Detoxify, Rejuvenate and Feel Fantastic – Fast!

Contributing writer for Wake Up World

A Simple Way to Regain and Maintain Your Health

It’s funny: when searching for a nice image to go with this article, the only picture coming up for “fasting” was an empty plate with knife and fork. Quite unimaginative, let alone positive. But it probably shows what many people associate with the word “fasting”: lack, going hungry, no food allowed, a punitive act even.

To me, fasting represents none of those. While some people use it for weight loss, this is not my motivation. Shedding weight may be a welcome side effect, but not the reason for fasting. That is something else: to give the digestive system a break and to detoxify the body. Simple as that. One can fast for shorter or longer periods: we do it every night, breaking fast every morning, at breakfast. So don’t say you can’t do it, because, if you can read this, you’re already an expert of many years. 🙂

[pro_ad_display_adzone id=”110028″]

Some people advocate for a regular, prolonged fast over night, with a fasting period of up to 12 hours. Others hold periodic fasting days to relieve their system. Traditionally, all religions include fasting in one form or another, going back centuries. Most cultures know of fasting as a method of rejuvenation, healing, and rebalancing the body, from ancient Egypt and Greece to Indian Ayurveda and modern Western science (e.g.Boschmann & Michalsen 2013, Fuhrman et al. 2002, Mueller et al. 2001). It makes sense our bodies developed this ability to switch between external and internal energy supply, as during hunter-gathering days, foodless periods alternated with periods of abundance – to maintain its integrity, the body had to learn how to deal with times of deprivation while keeping the organism intact.

Why fasting on purpose, though? What are the benefits? How does it work? What do I need? How long should I fast? Let’s see. There are different ways to go about this. Just choose what resonates and leave the rest.

First off, let’s define fasting:

“Fasting is […] the ability to meet the body’s requirements for macro- and micronutrients during a limited period of either shortage or absence of food, by using almost exclusively the body’s energy reserves without endangering health. […] It is the voluntary abstinence from solid food and stimulants (like caffeine or nicotine) for a limited period of time. […] According to the state of health, fasting can be practiced as therapeutic fasting (‘fasting cure’), preventive fasting, and fasting for the healthy (without therapeutic or medical intention).” (Boschmann & Michalsen 2013).

Fasting Benefits

“Fasting is the greatest remedy – the physician within!” Paracelsus (1493 – 1541)

There is no question that reducing food intake improves the health of overweight individuals: insulin sensitivity increases, blood pressure decreases, cellular oxidative stress and inflammation reduce, and cellular stress resistance increases (Mattson & Wan 2005). According to MDs who have fasted hundreds of patients, fasting ameliorates (in approximate order of efficacy) high blood pressure, general cardiovascular disease, asthma, arthritis, diabetes, several autoimmune conditions (RA, mixed connective tissue disease, lupus), and fibroid tumors (Holzman 1998, Fuhrman et al. 2002). A Japanese MD developed a fasting protocol and has successfully treated many patients suffering from CFS, ulcerative colitis, collagen disease, viral hepatitis, atopic dermatitis and some neurodegenerative diseases (Futaba 2015). Traditionally, fasting has also helped with bronchitis, hay fever, obesity, migraines, hives, liver problems, gall stones, constipation, boils, acne, and others (Meyerowitz 1999). German researchers confirmed the positive effects of fasting on rheumatoid arthritis and possibly also fibromyalgia (Michalsen et al. 2005). Another study found a decreased inflammatory response in Muslims observing Ramadan (Reis de Azevedo et al. 2013), essentially an intermittent fasting (see below) regimen where no food is consumed during daylight hours. It is an age old, tested and tried method that works. Why?

“So much of the energy that the body uses all day goes to digesting our food including muscular contractions of the intestine, chemical energy used to synthesize stomach acid, bile, and digestive enzymes as well as the billions of immune cells in the intestinal lining that interrogate the chemical nature of the food going by in the digestive tract. When that function is no longer required on a fast, all that energy is freed up and people surprisingly – but predictably – feel very light and energetic for the first several weeks on the fast” (Klaper 2014).

