Massage Warsaw- Massage Therapy – Warsaw Acupuncture

Tag: detox

  • Sping: The Best Time for a Dietary Cleanse

    With the undeniably warm weather here, it is time for another cleanse. I am relatively new to the cleansing game. I think this is the third year I’ve tried it. I think that spring time is the perfect time for me to do a dietary cleanse.

    I would hate to be stuck doing a cleanse during the summer patio season. Cleansing is a bit of an anti-social habit depending on your group of friends. It requires abstaining from alcohol and just about any party food. No more social lubricants. You actually have to rely on your natural born charm and wit to work the room. No more late night munchies like souvlaki or burritos. Who wants to be munching down on spinach at 3am? Then again, without alcohol, who has the munchies at 3am? The dietary cleanse actually is a bit of a behaviour modifier turning us into less juvenile versions of ourselves. But with Canada only having 2 months of true summer, who wants to waste time being grown up? Bring on the ice cream with Bailey’s!

    Winter is also a terrible time for a cleanse. One would think that since social hibernation usually sets in during winter that it would be the perfect time for a cleanse. It is true that we generally leave the house less in the winter, but I need my winter fat. I’m 5’10” and usually around 170 lbs, but cleansing will usually drop my weight down to around 160 lbs. Having a 2 or 3 pack (I’m just not a 6 pack kind of guy) is great for the summer, but who is ever going to admire my rock hard abs (I wish) in the winter? You would need some serious x-ray vision to be able to see through my layers of turtle necks, thermal underwear and woolly sweaters. The extra 10 lbs is the only thing that really keeps me warm in the winter time. I’d put my winter flubber against any thinsulate or gore tex combo anytime. I made the mistake of cleansing one winter and I almost froze to death. No lie! (unless you count that one…)

    So, this year, I’m trying to do a spring cleanse. It goes perfectly with all the spring cleaning I’ve been doing lately. Get rid of all that stuff you don’t need. I don’t have to worry about being too cold. The weather is still crummy enough to warrant staying in every now and again. The only hitch is Easter weekend. Some of the best Trinidadian food you can find in Canada gets cooked up on Easter weekend. Not to mention all the Easter chocolate. Another troubling coincidence is that I just started buying chocolate to have available for my clients (the most amazing part of that is that I can now claim chocolate as a business expense! Can you believe it? I can’t wait to put that in my accounting program… “Chocolate Expense”). This means that I have a couple of kilograms of Lindt Swiss chocolate lying around the clinic that I am not allowed to touch.

    Somehow I will get through this.

    I will be using Cleanse Smart by Renew Life.

  • The Longest Wait

    Yesterday’s attempt at free publicity is already behind me, but now that the cameras are put away and the lights aren’t glaring in my eyes anymore, I find myself anxious to see how it turned out.  The cast and crew were at my clinic for about an hour and probably put together a minute and a half segment for the news tonight.  The question is what parts will they show for the minute and a half ?  (btw, that’s roughly one tenth the minimum personal allowance according to Andy Warhol, which doesn’t seem quite fair.  It seems that there are way too many people out there that are getting far more of their allotment than they should.  Don’t I deserve at least the full 15 minutes?).  There was the interview which would have been wonderful if it weren’t for my 10 pound swollen tongue which mangled my words and the super slidey sofa which had me slouching and crouching like one of the hobbits from The Lord of the Rings (My Precious…).  Followed by about 4 or 5 shots of me pretending to pop some detox pills and wash them down with water (You won’t believe how technically difficult it can be to take pills).  And then about 10 minutes of still video footage of the Cleanse Smart Detox Box.  So, out of my interview, my taking pills or the footage of the box I’m guessing that the box is going to grab the spotlight away from me.  It is certainly the more photogenic of the two of us.  It didn’t flub its lines.  And it had a lovely colour scheme (I’m not sure how the white balance works on Asians such as myself.  If the camera wasn’t a Sony, I’d probably call it a racist).  But anyway, the show won’t air until 6PM tonight on Global, so I won’t know how much of a leotard I was until then.  For now, I am just stuck imagining the outcome and alternately calling up people telling them to watch the news or stay away from their TV sets.   All this for some free publicity.

  • Success!

