hong Kong, Iceland, Switzerland, Akimoto said.

Japan has long been touted as one of the world's longest-living populations, but experts are worried that changing eating patterns -- from the traditional fish and rice-based diet to fast food such as hamburgers and instant noodles -- may soon change this.

I'm not ure I understand the point of juice fasting. It's not really fasting, although it is about practicing restraint. Why not just eat fresh fruit, nuts, drink water, and add things like fresh fish and free range eggs from time to time? Doesn't that achieve the same thing as juice fasting, while promoting a healthy, constant lifestyle?

I'm actually thinking about giving a vision quest a shot (because I'm a raving nutjob) but never done it before, so this fasting business I find interesting. But I don't get the logic of a juice fast... and if I can see it, I might give that a shot instead of doing something as ridiculous as I'm planning.

BTW, I'm in Banda Aceh, Indonesia amidst a strict Muslim population, so it's interesting to read about fasting now.

Posted by SupremeCommander:

I'm not ure I understand the point of juice fasting. It's not really fasting, although it is about practicing restraint. Why not just eat fresh fruit, nuts, drink water, and add things like fresh fish and free range eggs from time to time? Doesn't that achieve the same thing as juice fasting, while promoting a healthy, constant lifestyle?

That's certainly a good way to live.

The idea behind a fast is that digesting food takes a lot of energy and attention from your body that, if put on hold for a period of time, could be put to detoxifying and healing the body. Ideally fasting would go hand in hand with time off from work, maybe a massage and steam, time in nature, and some contemplation and meditation. You know, reduced stress, increased rest, allowing the body to catch up on restorative chores it doesn't otherwise get time for. Juicing doesn't interfere with that process, and the surge in nutrients (one typically consumes a greater number of raw fruits and veggies when they juice than they otherwise eat) can aid the healing process without adding to the digestion effort. It can also help with blood sugar and energy levels during the fast as well, though I'm sure an argument could be made to the opposite effect.

In short, it's just an option that allows some of us to undertake a task we might otherwise not have the courage for. It's splitting the difference between giving the body a rest and keeping it energized and nourished. It takes a harder core will to water fast than juice fat but I'm sure the benefits are just as good.

But after the fast, your diet sounds right on, though I'd do more veggies than fruit. I'd also add in monounsaturated oils like extra virgin olive oil or macadamai nut oil, or butter for cooking, and no polyunsaturated oils like those made from soy, corn, canola etc. They're overly refined and too high in omega-6 fatty acids, which we already get a disproportionate amount of.

The best things I've done for my diet has been to drop sweet drinks, including juice, soda, alcohol, frappachinos, etc, and to avoid grains. I just totally dumped bread, corn, crackers, cereal, corn chips, rice, etc. My appetite is down, my energy crashes less, and some weight is dropping.

The next frontier for me is dairy. I'm experimenting there. I still like milk in my coffee and various cheeses. I'd feel at better about it if the stuff was organic and raw, but a lot of toxins are stored in the fat, and pasteurization kills a lot of enzymes and nutrients, homogenization alters the fat molecules in ways I don't trust, and growth hormones lead to udder infections that beget puss in the milk, etc. So all told I don't think the industrialized version of milk/cheese that is generally available to us is a healthy product, but I haven't kicked the addiction yet.

But that's why one fasts, to take a pause and get some of that crap out of the body every once in a while.

In my discussion with Code my overriding premise has been that the so called "dangers" of saturated fats is secondary to the dangers of refined carbs and polyunsaturated oils, and that as more meaningful studies are produced the data will catch up.

Here's a study that came out today regarding post menopausal women:

Link downloads a PDF

http://www.ajcn.org/cgi/reprint/80/5/117...

"Carbohydrate intake was positively associated with atheroscle-
rotic progression when replacing saturated fat and monounsaturated
fat but not when replacing total fat, polyunsaturated fat, or protein.
The association was perhaps stronger among women with lower
physical activity, who would be more susceptible to adverse effects
of carbohydrates—particularly refined carbohydrate— on HDL
cholesterol, triacylglycerols, glucose metabolism, insulin sensitiv-
ity, and weight gain (4 –7). Consistent with such biologic mecha-
nisms, the relation between carbohydrate intake and atherosclerotic
progression appeared to be stronger in women with a higher glyce-
mic index. "

.....

