Completed 14 days of Juice Fast

It's been a couple of weeks now since I completed my juice fast.  I drank only fruit and vegetable juices for 14 days.  When I began, I didn't know how long I would juice for and had a sense that my body would let me know when it was time to eat solids again. I was right, my body was loud and clear when it was time to have regular food.

First, I should say that juicing was a great experience.  I've never done a fast that lasted longer than 24 hours before.  I did very well with only having high concentrated vitamins and nutrients in fluid form.  It's amazing how many carrots it takes to make a 20 oz glass of juice.  Ray and I were going through enormous bags of carrots, apples, ginger, kale and celery.  After about 3 day, we began to make up our own concoctions.  Ray was craving tomatoes, so we came up with a tomato, celery, scallion and sea salt juice.  I tried to make a banana and avocado drink, but realized very quickly that they don't juice very well.  They just squish.  It didn't taste very good either.

I especially enjoyed, and still do, picking kale from my garden to juice in the morning.  So far, my favorite juice is Kale, carrots and granny smith apple juice.  We were spending about 2 hours a day standing at the juicer to produce 6-8 20oz glasses of juice for each of us.  With one glass taking ten carrots, three apples and a handful of kale, we were going shopping every other day.  The time spent was well worth it, for me.  I was happy to be drinking juice because my digestive system didn't have to work very hard.  It gave my tummy a well deserved break.

After about 12 days, I began to get hungry.  Part of it may have been because I had a full schedule of doctor's appointments that week and kept forgetting to drink, until I was famished.  By then, some carrot juice really wasn't satisfying.  It's very important to drink juice every two hours so the body doesn't reach that point of feeling hungry.  At day 14, I had this intense craving for meat.  I didn't care what kind it was, I just wanted to sink my teeth into some protein.  That's was the sign from my body saying, "Ok, we're good now.  Can you please give me something with substance!?"

As I slowly got my body back on solid foods, I realized that I truly don't know what foods work best for my body.  Over the past two years, I've had so many health issues, I just began to cut things out of my diet with hope that I'd feel better.  I stopped eating all dairy, coffee, gluten and finally all meat.  At about the same time period, I was in touch with an old friend who had seen a Naturopath for some health issues and she raved about the treatments she received.  That's when I decided it's time to get some real answers, from a trained professional, about the foods that will work best for me and carry me to a state of optimal health.

The juice fast had its challenges and its great benefits.  I will do it again, as well as continue to have fresh juice once a day.  It seems as though this fast was a catalyst to have me look closer at the nutritional aspects of healing.  I'm looking forward to my first appointment with the Naturopath, tomorrow morning.  I'll be sure to share my experience.

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