Day 20, Not so good day. :(

Hello my dear friends, today has been a so-so day. It started great, by going to the Farmer's Market super early. I bought some kale, carrots, cucumbers, roma tomatoes, zucchini, yellow squash and celery. Spent about $19 and left to go to Freshfield produce and bought some orange beets, bulb fennel, and avocado. Total spent was $26. Here the pic of my produce for this week. I decided to make a more veggie juice than a fruit juice this morning. Here is my combo. One orange beet, 4 celery stalks, 1" of ginger root, 2 cucumbers, and 1 cup of watermelon w/ rinds.

Orange Beet, more like yellow beet

Now I usually up the watermelon to take the taste out of the beets and such. But I wanted to try out the orange beets. So I used less, I juiced the beet and it came out super YELLOW. It was a beautiful color. You always should create a rainbow juice. Mine was going to be yellow, red, green today. I drank my juice with my hubby. Then the problem began, I started feeling my throat become scratchy, it was weird. I kept drinking it and finished it but I didn't feel so good. I didn't say anything to my hubby but when we tried to go out I noticed I wasn't feeling like myself. I felt weird, almost sick to my stomach. I drank water, and ate some nuts to get passed it but I wasn't feeling so good. :( We came back home and I decided to make some fresh guacamole. One avocado, 1/2 of a roma tomato chopped, 1/2 of a tomatillo, 1/2 of a lime squeezed, and garlic powder, salt, and pepper to taste. Mashed it all up and ate it like if it were porridge. I laid down and after 1 hour, I finally felt better. I'm wondering if it was the beet I put in the juice. I use red beets all the time and never had that issue. :( So when I use it again, I will only use 1/2 of it and see if my throat bothers me again. If it does then, I may be allergic to orange beets. :( That would suck.

For dinner, I didn't experiment, I made my regular Kale, carrot, cucumber, and granny apple juice. Hubby said it was sweet n sour. I told him it was from the granny apples. Thankfully, my throat didn't bother me this time. I guess because this is my last week coming in, my body is use to certain veggies. So tomorrow I will try the fennel bulb, zucchini, and yellow squash and see how my body likes it. That's it for today. Have a great night. If your looking for a juicer, here are some links you can check out. :)

  

Day 19, almost 3 weeks!

It's Day 19, and its now seeming normal to have my juices and being around people that eat their regular food. Since I've started, there have been several people who also started this juicing fast. At first it was only my husband and I. Now, I have 3 co-workers, 1 co-work from Chicago, 1 close friend of mine, and 1 FB/old HS friend of mine that have either started or getting started. The thing that I love most is they are doing it on their own free will. Cleansing the body is something we all need to do if you are not a healthy person. You body needs it. just like when you clean your house, car, work outside. When you clean it up it looks nice, smells clean etc. When you cleanse your body, your skin glows, your more alert, you lose some weight, most of all you've cleansed your body from all the bad toxins. You just can't beat that.

Super Green Kale. :)

Carrot base, kale, bok choy, cucumber,
and Apple. :)

This morning my usual Mean Red but added a carrot and ginger, for lunch I used a diffent type of kale. I call it SUPER DUPER Green kale, why? Because it's really dark green and it does taste bitter, but I made a carrot base, added Kale, Bok Choy, Cucumber, apple and ginger for my juice and thankfully the juice wasn't that bitter. :) Tonight I will probably do my Avo juice. I'm out of veggies and tomorrow is Farmer's Market day!! I am going to try Orange Beets and see how those taste, to change things up and see what else I can experiment with. I'm making this one short since I wrote some novels this week. Enjoy your weekend and remember you can start a juice fast anytime you want. You don't have to do 30 days. You can do a 3, 7, or a 15 day cleanse. That's a beginning to a healthier you. Be blessed and remember you only have one body, it's irreplaceable, so take care of it.

Update, no avo juice today. Went to Whole Foods and tried a new green veggie, Collard greens! It was pretty good. I had Collard greens, Kale, Chard, and apple. Very good. I bought my hubby what they call Clearly Carrot, Carrots, OJ, Beets, and Celery. The guy was so nice he gave me the extra from the juice. :) Check out the pics. :)

Collard Greens, Chard, Kale and Apple

Clearly Carrot + 1 for me. :)

Day 18, What's your Crack?

Day 18, last night went to bed late and had to wake up super early. No bueno (good) for me, it's so hard for me to break the habit and go to bed early. I really need to do that get at least 7-8 hours of sleep. That will be a goal for the next two weeks.

This morning had my usual mean Red, but with a little change up, added 1 small apple, and a cucumber, a large beet and less watermelon. Why less watermelon, because I need it to be more veggie, I tried it and it was a little "beety" but I was still able to drink it. So we will see how the tummy reacts to it. For lunch though, this may get tough. I made Kale, chard, cucumbers, celery, ginger and apple. BUT, I upped the kale, cucumbers and celery to make it a serious MEAN green. Let's see how it tastes later. Did I mention how important it is to drink water. I noticed that when I don't drink enough water, I don't go #2. When I do drink enough water, I got once to three times daily. I know it's kinda hard to just drink water all day.You can always make tea such as Jasmin, Green, Mint, Peppermint tea. Try not to use any sweetners when you do this. I know it's hard, I was one that always needed everything to be sweetened. Now I can drink anything without adding sugar to it. I was BIG on Splenda 3 years ago. I would use 5-10 packets in each water-based drink. When I did my first no-carb fast, I quit the yellow packets, it wasn't easy (see below about reactions of the body that was me) but I did eventually kicked the habit and learned that I didn't need to have everything so sweet. The one thing I hope to really kick the habit is soda especially COKE. That is MY CRACK that is sooo hard to kick. I guess it's the Corn Syrup I am still addicted to. I gave up the five whites: potatoes, rice, sugar, dairy, pasta etc. Soda is my venom, lets see if this will be the end of my miserable habit. :)

I need to get rid of this! BAD SODA!

