What Is Detoxing and is It Worth Doing?

When you clean your house for the spring time, you remove all of the unwanted garbage and dirt in order to make it feel cleaner and fresher. In many ways, this is what a detox program seeks to achieve.

By cleaning the body of unwanted materials and allowing it to ‘freshen’ up, a detox program is supposed to help you become healthier than ever before.

What is a detox program?

There are a number of detox programs available for people to try, but the overall goal remains the same: to cleanse the body of unwanted materials and allow it to reach a healthier state.

Some detox programs do this through changes in diet, while others incorporate the aid of certain nutritional supplements. For now, let’s discuss the various levels of nutritional detox.

One of the simplest approaches to detox is to eat healthier. The body is a finely tuned instrument that is able to handle chemicals and other contaminants, but with a healthier diet, it can process them much more efficiently.

This is especially the case when the normal diet is much worse than it could be. However, the long term effects of this detox diet will only last so long if the old habits return.

The next step to nutritional detox is to abstain from solid foods, usually through a juice fast. While not a fast in the strongest sense of the word, drinking only fruit and vegetable juices allows the body to conserve the energy that it used for digesting solid foods and start to process any unwanted chemicals in the body.

Most people will perform this detox for about three days at the minimum and up to a month in some cases. This sort of fast tends to be easier on many people because you are still taking in calories and carbohydrates, however, the lack of protein can make some people feel weak.

Only under a doctor’s supervision should anyone attempt to fast by only drinking water. This is a very risky way to detox the body. Because your body relies on a precise balance of electrolytes and nutrition, abstaining from all forms of food will send it into a state of shock. Again, this is not recommended for anyone that doesn’t have the permission of their doctor.

Supplements used for detoxing

There are plenty of detox programs that come in a box. These are generally packets of pills that are supposed to help the body loosen up decaying fecal matter as well as attract chemicals so that they can be excreted from the body.

These supplements generally contain herbs like milk thistle and stool bulking ingredients in order to help the digestive system work harder. Some of these detox programs can cause cramping and digestive upset, so you may want to limit their use.

The benefits of detoxing your body

In a successful detox program, you can expect:

1. Increased energy
2. More efficient digestion
3. Weight loss
4. Better health
5. Clearer skin
6. Increased vitality

However, there is some speculation that detox programs aren’t necessary for the human body and that merely bettering one’s diet is the best way to keep the body healthy.