I get asked this question all the time. My answer has always been buy it for five reasons.
- Amassing all of the organic ingredients can be tedious and expensive.
- You can’t get the same consistency in the juice unless you have a quality juicer.
- Buying a cleanse guarantees you will get all all of the nutrients you need to sustain the duration.
- The availability and schedule with the juices delivered daily makes the process so much easier.
- Almond milk is not fun or easy to make.
On Tuesday I completed my second homemade cleanse. And my answer is emphatically the same.
This post is going to be long, but it will be the most informative article I’ve written on cleansing to date.
My Experience Cleansing at Home
Three years ago, I attempted my first cleanse by myself on mostly fruit juice. Big mistake. I obviously had no idea what I was doing. This time around, after completing many “professional” cleanses (see my reviews below), I took the middle road and bought juice but not a whole cleanse for three days.
My Set Up
Per my request, Susan, a friend of mine who juices regularly and teaches about juicing, supplied me with the two key juices in a regular cleanse (pictured above): the green juice packed with vitamins and nutrients and cayenne lemonade that energizes you. Her blend of green juice has both ginger and garlic which most don’t usually include, but have great benefits. (See “Why you should juice” below for a list of ingredients and benefits).
My Diet
On day one I decided because I’m active I would have to eat as well as juice. I allotted:
1/4 cup of raw almonds 3 times a day
1 apple around 1pm
1 small bowl of spinach when I felt hungry
Herbal teas are also nice to incorporate during the day to break up the monotony of flavor.
My Experience
There are definite pros to making your own juice for a cleanse, but in my opinion, there are more cons unless you are a seasoned juicer.
The good part is that I got to tweak the juice recipes. For example, I couldn’t stand the garlic for more than one day so I had Susan omit that and add more kale. On day three I asked to incorporate a beet juice because the green alone wasn’t proving to be enough. I have to say, her green juice was one of the best I’ve ever had in terms of taste and hunger satisfaction. Surprisingly enough I wasn’t starving until the end of day three.
On all of my purchased cleanses I felt devastatingly hungry at one point or another. However, while I wasn’t hungry drinking these juices, I still experienced significant loss in muscle mass and energy unlike I ever have before. That’s a big deal for me. I wasn’t ingesting enough calories or protein. I feel like in a self-cleanse, it’s hard to gauge what you are feeling versus what you should be feeling. The process isn’t supposed to be easy or enjoyable; it’s supposed to detox your organs and give your digestive system a rest.
At the end of day three, I decided my body needed fuel asap. I ate a meal of steamed broccoli, raw almond butter, and dried pineapple to bring myself back to life. On day four, I integrated back into a full diet with quinoa and pineapple.
As always after a cleanse, I got a colonic to fully detox and pull out materials that weren’t able to move during the cleanse. See more on this at the end of the post.
Final Thought
My conclusion on amateurs (myself included) constructing your own cleanse: don’t do it. Unless you fully educate yourself or are under the guidance of a nutritionist, I would advise to not attempt a cleanse on your own. Absolutely incorporate fresh juice into your diet (you’ll read why below), but don’t attempt to cut out food altogether without guidance. You’ll end up starving, constipated, and frustrated. Not fun.
