As a burgeoning market of detox products is only too happy to remind us, our inner workings are ripe with mysteries we might rather ignore. Our intestines, marketers tell us, are coated with petrified “gook,” parasites and toxins—but it doesn’t have to be this way. Laxative capsules and powders like “Colonblow” can see to that.
Slightly more plausible do-it-yourself cleanses said to clean the intestine and liver of toxic buildup have also been gaining momentum in recent years. There’s kriya (the ancient yoga cleansing practices, which include a variation on enemas), juice fasts, grapefruit diets and the popular “Master Cleanse.” The latter, a glorified fast that allows nothing but a mixture of water, lemon, cayenne pepper and maple syrup, is supposed to last for however long it takes to start pooping water—anywhere from eight to 14 days.
It’s hard not to be in awe of those with the discipline to complete a task that entails starvation, let alone the glow of purity they seem to exude when it’s all over. Our bodies are our temples and nobody likes the sound of petrified gook, but does bodily enlightenment have to be so grueling?
For those without an iron will, local nutritionists can shed light on ways to achieve that purified glow by consuming food. Yes, food.
Veg Out
“We live in one of the most amazing places to eat cleansing foods. We are living like kings and queens here in Santa Cruz County,” says Jocelyn Dubin, a registered dietician and nutritionist who works at Nourish downtown. “It doesn’t hurt a couple times a year to push the pause button and really get conscious about eating foods that will help to eliminate toxins more efficiently.”
Foods that eliminate toxins? Look to (no shocker here) fruits and vegetables—especially vegetables. No single food has the magic ingredient, but eating a wide spectrum of produce and protein while eliminating things like alcohol, caffeine, refined sugar, gluten, dairy and red meat for several weeks is very cleansing indeed.
Both Dubin and Dr. Aimée Shunney, a naturopathic doctor with the Santa Cruz Integrative Medicine and Chi Center, are proponents of 28-day food cleanses designed to support crucial functions.
“If you want to detoxify, you have to support the liver. You need to be eating protein and amino acids that feed the liver,” says Shunney. Foods high in Vitamin A, like sweet potatoes and carrots, are examples of such foods.
Shunney’s cleansing program, the “Cleanse Organic” has clients reintroduce the foods they eliminated from their diet one at a time during the last week of the cleanse in order to read how their body reacts to each food.
The successful food cleanse will reap sustained energy levels, mental clarity and an overall feeling of wellbeing at the time of the cleanse. As for what comes after, nutritionists promote it as a stepping-off point into a healthier lifestyle.
Lighter Than Air
Still, while nutritionists cringe at the mention of the “Master Cleanse,” those who complete it make fascinating revelations.
Paul J. R. Greenleaf suffered through the Master Cleanse not once but three times and found himself craving nothing but rice and steamed vegetables, which he ate a lot of as a kid.
“Fasting kind of gets you more in touch with your body’s core needs instead of just its many wants,” says Greenleaf. “Your mind feels clearer, colors seem brighter—everything kind of seems more in focus. Your body feels lighter. It feels like you’re operating more efficiently.”
Nutritionists attribute the commonly reported “hunger high” to ketosis, a chemical process that kicks in when the body tries to live without adequate carbohydrates, and the effect of extremely low blood sugar on the brain.
“When our blood sugar gets low like that and we feel so different, we associate it as feeling free and high, but really it’s the beginning of starvation,” says Dubin.
But isn’t it worth it to get rid of the petrified gook? Here, too, the pros take issue. The mysterious excrement one friend calls “the Black Matter,” which shows up several days into the Master Cleanse, is in fact bile produced by the liver.
“When you don’t eat, there is very little waste to bulk the stool, so the stool volume will be small, the consistency will be mushy or sludgy, and there will be a disproportionate amount of bile, making it appear green and dark,” explains Shunney, who goes on to warn against cleansing products that contain bentonite clay and psyllium. “These are known to cause green/dark stringy ropy stool that these companies then promote as the removal of mucoid plaque. It’s really just the products,” she says.
Nobody said the truth was palatable. But maybe there is something to be said for “hitting the pause button,” as Dubin puts it, on our appetites and thinking before we mindlessly reach for something to stop the growling of our always-demanding bellies.
