Detoxing doesn’t have to be difficult. This program was created by Nedra Sahr, M.S., C.N.S.Licensed clinical nutritionist

Fresh Start^TM Detox Protocol

The Seven-Day Program to Better Health

It can be strongly said that the ability to detoxify is a major determinant of a person’s level of health.” Joseph Pizzorno, N.D., Michael Murray, N.D. Encyclopedia of Natural Health, 1998.

Our bodies are in a constant state of detoxification.  Every time we exhale or break a sweat, every time we urinate or move our bowels, we’re detoxing.  The liver, kidneys, spleen and lymphatic system work to remove wastes and toxins that cause irritation and inflammation throughout our bodies.

Toxic substances are everywhere- in the air we breathe, the food we eat and the liquids we drink.  In fact, our bodies create toxins—they’re named endotoxins because they come from within as the by-product of metabolism. Endotoxins formed by bacteria and yeasts can be absorbed into the bloodstream where antibodies form to protect us against their harmful effects, but it often triggers a system wide effect of an autoimmune reaction in which the body turns on itself. By assisting your body in removing stored toxins through a detoxification program, your body can more easily heal itself.  Although cleansing is important for healthy people it is essential for those who are overweight or who do not feel as healthy as they’d like. People have always been exposed to toxins but today’s exposure to contaminants is not only greater than ever before but the risk is increasing.  There are over 7 million recognized chemicals; of that number over 100,000 are commonly used with 1000-2000 new chemicals being produced each year.  Safety tests are minimal to non-existent.

Our modern environment seriously overloads our body’s most important organ of detoxification, our liver.  Think of the liver as the body’s sewage waste treatment plant.  The liver filters and neutralizes every substance that passes through it.  When the liver becomes overburdened, the liver enzymes fail to break down the toxins, they then become stored in the liver and fatty tissues throughout the body.  The more fat on the body, the greater the toxic load.  Common symptoms of overburdening are headaches, muscle and joint pain, fatigue, allergies or flu-like symptoms, inflammation and brain fog.

There are many different detoxification programs.  Fasting, modified fasting, metabolic cleansing, colonic irrigation, steaming, mudpacks, saunas, herbal detoxification, and hot tubs all have therapeutic detoxification benefits.

I believe that a good detox program must meet specific criteria: It needs to work with your life and your values, it must be effective and it must act as the foundation for better health.  After looking at and trying many programs, I developed Fresh Start^TM in 2004.  Since that time thousands of people have used the program and have reported that they find it simple, portable, and it begins to produce observable benefits within three days.  If seven days is too challenging, do it for as long as possible.

Some people who have huge challenges continue for two weeks but that’s the outer limit in my opinion.

Your program will consist of eating fresh raw fruits and fresh raw vegetables in unlimited quantities. By eating fresh raw fruits and vegetables and drinking pure fresh water and herb teas, you’ll find that you will break the cycle of over eating if that is a challenge of yours.  You’ll smash addictions to fatty foods, refined carbohydrates, (sugary treats, and white bread products)  caffeinated and carbonated drinks. Science shows that when a person eats more than 52% of raw foods in his/her diet, cravings drop for sugar, tobacco and alcohol. The toxic load on your liver and kidneys will be substantially reduced giving them time to repair and rejuvenate.  Your colon will be cleansed and repopulated with beneficial microflora.

Choose Organic Raw Fruit as often as possible.  The starred fruits are the ones that are the most important to buy organic:

*apples                                      *pears                              strawberries

oranges                                      mango                            *peaches

grapefruit                                   pineapple                          grapes

lemons                                       star fruit                          *nectarines

watermelon                                 ugli fruit                            papaya

c antelope                                  blueberries                        avocado- limit 1/day

honeydew melon                          raspberries                        banana – limit 1/day

*cherries                                     kiwi                                any fruit not listed…

Choose Organic Raw Vegetables as often as possible, however the starred vegetables are the most important to buy organic.

Broccoli                                          broccoflower                     red or green cabbage

Brussel sprouts                               cauliflower                         watercress

Onions                                           *celery                                  *carrots

Asparagus                                      cucumber                           *all colors bell peppers

Tomatoes                                      sweet potato                        jicama

Turnip                                            pea pods                            green beans

*sprouts                                        radishes                               zucchini

summer squash                              *spinach                               *all varieties of lettuce

radicchio                                       scallions                                mushrooms

avoid white potato                          corn

Fruit and vegetables with thick inedible skins protect the produce against pesticides. Some fruits and vegetables simply do not require pesticides as pests are not a problem.

