As a New Year’s resolution, we often look to clean up the mess we created during the final few weeks of the year. Between the holiday parties, family get-togethers, and all of the leftover Christmas cookies, things can easily get out of hand. So how do you detox? How do you clean up the inside in order to clean up the outside? Advertising will pull you in several directions, but can they be trusted? Chiropractic care takes into consideration the whole body. Instead of following a complicated list of dos and don’ts, keep it simple by following “The 5 Rules of Detox” to get the cleanup underway.
- Clean Up The Brain
Detox is more of a state of mind than a magic food list. Detox is: a short term, highly focused eating program, designed to scrub the brain of the addictions that were created while eating with abandon. Detox resets the brain by halting the unhealthy behavior and creating new, healthier behaviors.
Action Step: Throw out the easily accessible unhealthy foods on the kitchen counters.
- Improve Liver Function
The main goal of detox is to help the liver, which detoxes the body. When the liver is running more efficiently, you’ll find you have a lot more energy. To assist the liver, temporarily cut out food and drinks that damage the liver, (alcohol, coffee, processed foods, etc.). If you struggle with exhaustion, stress, inability to focus, unexplained weight gain, or trouble sleeping, your liver function may be a major player in your symptoms. Unfortunately, sugar, caffeine, and alcohol will prop you up in the short term, but it could burn you out in the long term by wrecking your liver function. Increase the intake of foods that promote liver function, (dandelion greens, green tea, L-glutamine). These foods help the liver work efficiently, resulting in increased energy and improved digestion.
Action Step: Detox Smoothie
1 cup of dandelion greens, 1 cup of kale leaves, ½ cup coconut milk
½ scoop chia seeds, 3 oz. of pomegranate juice
1 tablespoon of lemon flavored fish oil
1 scoop of vanilla protein, 1 cup of ice
Blend and Serve
- Make Friends with Water
Drink more water! The best way to start your day is by drinking a cup of hot water with lemon. Do this before consuming anything else. Throughout the day, consider adding a tablespoon of liquid Chlorophyll, organic apple cider vinegar, or lemon squeeze into your drinking water. It helps carry the water to the liver and gallbladder and flushes out any toxins stuck to the cell walls. Avoid cold water! The best choice for the remainder of the day is room temperature water.
Action Step: Fill a water bottle before you leave the house in the morning. Drink it completely twice before lunch and twice between lunch and dinner.
- Add some Yin to your Yang
Many individuals have formed an unbalanced connection between weight loss, hardcore training and a number on a set of scales. When it comes to training and utilizing all your body has to offer, it pays to think beyond the bathroom scales. During your cleanse, avoid the hardcore training. Experiment with new training methods. Care for yourself through yoga, prayer, slow swimming, and long walks in nature. These are activities that may not give you the same heart rate spike initially. However, they have other benefits like massaging the organs, helping digestion, and assisting organ function. In the long term, this will reduce cortisol levels, (stress hormone in the body,) and encourage deep breathing, which helps eliminate toxins and improves blood circulation.
Action Step: Use one of the above activities for 7-15 minutes daily.
- Plan For Failure
Because addictions are so strong and bad habits are so hard to break, you WILL fail at detox. So plan for your failure. Create a backup plan for the moments when “life happens.” Life happens when the meeting goes long, basketball practice schedules change, you have to stay late at work, etc. When life happens you will most likely find yourself right back in your old habits that drag you down the black hole you are striving to escape. So have a backup plan for a quick meal on the go. Nuts, protein shakes, and protein balls can be portable and instant meals in a pinch. Don’t let life keep you in the gutter.
Action Step: Choc-Peppermint Protein Balls
1 C organic chocolate whey protein, 1 C mixed nuts chopped (almonds and hazelnuts)
1 C shredded coconut, 4 dates, 3 Tbs coconut oil
1 Tbs flax meal, 8 drops pure peppermint extract
4 Tbs warm water (or as much as you need to bind)
Mix, ready for rolling
- Put the nuts, coconut oil, water and peppermint extract into a food processor and grind to a rough powder.
- Pour into a bowl and stir in flax seed meal until well mixed. Add another tablespoon of warm water if mixture is too dry. Should form a dough-like consistency.
- Roll mixture into balls, and then dust with more shredded coconut or cacao powder.
- Serve or store in the fridge.
Bonus Tip: Write it all down
Keep a diary of what you’re eating, how much you eat, and how you feel afterward. Do the same with how you move your body. It doesn’t need to be a new obsession, just take notes when you think of it. It will reinforce new conscious choices and help build long-lasting health.
FREE Class: Detox
Join us January 21 at 6:00pm for this free class! Learn to detox with easy recipes designed to get toxins out of the body and improve metabolism. Email us to reserve your spot.
Our Facebook page is a great resource for additional tips and recipes.
Call our Roanoke, Virginia office for an appointment or to request more information on making 2016 a healthier, more productive year ~ 1-540-344-1055.
Dr. Daryl Rich, DC, CSCS
