I grew up in South Jersey, exit 3 off the
turnpike. Pizza, cheesesteaks, and Pepsi were their own food groups in my world.
Candy consumption was an everyday occurrence. Sure, I ate vegetables: corn in
the summer, canned green beans in the winter. There was only one kind of
lettuce and it was iceberg. Celery was edible only if slathered with cream
cheese, a carrot if dunked in onion dip.
Because I was tall and thin, I assumed I could
eat whatever the hell I wanted. Because
I became a runner in my 20s, I assumed I could eat as much as I wanted of
whatever the hell I wanted. And so I did.
Then, in my 30s, I got sick—really sick—as in
not-expected-to-live sick. A few days before I was discharged from a six-week
stay in the intensive care unit, one of my nurses suggested that someday, when
I was strong enough, I should consider doing a “liver cleanse.” Pictures of a
big gooey organ wearing a shower cap and bathing in a tub of bubbles came to
mind. A liver cleanse? WTF? I’d never
heard of this, but I was willing to try just about anything to help my recovery
process.
Months later, my family and I relocated to
Boulder, Colorado, home of every type of cleanse imaginable. A year into my
recovery I decided it was time. I went to a small natural grocer in town, read
through the various books on cleansing (there were many; who knew?), and picked
a program that was designed specifically for the liver. I decided I would do
this strict program for ten days. I left the store with $300 worth of vegetables
(to make “cleansing broth”) and supplements. I made lists and schedules and,
yes, the broth (which, frankly, tasted like dirty dish water).
The next morning I arose with determination and
took my first round of supplements, along with two tablespoons of olive oil and
the juice from half a lemon. An hour later, I choked down a cup of that nasty
broth. Another hour later, more supplements. At this point I was starving. And
that’s when I broke. It was only 11 a.m. and I ditched the cleanse in favor of
tortellini alfredo and a Coke. Cleanse #1: FAIL!
A few
years later, someone convinced me that I should attempt another cleanse, this
one fairly intense. Nothing but fruits and vegetables for 28 days. No salt, no
olive oil, no nothing. I could make fresh guacamole, but there’d be no corn
chip to deliver it to my mouth. My husband decided to do the program with me
(he did not know that colonics were part of the regimen when he signed on;
silly man). At the time, I was in the middle of a busy speaking tour across the
U.S. and I had two trips that had long been scheduled during the same month we
chose to do the cleanse. By the conclusion of the first trip, I was lethargic
and sick.
Just when I began feeling a bit better, the
next trip came around. I packed my juicer and a bag of organic produce, unsure
if I’d be able to find what I needed in the city I was visiting. United
Airlines “accidentally” rerouted my luggage to their home base in Chicago
instead of to my destination in Florida, and I’m certain it was because they
believed my juicer was a bomb. Imagine how embarrassed they must’ve been when
they opened the bag only to be overwhelmed by the smell of broccoli, cucumbers,
celery, and beets.
I spent two days in Florida, adhering to the
cleanse protocol while delivering three different keynote addresses. When it
was time to pack and leave for the airport, I felt I had not one electrolyte
left in my body. Tossing my clothing, toiletries and juicer in the suitcase
felt like far too great a task, so instead I lay on the bed and phoned Jeff. He
convinced me to stay one more day and to eat some “real” food for energy. Lucky
for me I had been booked into the Club Level of the Ritz-Carlton, so I made my
way to one of their “culinary offerings”—appetizer spreads—and proceeded to circle
the buffet table, grabbing at food and eating as I walked, a sad parody of Patty
Duke in “The Miracle Worker.” I returned home the following day to find my
husband looking gaunt and exhausted, barely able to lift his head from the
couch pillow to greet me. What a pair we were, a couple of emaciated zombies.
And it was only Day 19 in our 28-day program.
“Do you want to end this stupid cleanse?” I
asked him.
“Yes. Let’s get Chinese food,” he replied. And
off we went to stuff our pie holes with fried wontons, egg rolls, and beer. Cleanse
#2: FAIL!
After that experience, I swore off any sort of
deprivation-based program. It seemed that making my body weak in an attempt to
make it strong didn’t make sense. And given all my body had been through with
the big illness of years ago (from which I never fully recovered) I had to be
extra respectful of my body’s nutritional needs.