Today I was on the JointheReboot website and was reading the forums to see if I could find a new recipes and such. I read about a person that was struggling to drink green juice. They asked for help. What I read was; they were doing more fruit (too much fruit) than veggie juice, and asked if that was okay. They also mentioned that their health was seriously declining and needed advise to help them get started. I gave them some advice about teaching their pallete to adjust to drinking the juice. I know that sounds probably a little stern, but you have to teach yourself that it's mind over matter. If you baby it, it will never happen. Thank goodness, two other people backed me up and said that the advice I gave was in the right direction. The person replied back that they will continue to try to add the greens. I hope they really do because at the end of the day if your health is declining. You need to make a change before it's too late. Again, it's only my opinion. 

I can relate to what their body is doing: it is just rejecting it and doing everything possible to make you not drink veggies and go back to your normal eating habits. When people tell me they want to start juicing because they think it's somewhat easy. If you eat veggies, it's not such a bad transition. If you never eat veggies, like to eat fried foods, sweets, fast food and never really ate healthy. Your body is going to hurt all over, and feel head, joint, and muscle pain. Your going to feel like a crack head in a rehab (seriously some do feel like that); cold sweats, chills, maybe even the shakes may happen. One needs to prepare that you are going to feel icky for 3-5 days. Mentally prepare yourself that you will be a cranky, edgy person for a few days when you begin a juice fast.

In order to help people relate to someone who had some bad days. I have a link to a woman who blogged about her 1st week juicing. It's very different from mine, so I thought it would be good for you to see someone elses experience. 

http://planetsarah.com/2012/05/16/reviewing-week-1/  ~ She has some serious medical condtions and she realizes that this fast is not about losing weight, it's about getting the body cleansed to help her lose weight in the end. Everyone gets caught up in the whole "losing weight" ordeal instead of trying to just eat healthier. I truly recommend if you are doing a juice fast to join a forum about juicing. If you don't want to join the Reboot website, join something to guide you through your fast. So many things can go wrong if you don't follow certain rules. That's all for now, I'll be back laters. Have a blessed Day!

Okay I'm back early to give an update of my lunch juice. It's a 90/10 veggie & fruit split. The verdict is: it's drinkable BUT, I taste the bitterness of the kale, the chlorophyll of the greens, and no sweetness of the apple. I bottled it up today in a glass jar and WHAT a difference it made. Juice is fresher. I'm texting my hubby to ask to take a pic of his juice to let me see if there is a difference. I'll update you on that shortly. :) Hopefully he hasn't had it yet.  Although it's fresher, I definately taste the veggie side more than the fruit. Okay back to your normal programming. :)

Back again, not too late, I went on a bike ride to my dad's house today and I rode 15.3 miles. :) Yeeyay for me! Feet feel good, no pain and I didn't get as tired as I thought. For dinner today I had what's called the "Waldorf" at Whole foods. Kale, Celery, flax seed oil, and apple. It was good but the flax seed oil was "Ehhh" I didn't like it. I am a trooper though, I finished. it. LOL See below for more pics and get ready for tomorrow's juice. This type of kale is SUPER DUPER Green! :) Check it out. Have a great night! :)



Day 17, Benefits of H2Omelon!

Good morning!

H2Omelon Mean Green Juice

Last night I made my morning juice, I wanted to try a mean green but instead of the typical orange or apple base. I decided to try watermelon, let me tell you, watermelon take any green and makes it sweet as pie. My ingredients were kale, chard, cucumber, carrots, ginger, and watermelon. I used a lot of kale and chard. The Mean green is GREEN I was a little scared to find out if would taste good. To my surprise, it tasted AWESOME! So to my fellow juicers, use watermelon and if you want to add some more green clean the rind well with a fruit brush and put the rind in it too! Click here to read about H2Omelon benefits of rind.

For lunch today, I made a less fruity juice, it was Kale, Chard, Carrot, Cucumber, and 1 apple. Normally I use 2 to make it sweeter. Like I said yesterday, I'm cutting out the fruit and try to make more vegetable juice. Trying to convince the hubby to drink my Avodrink, he's not convinced yet of how yummy it is. LOL... I went to the female doctor today and he looks at me and says "You look great Judy, what are you doing?" I told him I was juicing and he says "I keep hearing about this that it's something great to do" so we talked for a second about it and he says he has a juicer and might try the Mean Red. :) Also today,  where I work we have a facility in IL that take our calls. Their is a lady that I talk to and emailed her my blog. This was yesterday, and today I spoke to her and she is going to start to juice. That's crazy! Someone that I've never met in person but basically talk to her on a daily basis is going to start her juicing to be healthy. That's AWESOME! I'm so happy to hear that from people. :) Everyday, people are trying to do things to be healthy. I'll be back later to give you an update on dinner. Toodles!

Hello again, dinner time, I decided to do my Avojuice minus the cilantro. It still was a great drink, although hubby called it liquid guacamole. LOL. He liked the taste but not sure if he could drink it. I just drank mine and all I can say is it really fills me up when I do. I bought some bok choy to try out juicing and it juices beautifully, will let you know tomorrow how it goes. :) Have a great night everyone. See you tomorrow! :)

Day 16, the weigh in.

Hello my friends,

Today was weigh in day and as you can see I am down to 161 lbs. Which is a total of 8lbs lost. Not too shabby, especially knowing that I'm not exercising to much. I walked two times last week, and did some exercising at home. Nothing major, this week I will focus on more water, less nuts, and see if that jolts anything. I wasn't expecting too much on the weight loss, but I'm glad to see that I am dropping and not plateauing. Let's see how next week's weigh in factors in. I'll be glad to lose 16-18 lbs from this. The one thing that makes me happy is I feel better, and that's is key. I have a bigger appreciation for veggies and thinking of how to incorporate them daily once this fast is over.

People keep asking me how's your diet going? I keep explaining that this is not a diet. It's a cleanse, here is a great explantion of it.

 This is how most diets go for the average American -- let's call him Joe...

