JUICY.

Juicy.

And no, I’m not talking about that awful clothing label circa a time when Paris Hilton was still relevant and for some unknown reason wearing a matching, bedazzled tracksuit seemed ‘cool’.

Juicy, as in juice. The kind to drink and enjoy.

In the weeks leading up to my wedding, I decided to do a juice cleanse, to give myself a kind of ‘reset’.

I know some of might be thinking, “wow, thats so extreme” “only drinking juice for 5 days?! that’s crazy”

Well i guess different people have definitions of crazy( i.e. I would say eating Mcdonalds is crazy these days), and so this definitely doesn’t fall into that category for me.

As you might know, I did my yoga teacher training back in January and as part of this you learn a bit about health and nutrition (but not as you would expect from a mainstream course covering the same topic). It’s a little more alternative, and perhaps not everyone’s cup of tea. However, for me, the general principles struck a strong chord. A plant-based diet, high in fruit and veg. Drinking a tonne of water and taking part in cleanses and short fasts throughout the year (the girl who was teaching us this component of the course was day 30 of only juice, abundant juice, and was absolutely thriving).

A lot of our energy goes towards digestion and the food we typically eat can be quite complex, think about how many ingredients can go into a single meal at times. So the idea behind a cleanse (at least to my understanding) is to simplify what you’re putting in your body to give your digestive system a break, allow that energy to go elsewhere in the body (i.e. healing etc) and hit the reset button.

During my month long yoga teacher training, I did a 7 day ‘eating cleanse’ where we could eat as much as we wanted, however the food was simple – no oil or salt, just fruit for breakfast, abundant luscious greens with some cooked potato and other veggies for lunch and dinner. Its amazing what a difference I could feel in my body even with a simple change like this, so I was really excited to try a more intense version of cleansing.

In the months leading up to the wedding, I was pretty run down. Stressed with work, with planning the wedding and hoping to get everything organised for my dream day. I had been struck down with all of the sickness, chest infections, colds and all that jazz (I work with kids and live with doctors, so you tend to get exposed to a lot). I was practicing yoga as regularly as my body would allow with all of the sickness, which kept me sane during this time, but with all the external stress around me I could really feel my body suffering.

Enter LUCKY YOU cleanse. Deliciousness delivered straight to your door, all the forethought done for you i.e. which juice to drink when. Because at this time in my life, I was all about simplicity.

MY EXPERIENCE

I chose to do their 5 day juice cleanse, although a 3 day option is available. I don’t want to bore you with a day by day recount.

However overall:

  • Day 2 and 3 are generally harder than the rest. Following on from that, you do get into a rhythm.
  • Somedays I couldn’t drink all the juices. Sometimes I would skip the last juice of the day, because I was too full. But the team at Lucky You Cleanse really encourage you to listen to your body and not to force it.
  • I did still drink coffee, just one in the morning. It was not a time in my life that I felt like I could go without, particularly on work days.
  • I still felt energetic, however definitely didn’t feel like my usual self during one yoga classes, so do take it easy on the exercise – again you’re body will tell you what your limits are if you’re listening.
  • Yes… I did crave food. And more than anything I just missed chewing a little bit. But I also found it such an interesting insight into the human mind – I was not hungry, but for some reason felt incomplete without chewing (NB you do “chew the juices” but its more just to activate all those saliva glands aka food receptors)

THE BEST PART

Hands down – the cashew nut mylk is life. Just when you get to the end of the day, thinking about how much you could really go some food right now, you get to this little slice of heaven. It’s the last ‘juice’ of the day. So creamy, so heavenly. I can’t even describe.

The other great part is how light I felt. I don’t experience alot of bloating, but I do notice when I have eaten more processed food than usual, or perhaps a poorly-combined meal. But on a juice cleanse, your body feels light and dreamy. How it really should feel all of the time.

THE HARDEST PART

As mentioned above, I missed chewing. Not even any one particular food, but just the action of chewing itself, on something crunchy.

WHAT YOU GAIN AKA THE RESULTS

Call it well timed, but by the end of my juice cleanse I had kicked the last of my sickness that had been hanging on for far too long. I felt re-energised, fresh and light. my stomach was flatter than ever #bloatingbegone. Can’t tell you if I lost “weight” per say as I don’t own scales, but I definitely felt slightly leaner, butI was more impressed than what I felt “internally” versus any external/appearance changes.

THE FINAL QUESTION – WOULD I DO IT AGAIN?

Absolutely. I actually would love to do one again in the next couple of weeks/likely will.

Also on my radar to experiment with – banana island (look it up).

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