Years passed with no mention of the word
“cleanse.” Then I came across a documentary by Joe Cross—“Fat, Sick and Nearly
Dead.” Not exactly god’s gift to cinematography, but a great little film
nonetheless. Watch it. All of it. I promise you there’s a wonderful surprise
about mid-way through. And by the end, I suspect Joe Cross will be one of your
heroes too. (Spoiler alert: he juices a shitload of fruits and vegetables for
two months, which helps him regain health, drop weight, and dump his
prescription meds.) Joe inspired me to blow the dust off my juicer and begin
cramming dark green things into it again. Then drinking them. But my
no-deprivation rule still stood firm, so a 100% juice cleanse—which Joe calls a
“reboot”—was not appealing to me. But perhaps with some modifications…
And that’s when my “10-Day Modified Juice and
Smoothie Not-Really-A-Cleanse Program” came into being. Here’s the overall gist
of it:
- Consume organic fruits and
vegetables as juice (I use an Omega juicer, which “masticates” the contents), a
smoothie (I prefer the Vitamix; if there was ever a blender on steroids, this
is it), soup, or as the real thing—a salad, a piece of fruit, whatever.
Overall, I lean toward liquids, but do not restrict myself to them. Sometimes,
you just need to eat a freakin’ plum, right?
- Have a good quality protein
shake every 1-2 days so you’re getting more protein than what the veggies can
offer. I mix whey protein with almond milk (Almonds have udders? Hello?!).
- Continue taking any
supplements and medications.
- Give yourself about a cup of
nuts/day if you need to eat something more substantial than rabbit food—like,
say, squirrel food!
- Chia seeds: get them, eat
them. They look like poppy seeds and apparently they’re good for more than just
growing chia pets. Some people like to put them in a glass of water and let
them expand before drinking them. I suppose if you like the idea of drinking
frog eggs this approach will appeal to you. But me, I just toss them back and
chug water, then spend the next half hour picking chia seeds out of my teeth.
They expand in my belly and help me feel full—in addition to all the great
stuff they’re doing for me nutritionally. I also sprinkle them on salads or add
them to smoothies.
- Drink a shitload of water.
When you’re done, drink more. Word on the street is that you should cut your
weight in half and drink at least that many ounces of water each day. So if I
weighed 140 (which, trust me, I don’t), I’d be drinking at least 70 ounces or
roughly 9 cups of water each day.
- Exercise lightly but
consistently. With the severe osteoarthritis I’ve developed, I’ve replaced
running with “extreme water jogging.” And by extreme I mean my level of
embarrassment every time I do it. I used to make fun of those people. Now I’ve
become one of them.
- Take Epsom salt baths. I’ve
heard it said that your skin is your body’s largest detoxification organ. Sweat
like you mean it!
- If you need help moving the
bowels (I'm resisting the urge to use the term "dump" here), I like an herbal product from
ReNew Life called Cleanse More, which—truth be told—should really be renamed
Poop More. Enough said.
- Treat yourself to a massage.
Hey, it’s for medical reasons!
- And if you cheat, shake it
off and get the hell back on the horse—err, program. The fate of the world
doesn’t rest on whether you slam dunk your first attempt at a modified cleanse.
Just keep moving, more or less, in the right direction.
So there it is. My non-FDA-approved 10-day
program to feel better, drop weight (I dropped—and kept off—9 lbs. during my
first program), and jumpstart changes in eating habits and lifestyle. For me,
it’s no longer about diets. It’s about truly, thoroughly, and permanently
making changes that support the quality of life I want to have as I continue in
my second half century of life, while also attempting to arrest—or better yet,
reverse—the effects of severe osteoarthritis in all my major joints. And I
needn’t make all those changes at once. Moderation is a beautiful thing.
Imagine that!
My program may or may not work for you. But if
you want to give it a try, go for it. If you want to modify it, go for
it. If you want to share more information with me, go for it. If you want to
tell me why my program sucks and yours is the one true messiah of health and
vitality, spare me. Please. Don’t we already have enough of that bullshit in
our various religious views? (Oh lord—I may have just opened a can of worms;
and worms are definitely NOT a part of this program.)
Recipes
I’ve had some requests to share my recipes, so
here goes. First, I have no set recipes. I prefer to play around with the
ingredients, which of course, at times, leads to a whole pitcher of nasty-assed
vegetable juice (hint: mustard greens make any juice taste like hell) or overly
spicy soup (hint: a little cayenne goes a long way). But here are a few basics:
Vegetable Juice. Let’s be clear: Bloody Mary’s do not count as vegetable juice. And
yes, I’m well aware that vodka comes from potatoes. Still—no vodka. Get over
it.
I use cucumbers, carrots, celery, beets, kale
and lemons as my basic juice ingredients. Apples can be thrown in too if you
want to go sweeter. The fresher the juice the better, but I get tired of
hauling out the juicer twice a day, so I make a pitcher and drink it over a
two-day period. Lemon cuts the grassy taste of dark greens. Cucumbers soften
the bite of any juice. And no matter how much you read that garlic and onion
are great for heart disease, they are nasty, nasty, NASTY if juiced without
anything else. Trust me—I’ve tried it. Then I spent five minutes standing by
the toilet trying to calm my gag reflex while my stomach burned more than Regan
when the holy water was splashed on her in “The Exorcist.” There are plenty of
decent juicing books in natural grocers that can give you more specifics for
recipes. It’s all about trial and error, baby!
