Some Additions

During my first fasts I learned a couple of things just through trial and error. I went through the first week in a fog and feeling pretty tired a lot. I kept waiting for that magic moment when I would feel better. Most people report that they start to feel better around day 7 and by day 14 they feel great! I went through the first five days and couldn't stand how I felt so I broke my fast over the weekend with large salads and a little meat and felt instantly better. I went back to fasting on Monday and by Wednesday I was feeling really tired again and maybe a little depressed. My husband was flying high and people I knew would come up and say I bet you feel really great...and I couldn't say that I was, really. Another five days later I broke the fast and felt better again.

I was very curious to know why I was having this problem so I decided something must be missing that I need. While it's true, vegetables have more protein per calorie than meat they are a very low calorie food so you must eat tons to get even a little protein...I cup of spinach has almost one gram of protein. You would need to eat or juice twelve cups to get almost twelve grams of protein. I decided that I was probably a little lower on protein than what would work for me and started adding protein powder to my morning drink, which helped. The second missing nutrient I found is B-complex and B-12. This made so much sense to me. It was an “ah hah” moment.

I have long known that B vitamins are responsible for stamina and energy. They help metabolize sugars. One experiment took lab rats fed brewer's yeast and compared their endurance to a control group. The rats in the control would swim about an hour before they gave up and had to be fished out of the tank. The ones fed brewer's yeast swam for two hours at which point the experiment was ended. I added brewers yeast to my morning drink and viola, stamina and energy! I even found that it cured my 16 year old son's depression, which he had been fighting for years. He went from being a dark and depressed teen to being a joking, twinkly eyed young man almost instantly—as though someone had thrown a switch.

You may not need these supplements to have a successful fast but if you find yourself thinking you just can't go on feeling like you do, they are things to try. Another supplement recommended for fasting is an omega 3 oil. These oils form long chain fatty acids which are anti-inflammatory and help provide energy to our cells. You might know that you can get these essential fatty acids from fish but you might not know that flax seeds and walnuts have even higher concentrations than fish and without the risk of fat soluble toxins that we talked about earlier. You can easily add cold pressed flax oil to your fast...it has almost no taste and can be blended into the juice you make or used with lemon as a salad dressing. Many of the vegetables you might juice will have Omega 3's –squash, spinach, kale, turnip greens, green beans and broccoli to name a few but if you don't feel great, it is worth trying and additional boost of omega 3's.

Another great addition to your fast is herbs and spices. You can add them right to the juice you make in powdered form or juice them in fresh form. Great additions are ginger—especially in the early days when you might need support for your stomach as it adjusts to not having regular food to chew on. Ginger is the best aid for digestive problems I know of. It will take away nausea, tastes wonderful and will help with acid reflux—which you may have in the early days. Your stomach is assuming your diet will continue unchanged and it will take several days for it to get with the program and stop making all the stomach acid you used to need to digest the food you ate. You may have heartburn, acid reflux and stomach aches or nausea. Ginger is your friend at these times.

Mint adds a wonderful zing to a melon-apple-cucumber juice when you are feeling like a little something sweet. I brought the kids to the new ice cream stand with a cup of this to shore up my resolve and felt pretty spoiled and satisfied. You can juice fresh mint just like any other green.

To my dinner I add curry powder, chili powder, fresh sweet onion and a clove of garlic. Raw garlic alone is used in herbal therapy to treat a myriad of ills including heart disease and cancer. Garlic is said to be anti-inflammatory, anti-viral, anti-bacterial and anti-fungal. Onions share in many of the same compounds as garlic and are extremely high in the antioxidant quercetin which fights free radicals and is considered by many to be helpful in avoiding colds and flu.

So be sure to add these flavor bursts to your juice for a health boost.