What Happens in the Body when We Fast?

The human body primarily runs on glucose, a simple sugar (carbohydrate). It is the easiest, readily accessible energy source and sugar reserves last for about a day, with the brain consuming c.120g per day. That’s 60-70% of the total body glucose metabolism (Brandt 1999). Compared to sugar, fat contains about twice as much energy, but metabolizes slower. The adult body has enough fat reserves to live on for 2-3 months. Fat depots may also store acids and toxic metabolic waste.

Without any food intake for several days, the body switches from primarily burning sugar to mostly burning fat reserves to satisfy cellular energy demands (Reis de Azevedo et al. 2013). Some fats convert to ketone bodies(water soluble molecules), the only fuel accessible to the brain besides glucose. With formation of sufficient amounts of ketone bodies after a few days of fasting, people tend to lose the feeling of hunger. Thus, when done properly, one should experience a good level of vitality and absence of hunger during a fast (Klaper 2014, Boschmann & Michalsen 2013).

Fasting vs Starving

Two cell types must always use some glucose for fuel: your red blood cells and your brain cells. So despite no food coming in, the body must find a way to service these cells with sugar. It does so by using glycerol, a fat building block, and amino acids from muscle proteins to produce glucose. Thus, besides using fat for fuel, the body also converts muscle tissue into energy. In the beginning of a fast, this process also fuels the brain with its large sugar demands. A few days in, however, the liver churns out enough ketone bodies for the brain to switch its energy source away from glucose. Thus, muscle tissue is preserved and kept functional, sacrificing as little as possible for sugar conversion. Otherwise, the brain’s energy demands would lead to the body breaking itself down to fuel its systems (starvation) – hardly a beneficial nor sustainable scenario. By diverting the brain to using primarily ketone bodies, however, absence of food can be sustained through burning fat for quite some time without serious starvation (depending on one’s fat reserves). It’s a survival mechanism we’re all equipped with to prevail in times of famine. Interestingly, “ketones have been shown to preserve learning and memory functions and slow disease progression in the brain” (Collier 2013).

So from day three of the fast, after depleting sugar stores, the body sustains itself from its fat reserves (ketosis). It begins eliminating toxins. It also begins clearing the colon of putrefied waste and reabsorbing aberrant cells and metabolites in the body. With every following day, you’re burning through more fat, releasing acids and toxins from sometimes long held depots, supporting your body in a thorough and meticulous “house keeping” process. Eventually, lipomas (benign tumor of adipose (fat) tissue) and atheromas (accumulated waste in your blood vessels) may disappear after a prolonged water fast (Kim 2013). Other symptoms may lessen or disappear altogether as well.

One word on detoxifying: your body does it all the time. It’s nothing unusual or periodic. With every exhale, you breathe out acids, for example. Every day, you lose about 2.5l of water through your skin, breath, and bladder. Every day, you eliminate metabolic waste as stool and urine. Sweating is a natural way to detoxify, that is why using deodorants that clog up your “release valves” is a bad idea – it hinders the body’s effort to expel toxins. What’s a toxin? In my definition, any molecule that should not be present in the body. This may pertain to metabolites arising from normal cellular function or externals like pesticides, food additives, or industrial output. The body has a myriad of ways to deal with these. Fasting gives it the opportunity to achieve much more than it usually would because no energy must flow into digesting and assimilating regularly supplied food. When you eat less and rest more, the body automatically increases its ongoing detoxification processes.