Kale Smoothies. Growing up, I didn’t even know kale existed. Ten years ago, I
couldn’t identify it in a produce store if my life depended on it. Now, I go
through 3-6 bunches of it each week. Go figure.
Let’s be honest: the key to making a decent
kale smoothie is drowning out the taste of, well, kale. For my smoothies, I
throw an entire bunch of kale in the Vitamix. I add about a cup or two of water
(or OJ if you prefer) and blend until it’s liquefied.
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| Oops! |
Then I toss in two
bananas, roughly two cups of blueberries and strawberries, the juice from one
lime (I use a handheld lime juicer, but you can remove the skin and toss the
whole lime in if you want), an avocado (remove skin and pit, duh), and any
other random fruit I have around (peaches, pineapple, etc.).
You can throw in
protein powder if you want, though it can add a chalky taste. Also, almond
butter is a good substitute for avocado. And chia seeds or ground flax seeds
could be a good addition as well. You can add more water and/or ice until you
get the consistency you prefer.
And remember to secure the Vitamix lid well
before jamming the machine on high speed. It’s no fun cleaning kale smoothie
off the ceiling. Trust me, I know.
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| Simple Ingredients for Soup |
Pureed Vegetable Soup. I stole this recipe from my acupuncturist’s wife. She’s French,
and if there’s one thing the French know it’s food. (Granted, they’ve got that
wine thing down pretty well too.)
Clean and cut the following vegetables (leaving
their skins on) and toss them into a pot: 3 potatoes, 1 leak (split down the
middle and rinse well; mud collects in their annoyingly tight layers), 1 onion,
2 carrots, 2 celery stalks (use a carrot peeler to remove some of the
stringiness on the back side of the celery), and 4-8 cloves of garlic (I added
this little improvement; shhhh, don’t tell Dominique).
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| Dominique's Soup |
Toss in one whole bay
leaf and cover with water—about two inches above the top of the vegetables.
Boil for several hours until the vegetables are soft. Remove the bay leaf then
puree the soup using a handheld immersion blender (no, you don’t remove any of
the water). Finally, add spices to taste
(salt and pepper are fine; I throw in turmeric and cayenne to help with my
arthritis). Yes, there are—gasp!—starchy potatoes in this recipe. So what!
Don’t be a potato hater. Eat your soup.
Cleansing Broth. This is basically a new twist on “vitamin water.” Not the tastiest or most filling meal you’ll ever have, but hey—it’s chock full of
vitamins and minerals. I’d call it a morning coffee substitute, but some rabid
coffee addict out there would likely hunt me down and smack me for making such
a statement.
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| Cleansing Broth in the Making |
Take the biggest cooking pot you have and toss
in chopped clean organic vegetables with the skins on. Broccoli, cauliflower,
cabbage, seaweed, garlic, onions, scallions, carrots, celery, radishes, leaks,
parsnips—whatever! Fill the pot with water and boil the crap out of those
vegetables. Then, remove all the vegetables, season to taste
(again, people: vodka is not a seasoning), and store the broth in glass containers
in the fridge until you’re ready to drink it. I reheat small amounts on the
stove top (not the evil microwave oven) as needed, a couple cups per day.
There’s no such thing as overdosing on this stuff, so if you want more, go for
it. Mmmm, mmmmm.
Disclaimer
Let me make one thing perfectly clear: I’m not
a doctor, nor do I play one on YouTube. I’m just a 50-year-old woman who has
experimented with many healing modalities in an effort to find what works for
her. I share this information not as a way to dispense medical advice, but
because some Facebook friends wanted to know more about what I was doing. I see
several different health care specialists—MDs, naturopaths, physical
therapists, acupuncturists, body workers, nutritionists—and I view them all as
“consultants” to the entity called My Health. But I’m the CEO. And the final
decisions—including the one to do my 10-Day Program every so often—rest solely
with me.
I believe that there is no one right path to
wellness. I believe that we are each responsible for our own health and
wellness (though I wholeheartedly support a government-run healthcare option
that prevents those with preexisting conditions from being kicked out of the system
by private insurers; see this blog by Roger Ebert to understand why I stand by
Obamacare, warts and all). I believe that many of us could be a lot healthier
than we are, but that choice would require lifestyle changes that we aren’t yet
willing to make. I believe that when the pain (emotional or physical) becomes
great enough, we will make those changes. I believe we are capable of
changing. Old dogs, new tricks. Woof!
And p.s. Philly Cheesesteaks and pizza are
still two of my favorite foods. I just don’t scarf them down as often as I used
to.
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| Mmmmm. |