    I spent so much time in the last few posts talking of my little slip ups doing my detox cleanse that I figured it’s about time that I gave you some positive news.  The day’s not over yet, but so far, I haven’t cheated.  Same goes for yesterday where I was a model of discipline and determination (minus 3 teeny weeny itsy bitsy Quality Street chocolates… but they were just wafer thin….).

    I started last Monday  night and this morning I took the last herbal supplements, that means that I’m done.  I finished a one week cleanse.  And really, it wasn’t that difficult.   Especially with my soon to be patented “cleanse with benefits” method.

    I should feel relieved and have the urge to run out and get me some T-bone steak, but I feel like something’s missing. You might not believe this, but I’m pretty sure I’m going to extend the cleanse.  My plan is to buy some more supply and extend the detox/cleanse till the end of this week.   I know that I could stop now, but I feel like I am just really getting into the good stuff.  The stomach is feeling flatter, I’m getting used to the leaner cleaner diet (the cravings are almost non existent now), my body feels pretty well adjusted to the changes, and my digestive system…. well, it’s almost working the way I want it to.  It’s all good stuff, but I just feel like I have unfinished business still.

  • Oops, I did it again

    So, that’s now twice that I slipped up on Saturday.  A new low.  This cleanse business is becoming more of a “cleanse with benefits” the way things are going.  Thank goodness I’m not a nutritionist, otherwise I’d have to seriously consider looking for a new line of work.  Luckily I’m just a humble RMT whose failings on the diet front have no reflection on his skills at massage.  Whew…

    Last night’s indiscretion was mostly my fault, but I think the menu was partly to blame.  How can anyone resist such a deliciously worded menu?  The menu in question belonged to “Real Thailand” on Bloor west of Spadina.  It did not disappoint.  A real Thai restaurant, owned by real  Thai people, serving real Thai dishes.  The menu went far beyond the red/green/orange curry or the chicken/beef in ginger and had my mouth watering just reading about the mussel, king fish and shrimp soup.  So, in yet another moment of weakness, I broke down and had a fantastic dinner.  Weakness can be so yummy.

  • Cleansing Can be Tough Business

    After the initial stumble (Norwegian caviar, English chocolates…. things are tough for an RMT), I was on a bit of a roll for a while.  Nothing passed through these teeth unless it was vegetarian, gluten free and non dairy.  That is until today when a client brought in, for little ‘ol me, home cooked shrimp in an onion & tomato sauce over a bed of quinoa.  Absolutely yummy.  A little bit of a guilty pleasure, but not too much as I figure that shrimp is gluten free, dairy free and such a great, light little seafood that it’s practically vegetarian as well.  I’m starting to think that the best part of the cleansing has got to be the cheating.  And can I help but cheat when the universe seems to be conspiring to keep me well fed?

    The real reason why I cleanse, though, is for the health benefits.  Right away when I start a cleanse, my digestive system kicks into high gear and feels much more at ease.  After about a week I notice an increase in my energy levels and clarity of mind.  Also, food starts to taste better as if my taste buds have heightened senses.  And, one of my favourite side effects is that by the end of 2 or 3 weeks of cleansing, I am usually about 5 or 10 pounds lighter.  Miraculously, most of the weight seems to be from the midsection, which I am perfectly OK with.

    So, I’m back on my cleanse again and it’ll be a bit tricky as this weekend is Taste of the Danforth, so basically as soon as I walk out my front door, I am greeted by ferris wheels, amusement park rides and the smell of souvlaki, lamb and gyros.  The Taste of the Danforth is a meat lover’s paradise, but definitely not a good place for me this weekend.

  • It’s Cleansing Time Again

     

    As I said in my last post, I was in Montreal on the weekend.  It was a great time, but all the rich food, alcohol and unhealthy living took its toll on me.  By the time I got back to Toronto, I felt a bit of a physical mess; my digestive system not quite feeling right.  A great reminder to lay off the red meat binges, the ice cream cravings, and of course social lubricants (alcohol, thou art a cruel mistress).  I was feeling in such a state that I had decided that it was finally time to go on a cleanse again.  (I am no expert on cleanses, and if any of you are, feel free to send me an email if you would like to write a guest post on the subject).  But I thought it would be interesting to let you know how my cleanse is going for me strictly for interest sake.  Again, I am no expert on dietary measures and my situation is in no means the same as yours.  If you are considering a cleanse, please consult an MD or naturopathic doctor first.