Fasting Options

Caloric Restriction (CR)

[pro_ad_display_adzone id=”110030″]

The physiological benefits and life-extending properties of CR are well documented from animal and human studies (Varady & Hellerstein 2007, Barzilai & Gabriely 2001). Restricting daily energy intake by 15–40% of what one would usually consume improves glucose tolerance and insulin action, reduces blood pressure and heart rate (i.e. improves cardiovascular health), and reduces oxidative damage to lipids, protein, and DNA, thus exerting a protective effect from oxidative stress and ameliorating aging-related diseases (Wegman et al. 2015). Other documented outcomes include increased life span, reduced incidence of spontaneous and induced cancers, enhanced immune function, increased nerve cell survival, lower rates of kidney disease, and prolonged reproductive function (Varady & Hellerstein 2007, Mattson & Wan 2005). Despite many data stemming from animal models, a two year human trial found substantial concordance between the reaction of humans and that of other vertebrate species (rodents & monkeys) to CR (Walford et al. 1999). Thus, results derived from animal CR studies may offer valuable insights into human biology.

Intermittent Fasting (IF)

Intermittent fasting is any regimen that restricts or stops food intake for set periods of time, whether that’s fasting 8-12h over night per day, a day or two per week, or alternating between 24h of eating and 24h of abstaining. There are many options.Preclinical findings suggest that the transient periods of fasting induce benefits on aging similar to extended CR (Wegman et al. 2015), even when there is little or no overall decrease in calorie intake (Mattson & Wan 2005). In other words, health may be improved by reducing meal frequency without reducing calorie intake. IF is seemingly as effective as CR in relation to cardio vascular disease and type 2 diabetes risk factors. Varady et al. (2009) showed the cardio-protective effects of IF in 16 overweight patients after an eight week intervention. Positive outcomes included weight loss; reduction of fat tissue mass, blood pressure, and heart rate; improved lipid profiles. Results from animal studies also suggest a protective effect on cancer risk (Varady & Hellerstein 2007) and showed that both CR and IF sufficiently prevented the development of type 2 diabetes while also positively influencing lipid metabolism (Baumeier et al. 2015). Another human study reports a significantly greater (liver) cell-protective effect from IF compared to CR (Reis de Azevedo et al. 2013), and Klempel et al. (2012) successfully combined both IF and CR to help obese patients with weight loss and coronary heart disease prevention. The beneficial effects of IF and CR result from at least two mechanisms — reduced oxidative damage and increased cellular stress resistance (Mattson & Wan 2005). “Intermittent fasting can also produce similar effects as intensive exercise, says Mattson, including increasing heart rate variability while reducing resting heart rate and blood pressure” (Collier 2013). See some examples of IF regimens below.

Alternate-day Fasting

This approach alternates between a feast day where any food can be enjoyed without limits and a fast day with zero or highly reduced food intake. Feast and fast periods typically last 24h each. Contrary to CR above, alternate-day fasting does not limit overall calorie intake and only alters the frequency of food consumption (Varady & Hellerstein 2007). So this approach may attract those who dislike counting calories. The prospect of omitting food for just a day at a time may also appear less daunting than that of abstaining for a whole week or longer.

Three Cycles of Eight Fasting

The idea is to allow the body distinct periods of detoxifying, ingesting, and digesting food.

Support the body through conscious deep breathing (acid release), exercise and/or sauna (detox through sweat), elimination via colon & bladder. Moving the body and sweating helps the lymphatic system to clear out waste, as does gently bouncing on a trampoline. Drink only water during this period.

Noon to 8pm: ingestion period

The best period for eating. Start with fresh fruit. Keep it raw until dinner (veggie bread, sprouts, greens, etc), which can contain more protein and complex carbs: dense breads, lentils, rice, avocado, big salads, veggie soup.

8pm to 4am: digestion & repair period (no eating)

Assimilation period: time to extract and use dietary nutrients to rebuild and repair body structures. If you’re eating into the night, it interferes with nutrient assimilation, as the body now needs to expend energy on digesting food instead of processing and extracting nutrients. It takes about two hours to move food out of the stomach into the small intestine, where most nutrient absorption occurs. Do yourself a favor and eat only up until 8pm. A lot of people make that 6pm, in fact, considering the stomach passage time of two hours.

