Many people like to jump start their health and wellness plan with a cleanse or detox. This is because a detox supports the goals of weight loss, increased energy, and the removal of toxins from the body.

We detox our bodies to clear symptoms like lethargy, bad skin, and brain fog. A cleansing program is a tool to help you make positive changes to your health. A detox can help you get over soft addictions to sugar, caffeine, or salt. Withdrawal happens fairly quickly, and as cravings are reduced you can begin a healthier lifestyle without old addictive habits.

Detoxification is also helpful for weight loss, although this is not the primary purpose. The body stores toxins in fat cells. When you cleanse your body, the toxins and fat are removed simultaneously. This is why cleansing is popular — weight loss combined with a feeling of well being. People often claim to be more clear headed after a detox.

Weight loss occurs on a cleanse simply because there are fewer calories being consumed. Since weight loss boils down to creating a caloric deficit, eating less overtime is a simple way of losing weight.

We also detoxify and cleanse to rest and heal our overloaded digestive organs. This is often an overlooked, yet very important, area considering optimal health truly begins with the health of our digestive system. Eating all the time or at odd hours, stresses the digestive system. Often, the result is constipation or diarrhea. A cleanse can help regulate your digestion as well.

Aside from the internal health benefits, detoxification can also be a great catalyst for external change. After a detox, you may find yourself reflecting on and reevaluating what’s most important to you. With a clear head, you are more creative, motivated, more relaxed, and productive.

Visit Total Wellness Cleanse  if you want to lose weight, inrease energy, clear your head, and better digestion.

If you follow the lifestyle of the majority of the population in the United States bad diet, little exercise, stressful lifestyle–you have a 50 percent chance of contracting a major disease such as cancer, arthritis, arteriosclerosis, heart disease, or diabetes.

It’s crucial to learn how to detoxify remove all the toxins that have accumulated in your body and let your fluids and tissues regenerate.

Diet

Eat as much organic food as possible. Your diet should include beans, brown rice, oat bran, vegetables, fruits, and chicken or turkey.

Make detoxifying juices from apples, aloe vera, beet greens, asparagus, cabbage, carrot greens, celery, cucumbers, parsley, and turnips.

Make a vegetable broth from the following items: collards, Swiss chard, kale, mustard greens, cabbage, dandelion, Brussels sprouts, daikon radish, watercress, seaweed, shitake mushrooms, cilantro, garlic, leeks, fennel, anise, ginger, and turmeric.

Squeeze one lemon into 12 ounces of hot water. Drink this first thing in the morning when you wake up.

Finally, to help draw out toxins, take a 20-minute bath daily with infusions of seaweed, wintergreen, eucalyptus, peppermint, fennel, cinnamon, and epsom salts.

Herbs

Most Americans do not like bitters because our tastebuds are accustomed to sweets and salty food. Nevertheless, bitters are great for the liver. You can take them in tinctures and teas, although  many people find tea made from bitters distasteful.

Artichoke is a bitter (without the butter or mayonnaise). Artichoke is very regenerative and protective to the liver. It also reduces blood fat, stimulates bile elimination.

For a cold liver, try boldo. It’s good for bio release of toxins.

The herb barberry promotes bile flow and is helpful with jaundice and gall stones. Try a tincture of 15-20 drops three times a day or take a tea made of barberry.

Oregon grape (bitter) is good for slow liver function, slow protein digestion, and helps released stored iron in the liver. Usually a person with this problem will have sticky stools or the stool will float.

Yellowdock (bitter) stimulating and cleansing to the liver. Good for chronic constipation. Can also be helpful for acne, especially acne on the back and behind.

Dandelion Root (not the leaf) reduces heat and congestion in the liver and gallbladder.

Golden Seal (leaf) stimulates the production and secretion of bile.

Blue Flag increases bile flow in the liver and gallbladder. This is good for people who eat a lot of over processed junk food.

One last thing. If you have a sweet tooth and are trying to break that habit, eating bitters will take the craving away.

If you feel healthy, do you need to detox? Actually, you do. Modern life is filled with tons of conveniences that all add to our toxic load. Think of the popularity of raw foods such as oysters, sushi, and steak tartar. We ingest any microscopic parasites that are in these foods.

Then there’s fast food which is filled with unnatural preservatives and pesticides. These chemicals enter your body when you breathe or ingest them and through your skin. The problem is that they don’t just go away. These chemicals can build up in your body and make it operate less efficiently, just like gunk building up in your car’s engine.

