Clean Program Part 2

I ordered “Clean” by Dr. Alejandro Junger on Amazon and began reading it within a few days. By the time I picked up that book, it had been 8 months since surgery, my wedding was 3 months away, I was still in pain every day and my body simply did not feel like my own. I wanted to dance at my wedding without fearing the price I might pay for a twist or dip into my fiancé's arms. I wanted to feel like myself again and eliminate the temptation of old familiar habits and comforting myself with food. I was sick of feeling weak and vulnerable. I had a lot of healing to do.  I remember reading the book’s subtitle, “The Revolutionary Program to Restore the Body’s Natural Ability to Heal Itself” and thinking, “yes please.”

The book opens with powerful stories of healing and dramatic health changes that were surprising enough to me to inspire nothing but skepticism at first. But I kept reading (I was really in that “I’ll try anything” place,) and eventually I got to a point where I kept nodding my head at the book like a weirdo (by myself on the bus,) or widening my eyes with childlike excitement (which B found rather entertaining.) Once I got through enough of the anecdotal evidence, read about Dr. Junger’s personal experiences with stress, diet and lifestyle, and skimmed over the familiar basics on toxicity, I thought “Jesus. This makes a lot of sense.” (Full disclosure: you’re not going to politically or philosophically agree with everything the guys says. And in my opinion, you don’t have to. That would just be bizarre. But try to keep an open mind and entertain the idea that he is on to something.)  

In summary, Dr Junger’s theory is that we create a war zone in our bodies by consuming processed, inflammatory, acidic  - or in a nutshell, harmful – food and beverages. Then we slather synthetic, funky stuff on top of our bodies, in our hair, on our faces. Throw in toxic substances in our homes (cleaning products, etc,) coming out of our cars and in the air we breathe. Our bodies spend so much energy fighting all these internal, external and environmental battles, that we are ill-equipped to face disease, illness, stress or even silly things like food poisoning. We’re a bunch of sad sacks with overwhelmed bodies and overwhelmed minds. 

“Clean” challenges you to remove as many of the above barriers to overall health and well-being over a 21-30 day process that requires mindfulness, discipline and focus.  Wipe your slate clean so you can have a clear, unadulterated understanding of what your body and mind need to operate as the well-oiled machine it is intended to be. Help the machine "remove, restore and rejuvenate" through a series of pretty simple behavior modifications. Sacrifice a bunch of crap your body doesn’t need anyway; instead nourish it with bold, bright, beautiful fruits and vegetables and wonderful things like wild game and ancient grains. Go easy on yourself while your body is doing the hard work of purging years of Twinkie plaque and ice cream mucus. Help the process along with long walks, steams, meditation, massages, plenty of sleep and rest.  Emerge  feeling like a superhero. Yes, a superhero. That is the only way to describe how I started to feel by day 6. There is no other word that could communicate the combination of energy, clarity, happiness and empowerment that this process yielded for me.

But, as is the case with anything worth anything in life, it isn’t easy. Or cheap. Or comfortable. Or fast. But boy does it work.

Next up: The Dirty Details and Why They’re Worth Dealing With (You didn’t think I’d be all “sunshine and roses” about it did you?)