Getting and Staying Healthy After Fifty

I won’t even finish that sentence. This is a rant, because I feel like I was screwed.

I suffered for 12 of the 14 days I was trying to get through the master cleanse, and I can’t see any results other than losing 5 lbs. I’m already starting to gain back. I don’t feel healthier, have more energy, or any of the other stuff they claim. I wish I had never done it.

Plus, my bowels are now so messed up, I can’t even have a BM! I’m glad I didn’t take the laxative every day, or they’d be worse. 

I feel like I wasted two weeks on something totally worthless, when Icould have been doing the juice/raw food diet, been healthier, and lost more weight.

Of course you’ll lose weight if you don’t eat, but let me tell you the downside.  No matter how dedicated you are, when you start eating solid food again, you WILL have all the same cravings that you had before.

Today, I went to buy carrots for my juice fast, and guess what?  I bought candy. I still have the same sugar cravings, and if possible, they are worse than before.

So don’t torture yourself on the Master Cleanse. It’s not going to do you any good for losing weight, and may actually be bad for you.

I’ll never do it again, that’s for sure!  And now I’m stuck with four jars of molasses. Guess I’ll be drinking molasses in my coffee for awhile. Yep, I’m drinking coffee, and loving every single cup. 

Am I still going to try to lose weight? Yes, but with something that won’t almost kill me, and will actually work. I’m doing juicing and raw food for the next six months.  I’ll actually be healthier and thinner without putting my body through what I had to put it through with this. 

I know some of you people who are addicted to this MC thing will say “Well, you cheated, and you didn’t follow it exactly, blah, blah, blah.”  I don’t care what you say, this thing is just something to take advantage of desperate people like myself.  I knew when I had the horrendous leg cramps that this thing wasn’t giving me the right nutrition, like it claims.

No more. No fads, no starvation, just food that is actually healthy for me and lots of exercise.   I’ll lose the weight I want to, but when I do, my system will not be this screwed up.

Wonder how long it will be before it gets straightened out? 

11/28/08 (oops! Forgot to publish)

I spent the day yesterday in pain. I figured it was a healing crisis, so I finally took four ibuprofen and went to bed when I could stand it no longer. My gut just felt twisted, and I was having a hard time even standing up straight.

So I spent yesterday sipping O.J., and suffering. Today, I brewed up the veggie soup I will be eating for the next three days. It really isn’t much, not really homemade, and definitely not organic. This is what I put in:

1 can of potatoes
1 can of diced tomatoes
1 can of whole kernel corn
1 can of lima beans
1 can of kidney beans (for protein)
2 sliced carrots
2 sliced celery stalks
1 cup frozen okra
1 medium chopped onion
1 tsp chopped garlic
a little Nature’s Seasons
a tad of salt

All I can eat all day of this is the broth, and a few of the veggies with it tonight. I had forgotten how good veggie soup broth was! I always add meat to my veggie soup, so I hadn’t had any real veggie broth for awhile now. I’m definitely liking it, and of course, as it simmers away, the broth gets yummier and yummier each cupful.

I seriously could live on veggie soup, which is good, because I intend to live on it for the next three days, then go on a raw food diet. I think I have enough, but if not, I’ll just make some more.

Oh, and I have no idea how much weight I’ve lost, because it keeps fluctuating up and down according to my scale. I just know the bloat is gone in my upper belly, and my lower belly is much smaller. I’m thinking probably from 8-10 lbs. so far, if I’m judging by how my pants fit.

11/29/08

This veggie soup really is pretty good. Not what I’m used to, because I usually put beef in it, but I’m enjoying it.

Yesterday, I was putting 2 parts broth to 1 part veggies, and today I’m doing 2 parts veggies to 1 part broth.

On the upside, I just tried on my stretch/skinny jeans, and they actually pulled on over my butt. First time I’ve been able to wear them for two years. I tried my size 10’s, but they’re still too tight in the waist, so probably another ten days for those.

Tomorrow, I eat soup all day, then Monday, I start the juice fast with one meal in the evening. That should knock off another 10 lbs. by Christmas, doncha think? I hope so.

My belly is really flabby, so I’m starting calesthenics tonight. Just 25 reps of everything, but you have to start somewhere, right? I’ll do 25 for three days, add 1, then repeat until I’m up to 50. Then I’ll add one a day until I’m up to 100. By then it should be pretty easy to do 100 of each.

I’m really psyched! Even though I didn’t follow the master cleanse exactly, and cheated some, I still got the results I wanted, so I’m motivated to go forward with this.

Modified Juice/raw food fast, here I come!

I’m tired or torturing myself. I must not have been very toxic, because I never had a lot of detox symptoms, except for the coated tongue, which will just have to stay that way.

I’m really sick of the whole thing. I’m still hungry, and the energy I had on day four and five is totally gone. I’ve only lost 5 lbs, which I will gain back as soon as I start eating again.