Fasting One Day per Week

Abstaining a day per week is not going to detox you much more than usual, but it offers relief to a system chronically overloaded with calories, freeing it up to achieve a little extra house keeping work. You also add 52 food free days per year, which ought to positively influence any weight management efforts. Since our gut plays a central role in our state of health (Group 2010), it makes sense to periodically offer it a break, giving it the opportunity to repair, rejuvenate, reset. Think about it: in your every day – except for the nightly fast, and sometimes not even that – when is there a quiet period for your digestive system? To consciously offer your system a break is beneficial on all levels. You reconnect with your body. You’ll feel renewed, and you are, literally, from the inside out.

Juice Fasting

A juice fast is absolutely worth the effort. You’ll feel fantastic! I observe it twice a year, ideally with the change of seasons, in spring and autumn. What’s juice fasting? First off, it’s not referring to store bought juice. No sir. You’ll need a decent juicing machine to do this. Do what? Make your own juice at home! Every day. YUM. During a juice fast, I make between 3-8 green juices per day, depending on how I feel. Water and tea are also allowed. You can tweak this to your liking. I love juicing and juice fasting because it:

offers your body valuable plant nutrients (e.g. antioxidants, vitamins, minerals),
helps your body stay alkaline (Crocker 2008, Chatham 2012),
improves digestion (Murray 2002),
augments antioxidant capacity and lowers cellular damage through lipid peroxidation (Potter et al. 2012),
stabilizes blood sugar (Chatham 2012),
reduces DNA damage, thus possibly exerting a cancer-preventive effect (Ruxton et al. 2006),
helps your body detoxify (e.g. by burning fat reservoirs which store toxins or by extracting heavy metals from blood) (Chatham 2012),
gives your digestive system a break from solid foods and thus time for repair,
offers your body nutrients easily and quickly absorbed by the GI tract (Chatham 2012),
may contribute to balancing your blood lipids (Afroz et al. 2014),
enhances wound healing and tissue regeneration (e.g. by reducing oxidative damage (Oliveira et al. 2013)),
helps dissolve kidney stones (Chatham 2012),
promotes weight loss,
increases energy levels,
reduces the risk of cardiovascular disease (Ruxton et al. 2006),
offers your body the best water in the world: cellular water (Hendel & Ferreira 2003).

While this last point is an article unto itself, let’s just say that your tap water and your body’s cellular water have little in common. Organisms turn water into a living matrix that allows life processes. Water is so much more than just H₂O! When you juice plant parts, the resulting juice IS that plant tissue’s cellular water: a highly structured substance that carries information and enables cell communication, within and between cells. When you drink that juice, it is infinitely more valuable than any tap water anywhere. Unless you live nearby a pristine stream, you’re better off juicing (organic) vegetables than drinking tap water…that’s why Charlotte Gerson of Gerson Therapy fame, which helps people heal from all sorts of major ailments through juicing, says one should in fact not drink water. Within her model, I see why she says it. People in her care drink about a juice per hour – after 13 glasses or so a day, you really do not need any more water. And more importantly, as just said, the veggie water is so much better than most any bottled or tap water. Contrary to those types, it is alive and does not introduce water borne toxins to a body in need of healing through nutrition (real food) and detoxification. I listed Charlotte’s book in the references – a worth while read for anyone interested in healing and wellbeing through juicing. Our Youtube channel also offers one of her lectures.

For maximum benefit, prepare your juice fast by adhering to a “week of less” the week prior: quit caffeine, eat less food (e.g. two meals instead of three), drink plenty of water or herbal teas. This eases you into your juice fast. You can also already make a juice per day and enjoy the fresh taste – a great habit to maintain besides a juice fast.

I tend to keep it green during a juice fast. A green juice is any juice that’s green. =) You don’t say…? Just clarifying, because it means you can include an apple and a carrot, long as the end result looks green. Apples and carrots, while containing ample sugar, make green juices more palatable. Experiment, and use as little fruit as possible. Your juice should taste good, however, otherwise it’s easy to associate unnecessary dislike to juicing, and that would be missing out on a wonderful healthy living practice.