Instead of letting these chemicals slow you down, many people flush them out by detoxifying their bodies, or detoxing. Without all the extra gunk clogging up your system, your body can operate more efficiently, get rid of waste, and absorb more of the essential nutrients from your food. That means you feel better, have more energy, and can help you lose weight.

There are many different ways to clear chemicals out of your body, from drinking extra water, to fasting or juice dieting, to simply taking an herbal supplement. While all these products detox your body, they don’t necessarily do the same thing. For instance, one product may be designed to remove toxins from your intestine, while another works on your liver.

The most common cleansing products and supplements that are used to flush out the system are normally called colon cleansers. This is generally considered the best place to start because the colon is your body’s natural way of getting rid of waste. If your colon isn’t working properly, none of your body can. It’s just like if the garbage workers go on strike in a city; eventually the whole place fills with trash.

Besides slowing down your system, the toxins that build up can also give you serious health problems. Colon cleansing is particularly important because plaque actually builds in the colon, hardens, and can even petrify. Not only is this build-up thought to cause colon cancer, it may also contribute to heart disease, allergies, and a host of other health problems. The toxic effects spread through your whole body and can be detrimental. Detoxifying can help prevent these problems and can also strengthen your immune system so you get sick less.

If you’re serious about removing toxins, it’s good to work with a schedule and detox each essential part at a time. Detoxing your liver is great, but if those toxins simply build up in your colon, the detox really isn’t going to do you much good.

Flushing out the toxins from your body isn’t really going to help if you simply replace them again with new ones. That’s why it’s also recommended to eat fresh, non-processed organic foods as much as possible to keep your body clean and healthy.

The lymph system is a major part of the body’s immune system. While lymph nodes are not easily seen or felt, they are usually found in clusters in the neck, armpit,and groin. They play an important role in transporting  lymph fluid — a clear fluid made primarily of white blood cells.

Lymph nodes produce immune cells that help fight infection, so anything we can do to keep them healthy should be a priority. Since our lymph glands do not have a pump like the heart, we can help its circulation by doing certain activities:

Dry Brushing

A method called “dry brushing” is an excellent way to exfoliate your skin and cleanse the lymph glands at the same time. Dry skin brushing stimulates the lymph glands and helps them drain the toxins into the colon to be expelled.

You will need a natural bristle brush which can be purchased in the cosmetic department of most retail stores for about three dollars. The dry brushing method only takes a few minutes and is best performed in the morning before your shower.

You will be using your brush “dry” and beginning at your neck, sweep the brush across your skin under the ears, down the neck and onto your shoulders. Brush up both sides of your arms from the hands to shoulder. Brush gently, across and down your chest to your abdomen and as much of your back and buttocks as you can reach. Brush up from your ankles to your thighs both inside and out and end by vigorously brushing the bottoms of your feet and around the toes.

After brushing you can shower or relax in a tub of warm water with Epsom salts or apple cider vinegar added to help cleanse and detoxify your skin through your pores.

Jumping or Rebounding

You can also have fun while stimulating your lymph glands by jumping rope, doing high-impact aerobics or bouncing on a mini-trampoline for at least ten minutes a day.

Dr. Houston’s Method

According to Hanna Kroeger there is another simple way that she calls, “Dr. Houston’s Method,” to flush the lymphatic system. It can be performed at anytime is as follows:

“Spread the fingers of your left hand and place on the back of your neck. Cup your right hand and place it under your left armpit. Hold this position for three to five minutes.”

When the lymphatic system is functioning properly, other bodily systems work better and you will feel more energetic. A healthy lymphatic system helps your immune system, aides in the flushing of toxins from the body, helps reduce cellulite, increases circulation, helps digestion and improves the functioning of the nervous system.

There are many claims about the benefits of colon cleansing, but is it truly beneficial? Colon cleansing can be a good step in getting healthy especially if you have a diet heavy in red meat or generally have a hard time shifting your bowels. If you don’t go regularly, or find that your bowel movements are especially smelly, a colon cleanse may be just what you need.

When we eat food, our colon is responsible for filtering out all the waste from our bodies, but with all the processed food and additional chemicals we eat, our bodies can have a hard time. This can leave waste in our system that builds up, petrifies, and slows us down. Colon cleansing flushes all this waste out of the colon so our bodies can process food more efficiently.

When starting colon cleansing, you may see initial weight loss as all the extra bad stuff that was sitting in your body gets flushed out. However, the weight loss doesn’t stop there. With all the excess waste flushed out of your colon, your body can better absorb nutrients and dispose of waste more efficiently. This leaves you with more energy and can help get rid of even more pounds.