"Although CHD is the leading cause of death among both men
and women, prior studies have historically focused on relations
between risk factors and CHD in men. Our findings are not
consistent with the hypothesis— based largely on observations in
men—that saturated fat intake increases atherosclerotic progres-
sion in postmenopausal women but instead suggest that saturated
fat intake may reduce such progression, especially when mono-
unsaturated fat intake is low or carbohydrate intake is high"


-------

Isn't it amazing that our population, which is high in obesity, diabetes and heart disease, are fed the same high grain diet industry uses to make chicken, beef and pork so fat so fast for consumption? Meat producers want their animals to become obese young so as to keep upkeep low - it also keeps the flesh soft and pudgy for human consumption. The simplest way to do this is to feed them grains, even though historically, like humans, these animals had little interest in them. Similarly, the USDA tells us to eat 6-11 servings of grains a day. You'd think the goal was to get us fat fast too.

And just so people know, when we speak of polyunsaturated oils, those are the general cooking oils you see in the supermarket: corn, soy, canola, vegetable, etc. They're also what's used in margarine, mayo, salad dressing, dips and virtually all packaged foods. They are highly processed and treated with carcinogens,like benzene.

The best oils to use are cold pressed and extra virgin, particularly from olive, macadamia, and avocado. These are high in monounsaturated oil.

[Edited by - blueseats on 08-15-2008 12:07 AM]

All carbs are not equal. Foods containing simple carbs - like sugar, potatoes and white flour raise the glycemic level and stores fat more than foods containing complex carbs - like whole grains and beans.

When carbs are restricted and they speak of "unlimited energy" you can assume the energy is coming from fats. So this was a study of a reduced carbs and unlimited fat diet. And, of course, unlimited protein includes meats.


Unlimited Energy, Restricted Carbohydrate Diet Improves Lipid Parameters in Obese Children

BRIAN S. DUNLAP, M.D. AND JAMES R. BAILES, Jr., M.D.


RESULTS:

Twenty-seven patients were enrolled in our study. After nine patients dropped out for various reasons (4 for poor compliance, 1 felt the diet was too expensive, 1 felt the diet was unhealthy, and 3 were lost to follow-up), ten males and eight females returned at our 10 week follow-up and formed our study group. The mean age of patients was 9.3 years (nificance. Both total cholesterol and triglycerides did show a significant change, as total cholesterol was reduced by 24.2 mg/dL (P0.018) and triglycerides were reduced by 56.9 mg/dL

DISCUSSION:

After a 10-week pilot study of a restricted carbohydrate, unlimited energy diet, our data show a significant improvement in both total cholesterol and triglycerides in an elementary school–aged population. There have been several studies in the adult literature that have evaluated the effect of a restricted-carbohydrate diet on lipid profiles.17,19–27Samaha et al. reported improvements in triglycerides and insulin sensitivity when comparing a low-carbohydrate diet to a calorie-restricted, low-fat diet in a population of overweight veterans.20 Yancy et al. also compared a low-carbohydrate diet to a standard low-fat, calorie restricted, low-cholesterol diet in healthy overweight hyperlipidemic individuals. They found better compliance, greater weight loss, and beneficial serum lipid effects, as triglycerides decreased by 42%, HDL cholesterol increased by 13%, and no significant change was noted in total cholesterol or LDL cholesterol between the 2 diets (2 of 45 patients dropped out because of LDL elevations).21Brehm et al. showed a significant decrease in serum triglyceride levels in a population of obese women that followed a lowcarbohydrate diet compared to a standard energy-restricted low-fat diet.22 Sondike et al. compared a low-carbohydrate diet to a low-fat diet among obese adolescents (mean age of 15) and found a decrease in triglycerides but a mild increase in total cholesterol.17

The long-term effects of dieting were recently addressed by Halton. Nearly 83,000 women were studied after completing a validated food-frequency questionnaire. They found that diets lower in carbohydrates and higher in protein and fat were not associated with an increased risk of coronary heart disease. When diets included vegetable sources of fat and protein, a moderate reduction in the risk of coronary heart disease was shown. After examining the association between coronary heart disease and each macronutrient separately, higher total carbohydrate intake was associated with a moderately increased risk of coronary heart disease.27 Although this is an important study, its relevance here is uncertain, as these women were not specifically on a restricted-carbohydrate diet, and the study looked more at dietary patterns.

