Benefits of Juice Feasting

Many people go into juice fasting to lose weight. And while weightloss is definitely a benefit of juice fasting, there are many, many other health benefits to be had, too.

Remember that in the movie, Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead that both Joe and Phil healed a chronic skin condition and were able to come off of their medications that they were taking for it.

The woman that was suffering from chronic migraines and went on a 10-day juice fast cleared up her migraines and they didn't come back.

The gal I profiled yesterday also noticed some great health benefits aside from her weightloss. Here is what she had to say:

There were A LOT of benefits, one of the coolest was how flexible I became.  I wasn't even that much into yoga, but I got into yoga because of the flexibility my body attained while fasting.  I was shocked at  how bendy fasting had made me.  Also my hair and skin looked A LOT better, in fact that's when I stopped using shampoo.  (I went back to using it this year, but I went a solid 4 years without using it at all)

I felt so much lighter and more mobile...I wanted to run and jump everywhere, very energetic.  I got down to 90 pounds at the end, which was my lowest weight as an adult, and I started at 170.  One of the biggest changes was my mood disorders which I've struggled with my entire life - totally disappeared on my juice fast.  I was healed by the end.  No more anxiety, depression or bipolar.  My entire attitude changed due to this, and I became a much more confident person.  I felt super powerful. 

When I went raw afterward, I maintained a 110 pound weight for 3+ years.After juice fasting, I went to the eye doctor and the doc was shocked to discover that my eyesight had actually improved!  He said that was almost unheard of.  I went down a whole prescription number.  It kept going down too from being raw, I used to be a -8 and now I'm a -6.  So I did get some notable improvement there."

Juice fasting gets all the same benefits as water fasting, but without the dangers, expense, and having to be bed-ridden all day or even necessarily having to be supervised. Dr. Joel Fuhrman, who supervised Joe Cross' fast, in the movie Fat, Sick or Nearly Dead, wrote a book on water fasting and how he healed his ankle injury as a skater by water fasting.

I find it interesting that Dr. Fuhrman is now promoting juice fasting. Water fasting is controversial and very high risk for some groups of people and needs to be carefully monitored under medical supervision like at a place such as True North in Northern California to prevent electrolytes from getting too low. This danger is not present with juice fasting since you are getting a steady supply of nutrition and can even keep up with your normal routine.

Here is a link I found about what eventually happened in the Natural Hygiene movement with regards to fasting:

http://www.hawaiianfastingretreats.com/naturalhygiene.html

Throughout his career, Dr. Shelton supervised over 40,000 fasts that his patients undertook while under his care.  Fasting was advocated by the Natural Hygienists in cases of acute and chronic illnesses as the quickest means of restoring one to a state of health by removing the toxic accumulations within the body.  Despite his repeated jailings his hygienic practice continued to grow and he was respected and admired for his efforts.

By 1932, Dr. Shelton lectured internationally with hundreds of people attending his events.  Over the course of the next 40 years, Dr. Shelton continued to publish many books and run his health schools.  He united the hygienists of the day by organizing the American Natural Hygiene Society.

The year of 1978 marks the beginning of the rise and fall of Natural Hygiene.  Shelton takes in 49 year old Hal Conrad who is suffering from ulcerative colitis.  The medical doctor he had seen ordered a colostomy and iliostomy, the cutting of the large intestine and stomach area, and wearing a sack to collect fecal matter for the remainder of his life.  He died of a heart attack in the health school.

His wife sued for $890,000 on a charge of negligence.  While in litigation over the next 2 years, business at the health school was at its peak.  The School overflowed.  Trailers were brought in to accommodate the many patients seeking care under Dr. Shelton.  In 1980, Dr. Shelton's long-time assistant Dr. Vetrano left to open her own health facility.

Dr. Vetrano

The courts ruled against both Dr. Shelton and Dr. Vetrano in 1983.  Required to pay the $890,000 to Hal Conrad's wife, both Dr. Shelton and Dr. Vetrano were bankrupted. 

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There are only a few handful of medically-supervised water-only fasting facilities in the U.S. today. There are other's outside of the U.S, but one must exercise caution and ask good questions with regards to experience of interns overseeing the fasters as well as what type of monitoring of health conditions before and during the fast to prevent electrolyte loss so that complications are prevented and you are getting the most out of your money as there is a considerable expense involved, not to mention the airfare out to the facility as well as you have no legal recourse in case something were to go wrong.

I commend the early pioneers for their courage to forego the medical route and let the body to it's own healing and I feel what we've learned over the years is that with proper nutrition, the body can indeed heal dramatically. The late Dr. Max Gerson used vegetable and fruit juices along with some judicious cooked meals in his healing program with patients that were dealing with illnesses that ranged from autoimmune, advanced cancer, tuberculosis and many other ailments.

Juice fasting is safe, it's delicious, it's easy, convenient, affordable and effective. There are virtually no side effects and great benefits.

I highly recommend that people try it for themselves at least once to see what it does for them. It can be used whenever someone needs to "reboot", recharge and rejuvenate.