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Water Fasting/Cleansing

I’ve noticed a lot of people suggesting to do a 1 day water fast and work towards doing this once a week. Is the purpose of this to sort of help cleanse your digestive system?

I want to do some sort of cleansing as I feel there is a lot of built up waste in my colon and toxins in my body. Also, my belly is the one area of my body I’m not able to lose weight in. I’ve always suffered from a very chubby belly, even when I’ve been very skinny. Since eating raw I’ve been losing weight in other areas of my body, such as the arms, back, and breasts, but not my belly. I’ve been eating mostly vegan for 2+ years and eating mostly raw since April. I’m working towards 100% raw, I’ll get there eventually.

I tried doing the Master Cleanse and just can’t do it. The salt water flush almost made me vomit and the “lemonade” mixture tastes disgusting to me, (probably because of the maple syrup, YUK). There is no way I can do it for 9 days like the book suggests. I had a hard enough time getting down just one glass of the stuff. I refuse to buy some powdery/capsule/pill type product because that just doesn’t seem very natural, plus those types of things are expensive.

Would doing a water fast one day once a week help me in cleansing my colon and help with weight loss? Or does anyone have any other natural, inexpensive, cleanse suggestions besides the Master Cleanse? I can’t do a juice fast because I don’t own a juicer and can’t afford to buy one anytime soon!

Thanks in advance! :)

Comments

  • LucyLucy Raw Newbie

    Hi Greenpolkadot,I did a watermelon fast for 3 days and that was great!!I lost some weigh and I’m feeling amazing. Just blend watermelon and that’s it.

  • coconuttycoconutty Raw Newbie

    Oh boy I could totally do a watermelon fast! Maybe I’ll try that next time!

  • Good idea..watermelon fast…could i eat it sometimes to..I have an oral thing!

  • Hi Greenpolkadot,

    I’m with you on the maple syrup thing. Eating any form of carbohydrates supplies your body with energy and prevents it from fully going into ketosis mode where you are burning fat.

    It takes about 3 days for your body to fully switch over to burning fat stores for energy. This is why once most people get to the third day of water fasting, they are no longer hungry. Because you’re body isn’t starving, it’s burning almost exclusively fat for energy at that point. (and about 20 grams of muscle protein a day.)

    I do think people on longer water fasts should supplement electrolytes and minerals. Also a small number of people have genetic quirks that make fasting extremely dangerous. Like beta oxidation disorders. There are some individuals who don’t know they have a mild form of this disorder even in adulthood.

    Here’s a longer more complete description of what happens to the body during water fasting (from gaianstudies.org)

    The Physiological Changes of Fasting

    Many of the most dramatic changes that occur in the body during fasting take place on the first three days of the fast. These occur as the body switches from one fuel source to another.

    Normally, the primary form of energy the body uses for energy is glucose, a type of sugar. Most of this is extracted or converted from the food we eat.

    Throughout the day, the liver stores excess sugar in a special form called glycogen that it can call on as energy levels fall between meals. There is enough of this sugar source for 8-12 hours of energy and usually, it is completely exhausted within the first 24 hours of fasting. (However, once the body shifts over to ketosis or fat as fuel, this new fuel is used to also restore the body’s glycogen reserves.)

    Once the liver’s stores of glycogen are gone, the body begins to shift over to what is called ketosis or ketone production – the use of fatty acids as fuel instead of glucose. This shift generally begins on the second day of fasting and completed by the third.

    In this interim period there is no glucose available and energy from fat conversion is insufficient but the body still needs fuel. So it accesses glucose from two sources. It first converts glycerol, available in the body’s fat stores, to glucose but this is still insufficient. So it makes the rest that it needs from catabolizing, or breaking down, the amino acids in muscle tissue, using them in the liver for gluconeogenesis, or the making of glucose. Between 60 and 84 grams of protein are used on this second day, 2-3 ounces of muscle tissue.