In a landmark study by Gardner et al., 4 popular diets that varied greatly in carbohydrate content were compared over a 12-month period. Randomization, large sample size, and long-term effects are among the issues addressed by this study that had not been possible in previous studies. Overweight females assigned to the Atkins diet (significantly carbohydrate-restricted) had more weight loss and more favorable outcomes with respect to metabolic effects at 1 year when compared to women assigned to the Zone (carbohydrate restricted), LEARN (fat restricted, high carbohydrates), or Ornish (no meat, significantly restricted fat, and very high carbohydrate) diets. The authors concluded that their findings have important implications for clinical practice and healthcare policy.28Physicians whose patients initiate a restricted-carbohydrate diet can be reassured that lipid effects are unlikely to be of immediate concern.

Many parents and physicians alike are reluctant to put children on a diet before puberty. Concerns regarding safety and the negative connotations that the term “diet” imply are reasons often stated by parents of young children who are overweight. Our data are consistent with data found in the adult literature, and suggest that a restricted carbohydrate, unlimited protein, unlimited energy diet may decrease cardiovascular risk factors in obese children.



[Edited by - blueseats on 08-16-2008 11:18 PM]

Dr Sylvan Lee Weinberg, a former President of the American College of Cardiology, a former President of the American College of Chest Physicians and the present editor of The American Heart Hospital Journal stated that the low-fat high-carb diet recommendations are no longer tenable.




VIEWPOINT AND COMMENTARY

The Diet-Heart Hypothesis: A Critique

Sylvan Lee Weinberg, MD, MACC

Dayton Heart Hospital, Dayton, Ohio, USA



Abstract

The low-fat "diet heart hypothesis" has been controversial for nearly 100 years. The low-fat, high-carbohydrate diet, promulgated vigorously by the National Cholesterol Education Program, National Institutes of Health, and American Heart Association since the Lipid Research Clinics-Primary Prevention Program in 1984, and earlier by the U.S. Department of Agriculture food pyramid, may well have played an unintended role in the current epidemics of obesity, lipid abnormalities, type II diabetes, and metabolic syndromes. This diet can no longer be defended by appeal to the authority of prestigious medical organizations or by rejecting clinical experience and a growing medical literature suggesting that the much-maligned low-carbohydrate, high-protein diet may have a salutary effect on the epidemics in question.

J Am Coll Cardiol 2004;43:731-3

http://content.onlinejacc.org/cgi/conten...

Posted by BlueSeats:

The idea behind a fast is that digesting food takes a lot of energy and attention from your body that, if put on hold for a period of time, could be put to detoxifying and healing the body.

Word. That's what I didn't understand.

Can you recommend a juicer, a veggie/fruit mixture, and a frequency of fasting for a first timer?

I want to try for 10 days, the logic being if I make it half that I'll be satisfied. I'll have some time to kill before I move and I think fasting may be a good way to kill time, especially because I'm trying to lose the fat below my belly button.

While I don't recommend fasting, I will recommend a juicer. It's the Breville 95xl. It has a wide mouth (about 3 inches) that can handle a small apple, a powerful motor and two speeds. Juicing goes very quickly and clean up is about as easy as juicers get. You can get it new for $150 and factory reconditioned for $85 at amazon. Shipping is both free and fast with amazon prime.

http://www.amazon.com/Breville-JE95XL-Two-Speed-Juice-Fountain/dp/B0001IT0IY/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=home-garden&qid=1218969536&sr=8-1

http://www.amazon.com/Factory-Reconditioned-Breville-XXJE95XL-Speed-Fountain/dp/B000ONN7P8/ref=pd_bbs_sr_6?ie=UTF8&s=home-garden&qid=1218969536&sr=8-6

I just got mine from amazon.com (factory reconditioned)and I'm very happy with it.

Posted by SupremeCommander:

Posted by BlueSeats:

The idea behind a fast is that digesting food takes a lot of energy and attention from your body that, if put on hold for a period of time, could be put to detoxifying and healing the body.

Word. That's what I didn't understand.

Can you recommend a juicer, a veggie/fruit mixture, and a frequency of fasting for a first timer?

I want to try for 10 days, the logic being if I make it half that I'll be satisfied. I'll have some time to kill before I move and I think fasting may be a good way to kill time, especially because I'm trying to lose the fat below my belly button.

Supreme, I bought my juicer like 15 years ago. It's a Panasonic that ConsumerReports had recommended. Cost about $75 and I've been very happy with it. My sister and I recently went shopping for one for her at Target. There was one on sale for $50, don't remember the brand, but it looked every bit as good as mine and she loves it. Point being, don't overly worry about the juicer. If Ira recommends that one and you can swing the price go for it.