Most people enjoy eating raw fruit but few have tasted raw asparagus, sweet potato,(delicious) or my favorite, jicama.  Jicama looks like a white potato but is sweet, crisp and contains lots of liquid.  Go outside your normal eating and buying patterns to try eating raw those vegetables you would normally cook.  Cut them into sticks or rounds & dip them in salsa if desired.

AVOID ALL COOKED FOOD.  EAT HUGE QUANTITIES- UNLIMITED  FRUIT AND VEGETABLES AND EAT OFTEN.

Getting Ready: Enlist the support of your family to help you avoid your trigger foods. Ask them to eat the chips in another room or hide the cookies you love.  If they want pizza and it’s your favorite, ask them to consider going out for pizza while you stay home. Shop ahead for 3-4 days of fruit and vegetables and clean them as follows:

Wash all produce in a pan or sink of water to which you add a squeeze of Shaklee Basic-H².  Let the produce soak for 6-8 minutes. Many preservatives and insecticides need some soaking time to help remove  them. Soaking longer than ten minutes can cause vitamin and mineral loss.  Rinse and dry. Store each variety in its own glass container or Evert Fresh bag that you purchase from a health food store or from www.Evertfresh.com. The bags keep produce fresher longer and have no out-gassing effects.  They are completely safe. Some are called Debbie’s bags.  Same thing.

When you leave the house, take a huge amount of cut up fruit or vegetables with you so that you can continue to graze all day long. The refrigerated lunch bags work well for this purpose.

Morning suggestion: Make a LARGE fruit smoothie by blending various fruits in the blender, keeping the pulp. We like to start with fresh or frozen organic berries, watermelon, apple or peach, pear and any fruits you can find- orange is a good addition.  Pulse until you have a drink that has some chunks of fruit- half chewing & half swallowing is a satisfying way to curb the appetite. If you are still hungry after your smoothie and your cup of tea or water, have a piece of fruit or some cut up vegetables.  You do not need to be hungry on this program.  You will be substituting volume for calories.  No need to count calories.

Grazing all day is essential to the success of this program.  Keep a bowl or bag of fruit or vegetables within reach, at all times.  Graze all day long.  If that’s not possible, try eating a large amount of fruit and vegetables every two hours.  AND drink 3 quarts of pure filtered water each day.  Choose still water not sparkling water. Sparkling water acidifies the body, whereas, it is the intention of the program to create a more alkaline system.  Much of your water intake can come from herb teas, non-caffeinated.

Lunch or dinner: We recommend making gazpacho (recipe on request) and having that for lunch or dinner, along with lots of cut vegetables and cut up fruit.

You can make an excellent salad for your evening meal of 3-4 types of lettuce and 5-7 assorted vegetables. Consider adding raw corn cut from the cob, raw peas shucked from the pods for additional variety.  Raw asparagus is delicious in this salad and we find that adding an avocado is very satisfying- for most people a half an avocado is sufficient but you may have a whole avocado if you so desire.

Have the largest bowl of salad that you can eat.  The idea is to eat a lot of volume to replace the foods you are not eating this week. Choose ANY olive oil/ vinegar based dressing to add to your salad but dress it lightly- not more than 1 ½ Tbsp dressing. Squeezing a lemon or lime over your salad greens first gives a fresh taste to your salad.  Make a vinagrette type dressing of lemon juice and any type of vinegar.  Blend a tomato and add spices for a dressing.  Choose, garlic, basil, chervil, coriander, dill, fennel, marjoram, sage, oregano, parsley, thyme or rosemary.

Avoid Ranch dressing if possible- loaded with chemical preservatives. If you love Bleu Cheese dressing go ahead,  but cut it with a bit of vinaigrette.

For a treat after dinner, have a cup of herb tea, hot or iced.  The Wild Berry Zingers, Blueberry, Raspberry, Good Earth Original spice teas all have a sweet taste that satisfies like a dessert.

The No’s:

Following these suggestions of No’s will have you saying YES! in seven days.

• No cooked food
• NO artificial sweeteners
• No juices
• No coffee
• No protein shakes
• NO Nuts
• NO Sushi
• No meats, fish or poultry
• No Alcohol
• No soft Drinks

If you avoid these acidic foods the liver, colon and kidneys are given a rest

The caffeine Coffee or Soda issue: If you are drinking more than one cup of caffeine coffee or two cans of diet soda daily, you may wish to reduce your intake gradually so you do not experience withdrawal symptoms.  Reduce your consumption by one every other day until you are drinking plain water and herb teas.  Why?  Caffeine is a dehydrating agent and increases the body’s need for water.