Plan A: cut calories and increase activity. Ok, that sounds simple enough. After about a week or two, Joe will decide the one or two pound weight loss per week is not worth the hunger pangs, sweets cravings and grueling excursions at the gym.

Plan B follows, shortly after Joe person gets an invitation to his high school reunion and his ex-girlfriend's wedding reception. Plan B consist of salad, veggies, and more salad until he starts dreaming of cheeseburgers in the middle of his work day. Plan B usually lasts less than 24 hours -- followed by a guilt ridden, but jittery wait in the nearest fast food drive through.

Plan F: this is when Joe finally decides, "This is just how my body is supposed to look, and I'm tired of feeling guilty each time I eat a Twinkie. I'm never going to look like Brad Pitt!"

The problem with diets, and where they fall far short of nutritional cleansing, is in the following three areas: rapid weight loss, reduced/eliminated unhealthy cravings, and long term results.

Lets go over each of these in detail...

How does cleansing help you loose weight rapidly?

Believe it or not, cleansing is not actually designed to help you lose weight, but to assist the body in its overwhelming task of flushing impurities from your system. Your body actually produces fat to encapsulate impurities (toxic air, water and foods) that enter your body. Nutritional cleansing leeches those toxins from your cells and then, as a side benefit (and a very nice one, I will say) your body will let all that extra fat melt away quickly. When done correctly, you can expect to lose 5-10 pounds in your first 10 days of a good cleanse.

How does cleansing reduce cravings?

A healthy body craves healthy foods -- that is all there is to it. When you flush impurities from your system and flood your cells with intense nutrition, you won't crave junk food. Most junk food cravings are a sign that you desperately need a certain mineral in your diet. For example, when you are craving salty foods, like potato chips, you are most likely low on sodium or chlorine. A good nutritional cleanse will flood your cells with every vitamin and mineral it needs -- resulting in less or no cravings for junk.

How does cleansing help me lose weight long term?

When impurities enter your system, your body produces fat to coat these toxins. When you diet, you lose body mass, but you still have the same amount of impurities in your system. The effect -- your body senses increased levels of toxicity and goes into emergency fat production -- this is more commonly known as the REBOUND! This is why most diets help you lose weight, but almost inevitably, you gain the weight back, and then some.

When you choose to lose weight using a nutritional cleansing, your body sheds impurities which stimulates your body to release fat. There is no rebound with cleansing since the impurities are flushed from your system and your body doesn't need to produce excess fat.

Here are the facts: cleansing will improve your health and reduce your waistline more quickly than a traditional diet. Weight loss can be a frustrating experience, so take the guess-work and "hoping for results" out of it and start a nutritional cleanse today. You are guaranteed more health and less flab.

That's the best way it can be explained. What's also funny is today I get a call from someone who I worked with years ago. They decided after all these years to call because they heard through the grapevine that I'm in "Health Industry." Amazing how people think that because I like to blog that now I want to sell Health products. Needless to say, they wanted to talk to me about this new company, and how it's going to make me money.Etc. I stopped him right away and told them I wasn't interested, thanked them and got off the phone. I guess whoever read my blog didn't see that part that I am not interested in joining anything that involves me selling anything. I don't sell juice, I'm just sharing my experience from it. If you choose to join me, it's FREE. That's the way it should be. Join The Reboot is a free site that offers free information for people getting into juicing. Okay, done venting sorry. Back to the juicing. :)

Morning juice today was H20melon including the rind (yes the green rind), carrot, beet and ginger. Very good, I enjoyed it immensely. I forgot to bring my nuts today (BIG FAIL for me) and what I have been doing to stop the hunger pangs is drinking tons of water. I even brushed my teeth to get my mind to get off of it. It got me through till lunch hour. Lunch juice was orange, kale, chard, carrot, and cucumber. Very yummy! I am having some Jasmin Tea right now, my body is rebelling that I haven't had any nuts but today I guess is my true juice fast because I have had no nuts today. LOL. For tonight, not sure what I want but I'll let you know. Chat laters!!!

Came home to find out that out water has been shut down for repair and it could be 4-5 hours of it being shut down. No water, no juicing, where to go... WHOLE FOODS!!! Had my usual and a nice can of Coconut wata! Gosh, I wish I were back in Belize, cocos are always available for fresh coco water. I love that stuff. While I was there I checked out the produce and the deliveries of fresh produce was coming out. So I bought some really fresh Kale. I was excited about it, which is not a norm for me. My hubby and I spoke about how we should implement new meal plans and include nuts, and different greens into our diet. If we want steak we only cook one and split it in half, share meat instead of cooking alot of it. I was very happy to hear he is looking to change the way we eat. Oh of course we keep juicing, just not as much. :)

When we got home, I ate some nuts (not a lot) and the water was back on. Yeeyay! That means I could make my juice. Stay tuned for tomorrows juices! Take care!!!

Half-way there! 15 DAYS! OMG!

It's Day 15, and I can't believe I've gone 2 weeks without meat, carbs, regular foods (with the exception of 2 situations). I don't feel sick, or deprived of food. The juices have filled me up, and snacking on nuts have been very important for protein. I'm making it. Now I'm going to do 15 more days to complete my fast and going to try other veggies these next two weeks. Juices will change up a little, try to do more veggie juices vs. fruit with veggies. I'm going to try to make sure that these two weeks are as cleansing as possible. I'll let you know how that goes. As far as this morning, I had my favorite juice... I got H2Omelon so I gotta make the mean red! :) For lunch it was oranges, celery, kale, ginger, cucumbers and carrots. But TONIGHT, I tried my V8 Avo drink. It was off the HOOK! Here are the pics! :)

Lime, Tomatoes, Tomatillos, Celery
Chard, Garlic, and 1/2 Jalapeno

Add 1 Avocado to the blender with
your juice.

   

Blend it, add a little salt and pepper.
Then ENJOY IT! YUMMY!

This by far was the best avocado smoothie every. If you like avocado, and want to make a veggie drink. This is the ONE! Here is what I did:

4 stalks of celery

2 Roma tomatoes

2 tomatillos

1/2 of jalapeno deseeded

1 chard leaf

1 small bunch of cilantro

1 avocado only put in blender once you make your juice! 

