The Juice Cleanse Reset Diet (8 page)

If you’ve gone through life thinking that you’re not a great multitasker, it turns out you were wrong! Your body automatically multitasks, regulating your temperature, blood sugar, vitamin D, and oxygen levels twenty-four hours a day. Another very important task that your body does automatically is regulate your acid/alkaline ratio.

P stands for potency and H stands for hydrogen; pH stands for
potency of hydrogen
. More hydrogen equals greater alkalinity and more oxygen equals more acidity. Your body is designed to operate at a slightly alkaline state, with a blood pH just above 7. An overly acidic pH leads to inflammation, resulting in disease, illness, and fatigue. Since your body is hardworking and quite resourceful, it won’t allow
you to live in a dangerously acidic state. Instead, if your blood veers into an overly acidic state, the alkaline minerals from your tissues, organs, bones, and teeth will be drawn out in order to bring your pH back into balance. After your body uses these alkaline minerals to restore its desired pH, they are released from your body through urine. According to a 2011 study published by the
Journal of Environmental and Public Health
, the “quantity of calcium lost in the urine with the modern diet over time could be as high as 480 grams over twenty years or almost half the skeletal mass of calcium.” No wonder there has been such an increase in bone density issues like osteoporosis. The moral of the story is: help yourself stay alkaline by eating your fruits and veggies!

Stress and all of its triggers—lack of sleep, emotions, living a sedentary lifestyle—lead to acidity. Your body constantly undergoes stresses that may contribute to acidity. You can decrease the detrimental impact of these stressors on your body by consuming a diet rich in alkaline foods, or you can exacerbate the problems by eating an acidic diet. Eating 100 percent alkaline foods is a lofty goal for even the most disciplined of eaters. The good news is that you don’t have to consume 100 percent alkaline foods in order to increase your alkalinity. The precleanse phase is designed to shift your diet so that you’re eating approximately 85 percent alkaline foods.

One of the key ingredients to sticking to the precleanse phase is proper planning. We suggest you go shopping on a weekend, and use our shopping list to purchase all of the items you’ll need for the week. You can prepare some of the meals on Sunday, and then pack your meals and snacks each night for the next day. This way, you won’t find yourself without food when you’re out or at work. You’ll use your meals, juices, and smoothies to get your body accustomed to burning calories throughout the day. Feel free to take shortcuts, like using organic canned beans (free from additives, of course) and prechopped vegetables or fruit. But we do want you to make the meals yourself rather than getting takeout from a restaurant, because that is the only way that you can truly know what ingredients go into your meals.

It’s important that you choose a time for your cleanse when you have limited social or travel commitments. You’ll find it much more difficult to stick to your days of structured meals and juices if you’re attending a celebration on Saturday night. Planning your cleanse during an appropriate time sets you up for success. However, if you’re not able to clear your social calendar, it doesn’t mean you need to fall off the wagon. You can always choose a green salad with oil and
vinegar or fresh lemon juice, a grilled vegetable plate, a broth-based vegetarian soup, or a fresh fruit plate if you’re at a business or social engagement that requires you to participate in a meal. Drink plenty of water to help keep yourself full and avoid temptation, and then go back to the plan for your next meal. You don’t need to announce that you’re on a “special diet” because healthy food can be found on any menu if you know what to look for and are determined to succeed.

If you need to cook dinner and prepare meals for your family, put them on the same meal plan as you. All of the recipes are nutritious and delicious and creative enough to satisfy even the most picky eaters. If your family wants meat when you’re on a vegetarian day, pick up an organic rotisserie chicken from the supermarket to supplement whatever you’re making.

During the precleanse phase, you’ll begin resetting many areas of your health. Pay attention to these resets to recognize how the changes feel as they occur.

You’ll become conscious of what you put into your body, and make sure you have your healthy meals and snacks with you. It’s easier to slip when you fail to plan or pay attention. Resetting your attitude and your mindset is intregal to your plan for success.

If caffeine or energy drinks were a daily occurrence for you before the precleanse, you may find that your energy levels actually slump during this phase, as you eliminate these stimulants from your diet. Realize that this energy slump is only temporary; your energy will
soar in just a few short days. Removing these items from your diet is important to the success of the Juice Cleanse Reset Diet and will make the juice-cleanse phase much more effective. If you need an energy boost to help you beat your slump, eat a piece of fruit, take a nap if possible, or go for a quick walk.

By eating something every three hours or so, you’ll get your metabolism burning more calories. You won’t be skipping meals or snacks or feeling like you’re famished at night, and you should be able to control those late-night munchies better.

During the precleanse phase, you’ll eliminate all processed foods and increase your consumption of fruits and vegetables. Although vegetables may not taste great to you at first, as you remove the chemicals from your diet, your taste buds will begin to readjust.

As you replace the processed food, dairy, fried food, meat, and so on with whole grains, fruits, and vegetables, you’ll notice some changes in your digestion. Chances are that your bowel movements will become more regular and that you’ll experience less digestive discomfort.

Start paying attention to your weight and the way your clothes fit. If you want to lose weight, keep that goal at the forefront of your mind to help keep you strong through moments of temptation.

As you remove the processed food and alcohol from your diet and transition to real food, you’ll notice a reduction in the bags under your eyes and puffiness in your face. Even small changes in what you put into your body affect your beauty.

The daily meal plans below are a road map to make your journey easier. They set forth the path, but the driving is up to you. If you don’t like something on the plan, feel free to swap out a meal with another recipe in the same section (see
chapter 8
for recipes). Meals are organized into breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snacks. As long as you’re choosing an alternate recipe from the same category, you’ll stay on track. Of course, if you’re a vegetarian or vegan, you’ll substitute a vegan or vegetarian selection for any meal that includes dairy, meat, eggs, or fish. If you’re an omnivore, no matter how much you love meat and dairy, it’s very important that your meals on the day prior to starting the juice-cleanse phase
do not
include these items. Trust us—it will make the transition to juice easier.

Remember, the length of the precleanse is determined by the type of cleanser you are. If you’re type 4, you’ll start at seven days before the juice cleanse. If you’re type 3, you’ll start at four days before the juice cleanse. If you’re type 2, you’ll start at three days before the juice cleanse. And if you’re type 1, you’ll start at two days before the juice cleanse. Over the course of the precleanse days, you’ll be changing your eating habits to a very alkaline, vegetarian diet. Regardless of type, everyone’s final two days before the juice-cleanse phase will be the same.

You may be tempted to shorten the number of days you stay in the precleanse phase. Don’t succumb to the temptation. This is a life journey to health, not a crash diet. The more closely you adhere to the
plan, the greater your chance of lifetime success—and also the more pleasant the juice cleanse itself will be. Rushed detox is a fad and is not pleasant!