So today I will only drink the lemonade, no salt water flush, no laxatives, no torture. Tomorrow I am going to start the four day routine to come off the fast, although I think it’s probably pointless, and unless I lose another 5 lbs. over the next 4 days, I’ll consider this whole thing a bust.

Besides which, I absolutely have to take my vitamins from now on, because last night I was up four times with severe cramping in my feet, which can only be a potassium deficiency. I took a multi last night, or rather at 4 a.m. this morning, and I will continue to take my vitamins from here on out.

I’ll do the modified fast after the four days, drinking the lemonade and tea during the day, and having a salad for supper. No laxatives, though. I’m done with laxatives, even bulk laxatives. I figure a raw food diet is laxative enough.

So ends the torturous 10 day fasting experience. I’m really horrible at fasting. I don’t ever intend to do it again. I’ll do the modified fast for a month and see what happens, then I’ll add another raw food meal and stick with that for a month.

I know that one reason I failed so miserably is that I didn’t do any exercise to speak of. I admit that. I intended to, but didn’t because I had more important things to do, and my mind just wouldn’t wrap around the exercise thing. Now I’m truly too tired to exercise, other than walking up to the store for food, which is exercise, I guess. I will try to walk faster, so as to burn more calories.

My advice to anyone trying this Master Cleanse is not to be tough on yourself if you fail. It’s a very, very hard thing to do for ten days and four days after. Not a lot of people succeed their first time out. So if it doesn’t work for you, try something new and keep on keeping on.

Well, at least my scale says I lost another pound. I haven’t done my salt water flush, so I may lose another after that, but gain it back as soon as I drink some more lemonade.

I actually saw a waistline this morning! Been a long time since I’ve seen that.

My tongue has this grayish-greenish coating, which I sincerely hope goes away in the next two days. Tomorrow is my last day on this fasting, so if it’s not gone after the four days of orange juice and vegetable soup, I may have to just go back on it until it clears.

I can sincerely say that the absolute worst part of this whole thing is the salt water flush. I hate it! I even add a little lemon juice to make it more bearable, and I still hate it! I also hate having to run to the potty every ten minutes for two or more hours. I’ll be so glad when the next two days are over, so I don’t have to do that anymore.

I used the fiber laxative last night, and got solids out this morning. I saw a couple more of those solid ball looking things. Someone said those were bile stones, but mine weren’t green. They are just sort of oblong and really solid. Hard to think those things have been in me all this time. Eck!

So my friend the health nut says that if I continue with the lemonade during the day and raw veggie meal at night, I will still detox and still lose a lot of weight. She’s done this for up to 60 days with no ill effects.

I’ve been really cold the last couple of days. Last night, my thermostat said 76 without the heat on, and I was freezing. Had a hard time getting warm when I went to bed last night, although it was 74 in the house. Had to crank up the heated mattress pad to 4, which is very unusual. I’ve never put it on over 3, except that one night when it got down to 25.

The burning in my gut is gone, although it’s still rumbling. Must be the salt water.

More tomorrow…

O.K., first off, I had a catastrophe last night and had to cheat.  The cayenne pepper in my lemonade had a clump that didn’t dissolve, and when it got into my mouth, and I spit it out, it went into my eye.  I rinsed it out quickly, but that eye is still a bit blurry.  I’m sure it will be fine.

The bad part was that it was still in my mouth, and my mouth was on fire, so I had to eat bread to make it stop burning.  Yes, bread.  Big no-no.  Besides which, it made me very hungry once the bread started to digest, and those carbs got into my system.

The hunger has carried over to today, and while I’ve tried to fight it, I haven’t been successful.  But no more bread.  I did eat a handful of Cheerios, a half grapefruit without sugar, and some iceberg lettuce.  So I’ll take a laxative tonight, and hopefully, I will not be starving like this tomorrow.  This whole experience has just been strange.  

I guess eating is supposed to make me sick now, but it hasn’t.  Of course, I haven’t exactly been faithful to the fast, so I guess my body did not ever get “unused” to food.  I think I’ve made it three days out of 7 with no food at all.  Still, I have lost 5 lbs.  I had hoped to lose ten, but there are still 3 days of the fast, and 4 days of coming off of the fast coming, so maybe I’ll lose more.

I have been thinking I really screwed this thing up, because I wasn’t having any detox symptoms, other than the caffeine withdrawal headaches the first couple of days.

Today, my tongue is coated, which is a good sign.  Also, the salt water flush brought out two big chunks that weren’t anything I’ve eaten lately.  It might be the hamburger patty I ate on day one, but I took a laxative that night, so that should have been gone through me.  These chunks were really hard and solid, and didn’t look like anything I’ve ever eaten.

So it begins…the detoxing!  I am so happy to see this!  It spurs me on to keep on with the detox, and not cheat anymore.  I really wasn’t hungry last night at all.  Probably won’t be tonight either, and if I’m not, I’m not eating.