The rest is history. Add a little salt & pepper and BAM! You got Avojuice. The best stuff ever. This makes me feel so good after I drink it. It's going to be in my menu this week again! :) See you guys tomorrow for the Weigh in! Gotta make tomorrow's juices! Have a great night! 

Day 14, Made it to two weeks today! :)

Well guys, I made it to my 2 week mark. One day short of 15 days and I'm going for another 15 days. I want to do it to 30 days. My hubby is supporting me and will be by my side as I go for another 15 days of juicing. Today I felt a lot of headaches, I wonder if my body is getting tired of this fast. Maybe it's detoxing now, who knows. All I know is I've gotten this far, I just have 2 weeks and 2 days to go to accomplish my goal.

This morning, I decided to use all the other fruit in my fridge to make my morning juice. It was strawberries, blueberries, grapes, celery, 1/2 a beet, and ginger. I thought with the strawberries and the blueberries would take out the sweetness from the grapes. Nope, way too sweet. Note to file. mix with water. Make 1/2 of the mix and put water in it. Just note to file, I used 3 celery stalks. :) Pictured here is only one on the left. On the right you can see how this juice came out a beautiful purple. I want to call this Deep Purple Juice.

I posted this today on facebook and my friend sent me this video. It's pretty funny, sad but funny.

It's amazing how many people can relate to this video. Some people never get to have fresh juice because they simply can't afford it. It cost you $0.45 to buy Koolaid and just put sugar and water in it. Then you have a drink for the entire day. To make a liter of fresh OJ, it will probably cost you alot more buy enough oranges to juice to make it. To eat wrong is cheaper for anyone. Its sad but that's how it works...

I can relate to the video above but I was fortunate that my mom made me fresh OJ when it was in season. Back then when I was young, you got veggies in seasons. Watermelons are in the summer, Cherries, strawberries, blueberries are in the spring, corn, squash were in another season. Everything was given to you in seasons. Now-a-days, if you pay more money, you can get any type of fruit you want. Same with veggies, because they get them from different countries to give you that comfort of buying them anytime. When I was in my early twenties; I lived in Belize, in the small Caye called Ambergris Caye, you ate with what was caught from the sea and the fruits that grew on the land.You had lime trees all over, plantain, coconut, and so many types of tropical fruits but not so much on the veggies. Fish galore though... I learned to appreciate the seasons in the U.S. When I came back, I appreciated eating meat, poultry, and pork. Fish on the other hand costs money here in the states. It's not as plentiful as it was on the island in Belize. Those were the days... Ahhhh....

For lunch I had a kale, carrot, cucumber, celery, and apple juice. No need to put a picture up because you seen this before. Unless I make a new type of juice. I'm done with the pictures. For dinner I made the same one except I used oranges instead.  Making this one short because of the novel I did yesterday. Staying strong and proud I made it to two weeks. Now lets see how I make it through week 3. Stay tuned! Ciao!

JC

Day 13, Finding out how much juice veggies give!

Hello all, it's Day 13, and everything is going great! This morning's juice was the mean red. I got some watermelon yesterday so I'll be making alot of mean reds this week. I went to the farmers market and purchased some beautiful kale bunches (bought 3), celery (one bunch), carrots (bought 5 huge ones and 10 skinny ones), beet root (4 bulbs), a red and yellow pepper, cucumbers (bought 8), and gala apples (bought 6). My total was $21.50 again. Not bad for all that I got. I packed my kale, carrots, beet roots, and cucumbers and now I'm ready for the week!




Mean Green, you can see the carrot.
ginger on the left, and the cucumber
kale, celery, and apple make up the
green. :) YUM

A friend of mine was here from out of town. We went out together and she wanted to get something to eat. We went to a Pho restaurant, so to not be in a awkward situation, I ordered Pho without noodles, just the broth. I added fresh sprouts, it had green onions, mint leaves, jalapeno, lime, and saracha. It was a refreshing moment because I really didn't mess up my fast. I just had broth, ate sprouts (which is a vegetable), the green onions, lime, and jalapeno are all healthy options. The mint leaves just added flavor to the broth, and the saracha gave it some heat. I was able to enjoy my time with my friend and keep it all liquid. I drank Jasmine iced tea, and water. I went home and had my 2nd juice, which was Kale, carrot, celery, ginger, and apples. Very fresh and tasted fantastic! I stayed pretty full all afternoon, and my stomach is really been cleaning out. (if you know what I mean) In a good way, for me juicing and just eating nuts; its a lot and it's only telling me it's cleaning me out. I feel lighter, my body is slimming down. I have energy, and it's only making me realize that when you feed your body the right stuff you just feel better.

Adding pepper to the juicer. See
the yellow in the cup? :)

For dinner, I decided to try out something new. (I know, what is she doing now...) Remember I bought a red and yellow pepper. Well I decided to experiment and see how much juice can I get from these veggies you see on the right. I juiced 1 cucumber, 1 large carrot, 2 peppers, 3 celery stalks, 1/4 piece of jalapeno (de-veined and all seeds removed) and 4 kale leaves. Weird combo right? Well, not really. Peppers and carrots are sweet, Cucumber, kale, celery, and jalapenos are not sweet. So the question is with this mixture, will the juice be a hot sweet juice? I juiced the peppers and let me tell you. Peppers have a lot of water in them. Those 2 peppers gave me. 8 oz of juice. See below.





Mixing 2 peppers. Looks like a yellow
sun mixed with orange foam. :)

It gave 8 oz for 2 peppers! Not bad!

I then proceeded to roll my kale into bunches and add them to the juicer. When you do this always add a veggie or fruit that has lots of water. This will help juice any leafy veggie you use. See below. :)





Always cut your cucumbers, large carrots so that your juicer gets the most out of your veggie. Putting them uncut can cause the juicer to get stuck trying to rip the skin open. Just a few slices makes it super easy for your juicer to get the juice going. :) see the picture on the left. Nothing fancy, just two slices and you have perfect cuts for your juicer. I then added my 1/4 cut of jalapeno in this to give it a little heat.