    By the third day ketone production is sufficient to provide nearly all the energy the body needs and the body’s protein begins to be strongly conserved. The body still needs a tiny amount of glucose for some functions, however, so a very small amount of protein, 18-24 grams, is still catabolized to supply it – from 1/2 to 1 ounce of muscle tissue per day.

    Over a 30 day water fast a person generally loses a maximum of 1-2 pounds of muscle mass. This conservation of the body’s protein is an evolutionary development that exists to protect muscle tissue and vital organs from damage during periods of insufficient food availability.

  • coconuttycoconutty Raw Newbie

    Great little article there, thanks for posting :-)

  • ZoeZoe Raw Newbie

    I fast once a week. I don’t eat for a whole day and night, 24 hours. I do it for many reasons:

    It gives my digestive system a break.

    It makes me feel high and Spiritually connected.

    It gives me a different view on food, hunger and eating over the rest of the week, i.e. I find myself satisfied with simpler food and eating much less, and not using food as a drug for entertainment/emotional anaesthetic etc.

    It makes me feel very healthy.

    I love fasting one day a week.

  • newbienewbie Raw Newbie

    zoe,

    for that day, do you drink any water or do you fast entirely?

    thanks!

  • coconuttycoconutty Raw Newbie

    Hi Zoe. I’ve been thinking about doing the one day a week fast. Do you make it the same day every week? And what day do you find works out the best for you?

  • blujett8blujett8 Raw Newbie

    coconutty-extra inspiration for weekly fasting http://www.rawfriends.com/fasting.html

  • ZoeZoe Raw Newbie

    Hi newbie and coconutty, I do it on Mondays usually, but if that doesn’t fit in with what I am doing then I’ll change it to another day. I either drink juice or just do water. Depending on what I feel like doing on the day. I do Mondays because Mondays can be a little flat and dull, and fasting makes me feel so zingy and connected it livens it up, and it makes the week start with a bang!

    Great link blujett8, thanks.

  • deborahanndeborahann Raw Newbie

    Has anyone done the blessed herbs colon cleanse or body cleanse? The best option has a 5 day juice fast and you take a toxin adsorber mixture every 3 hrs so that should quell the hunger. I am going to try this. I generally have trouble with 6 hrs without eating so this is going to take some major willpower. If anyone has done this, post how you did. I’ve done some cleanses from the health food store but never really noticed much difference.

  • It is far easier to get into the zone of juice “fasting” if you start the week before and eat whole fresh fruits and veggies, especially melons and fruits with high water content (tomatoes, watermelons, cantaloupe, honeydew, oranges). Also drink juice. No nuts, no recipes, no spices except maybe cinnamon, no oils or fats or seeds, etc. After a week of this, you are much more likely to easily and comfortably transition into juicing exclusively and to stick with it. That’s been my experience.

  • I did the Blessed Herbs fasting cleanse. It was my very first fast and it was easier than expected. Absolutely those first couple of days are the hardest, but I found it to be more mental than anything. The three hour mixture helped alot because you knew you were going to be able to put something in your body & it does help to give you a full feeling.

    I agree with Lauraj on preparing yourself. It’s easier if you’ve adjusted your body slowly to eating less and lighter.

  • Hi Everyone! I am new and have a question about cleansing / detox. Is there just one GREAT book to help me with this confusing topic? Is cleansing and detoxing the same thing? It seems like you do different things to different organs. I am also looking for info on metal detox. Sorry to ramble.

  • deborahanndeborahann Raw Newbie

    I am on day 2 of the fast and it really does help to have that adsorber in you system to keep the hunger pains away. The decreasing food intake for the 3 days before was actually harder than the fast is! I have quite the appetite and it is tough to stop eating before I’m full. I feel better today energy-wise but I’m horribly cold .Maybe this will pass, too. By the way it is so far a very good cleanse! Calibama—I think you detox with a cleanse, but I don’t think you have to cleanse to detox. I may be wrong, but this is what I perceive from reading.

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