As for recipe recommendations and such, I'd do an amazon search for "juice fast" and pick up whichever gets the best ratings. Fasting is not so complicated that you need a book to do it, but a book will surely provide good motivation, and there are enough tips to consider that it would be too hard to write it all out here. Look to my first post un this thread for my basic overview. And when you consider juice recipes but an emphasis on foods known to bolster the liver (the primary filter of the body). For instance, at Whole Foods you can get dandelion leaves. They're great for the liver. They taste good in salads and you can also add them to your juice and broths. Don't forget to make broths. Beets are another good one, as are alfalfa sprouts.

A great standby juice is apple-carrot-celery. Consider adding in lemon and/or ginger root here and there. Drink asmuch water as possible, maybe a fasting tea (which has lots of herbs for the liver), and another old standy, fresh squeezed lemon juice + cayenne pepper + organic maple syrup. Cleansing lemonade.

But get yourself a little book.

I still have stuff I could post regarding fats and heart disease, but I wont waste my time and the bandwidth if nobody really cares. If anyone wants more please speak up, otherwise I'll let it die.

finally decided to give this a shot... on day 3 of the juice fast. There's this bar near me that makes reuben egg rolls that you dip into Russian dressing. I am am having fantasies about them

SupremeCommander wrote:finally decided to give this a shot... on day 3 of the juice fast. There's this bar near me that makes reuben egg rolls that you dip into Russian dressing. I am am having fantasies about them

I juice fasted and all it did was make me want all the junk food I dont normally eat. I had dreams of foods I haven't had in years because they are so bad for you. I probably wouldnt do it again. I made it the 3 days but man it was rough.

I even own a juicer and drink it regularly but non stop juice was nasty. Stay close to a bathroom in case you get the hershey squirts.

OasisBU wrote:

SupremeCommander wrote:finally decided to give this a shot... on day 3 of the juice fast. There's this bar near me that makes reuben egg rolls that you dip into Russian dressing. I am am having fantasies about them

I juice fasted and all it did was make me want all the junk food I dont normally eat. I had dreams of foods I haven't had in years because they are so bad for you. I probably wouldnt do it again. I made it the 3 days but man it was rough.

I even own a juicer and drink it regularly but non stop juice was nasty. Stay close to a bathroom in case you get the hershey squirts.

yeah... I just got squirts today. nothing until today day 4. I'm planning on fasting one more day, then I'm calling it quits.

I am still fantasizing about food today, but I want something like an ahi tuna salad, and that is not something I typically go out of my way to eat. Kind of curious to see what tomorrow is like. I almost wish I had it in me to make it 10 days but that would get in the way of Buffalo wings and binge drinking on the weekend

SupremeCommander wrote:

OasisBU wrote:

SupremeCommander wrote:finally decided to give this a shot... on day 3 of the juice fast. There's this bar near me that makes reuben egg rolls that you dip into Russian dressing. I am am having fantasies about them

I juice fasted and all it did was make me want all the junk food I dont normally eat. I had dreams of foods I haven't had in years because they are so bad for you. I probably wouldnt do it again. I made it the 3 days but man it was rough.

I even own a juicer and drink it regularly but non stop juice was nasty. Stay close to a bathroom in case you get the hershey squirts.

yeah... I just got squirts today. nothing until today day 4. I'm planning on fasting one more day, then I'm calling it quits.

I am still fantasizing about food today, but I want something like an ahi tuna salad, and that is not something I typically go out of my way to eat. Kind of curious to see what tomorrow is like. I almost wish I had it in me to make it 10 days but that would get in the way of Buffalo wings and binge drinking on the weekend

Haha stay strong my friend - its a rough road but 1 day to go is fantastic.

OasisBU wrote:

SupremeCommander wrote:

OasisBU wrote:

SupremeCommander wrote:finally decided to give this a shot... on day 3 of the juice fast. There's this bar near me that makes reuben egg rolls that you dip into Russian dressing. I am am having fantasies about them

I juice fasted and all it did was make me want all the junk food I dont normally eat. I had dreams of foods I haven't had in years because they are so bad for you. I probably wouldnt do it again. I made it the 3 days but man it was rough.

