Progress!

So this week, I've been doing alot of high intensity training which ended up just me being really sweating in my uniform for the majority of the day and being extremely tired BUT, I'm writing this just to show you the progress I've made so far!

SO, here is the before picture I took of my face right before I started the juicing (no make up). So for all of you that thought my skin was fine...YOU ARE WRONG! I just like to think I do a good job of putting on make up. Embarrassing as it is to put this up, you all should be able to see the differences and how this might work for you if there is nothing in the world that can make your face better. I find this to be a huge bother and it is a big self-esteem thing when you have to spend a while on your face to cover it up and make it look somewhat decent.

 

 

 

 

Look how sad I am....

And this is the after picture!

Happy face!

Again, with no make up (except the eyes) and look how much clearer my face is. I still have a couple of red spots no thanks to the equipment I had to wear for the past week that clogged up all the sweat around my face. But there are no humongous red spots all over and it doesn't look like the frickin' Appalachian Mountain range going across the lower half of my face. I'm pretty confident if I keep up with the juicing, I will have flawless skin in no time!

Splurge and Choices

I've been a horrible blogger and haven't posted anything for a few days now! But all is well besides dealing with work and losing my wallet with all of my IDs, yikes! So what I wanted to talk about for a while was the idea of treating yourself every once in a while. Yes, you can do it. Simple as that. And the weird thing is that my body and mind actually feels guilty doing it. The other day I went out with a group of girls to dinner and got a nice grass feed burger with all the veggie toppings. About a couple hours after, I felt the need to juice to flush out the 'stuff' that I had just ate. Granted I only did the juice fast for 3 days and then started to add some food into my diet, but nothing like a huge burger for dinner. I was so used to juicing and enjoy the nutrients I was getting that I couldn't even enjoy a burger like I used to! I think I'm going to take some of the recipes off of Joe's website and incorporating that into my diet just so I can actually enjoy a meal and not just juicing and eating seeds like a bird.

Another topic that was brought but by a SFC in my class that I was in for the past two weeks. He seemed interested in the things I was talking about when it came to my juicing. I always brought in my juices to class and he always had something new to ask. In a way, I liked that he was interested and kept asking questions. I did make some recommendations about things he could to if he ever decided to go the juicing route. And the last thing I talked to him about was the difference between the people that are enthusiastic about a diet that works for them and people that try and force their diet on others.

I believe that everything you do is based on a choice that you make. If someone if fat, they chose to go down that route and not be healthy, but they always have the choice to turn that around and lose weight to be healthy again. For me, I never pushed this diet on anyone. I had talked about it occasionally before I started the fast but the only reason people were interested was because of the juice itself. They wanted to know why I would do such a crazy thing and with that spurred a conversation. There are those out there that swear by a diet and then try and tell others that they need to do it. Honestly, if someone is happy with being overweight (which I have yet to hear) or enjoys eating the foods that they do, then leave them be. A lot of people have the mindset that we have one life to live and that we might as well enjoy it instead of worrying about what we eat. Yes, I totally agree. And that is why I don't try and push anything on anyone. I'm doing an experiment on ME. I wanted to see how this fast would work on ME. And if people are noticing that there is a difference in how I look because of what I did and they are interested, that  is a choice THEY are making to dig deeper and find out whats going on. So far I am liking the experiment and enjoying the benefits I'm getting from it. If people don't want to sit there a drink juice 5 times a day then don't! No one is forcing you to. If you want to live healthier, try and make you diet doable so that you are not depriving your body. Slowly ween off of the foods that you know are bad. There is always a good place to start, but never shock your body into a fast or diet that you haven't prepped for.


I know I've said it before and I'll always say it again, and even as part of my little mantra. YOU make the choices in life in what you want to do. Set your mind to it and it will be done. No one else can make you do the things you do with your life. It's all about YOU!

Day 6: Never Forget... 9/11

Never Forget!! 9/11

Thanks for checking out the blog today. Gonna make this a short one.

For breakfast I reverted back to my favorite drink of 4 carrots, 2 green apples, and a lemon. They just taste so good together!! Lunch was the Garden Variety from Joe's Website and for dinner I got a little creative! I just took all the things green in my fridge and made a fantastic drink!

"Everything Green"
1 Green pepper
1 Cucumber
1 large handful of spinach
4 leaves of kale
1 green apple
1 handful of parsley

The green pepper was surprisingly good and gave it a nice kick.

Dessert was another experiment:

1/4 pineapple
1/4 watermelon
1 handful of strawberries
4 leaves of kale
1 handful of raspberries

Again, you can't go wrong with a bunch of fruit mixed together!!

The Effects

My face is officially smooth! The only thing I'm patiently waiting for is the red spots to go away. It's trying to heal itself and I'm doing a much better of leaving it alone. Hopefully by the weekend the red color will go away!! During the day it is surprising how much energy I have. I am able to sit in the most boring class known to man and not even nod off (unlike some of my other classmates who struggle within the first hour haha). My weight is fluctuating between 133-135 during the day. I am definitely noticing a difference in the size of my waist and can fit into some dresses that I struggled with before!!

Eating vs Juicing

A friend brought up a great question.

"Why can't you just eat the fruits and veggies instead of juicing them?"

And in all honesty, that is a very good question. Think of it this way. Do you know how many carrots it takes to make a pint of juice? I'd say in the neighborhood of around 1 to 1 1/2 pounds. That's A LOT of carrots to eat at one sitting. Then there's the question of your chewing the carrots down to a pulp so then your digestive system can turn it into juice in order to digest it. Even if your digestive system was in real good shape you still only get a very small percentage on the nutrients that are available in that vegetable.