Artificial sweeteners:  None recommended.  Ever! If you need to sweeten your tea, choose Stevia, powdered or liquid.  It’s available in the natural foods section of your supermarket. ( Editor’s note: If you like artificial sweeteners please read these post on Aspartame (Nutra Sweet and Splenda and hopefully you will change your mine)

Eating Out: We’ve found that this is a very simple program to follow when eating out.  For breakfast ask if the chef would prepare a fruit smoothie of lots of different fresh fruit.  Or  just ask for a bowl of cut up fruit, a half grapefruit, or sliced banana.  Tell the wait staff to leave the yogurt and granola in the kitchen. Lunch can be a bowl of gazpacho if it’s on the menu or a huge salad, dressing on the side.  Repeat for dinner.  Ask for the raw vegetables you’d like in your salad by name.  Volunteer to pay extra if it’s an inconvenience to the staff.  For a day trip or two, you can pack several refrigerated lunch bags with cut up fruit and cut up vegetables.  Many program participants have taken a small cooler of fruit and vegetables on the airplane when they were traveling to areas they thought would be difficult to find good produce.  We’ve had over-the-road truck drivers who have successfully followed the program through the truck stoops of America by adopting the above practices.

Shaklee Supplements:

5 Alfalfa  tabs (item code 20153)  in the morning and five at night- preferably before eating. Shaklee Alfalfa is exceptionally a good alfalfa product because Shaklee uses only the leaf and harvest it in the evening when the nutrients are highest in the leaf)

4 Fiber tabs in the morning- can be added to your shake- and four at night

1 Liver DTX Complex in the morning and 2 at night (Liver DTX protects liver, stimulates body’s ability to regenerate liver cells, stimulates body’s productions of glutathione or GSH a very powerful antioxidant. Liver DTX also maintians and enhances bile flow, detoxifies the body via the liver, and support liever’s processing of toxins such as drugs, pollution or non-organiz foods) Other beneficial properties include: anti-bacterial;anti-candida; anti-inflammatoroy, anti-tomour, anti-viral, antioxidant. Liver DTX is safe to take for extended periods.

1 Optiflora Pearl in the morning, add ¼ tsp. of Optiflora Pre Biotic Powder to the shake.  Increase theOptiflora PreBiotic powder by ¼ tsp. every 2 days until you reach 1 tsp.

After the detoxing program, continue using the supplements until they are finished.

The raw foods, clean pure water, and supplements all work together to help the body release toxins from the fat cells so the liver can process them for removal from the body.  The supplements recommended all contribute to the detoxification/cleansing process.

What can you expect during the first week? Each person’s experience will be unique to them.  The more environmental toxins you have built up in your body, the greater the cleansing process..

• Consider getting eight hours of sleep each night during the week to help the cleansing process be more efficient.

• Be very intentional about getting the full 3 quarts of water each day. After all, you wouldn’t send the RotoRooter man to the basement with a damp sponge to clean out clogged pipes!

A few people experience fatigue, irritability, headaches, weakness, bad breath, or flu-like symptoms for the first few days. Usually it’s because they are not eating frequently enough, not drinking enough water or are in withdrawal from caffeine, sugar and alcohol. By the third day you should experience more energy, a feeling of being internally clean, and most likely you’ll find that you are thinking more clearly. If you experience growling stomach hunger, eat more food and eat more often. If you simply cannot complete the seven days of cleansing with just the raw fruits and vegetables you may have a Shaklee Cinch Shake for Breakfast and Dinner.

By the third day, you will be amazed at how much better you are feeling.  You’ll be delighted to realize that you are not craving sweets, breads, or fried foods.  Our participants find that their skin is clearer, digestion is improved, and they regain their mental focus. In addition, most report that they drop 4-12 pounds. A periodic detox is one of the easiest ways to see a dramatic improvement in how you feel

Nedra Sahr, M.S., C.N.S.

Licensed clinical nutritionist

Choose your favorite gazpacho recipe or follow this one…it’s delicious.

Bill’s Gazpacho

About twelve egg sized tomatoes- plum work well

1 red pepper

I English cucumber partially peeled

1 apple

1 tablespoon of crushed organic garlic

salt and pepper

2 teaspoons olive oil

a dash of hot sauce

Juice of 1/2 lime

Put all in cuisinart and pulse to consistency you like (I like mine chunky)

Serve cold or gently warmed- do not boil.

Thanks to Bill McBurney, Ottawa, Canada for sharing this recipe!

Editor’s Note: If you try this I would love to hear from you on your results.

To Your Health, Caroline