I then added the celery, and carrots: Celery just slides down the chute you barely need to put any pressure to get them juicing, they produce alot of juice. The last picture is the halfway mark of my juicing. :)

I wanted you to see how easy this is. Many people think it's a lot of work, it's really not. Think of when you cook, you have to clean, peel your veggies, potatoes, cut the chicken, or slice the fat off the meat, season your meat, cook or bake it. Then you have to serve it. You have the stuff you prepared your meal, the pots and pans to cook, and the plates, silverware, and glasses you drink out of you have to clean. All I have to do is wash my produce, cut, make juice, then clean the juicer and cups. That's it. Don't forget you have to clean your stove too, in case something spills over and such. I'm not saying that you shouldn't cook. I'm just comparing both jobs. It's not that hard. It's pretty easy. Less dishes and pots and pans to wash. Less wait for your dinner, and it's ready in 10 mins or less.  It's just a change of how you eat. Just saying. It makes sense right? To do this to clean your body out of all metals, toxins from the fat in the meats you eat. Clean your GI tract, pancreas, liver, kidneys, blood, lymphatic system. Reboot your metabolism and heart with healthy vitamins, phyto and micronutrients. Giving you body beta-carotene shower to clean any type of tumorous cells that could be lurking in your body. Cleaning your colon with waterous veggie juice and cleaning it completely. Isn't that worth a 3 or 15 day cleansing. I think it is...

To all of you who don't think that your health isn't worth all the hassle of doing a detox. It's okay. Some people have genes that have very good metabolism, fights toxins and such. Every person is different. But with the US being the highest percentage of people being obese, having diabetes, cancer, and taking the most medication in the world. Why is going on a juice fast such a voodoo thing? Is it that society would prefer to eat junk food, drink high fructose corn syrup soda, and eat fast food and think that you will live to be 100? I don't know about you. I prefer to try this and see how I can change my life and be a healthy person. Does that mean I will never eat BBQ, steak, fried chicken etc? No, I will eat it from time to time but now I think what I will do is eat in moderation and always add fresh veggies with my bad food. Even if it means for me to take home my meals and at home have this with a fresh salad or make a green juice to take all the fats, and bad stuff from my body. Or who knows maybe I won't crave BBQ, which I really don't think that would happen but who knows. The thing is that I will be aware of what I'm doing to my body when I have that Mac & Cheese from 4Rivers BBQ, or that hamburger from 5Guys with fries that were from potatoes from Idaho with Malt vinegar and ketchup. Food is whatever we give our body. Our body doesn't care what we eat, our minds will process it and make fat, and stick it somewhere in our bodies. If we teach our brain that we eat healthy foods, it will cleanse and regenerate clean cells to clean out our insides and it will give us clearer minds, feel good days, energy to handle those stressful days. Sky is the limit.

Do what you need to do. I'm only expressing what I feel and would never tell anyone to do this with out the consultation of a doctor if you have medical condition. I'm no doctor, just someone who wants to live healthy and not have to take medicine for things that I can stop from happening. Diabetes, obesity, hypertension, stress, and GI diseases. I'm all about keeping "me" healthy. Good luck to all of you and have a great night. :) Remember if you have questions. Please send them in the comments. I promise to write back or you can ask me on Facebook. I'm here to help if you need it..

JC









Day 12, tried new combinations for juicing!

Top one was breakfast, bottom one
was lunch. :) Stackables!

Hey y'all, Day 12 and today's juices were different from my others. Reason? Well, my mom bought me some blueberries, strawberries, and grapes. So I decided to try for my morning juice to have strawberries, blueberries, green lettuce, celery and ginger. Let me tell you this; You need a lot of blueberries (I put 3 cups of it) and strawberries (I used 10 of them) to get 4 oz of this juice. Note to file buy 3-4 pints if you want to make a juice of blueberries and strawberries. Morning juice came out not sweet but smelled awesome! Taste wise it wasn't very sweet but it was drinkable. I can't complain, I guess I'm getting use drinking them regardless of sweetness. My brain is adjusting to this thing, thank goodness! Went to work and had a great day there and for my lunch I made a Carrot, Beetroot leaves, green lettuce, celery, ginger and grape juice. That came out pretty good, sweet and very fresh. Overall, I try to do my best in this and people ask me are you going to do the full 30 days. I decided that I will go 30 days. I think by my 30 days, I will have truly change my ways of eating and continue to juice and include it in my daily meals. I'm starting to really enjoy drinking my veggies and will hope that I can start eating these veggies and have the best of both worlds.

Hot Juice! :)

For dinner, I didn't have much veggies leftover to make a juice. Only a tomato, beets, cilantro, and radishes. Yeah I know doesn't sound to yummy. So I went to the farmer's choice (Veggie supermarket) and bought the following: jicama, jalapeno, avocado and celery. I made a juice with a tomato, cilantro, radishes w/ leaves, celery, jicama, and 1/4 of a jalapeno (de-veined and seeded). This is what the juice look like. --------------------------->



Think about these ingredients, radishes is known for the vitamin C and it's cancer protection properties. Jicama has potassium, vitamin A & C, calcium and magnesium. Tomato has a huge amount of lycopene, vitamin B6, C, and K and so many other things. Cilantro leaves are anti-inflammatory, anti-fungal, anti-bacterial, anti-microbial, and they're a chelator (remove heavy metals from the body). Jalapenos are rich in antioxidants, is a anti-inflammatory, vitamins A and C, as well as bioflavonoids. This juice is a very nutritious one and I just added one more thing... I took my blender out and put 1 little Haas Avocado and blended the juice with it. This was my end result. A smooth, creamy drink. I fell in love when I tried it. It was by far the best drink I ever had without fruit. This one you cannot put away for the next day. This has to be consumed IMMEDIATELY. Because you can't save Avocado unless you have those machines that you can take and suck out all the air to make it airtight to save the juice. If you try to save it, it will turn dark brown and probably not taste so good.