One can juice next to anything. Depending on the recipe, you can enjoy a light juice, or one that literally smells and tastes like a liquid salad. An ample arena to get creative! Should you produce an unswallowable concoction, add some cucumber or celery (1 stalk), they have saved many a creation. =) To learn more about juicing and which juicing machine to use, go here. The references below also offer some literature with recipes to get you started.

After a week of this, I not only feel greatly energized with a renewed appreciation for food and its delicious taste, I also eat more consciously and practice better discernment of nutritious versus unhealthy (processed) foods. It’s a reset on many levels.

Good to Know…

While juice fasting, you may experience temporary discomfort such as headaches, fatigue, irritability, lightheadedness, bad breath, body odor or skin eruptions, as your body begins to rid itself of toxins. Your tongue will likely acquire a thick white or yellow “coating” a few days in. Just remove it in the morning (a tea spoon works well). This is nothing to worry about, but rather a sign that your body is working to release metabolites it may have hung on to for decades, rarely getting the chance to eliminate them.

Some people experience nausea from wheatgrass juice or green vegetable juices. These are rather strong, especially when you’re not used to this in the beginning. Go easy on green green juices and play with recipes. In my mind, there’s no reason for nausea. Reduce the proportion of greens or dilute with cucumber, for instance. You will gradually get used to greener and greener juices, until no nausea results from them. Gradually work your way toward the mean green side of things. =) Remember, it’s a green juice as long as it’s green, whether that’s achieved by carrot, apple, silver beet, and spinach (palatable green juice) or broccoli, wheatgrass, and cabbage (mean green juice). Throwing in beetroot will turn things brown, no matter how little. No worries. Beetroot is an awesome ingredient. Just experiment. Rule of thumb: your juice should taste good. Or great. Here’s one for outside the fast: 4 carrots, 2 apples, fresh coconut water (from 1 nut), small handful of coconut flesh, 3 mint leaves. Soooo delicious! An awesome way to begin or end your day.

Water Fasting

Fasting in its truest sense, with a prolonged (3+ days) rest from food and drink, except for clean water. It promotes self-healing by casting off accumulated toxins. While extremely versatile, our bodies’ capacity to store and/ or eliminate foreign matter taken in through the diet (think food additives, processed foods, herbicides, plastic derivatives) is not unlimited. These toxins, if left to circulate through the system or stored in fat tissue for too long, act as antagonists to cells and organs, interfering with cell nourishment and regeneration. Eventually, physical discomfort or illness may arise from toxic overload.

According to Dr. Michael Klaper of TrueNorth Healing Center in California:

“a water fast is a very powerful way to initiate healing and to bring rapid and dramatic improvement […]. Water fasting cleanses the body on a deep, cellular level. All of us in our body cells, have remnant molecules of every restaurant meal, fast food snack, and processed food dessert we have ever eaten. There are flavorings, colorings, preservatives, dough conditioners, stabilizers, and thousands of other compounds that compose the chemical soup of modern cuisine in all the cells in our body. These substances accumulate in our tissues over time, contributing to feelings of chronic fatigue and bodily dysfunction. A water fast has the effect of “taking your cells through the car wash” where day after day, nothing but pure water washes through each and every cell. This markedly lowers the concentrations of the foreign, disruptive molecules. It is no wonder that people predictably emerge from a water fast feeling lighter and cleaner on the inside, because they really are.”

Pure water is the key word…it may not be that easy to come by. It’s one reason why I prefer a juice fast.

Use your common sense before beginning to water fast, especially with any ailments present – it may be prudent to engage a healthcare professional to monitor your process. They’ll ensure that all goes to plan and that the fast is ended before any problems may arise. See below for a list of contraindications where fasting is not recommended.

An added bonus of this option: you don’t have to think about what meals to prepare when, and it also saves you money and time spent at the supermarket. It frees up time to focus on other things. Combined with walks in nature and yoga or meditation, this can be quite the regenerative time for body and soul, I imagine. How a full work day fits in, I am not sure. Otto Buchinger, a world authority on healing through fasting, advocated for people to come to his clinic and leaving their every day lives behind for a while. To me, this makes perfect sense. It pertains to those struggling with their health as it is, and not necessarily to healthy individuals interested in using fasting to rebalance their metabolism. Even though a retreat setting may help everyone sticking with the project.