I even own a juicer and drink it regularly but non stop juice was nasty. Stay close to a bathroom in case you get the hershey squirts.

yeah... I just got squirts today. nothing until today day 4. I'm planning on fasting one more day, then I'm calling it quits.

I am still fantasizing about food today, but I want something like an ahi tuna salad, and that is not something I typically go out of my way to eat. Kind of curious to see what tomorrow is like. I almost wish I had it in me to make it 10 days but that would get in the way of Buffalo wings and binge drinking on the weekend

Haha stay strong my friend - its a rough road but 1 day to go is fantastic.

Great that you have the willpower to fast for 4 - 5 days. It is very important to come off the fast slowly. Start with some soups and steamed vegies. Maybe some toast without butter or oil. If you go on a binge this weekend, you'll blow a lot of the detoxing by fasting....and fasting isn't easy.

Markji wrote:

OasisBU wrote:

SupremeCommander wrote:

OasisBU wrote:

SupremeCommander wrote:finally decided to give this a shot... on day 3 of the juice fast. There's this bar near me that makes reuben egg rolls that you dip into Russian dressing. I am am having fantasies about them

I juice fasted and all it did was make me want all the junk food I dont normally eat. I had dreams of foods I haven't had in years because they are so bad for you. I probably wouldnt do it again. I made it the 3 days but man it was rough.

I even own a juicer and drink it regularly but non stop juice was nasty. Stay close to a bathroom in case you get the hershey squirts.

yeah... I just got squirts today. nothing until today day 4. I'm planning on fasting one more day, then I'm calling it quits.

I am still fantasizing about food today, but I want something like an ahi tuna salad, and that is not something I typically go out of my way to eat. Kind of curious to see what tomorrow is like. I almost wish I had it in me to make it 10 days but that would get in the way of Buffalo wings and binge drinking on the weekend

Haha stay strong my friend - its a rough road but 1 day to go is fantastic.

Great that you have the willpower to fast for 4 - 5 days. It is very important to come off the fast slowly. Start with some soups and steamed vegies. Maybe some toast without butter or oil. If you go on a binge this weekend, you'll blow a lot of the detoxing by fasting....and fasting isn't easy.

today was day 5 and I broke it tonight. So like 4.75 days. I had steamed white rice. Then I had a salad and a lasagna. I know that I probably screwed my dismount up, but I still have a lot of juice left and I plan on still doing that for breakfast/lunch moving forward. At least for the next week or so. But I'm 6'4", 210 and I got really hungry

SupremeCommander wrote:

Markji wrote:

OasisBU wrote:

SupremeCommander wrote:

OasisBU wrote:

SupremeCommander wrote:finally decided to give this a shot... on day 3 of the juice fast. There's this bar near me that makes reuben egg rolls that you dip into Russian dressing. I am am having fantasies about them

I juice fasted and all it did was make me want all the junk food I dont normally eat. I had dreams of foods I haven't had in years because they are so bad for you. I probably wouldnt do it again. I made it the 3 days but man it was rough.

I even own a juicer and drink it regularly but non stop juice was nasty. Stay close to a bathroom in case you get the hershey squirts.

yeah... I just got squirts today. nothing until today day 4. I'm planning on fasting one more day, then I'm calling it quits.

I am still fantasizing about food today, but I want something like an ahi tuna salad, and that is not something I typically go out of my way to eat. Kind of curious to see what tomorrow is like. I almost wish I had it in me to make it 10 days but that would get in the way of Buffalo wings and binge drinking on the weekend

Haha stay strong my friend - its a rough road but 1 day to go is fantastic.

Great that you have the willpower to fast for 4 - 5 days. It is very important to come off the fast slowly. Start with some soups and steamed vegies. Maybe some toast without butter or oil. If you go on a binge this weekend, you'll blow a lot of the detoxing by fasting....and fasting isn't easy.

today was day 5 and I broke it tonight. So like 4.75 days. I had steamed white rice. Then I had a salad and a lasagna. I know that I probably screwed my dismount up, but I still have a lot of juice left and I plan on still doing that for breakfast/lunch moving forward. At least for the next week or so. But I'm 6'4", 210 and I got really hungry

Don't worry about it - I went 3 full days and on the last night I broke down and ate some avocado - it tasted so good I immediately made some toast with PB&J. Just the simple act of chewing and the taste of food was a revelation. Remember you have been starving yourself so your body goes nuts as soon as it gets food again.

Just take it easy the next few days and you will be fine.