On Toxins: Care, Feeding and LOCATION

In response to the revelatory nature of the previous post, I direct you to half/double's post at 10:15, entitled "Kasia Whines".

never mind. kasia drinks more lemonade.

clearly, this has become my personal blog.

as i drank my oj last night (it was great!), I finally got around to wondering why my left leg hurt all day yesterday, from the knee to the hip. it eventually got so bad that i couldnt walk comfortably.

after googling a bit (it's not a verb! i swear!), i came across this:

Stage 3 (Day 8 to Day 15) On the latter part of an extended fast, you can experience enhanced energy, clear-mindedness and feel better than you have felt since childhood. On the downside, old injuries may become irritated and painful. This is a result of the body's increased ability to heal during fasting. If you had broken your arm 10 years before, there is scar tissue around the break. At the time of the break, the body's ability to heal was directly related to lifestyle. If you lived on a junk-food diet, the body's natural healing ability was compromised.

During fasting, the body's healing process is at optimum efficiency. As the body scours for dead or damaged tissue, the lymphocytes enter the older, damaged tissue secreting substances to dissolve the damaged cells. These substances irritate the nerves in the surrounding region and cause a reoccurrence of aches from previously injured areas that may have disappeared years earlier. The pain is good as the body is completing the healing process. The muscles may become tight and sore due to toxin irritation. The legs can be the worst affected, as toxins accumulate in the legs.

Wow, whaddya know! In fact, my entire left quad calcified when I was 15, effectively turning that muscle into bone. and it hasnt felt like this since i was 15, when instead of sitting out, the doctors told me to keep playing (basketball), which i unintelligently did and later regretted.

so i'm back on the lemonade, at least through the day.

updates + a pic for katie

day six:

• ran around too much to notice i was hungry until i led our guests (theirc.org, check them out) to their catered meal

• felt generally positive, probably because of the hydration (thanks for the pep talk, caitlin!!). on the other hand, the plumbing went out in our building on the one day that i drank like ten glasses of water. do you know how annoying it is to have to BIKE to another building to pee? several times in a single afternoon?

• friends say i look small. actually, let me rephrase: AFTER i tell them i cannot join them for a drink, etc because I am fasting and have been for six days, THEN they say things like, "oh my god, you DO look pale" or "you're so small - i was going to say it before -", making me believe what i've always believed about myself: that since high school i have been and always will be the same, unchanging, totally boring size, weight and shape, despite what others want to believe, or what they think they see.

• after pondering for an entire day (i.e. waiting a day to steal a whole lot of free google juices and probiotic liquids), i've decided to start the non-lemonade liquid-diet part of the fast. here's the first picture of me sipping orange juice (this is for you, katie, just like those pictures of west oakland)

• So i guess this means the end is near; I'll drink oj until tomorrow afternoonish, when I'll try some soup (if it's entirely veggie-based) and maybe a vegetable or two. Why end early? Well, I think i've accomplished what I set out to do - I achieved a certain sense of (physical and emotional) calm, took a necessary rest from social activity, let my system refocus its efforts, and thought a lot about social and cultural patterns around food. Did you know there is a difference between the thought of hunger and actual, physical hunger? Did you know that after three days you poop water? So many interesting things I have learned. (I'll spare you the details.)
  

... unless you want the details, in which case, email me.

bit by bit

So I decided to sample bits of this master diet, starting with the tea, and then the lemons, and then the maple syrup. Oh and I used cayenne pepper in my rooibos chai!

The tea is f---ing painful.

Lemons are always great.

That maple syrup was beautiful, especially by the spoonful.

Cayenne pepper makes me sneeze.

I also realized I'm gluten intolerant, a realization I owe not to the master cleanse, but to my screaming intestines after every bagel/sandwich/piece of bread. What's the cure?

smooth move

I think it's pretty nice, actually.
good flavor profile.

update

ignoring caitlin's emotional post (no, no pity at all),

day 5:

• realized i wasnt drinking enough water when i almost fainted in my kitchen (my roommate got really scared, handed me a banana and said "here! eat this!")

• generally, feeling okay - not too hungry, not too tired, not too happy, not too energetic.
  

• however, i AM feeling socially outcast. i cant go for coffee breaks. i cant go to lunch with my coworkers. i cant go out for drinks after work. i cant even eat the free tartine bread in my kitchen (ok, not a social activity, but just as painful to pass up)

• i would characterize this day as an empty and thoughtful day.
  

i'm considering breaking my fast tomorrow; most of my goals have been realized, and thus i lose motivation with every vile sip of smooth move. we'll see how i feel in the morning.