When to Fast?

Anytime, really. And ideally, at a time when you’re not stressed… Holidays are good. Warm temperatures are good, too. Since you won’t digest anything solid, you’ll lose that inner furnace resulting from food processing. In other words, you may get cold more easily. Thus, warm summer months lend themselves to fasting. A Tahiti vacation equally works. =)

One word on public holidays: unless you’re super determined, I wouldn’t fast around these. It’s hard to resist temptations, and family members may well make a sport out of tempting you into the turkey or the Christmas cake. Best to fast at other times.

I usually take out a calendar at the beginning of the year and pencil in two weeks, one in the spring, one in the fall, and that’s that. Appointments with self set. Following the seasons is just a personal preference. You can really pick any time that suits you.

How Long For?

This really comes down to a personal preference. I’m happy with a seven to ten day interval for juice fasting. Some people go to 30, others even to 60 days. It depends on what you would like to achieve. Unless you’re healthy, I would recommend to collaborate with a professional when undertaking a prolonged juice or water fast.

Restricting calories is quite easily achieved by omitting a meal per day. I find two meals a day suffice. Intermittent fasting can be applied in various ways, just experiment and tailor it to your situation. Fasting really is about awareness around food, funny enough. Once you completed a fast, you’re more discerning with what you allow to nourish your body and what you can be without. With a renewed appreciation for your physiology and body feeling, reducing some foods suddenly becomes much easier, as do decreasing meal frequency and not overeating.

Who Shouldn’t Fast?

Besides relieving the system, detoxing, rejuvenating, and rebalancing healthy individuals, indications for fasting include metabolic syndrome and diseases, chronic inflammatory diseases, chronic cardiovascular diseases, chronic pain syndromes, atopic diseases, and psychosomatic disorders. Contraindications are cachexia, anorexia nervosa and other eating disorders, uncontrolled hyperthyroidism, advanced cerebrovascular insufficiency or dementia, advanced liver or kidney insufficiency, pregnancy, and nursing (Remely et al. 2015).

And on WebMD, Joel Fuhrman, a doctor who uses fasting with his patients, adds contraindications for people with wasting diseases or malnutrition and those with a history of cardiac arrhythmias. Also, children under 18 should not fast, because they’re still growing and developing.

Anyone on medication should discuss longer fasting options with their doctor first, as abstaining from food may increase drug effects:

“The action of all medications, herbal supplements, vitamins, etc. are all potentiated on a water fast. For that reason, all medications except thyroid replacements, must be stopped prior to the fast. For people who are on medications that they cannot stop, like prednisone, antidepressants, etc., a water fast is contraindicated. These people should not water fast, but rather, do a juice cleanse” says Dr. Klaper (2014).

Activities That Work in Well with Fasting

Exercise like walking and yoga go well with fasting, as do warm (< 37°C) detox baths with a followed resting period (30+ mins). I like to set aside a week and think of it as “rejuvenation week”, where I mostly engage in juice fasting, mild exercise, skin brushing, bathing, walking in nature, resting, conscious breathing, and meditation, all in support of a raised body awareness and increasing vitality levels as toxins take their leave. This simply feels good! In doing this twice a year, my body gets a break of at least 14 days per year. Only 14 days, really. But they make a big difference and effects tend to last as long as I maintain a two meals a day, plant based diet afterward, with only few excesses here and there. And if I do enjoy the occasional binge, I know the next resetting juice fast is always on the horizon. =)