    The cleanse I am doing is called Cleanse Smart and is produced by Renew Life.  It consists of 2 bottles of pills.  Bottle #1 is for an organ detox and bottle #2 is a colon cleanse.  The simplest part of the cleanse is taking the pills.  I take 2 organ detox pills in the morning and 2 colon cleanse pills at night.  Both times you must have an empty stomach.  And this is as easy as the cleanse will get.  The tricky part is the diet.  To really do a cleanse, you have to take all the junk out of your diet.  So, for the next while I will be eating like a monk.  Though I get the feeling that there are sects of monks that eat better than I will be.  After all, wasn’t champagne invented by French monks?  Now, if I was going to dedicate myself to religion, I’d definitely want to hook up with the partying monk variety.  But no, I will not be living off of a monkish champagne diet.  Instead, I won’t be taking any meat (red meat, white meat, pink meat, fish meat (Dr. Seuss… anyone, anyone?), steak, hamburgers, pork chops, sushi are all taboo for the next few days), any wheat products (no bread, pasta, couscous… not even a lousy cracker), any alcohol (beer, beer, beer or beer), any instant food (pizza pockets), any dairy (pizza pockets) or anything I might enjoy but might be vaguely suspicious of its questionable nutritional value (pizza pockets).

    My first hurdle was timing.  I arrived back from Montreal and promptly took the first set of pills muttering “never again” to myself as I washed them down with a glass of water (quite the ventriloquist act if you’ve ever seen me do this) and went to bed.  I woke up the next morning and washed down the second set of pills and looked around for some brekkie.  Well, my cupboards were practically bare, but also, there was nothing I had that I could consume as part of my cleanse diet.  Those cans of tuna? No.  The carton of eggs? No.  The breakfast sausages?  No.  Some toast?  No.  So, while I had food, I had nothing I was allowed to eat.  If there was nothing I could eat, then I would eat nothing.  No problem. I’ll just have to last a while until I’m done work so that I can go out and buy some veggies.  I was actually doing ok until a client arrived with a thank you present of Norwegian caviar and cookies from Starbucks.  Hmmmmmmmmm.  It would be rude to refuse…. I had just started the cleanse and I’m sure I had bits of the weekend still floating around in me, meaning that I was hardly clean yet and these dirty little cookies wouldn’t reaaaaallly be hurting me.  And so yes, only 12 hours into the cleanse and I was devouring cookies then crackers and caviar like I had just seen food for the first time.  I should add in my defense that the caviar was out of this world.

    Today, the second day of the cleanse, I ran down to China Town East and picked up a cornucopia of  Chinese greens, tofu, and fruit.  So I am now set to weather the storm.  I figure I can nibble on this mixed with some brown rice and be satisfied for a good while.  I was feeling proud of myself after going into work with a  stomach full of nutritious goodies until I had my second client who was so happy with how much better she was feeling since she started treatment that she brought me in a little care package of Cadbury’s chocolates as well as a goody bag of Quality Street chocolates.  Now, normally I can withstand any assault of Cadbury’s or Quality Street, but today I was defenseless, because not only were they chocolate (my favourite food group of them all), but they were from England.  Bloody ‘ell!  I should explain that Cadbury’s and Quality Street are chocolatiers as old as jolly old England itself and the chocolate they make there is superior and in a completely different hemisphere as the “chocolates” made in Canada under license from Cadbury’s and Quality Street.  (It should also be noted that one of the first real stumbling blocks that the European Union had in hammering out its framework was in the legislature over chocolate.  England was at risk of not being able to call its chocolate “chocolate” as it had a higher cocoa butter content that the rest of Europe.  There was a passionate, heated battle in European parliament, that somehow ended with me having pure chocolate gold in my hands on this day).  If you ever have the chance to try the real thing, go for it, you won’t regret it.  (well, except that you might now never really enjoy another chocolate again).

    Long story short (it’s a relative thing…. believe me, when I start on chocolate, it takes a lot to stop me), I greatly enjoyed a taste of England tonight.  I hope my cleanse forgives me.  I will try to be a better, truer cleanser tomorrow.  Amen. (Oh and if the 2 clients that led me into temptation are reading this….. Thank you.  The caviar, cookies and chocolate were absolutely delicious and well worth every morsel of guilt)