I read on one site where it said you could take brief “rests” from the detox and stay on it by drinking the tea during the day, then eating a light supper at night for a month, then go back onto the detox.  I might try that until I lose what I want to, because honestly, I don’t see this doing the whole trick for me.  I need to lose about 25 lbs.  I’ve lost 4 so far, but I don’t want to stop until it’s all gone.

I’m thinking I’ll do this 14 days (10 days + 4 days after diet), then do the tea and lite supper for a month, then do another detox and see what happens.  I never get hungry during the day anyway, so that ought to work for me. 

I finally weighed this morning, and I’ve lost 4 pounds in 4 days! I know I’ll eventually gain half of this back, but right now, it feels pretty good.

I can feel that my jeans aren’t quite so tight around my waist, in fact, I look like I’m actually getting a waist again. It’s a good feeling!

I did take my laxative last night, and it’s been a lot easier not to cheat tonight. I only had a small piece of watermelon for supper, which means my appetite is going away.

The bad part is that I didn’t drink all 8 of my cups of lemonade today. I just have a hard time getting it done, somehow, with everything else I need to do. I did drink 6, though, so not so bad.

I’ve been feeling terribly guilty because I’m not sticking to this fast the way I’m supposed to. I realize I won’t get the benefits that I would have if I had, but I can’t let myself feel guilty.

Talking to my friend, the health nut, and she gave me some perspective. I told her I had cheated, but that I only ate two stalks of celery and drank a cup of coffee because I was having flashing lights in front of my eyes, and thought I might be getting a migraine.

I felt more guilty about the food than the coffee (I considered the coffee medicine). She said “My God! You’re eating less than an anorexic! Why do you feel guilty?”

And that’s true. I only am cheating with a celery stalk or iceberg lettuce, or maybe a piece of watermelon, all acceptable during a fast. I don’t wolf down a whole ton of it, just enough to get my craving to chew out of the way.

I just refuse to feel guilty anymore! I’m going to carry on with the Cleanse, but I won’t call it a fast anymore. I’m going to eat as little as I have been, but if I get a craving to chew something, I’m going to eat something raw and acceptable.

Raw food diets cleanse your body anyway, right? So doing the detox thing and eating very little raw food can’t be bad for me. I’m still detoxing. Maybe I won’t detox as quickly, or as thoroughly as if I did it the way the book prescribes, but I’m not going to let guilt get in my way anymore.

Again, I’m not hungry all day until about 7 p.m., then I’m famished! I swear, I could eat the keys off the keyboard!

I talked to my friend who is all into healthy living and fasting and she said that if I absolutely have to eat something, eat celery or plain iceberg lettuce. Both of those are nothing but fiber and water, and won’t hurt the fast. So I bought celery today, and just got through eating a stalk.

O.K., this next part is potty stuff, so you might not want to read it if it offends you.

The laxative I took last night didn’t work too well, and I had to wait until almost 2 p.m. to do my salt water flush, because I went shopping with a friend. Since I don’t have a car, I have to go whenever she’s going.

Well, the salt water flush really worked this time! I was supposed to go for a walk with her at 4, and I didn’t know if I was going to be able to go. I finally went, and thank heaven she was busy with something and I had to wait, because I had to hit the bathroom twice while I was there. I managed to make it around the block (1.3 miles) without any incidents, but I had to head for the bathroom as soon as I got in the door.

I’m drinking the lemonade in 16 oz. sizes now, instead of the 8 oz. cups. I figure it will make me drink more of it. I’m drinking one now, and have one more to go to make my 6 cups for today. No way am I going to make it to 8, since I got such a late start. Well, maybe if I stay up late.

On the up side, I lost a pound already. I’m sure it’s only water, but hey, it’s gone! My friend says I should lose at least 5 -7 lbs. by the end of the 7th day (one week). I know that’s only water, because you can actually lose 5 lbs. in a week just by not eating salt.

I’m going to start power walking tomorrow. I’ve been too wrapped up in personal stuff to think about it for the last three days.

All in all, not a bad day. I’m happy with it. I do hope the hunger goes away by tomorrow. I’ve been craving french fries something awful!

11:20 a.m. EST

Just finished my salt water flush…ECK! I do it in two stages, half at a time, and I do add lemon to it to make it go down a little easier. Now I just have to wait for it to work.

This is easily the worst part of my day. I’m not doing the laxative tea at night, because it’s just too harsh for me. Instead, I’m taking a fiber laxative, which the salt water flush eliminates from my body along with all the stuff it’s picked up along the way.

4:45 p.m. EST

The salt water flush didn’t work this morning. Still, I don’t feel hungry at all, and haven’t all day. I still have three more cups of lemonade to go for the day. I tried to save them until evening, because I always get so hungry in the evening. I thought it would be good to have something to drink. Onward and upward!