Last But Not Least…

It should be noted that fasting followed by the standard American diet (aptly abbreviated as SAD), while temporarily relieving the systemic caloric overload and allowing for detox and cell repair, may yield no long-term benefit, as also pointed out by a German study looking at long-term weight reduction in obese patients (Beer et al. 2014). While people initially lost weight through fasting, most regained it later on. Those who kept it off were 1) educated on dietary and life style changes and 2) practiced the new habits as inpatients before continuing on their own at home. Giving them that opportunity (vs education only) proved crucial. When healthy study participants underwent CR in a controlled environment for two years and upon finishing the trial resumed their previous ad libitum eating habits, their mean body weight returned to pre-entry values within six months (Weyer et al. 2000). However, combining fasting with a subsequent vegetarian or vegan lifestyle promises positive long-term results (Kjeldsen-Kragh 1999, Mueller et al. 2001, Klaper 2014). The infamous “yo-yo effect” is not to be expected after a proper fast with subsequent lifestyle adjustments (Stoy 2012).

A plant based diet prefers organic live foods to processed ones, and contains less animal protein and carbs than SAD. MDs found that “maintaining a nutrient-dense, vegan diet of unrefined plant foods appears to be necessary after the fast to prevent the recurrence of symptoms and inflammatory activity” (Fuhrmann et al. 2002). So fasting really is part of a lifestyle intervention which includes subsequent eating habits and adequate exercise. People who manage this transition would hardly go back to their old ways, as their energy levels and overall feelings of wellbeing and vitality vastly improve. And that’s well worth ditching the habitual coffee, spaghetti, pizza, or sugars. Note the word “habitual”. Good news: the occasional indulgence is totally fine. Just find the right balance for yourself.

In conclusion, eating healthy and fasting periodically seems an excellent healthy living habit. I love the rejuvenating effects of juice fasting twice a year and recommend this practice wholeheartedly to those interested in high levels of vitality and wellbeing. What’s your experience with fasting periodically? Share it in the comments below! Remember, it’s only a few days of your life – and they may make all the difference.

“The time may come when not offering this substantially more effective nutritional approach [fasting] will be considered malpractice.” Joel Fuhrman, MD.

For more articles like this, sign up to Holistic Health Global’s monthly Healthy Living Newsletter or like HHG on Facebook! You can also connect on YouTube and online at HolisticHealthGlobal.co.nz

Article sources (book links bold):