YUMMY SOO GOOD!

I almost felt I was having a soup instead of a drink. I put a little garlic powder in and it just made it taste even better. I almost grabbed a spoon and started eating it like a soup. :) But I drank it, it took a while but it was a amazing dinner. :) Day 12 is over and I'm exited for tomorrow because it's Saturday and it's FARMER'S Market Day! I'll take pictures of what I find and what will be on next week's menu of juices. Have a safe weekend and remember you can contact me anytime on FB at http://www.facebook.com/#!/salsera54 and ask me anything. I will try to guide you and help you as much as I can. Good Night!

Day 11, my halfway mark is getting closer.

Good Morning friends, it's Day 11, and each day that passes my fast becomes a little easier. You will have weak moments but you must drink some water and tell yourself that you can do this. This morning I made my favorite juice Mean Red. Watermelon, beets, and this time I added ginger. Very refreshing, I'm addicted to ginger I must admit. Ginger gives my juice a nice kick, helps my digestion and it's a anti-inflammatory for your body. If I could drink this 365 days a year, I think I would. LOL.. I'm only 4 days from my halfway mark of my fast. Soon I will need to decide if I want to continue on my 30 day fast journey, or will I start incorporate my juicing into my diet. My husband will stop at 15 days and will incorporate juice into his diet and start eating healthier. At least that is the goal. It's so hard sometimes to make that change, but at some point we have to say we are going to do this or we say no we aren't. Decisions one must make. Have you decided to take a chance and do a Juice fast? I'm telling you if I can do it, you can too! :)

Update on my feet, they are "pain-free" for now, it's not cured but my feet are no longer hurting for now. It's like they blocked all the pain and I have new feet. I still have to do stretches and exercise them daily, because my scar tissue is still there. It's a waiting game to see how long these shot lasts. In my last one it was 2 months. So for right now, I have 2 months to start my exercise program and start to move around to tone up my body. When your on a fast, it's not recommended to do extreme workouts. I brisk walk 30-45 mins a day will give you plenty of workout and get your heart rate up. You can do weights, and such just remember to drink water or coconut water to rehydrate yourself. Don't continue to work out if you feel lightheaded or dizzy. I took a walk on Tuesday, and Wednesday did some floor exercises, and used the stability ball to workout my arms and legs. Today hopefully the weather will permit me to take another brisk walk. Let's see what happens. I'll be back later for lunch and dinner updates.

Green Monster

Back boy do I have a lot to say, this evening I had a meeting where it was going to be impossible for me to juice for dinner. So I went to my 2nd juice home Whole Foods, a good friend came with me and she wanted to have a "juice dinner" with me. I love when my friends take a chance to try something new. So I ordered my usual Kale, Chard, Ginger, and Apple juice. My girl friend ordered the "Green Monster" it has NO fruit in the juice. Which I was like are you sure? She said yup, I can't risk my blood sugar to go too high. So I said "okay" but the ingredients were brutal. Kale, Chard, Celery, Cucumber, Spinach and ginger." Whoa that's the MOMBA JAMBA of green juice. So I got mine first and I let her try mine and she said "Wow, that's really good." Her juice was given to her seconds after trying mine and when she took a a sip. Her face was priceless, "She says damn I can taste the celery big time!" I tried this and let me tell you it was the strongest Green juice I have ever tasted you can see and taste the chlorophyll in it. It left my tongue with a numbing like effect. I asked her if she was okay and she said "yep, i'm good." I felt bad because that was a strong juice to try for the first time. I drank my juice and she had like 1/2 of if left, so I asked if she was going to finish it and she said "Hell no." So I started to drink this monster green juice. I had to chase it with the foam from my juice to finish those last 8 oz. I thought my stomach was going to turn inside out, but to my delight, it didn't and I never felt so full in my life. It's strange how this juice filled me up and it's 10:00pm and I have no desire to eat. I have to say that if one has the will power to try making this juice. All the power to you, because it's a hard one to swallow.

Today I took a brisk walk around my neighborhood, I walked about one mile and it took me 45 minutes. It was great to be able to walk and not feel pain on my heels again. I still have to take it easy. I want these shots to last for a long time. I pray that I don't get the pain again. :) I will continue to find alternative ways to get my exercise in. Day 11 is over. Enjoy the weekend!

Day 10, Going good! Mean Green day!

It's about 7:30 am and I'm at work on Day 10. Drank my hot water with lemon and added a slice of ginger. Thing is I let it sit there for like 10-15 minutes and I didn't taste any of the ginger, not sure what I did wrong but I guess I'll have to research it to find out how to get the ginger out of it.

This morning I am having a weird mix but like I said before you got to try everything to find out what the do's and don't are. I made a Orange, Chard, Kale, tomato, and celery juice. I know Tomato probably threw you off. Well you're right, don't add tomato in your green juice and don't let it sit overnight. It changes the flavor and I can't quite get what it is and it's drinkable but I'm not enjoying it this morning. Lesson learned no tomato unless you make a gazpacho juice drink or V8 type drink. My opinion, maybe you will like the taste. :)