When you juice, you've already done probably 75% of the work done in digesting the whole vegetable since your body has to turn it into juice to begin with in order to extract the available nutrients. So you're getting a much muuuuuch greater portion of the available nutrients in a much more assimilable form. So in reality while you have an initial investment in the juicer you are saving money compared to the nutrition you get from juices versus the amount of whole vegetables you'd have to consume to get the same nutritional benefits of juicing. I drink 2 pints a day of a juice mixes consisting of carrots, celery, beets, parsley, kale, cucumbers, and green apples each day. I would say that I would probably have to eat close to 15 to 20 lbs of vegetables a day to maaaaaybe even begin approaching getting the same nutritional value. It really is amazing.

So in other words, it's all about digesting and how much our stomach can really take in order to get the full amount of nutrients that a juicer can provide. Don't get me wrong, eating the fruits and vegetables RAW still has other benefits that a juicer might not be able to provide like the fiber we are missing out. (Which is why I drink the kale cuz that does the job for me). So don't think that you HAVE to go out a buy a juicer to get the nutrients you need. Just start with little changes like taking about store bought juice and having an apple or a handful grapes instead. 

Remember, this is a choice that only you can make and this blog isn't here to tell you what right or wrong is. I'm simply putting out some information that most people probably don't know!

Day 5

Starting Weight: 136.2

Today starts off very slow as I get off Staff Duty and go straight back into this class. (For those of you that aren't military, staff duty is simply sitting at the HQ desk all night with couple other soldiers and not really getting any sleep. And yes, to all you other LTs out there, I actually stay and not go home lol).

The Menu

So far I juiced breakfast, lunch and my afternoon snack. Breakfast is Wrath of the Grapes which is:
30 grapes
1 pear
1 lime
2 cucumbers

For lunch I made "Dracula's Delight"
2 Beets
2 Carrots
6 Strawberries
6 Leaves of kale

I had A LOT of extra Wrath of the Grapes so I decided that I would use that as my afternoon snack as well. I packed another small bag of the Organic Pumpkin seeds as a small filler when we have our short breaks every hour. (I can't express how good these taste, then again, I LOVE pumpkin seeds). *Note: You should only eat about a cup a day, maybe even less because pumpkin seeds naturally have a lot of calories and saturated fat (which is ok in small amounts).

Dinner was "Half 'n' half" which consisted of
2 Celery Stalks
8 Strawberries
6 Leaves of Kale
1 apple
I am really starting to love these drinks!!  I'm starting to get really creative and making sure that lunch and dinner consists of the 80/20 ratio of veggies/fruit. I make sure to balance out fruit and veggies for bfast and afternoon snack, and then go fruit heavy for dessert!!

The Effects

It is official. The small bumps on my face have disappeared and is replaced with the much smoother and firmer skin that started around my eyes and forehead. I'm just waiting for the big red spots to quickly heal up so I don't have as much scarring anymore from my damn picking! LEGO!

Day 4

I made it guys! I made it through the 3 day fast and I even decided to keep going! But I added just a little bit of food into my diet such as pumpkin seeds and chia seeds. Still trying to hold on to the juicing part as my main meals.

I had the "Classic V8" which consisted of 5 carrots, 2 tomoatoes, and an orange. Pretty tasty if you ask me! Since I am still sitting in the class for the next week, I packed some organic pumpkin seeds sprinkled with Celtic salt.

 

These are great because they are Gluten Free, Wheat Free, and Nut Free (for all of you out there that might have allergies to the oils they usually mix seeds with). Im such a big fan of pumpkin seeds and they are packed with tons of magnesium (which we don't get enough of), act as an anti-inflammatory, lower cholesterol, and improve bladder function!

 

For lunch I had the Garden Variety leftovers but replaced the cucumbers with carrots. I had Hawaiian Punch as an afternoon snack again since there was so much!!

 

Sitting through this class seriously zaps all my energy but I managed to hang in there thanks to these juices.

 

The effects:

 

I can definitely tell that the smaller bumps that I had on my face are going away. I do have a tendency to pick the ones I feel just need a good popping so those still lingered around. I must refrain from touching them!! My face feels so soft and soft around my forehead and under my eyes that I can't stop touching them. I can't wait for it to spread all over my face once the disease is gone. =)

Day 3!

Day 3
Sunday August 8, 2013
Starting Weight: 137

Last day of the fast! I can't wait to start nibbling on some food!! I woke up again with tons of energy and wasn't dragging myself around the apartment like I usually do. I started off breakfast with some carrots, apples, and a piece of ginger. I spent most of the day occupying my mind with cleaning and researching other recipes for the juicer. I made the green lemonade again for lunch (It is starting to grow on me). I have noticed that I am losing quite a bit of weight but I can only imagine that it is water weight that I've been trying to get rid of for some time now. My face still looks the same but the redness has gone down significantly.

I made a new drink called "Hawaiian Punch" as my afternoon snack and it was delicious! It consisted of 1 Mango, 1/2 a pineapple, 6 leaves of kale, and a couple handfuls of spinach and strawberries. This also yeilded alot of juice which I will definitely save for later!!

Dinner was a modified version of garden variety where I just switched out the cucumbers (because I ran out) and added carrots instead. For dessert I finally tried the Red, White, and Blue (&Green) juice. That consisted 1/4 watermelon, 2 handfuls of blueberries, and 4 leaves of kale.

I think I might continue the juicing to see how it affects my complexion but still try to eat a little bit of food.