When most people think of weight control, they think diet and exercise, but an even simpler answer to what controls your weight is your digestive system. You may cut and cut your calories and not lost weight because your metabolism slows to adjust to the smaller amount of food. While exercise is a great way to speed up your metabolism, your digestive system could always use a little boost.

Do you want to work out, but just don’t feel like you have the energy to get up and go after a long day at work? Colon cleansing can help you feel better so you’ll be able to go work out without feeling like you have to drag yourself. First, you’ll lose all the excess weight from toxic waste in your system, which will give you energy in itself, but you’ll also be absorbing more nutrients and have a body that works and feels better. It will make it that much easier to get yourself moving.

If you’re serious about losing weight, colon cleansing can definitely help, but it’s not a magical cure or pill that will make the weight come off without effort. It’s no substitute for a healthy diet and regular exercise. To keep your body working efficiently, avoid putting the harmful toxic chemicals in your body to begin with. This means eating healthy food and sticking with a fresh diet rather than one chocked with preservatives and artificial colors and flavors.

While many people swear by colon cleansing, just like any other weight loss plan, it can be dangerous if not done properly. Always use tested products from trusted suppliers and consult a health professional before starting your colon cleanse.

Maybe you know someone who is chemically sensitive and gets sick from perfume or other common chemicals. Don’t mistakenly think your body is strong enough to handle it because you are getting sick, just much more slowly. You see, people with chemical sensitivities are not allergic to chemicals. They are having a reaction to poison.

What many term as disease is really reaction to poison. Even worse is that the medications for these diseases deplete the nutrients that we need to naturally detoxify such as selenium, zinc, B Vitamins, etc. Toxicity can result in–

• Heart problems
• Hypertension
• ADD/ADHD
• Diabetes
• Gut problems
• Psychiatric problems

The liver and kidneys are key in the body’s detoxification process. A healthy liver purifies the blood of toxins and ships out healthy blood to the organs of the body.

From the liver, the toxins are moved to the kidneys to be excreted in urine. Signs that you don’t detoxify well are not sweating, urinating, or moving your bowels well.

One of the reasons people have allergic reactions or chemical sensitivity is that their liver is not functioning well. This can be for many reasons. Sometimes there is a genetic component. There may be a family history of liver dysfunction.

There can also be an environmental reason that is mucking up the natural detoxification process such as exposure to lead or mercury.

The body is naturally able to purge or detoxify itself of most toxins with the right raw materials. If you drink lots of pure water, the kidneys can flush out toxins.

Soft drinks are not water substitutes. Soft drinks have high amounts of sugar which is harder on the kidneys and liver to process. Water is a natural solvent that breaks down toxins and allows them to pass through the body’s systems without doing harm.

Municipalities are more frequently using chloramines to purify water. Chloramines have been linked to elevated levels of toxic lead in drinking water in Washington, D.C. and Greenville, N.C. A small amount of powdered Vitamin C added to drinking water can neutralize this.

Stress is also a factor that can muck up the natural detoxification process. When the immune system is stressed, it affects the detoxification pathways—especially the kidneys and liver. If you are chronically stressed, your detoxification system functions at the same level.

Fiber from fruit and vegetables, not just grains, is an important factor as well. Fiber binds to toxins and neutralizes their effect when they come into contact with tissues.

The sodium/potassium level is important. The correct ratio has to be in effect for heart to pump well. An erratic heartbeat can add to the overall level of stress and suppress the body’s ability to detoxify.

How do you know if you’re detoxifying? You won’t have the symptoms of toxicity and illness. Your chronic illnesses such as allergies, yeast infections, and other perpetual problems will disappear.

The best strategy is to avoid toxins altogether if possible, but of course this is difficult. It’s also important to protect the liver. If you have alcohol or drug abuse in in your past Vitamin K, organic spinach, B Vitamins, and folates should be in your diet.

If you have Hepatitis C, avoid perfume and nail polish at all costs. Are you a mechanic working on engines? Protect yourself as much as possible. Living near a golf course is also a hazard because of the herbicides used.

For a quick liver flush mix the following in a blender and drink right before going to bed–

• ½ cup olive oil
• ½ cup lemon juice
• ¼ orange juice

Add some finely chopped garlic and/or finely chopped ginger for flavoring

It’s no secret what herbs are best for detoxification. The best formulas will contain milk thistle, senna, red clover, burdock, poke root, chaparral, or sheep sorrel. Just because medical science doesn’t know why these herbs work, doesn’t mean they don’t work–they do.

Resource: Total Wellness Cleanse