I'm starting to see the results of weight loss, my face is getting thinner, my pants at work are looser and overall body is starting to change. All of this gives me more strength to endure this fast for 30 days. I get many of my friends ask me how's it going, how do I do this? Not eating must be crazy, and you know it is crazy as it seems but many people go on Slimfast, weight watchers, etc. People replace their meals with a Slimfast or Ensure protein drink. What's the difference? The only difference is I'm making real juice and replacing my meal with that. It's a fast, not a permanent thing. It's a internal cleansing of all the organs so that you can start fresh with a better sense of eating. Of course your going to get some people that disagree about doing this type of fast and that you can just drink H2O to cleanse the body. It's true you can do that but now a days, water is so contaminated you have to filter it so aren't you losing minerals from it too? Fruits and vegetables are known to have essential vitamins, micro nutrients, enzymes, chlorophyll, phytonutrients etc. Think about it, I'm one to definitely say that I never ate vegetables as a kid. In fact, I didn't start eating green veggies till my late 30's. I loved my spaghetti O's, mac and cheese, corn, potatoes, white rice, rice and chick peas w/ pork rinds in them, beans with fatty ribs in them, maduros (Fried Plantains,) etc. as a kid. My healthy drink as a child was Ovaltine that had Vitamins in it. How much? I didn't care because it tasted like Malt Chocolate and I didn't matter it was sweet. I'm sure some of you can relate to that. Your parents probably made spinach, broccoli, or beet salad and you never put it on your plate. I know I didn't and my parents never made me eat it. So for someone like me who never ate veggies as a child it became a difficult transition in my later years. I had to teach myself to try green veggies and eat them. So in my 30's I realized I like Broccoli, Cauliflower, carrots, yellow squash, yellow,green, red peppers, and zucchini either raw or cooked "al dente." That's it. No Brussels sprouts, cabbage, kale, chard, collard greens, spinach, arugula etc. Those didn't look appealing and I didn't care how nutritious they are. Not my problem back then. Now I look at how I make these juices and I don't necessarily have to eat them but make a juice to incorporate them in my diet. It's easier, and I'm getting all the micro nutrients from them, I'm drinking anywhere from 250-400 calories in each of them. I'm not losing weight because I'm on a 500 calorie diet and taking HGC drops. Sorry to those who do that or sell it but 500 calories is crazy and it's a starvation diet. I'm consuming about 1500 calories a day through my juices and nuts I eat a day. That's normal, I don't know many people will have their opinions, and their doubts, but I read and watch Juice fasting stories and for a lot of people it's working. Maybe it's not for everyone, but this one is for me. That's my story for today. I told you I was going to be honest. I'm a brutally honest person, none of this is meant to hurt anyones feelings, it's my thoughts and I respect everyone's opinion. I would expect you would respect mine also and we can always: "Agree to Disagree" at the end of the day as long as you are happy with what you do with your health, makes me just as happy. It's your body. That's all this morning folks. Pictures to be posted later of juices. See you soon. Here is a article on juice fasting if you like to read it. Click Here!


 I'mI'm back as promised. My dinner juice was Kale, Chard, celery, green leafy lettuce, carrot, ginger, blueberries and apple with a hint of Coconut water. It was pretty good, a little carroty but the ginger gave it a nice hint heat. Here are my pics from my juicing yesterday and today. It's not that bad and honestly if you really want to do this you don't have to fast. Just add a juice into your diet. Make it your mid-morning snack, or add it to your meal. The cleansing effect will be priceless for your health. Tomorrow's juices are my #1 favorite Watermelon, ginger, and beets. Lunch is Kale, Chard, carrot, cucumber, lettuce, orange and apple. Have a great night Day 10 is OVER! :)

Day 9, New day, Seize the Day!

Morning Jamba, Watermelon, Beets,
Cucumber SO REFRESHING!

It's day 9, this morning when I woke up at 5am, I took my foot braces off and when I went to the bathroom. I didn't feel any pain on my right foot, my left was sore but it wasn't painful, more like achy. I got ready and I still stretched and did my normal exercises for my feet to start my day. I am just wondering how long these shots will last this time. In the past four times I went and got them the shots lasted anywhere from 2-6 months. My last set of shots were in December 2011, but I was back in the office by February and they again wanted to give me another set of shots. At this time, I told them I didn't want to do it anymore so they referred me to a Vein Specialist which was a complete waste of my time. He told me that there was nothing wrong with my veins. Of course they still wanted to do an ultrasound on my legs and feet to see if there was "anything" wrong with them. No, that would cost me out of pocket $200. It's amazing they are so ready to charge you everything and you have to pay so much out of pocket. :( What can you do.

On a good note, I had my juice this morning which was DELICIOUS! Watermelon, Beet, Cucumber, and Celery. I think that is by far the best combo! I love it! This afternoon's juice will be apple, cucumber, kale, beet, carrot, celery and blueberries. Trying to make the afternoon more green less fruit but blueberries has so many antioxidents I don't want to miss out on them. I will be back later to discuss my day, and I'll be weighing my self too! Let's see what 9 days has brought to me. :) Stay tuned!

Red Mean Juice! Beets, Carrot, Kale,
Cucumber, Spinach, Celery
and Apple. Yummers!

I can't believe it! 5 lbs gone! :)

Okay so I couldn't wait till later this evening, I called my co-worker to see if she was in the office (She has the scale in her office) and I went to weigh myself. Now I didn't work out at all since I started, so when I weighed myself last Tuesday, I was 169.4. Today I weigh 164.2! I lost 5 lbs, which is awesome for me. It's very difficult for me to lose weight especially when I can't workout. So it's a great day for me! Today's lunch juice was Apple, Carrot, Cucumber, Beets, Celery, Kale, a few blueberries. Pretty good tasting so it went fast! I still think there should be a Mean Red Juice that compliments a Mean Green juice. Regardless, the weight loss has given me a lift and makes me stronger to hold out on doing my juicing fast now. Alright I'll be back later with dinner. Happy Juicing!

Hello, yes it's late been busy doing things but for dinner I had a Clearly Carrot juice from WF. It was carrots, apple, beet, and kale. It was very carroty but good nevertheless. Til tomorrow day 9 is OVA! PEACE!

Day 8, not a good day. :(

Day 8, started off well with a Apple, kiwi, celery, spinach, and orange juice. I went to my doctor's appointment to find out what was the next steps to my feet situation. We spoke about what was going on which is I have a very serious case of Plantar Fasciitis (DUH, already know that) since the physical therapy didn't help much. He discontinued my therapy, and told me to allow him to try giving me cortisone shots. (5th time getting them) I express my concern with them and he told me if this time the shots don't work then he will put me on a Foot stabilizer boot for 6 weeks on one foot and 6 weeks on the other to see if that cures it. Here is my result of my shots. Those are bruises and my feet are very tender.