Alternation, Baby

Those salt unions! Gastrizing and ruckusing!

I've settled into a firm pattern of cleansing during the day and gorging myself in the haze of sleep after KASIA CALLS ME IN MIDDLE OF BLACK, BLACK EAST-COAST NIGHT to talk about hunger.

Then I wake up and feel horrible, but "cleansed" in the knowledge that it is not My Fault.

updates

day four:

• epiphany of the day: I can go to work later because I work through my lunch break!
• my memory has not been badly affected by lack of food. chinese midterm did NOT kick my ass as I thought it might
• the hills of san francisco, on the other hand, wind me entirely. I could barely make it up the 22/guerrero hill tonight.
  
• I sent this to my mom (thanks, eitan) and she did not respond.
  

dah

i lasted 12 hours then i quit and decided to eat food. Damn...

Oh well. Im going to not eat dairy for a week and see if my tummy feels better.

kasia whines

Caitlin S. Hu: hi!
kasiac: my legs hurt!
Caitlin S. Hu: goood!
Caitlin S. Hu: that's where the toxins are!
kasiac: ... my legs?

updates:

day one

• totally fine
• that tea is POWERFUL, yo

day two

• hungry.
• head is not clear. feeling a little stupid.
  
• trader joe's run w ry = hell for kasia's stomach
  
• massive caffeine headache forces kasia to bed at 8pm

day three

• coworkers surround me as i arrive, make fun of my lemonade bottle ("no guys! dont take that! give it back! i'm serious!")
• stomach is growling. first time it has spoken up since i started the fast.
  
• head is clearer. i'm managing to communicate, or at least i THINK i am.
  

kasia = not alone

I started today. I hate the saltwater thing. 5 hours into it I already feel sluggish with no coffee to get me going and a time change leaving me with an hour less sleep. So its just meh so far.

The first thing I did was the saltwater flush. I chugged a big warm cup of salt water and it was the grossest thing in the universe. I read all this stuff that said I needed unionized salt and it didn't say on my salt whether it was ionized or not. I don't even fucking know what that means. So i sat there for an hour thinking i just pointlessly drank a warm glass of salt...then i realized i was fine quite quickly!

Although I did get to play with my kitty last night (i got a new kitty over the weekend). Shes been hiding under the bed all weekend but last night as I was drifting off to sleepy land, she jumped up on the bed and i petted/played for 30 mins. It was cool cool.

I share the kitty story because i think that it is a sign that this (and everything else in my life) will go well.

That is all.

-Ryan

am i alone?!

hello can we get a headcount
who's fasting?
AM I ALONE
I FEEL SO ALL ALONE

i dreamt of a buffet last night.
as i stuffed a brownie into my mouth, i thought, "this is a damn good brownie"

hunger and hate

my roommates are eating indian food in the kitchen
i hate them so much

time to extend my nap another hour until they have the courtesy to leave me and my hunger alone.

Hay B

Yes, Beyonce endorses the master cleanse, because it made Dreamgirls just that much more visually stunning. And so we follow in her footsteps, diligently applying to our own lives lesson after lesson from the Dreamteam: the fat girl never wins; lemonade-away and someday our 'kidneys' may look like Beyonce's; and if all else fails, there's always song.

ryonce, wyonce, cyonce, kyonce

** CORRECTION! SALT WATER MIX THING: 1 QT = 1/4 GAL **
[this stuff is nasty and i refuse to drink 1/2 gal]


(yes, the last two probably sound the same)

i was at tev's tonight for dinner and i mentioned this was my "last supper" (in an effort to make him feel special? guilty? one and the same) and then instead of yelling at me for starting an insane eating regimen (none at all) he was like, oh i have the tea - do you want it?

here's what it looks like (envision it backwards):


and so everyone's on the same page, i plan to:

• drink a cup of the ol' SMOOTH MOVE at night
• drink 2 quarts = 1/2 gal 1 QT = 1/4 GAL of sea-salt-lukewarm-water every morning
• create the following lovely mixture to bring to work with me (makes 1/2 a gal):
• 5 lemons
• 1/2 gal water
• 1 cup of grade B maple syrup (everyone's so incredibly ANAL about the "b" part, no pun intended)
• pinch of cayenne? i dont know what a pinch is but i guess i'll make it "to taste"
  

are we all on the same page?

ready ... set .... GO!

Eeep eep

Thanks for posting that Kasia. How scary and foreboding! I can't believe I'm about to fast in order to rock my colon. But, I'm totes ready for this.