Afroz et al. 2014. An experimental study on effects of wheatgrass (Triticum aestivum) juice on low density lipoprotein (LDL) level in blood of experimentally induced hypercholesterol-aemic Evans rats. Bangladesh J Physiol Pharmacol 2014;30(2):18-24.
Barzilai N and I Gabriely. 2001. The Role of Fat Depletion in the Biological Benefits of Caloric Restriction.
Baumeier et al. 2015. Caloric restriction and intermittent fasting alter hepatic lipid droplet proteome and diacylglycerol species and prevent diabetes in NZO mice.
Beer et al. 2014. Retrospective Long-Term Comparison of Naturopathic Fasting Therapy and Weight Reduction Diet in Overweight Patients.
Boschmann M and A Michalsen. 2013. Fasting Therapy – Old and New Perspectives.
Brandt M. 1999. Chapter 5: Endocrine Regulation of Glucose Metabolism.
Chapter 6: Starvation and Diabetes Mellitus.
Buchinger O. 2013. Das Heilfasten.
Chatham J. 2012. Green Juicing Diet.
Collier. 2013. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3652955/pdf/185e321.pdf
Crocker P. 2008. The Juicing Bible.
Fuhrmann J, Starter B and DJ Calabro. 2002. Brief Case Reports of Medically Supervised, Water-Only Fasting Associated with Remission of Autoimmune Disease.
Futaba T. 2015. The Relation between a Three-Day Sitting Meditation Fasting and the Participant’s Psychophysiological Condition: Through Nonlinear Chaos Analysis of Pulse Waves. 5th International Conference on Biomedical Engineering in Vietnam.
Gerson C and M Walker. 2001. The Gerson Therapy: The Proven Nutritional Program for Cancer and Other Illnesses.
Group E. 2010. The green body cleanse.
Hendel B and P Ferreira. 2003. Water & Salt.
Holzman D. 1998. Fasting: Health Benefits Versus Risks.
Huber et al. 2003. Effects of One Week Juice Fasting on Lipid Metabolism: A Cohort Study in Healthy Subjects.
Kim B. 2013. Should You Fast One Day A Week?
Kjeldsen-Kragh J. 1999. Rheumatoid arthritis treated with vegetarian diets.
Klaper M. 2014. FASTING – Effective Therapy for Health Conce rns.
Klempel et al. 2012. Intermittent fasting combined with calorie restriction is effective for weight loss and cardio-protection in obese women.
Mattson MP and R Wan. 2005. Beneficial effects of intermittent fasting and caloric restriction on the cardiovascular and cerebrovascular systems. Journal of Nutritional Biochemistry 16 (2005) 129–137.
Meyerowitz S. 1999. Juice Fasting & Detoxification.
Michalsen et al. 2005. Mediterranean diet or extended fast ing’s influence on changing the intestinal microflora, immunoglobulin A secretion and clinical outcome in patients with rheumatoid arthritis and fibromyalgia: an observational study.
Mueller H, Wilhelmi F and K-L Resch. Fasting followed by vegetarian diet in patients with rheumatoid arthritis: a systematic review. Scand J Rheumatol 2001;30:1-10.
Murray MT, Birdsall T, Pizzorno JE and P Reilly. 2002. How to prevent and treat cancer with natural medicine.
Oliveira et al. 2013. Green juice as a protector against reactive species in rats .
Potter et al. 2012. Carrot juice consumption augments antioxidant capacity and lowers lipid peroxidation in humans.
Reis de Azevedo et al. 2013. Effects of intermittent fasting on metabolism in men.
Remely et al. (2015). Increased gut microbiota diversity and abundance of Faecalibacterium prausnitzii andAkkermansia after fasting: a pilot study.
Ruxton CHS, Gardner EJ and D Walker. 2006. Can pure fruit and vegetable juices protect against cancer and cardiovascular disease too? A review of the evidence.
Stoy K. 2012. Prospektive unkontrollierte klinische Studie zur Wirksamkeit von ambulantem Heilfasten nach Otto Buchinger auf Schmerz, Befindlichkeit, Gelenkfunktion und paraklinische Entzündungsparameter bei Patienten mit Arthrose. Dissertation.
Varady KA and MK Hellerstein. 2007. Alternate-day fasting and chronic disease prevention: a review of human and animal trials.
Varady et al. 2009. Short-term modified alternate-day fasting: a novel dietary strategy for weight loss ans cardioprotection in obese adults.
Walford et al. 1999. Physiologic Changes in Humans Subjected to Severe, Selective Calorie Restriction for Two Years in Biosphere 2.
Wegman et al. 2015. Practicality of Intermittent Fasting in Humans and its Effect on Oxidative Stress and Genes Related to Aging and Metabolism
Weyer et al. 2000. Energy metabolism after 2 y of energy restriction: the Biosphere 2 experiment.

About the author:

Katrin Geist loves exploring the mysteries of life. Initially doing so as a biologist, she now devotes her time to helping people regain and maintain their wellbeing through Reconnective Healing and wellbeing coaching. Biophysics taught her the importance and far reaching implications of a truly holistic approach to wellbeing, and to life at large. More and more, she begins to understand how energy, frequency, and information shape our lives – knowingly or not.

Katrin holds a BA from the University of Montana, U.S.A. and an MSc in biology from Berlin University (FU). This science background enables her to communicate scientific subjects in an accessible way, so that everyone can benefit from information otherwise often confined to technical experts.

Katrin has held international wellbeing clinics in several countries and currently works from her New Zealand office in Dunedin. She feel privileged to serve in this capacity and invites you to experience something different. Take back the reins of your health and discover more!

To contact Katrin for personal or remote sessions and to invite her for a seminar or presentation, please call or email her. You can contact Katrin via Facebook • Email • Website • or telephone 0064 (0)21 026 95 806 (NZ mobile).