They pinched it right on the fascia. :(



I went back to work and my day was pretty horrible, I experienced headaches all day. I had lunch today hoping it would take the headaches away, but I actually felt worse and my feet were so sore that it hurt just sitting with my feet just on the ground. I had some almonds for a snack and nothing worked. I was pretty upset about it but I made it through the day and when my husband picked me up. He saw how upset I was about the pain in my foot. He told me I should take some asprin or a pain reliever to help with the pain. The thing he forgot is when I take any type of medication it's I get a extremely upset stomach when I don't eat anything. He then continued to tell me that I really needed to reconsider due to the pain. My decision had to be break the fast and eat something to take the pain pills or deal with the pain. So after considering it, I decided to eat a egg and a piece of Sprouted Grain bread and my juice so I can take my pill. Yeah, I broke it but in the end, my feet are better and I just hope tomorrow the cortisone kicks in and i'm able to be pain free for a little bit. Tomorrow I will be back on track. I guess when push comes to shove one must do what they got to do. We all fall off the wagon sometimes. All we can do is get up and back in and try not to fall again.  Till tomorrow m friends. This is a short one, I need to rest. Long day tomorrow. But i'm ready to seize the day! Day 9 is a new beginning...

Day 7, My first week done!

It's now my 7th day of juicing. This morning I woke up rather late and started to juice. I wanted to make something different today. So today I did Orange, Blueberries, Apple, Carrots, Celery, Kiwi and Spinach. I know crazy combo, but as it came out I was saying eww the color was horrible. When i tried it, very sweet can't taste the celery or spinach and it was pretty darn good. I feel good and it's giving me a good vibe that I'm going to be able to do this for another 2 weeks. It's Father's Day today so I'm going to make this a short one so I can go spend it with my dad. I'll be back later with my lunch juice and dinner. Enjoy your SUNDAY! Happy Father's day to all!

I'm back, for lunch today I had another Juice date with the hubby at Whole Foods. I'm so glad we have one not to far away from us. It just makes things so convenient for us if we aren't in the mood to juice. Then my hubby went and bought us a new juicer! A Jack Lalanne juicer, it's such an upgrade from the other one. Bigger mouth to put your veggies and fruits in, much faster in making juice. So am I happy? HELL yes I am, thank you my wonderful husband! He has been such a great support in my fast, I don't know what I do if he was eating regular and just me juicing. I just hope and pray that all this effort pays off for the both of us health wise. I know the one thing that it has done is making me a believer that one can eat their vegetables. Maybe I can't eat them, but I can drink them. If that helps me become a health conscious person then it's a win-win.

Tonight's juice was apple, pear, kale, cucumber, spinach, celery, lime, carrots, and beetroot leaves (no beet.) What I am realizing, is when you use lime, or lemon, you must drink that juice immediately. If you put it in the fridge and let it sit. The citrus will take over the entire drink and you won't taste anything but the lime. So for you newbies, unless you really like lemon/lime, do use it in your juice and let it sit... That's it for tonight. Day 7 is officially over... Starting week 2 tomorrow! So excited! Stay tuned!

Day 6 Weekend is here.

Woke up this morning and even though I brush my teeth 2-3 times a day. I always feel like they aren't clean enough. :( I'm wondering if it's from the juicing the particles of the juice are getting stuck in my teeth. I'll have to ask my dentist when I go see her next time. This morning I made a refreshing Watermelon, Beet, and Carrot juice. WOW, now that's a awesome combo, woke me up and I was ready to go. I picked up my parents and went to the local farmer's market in Winter Park. It's my favorite one because it's HUGE and has 3-4 different veggie stops so you can stop and compare prices and produce.

To my surprise, I bought $21 worth of veggies and it's ALOT of veggies. Take a look! Just to give you a breakdown:

6 Beets roots
6 Fat Carrots (not the skinny ones you see at the store)
8 Cucumbers (8-9" long and 1 1/2 inches thick)
2 bunches of kale
1 bunch of Celery
9 Roma tomatoes
1 bunch of parsley
1 bunch of radishes (hidden behind the beet leaves.

You can't go wrong with that! I was super excited. Just remember to go buy veggies at the market get there EARLY. You'll get the freshest produce. My parents were so surprised of how serious I was with my juicing that they bought veggies because they now want to eat more veggies in their diet. LO...

For lunch today I made my own V8 type juice. It had Celery, cucumber, carrots, tomatoes, cilantro, beets, spinach, and radishes. No fruit, I wanted to see if i could deal with drinking it just like a V8. You know, it was pretty damn good. Refreshing, but different. I added some pepper and a dash of salt and DAMN it tasted even better. Next time I'm gunna put a jalapeno to give it some kick! I'll be back later to do my dinner. But here are some pics from this morning's juice and such. See ya later. Day 6 is going great!!! :) It's a Red Juice day! :)

This was this morning's juice.
I call this "Taste the Rainbow" juice

My version of V8. Not too bad. :)

Drinking this was such a refreshing
breakfast! 

I'm back~ Well this afternoon was quite interesting. If you read earlier this week I mentioned about being regular and that it was surprising due to me being on this fast. Today was the "liquid Draino" day for me. Thank goodness it was only one bad moment. It could of been worse. So it does happen, and it's all for the good of getting you "clean and cleared." LOL... I just hope now that my intestines and getting squeaky clean and with today's Red Mean juice I gave my Kidneys and Liver a good cleanse. Tonight's dinner was leftover my V8 juice and I did have a few slices of Red/Yellow pepper in the raw. I was at a party and that was the healthiest thing on the table. So I took a few slices of that and enjoyed chewing them slowly and in my mouth "juicing" them. I know. I'm crazy. 

Now I am about to finish up my Father's Day gift for my daddy. Can't wait to see him tomorrow! To all the Father's out there. Happy Father's Day!! 

If you have questions about juicing, you can go here and click on "PLANS" and you can try it out. 

Good Night. Day 6 is over! Yeeyay!