Today I read this weird woman's journal about doing the cleanse here, which I had no idea, but apparently a lot of people do this to lose weight. She says she isn't but she so is; its all she talks about. The "master cleanse" got a lot of attention because Beyonce did it for her role in Dreamgirls or something. I hope I look like her after. I = Ryonce

Have each of you read the book and bought all of you stuff?

Is there a type of tea too? Or is there only the "lemonade" and the enema solution? I haven't had a chance to read the book.

Cheers!

info + fear

first of all,
"In talking to people doing the cleanse, I've learned that people with caffeine addiction (coffee, soft drinks, etc.) may experience headaches for the first 2 to 4 days."

also, from wikipedia:

The Different Juice Fasting Stages of Detoxification

Stage 1 (Day 1 To Day 2) On the first day of fasting, the blood sugar level drops below 70 mg/dl. To restore the blood to the normal glucose level, liver glycogen is converted to glucose and released into the blood. This reserve is enough for half a day. The body then reduces the basal metabolic rate (BMR). The rate of internal chemical activity in resting tissue is lowered to conserve energy. The heart slows and blood pressure is reduced. Glycogen is pulled from the muscle causing some weakness. The first wave of cleansing is usually the worst.

Headaches, dizziness, nausea, bad breath, glazed eyes and a heavily coated tongue are signs of the first stage of cleansing. Hunger can be the most intense in this period unless the enema is used which quickly assists the body into the fasting state by ending digestion in the colon.

Stage 2 (Day 3 To Day 7) Fats, composed of transformed fatty acids, are broken down to release glycerol from the gliceride molecules and are converted to glucose. The skin may become oily as rancid oils are purged from the body. People with problem-free skin may have a few days of pimples or even a boil. A pallid complexion is also a sign of waste in the blood. Ketones are formed by the incomplete oxidation of fats. It is suspected that the ketones in the blood suppress the appetite by affecting the food-satiety center in the hypothalamus. You may feel hungry for the first few days of the fast. This effect is temporary. The desire to eat will disappear. Lack of hunger may last 40 to 60 days, depending on whether you are on water or juice.

The body embraces the fast and the digestive system is able to take a much-needed rest, focusing all of its energies on cleansing and healing. White blood cell and immune system activity increases. You may feel pain in your lungs. The cleansing organs and the lungs are in the process of being repaired. Periodically, the lymphatic system expels mucoid matter through the nose or throat. The volume excreted of this yellow-colored mucus can be shocking. The sinuses go through periods of being clogged, then will totally clear. The breath is still foul and the tongue coated. Within the intestine, the colon is being repaired and impacted feces on the intestinal wall start to loosen.

Stage 3 (Day 8 to Day 15) On the latter part of an extended fast, you can experience enhanced energy, clear-mindedness and feel better than you have felt since childhood. On the downside, old injuries may become irritated and painful. This is a result of the body's increased ability to heal during fasting. If you had broken your arm 10 years before, there is scar tissue around the break. At the time of the break, the body's ability to heal was directly related to lifestyle. If you lived on a junk-food diet, the body's natural healing ability was compromised.

During fasting, the body's healing process is at optimum efficiency. As the body scours for dead or damaged tissue, the lymphocytes enter the older, damaged tissue secreting substances to dissolve the damaged cells. These substances irritate the nerves in the surrounding region and cause a reoccurrence of aches from previously injured areas that may have disappeared years earlier. The pain is good as the body is completing the healing process. The muscles may become tight and sore due to toxin irritation. The legs can be the worst affected, as toxins accumulate in the legs. Cankers are common in this stage due to the excessive bacteria in the mouth. Daily gargling with salt and water will prevent or heal cankers.

Stage 4 (Day 16 to Day 30) The body is completely adapted to the fasting process. There is more energy and clarity of mind. Cleansing periods can be short with many days of feeling good in between. There are days when the tongue is pink and the breath is fresh. The healing work of the organs is being completed. After the detoxification mechanisms have removed the causative agent or render it harmless, the body works at maximum capacity in tissue proliferation to replace damaged tissue. While a short fast will reduce the symptoms, a longer fast can completely heal. Homeostatic balance is at optimum levels. The lymphatic system is clean except for a rare discharge of mucus through the nose or throat. After day 20, the mind is affected. Heightened clarity and emotional balance are felt at this time. Memory and concentration improve.

Stage 5 (Breaking the Fast) The sticky, toxic, mucoid coating on the intestinal wall is loose, and the first meal frees it from the intestinal wall. Toxins enter the blood through the colon. The gallbladder dumps its waste in a heavy discharge of bile. This can cause an instant bowel movement upon eating followed by intense diarrhea. If the symptoms are too uncomfortable, an enema will help.

uh ... guys ...
i'm scared

Now::Now?