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Talk to me about juicing

I have thought about getting a vitamix, but I'm afraid of the amounts of fiber. So I want to try juicing, I hae read that the fiber is lost in the process, but nutrients are still in the juice. Anyone use a juicer? Are nutrients lost?
 
I have been looking into juicing lately... think it is worth a go, especially for people like us with IBD!
 
I would highly recommend juicing. All of the fibre is removed so there are no issues there and it is a great way to take on board a load of fruit and veg that busy lives prevent us from sitting down and eating.
It is important to have fruit and veg mixed as just fruit can be too sweet and may go straight through you , if you know what I mean. While just veg can be a bit boring or bitter and put you off.
It is possible that some nutrients are lost, but way less than by boiling them and throwing out the water or cooking them to death. You can even keep them in the fridge for a bit without loosing anything, although they always taste better straight off.
Look around the forum for info and recipes :)
 
I pretty much always have juice every morning for breakfast. Then I may also take a juice for my lunch instead of sandwiches. I try not to eat too much bread.
 
I found I was feeling particularly bloated and even in pain on Mondays , then I realized I tended to eat more bread and toast over the weekend. So I cut it out a bit to see if I felt better and I do.
I have all sorts of juice. Often apple , cucumber, celery, spinach and lime.
 
Anyone thinking of Juicing should read the book "Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Juices by Norman W Walker. It will tell you just about everything that you need to know about juicing. It IS NOT a juicing recipe book! It lists the vegetables and fruits and the effect of juicing them on the body. There is also a section in the back listing what juices to use for what condition or disease. One thing that anyone starting on a juicing program needs to know, is that juicing will begin to break loose all of the toxins that have built up in your body from all of the processed foods you have eaten and virtually any toxin that is in your body. You need to start slow so this process does not impact you to aggressively. When you read Norman Walkers book you will understand, but also understand that the more toxins in your body, the more that needs to enter your system again so that they can be passed out of your body. There are things that you can do to help your body eliminate the toxin faster , like coffee enemas, and enemas in general. Norman Walker talks about this extensively. Do not be frightened by the word enema or giving yourself one. It is probably the best thing that you can do to help yourself feel better because it will clean out your digestive tract. Then the nutrients from the juicing will be able to heal your body faster and more effectively. You body has the ability to fight off just about ANY disease, if it is healthy. Anyone that has eaten the Standard American Diet, S.A.D. DOES NOT have a healthy body, and most likely has a seriously compromised immune system. Once you regain your health and build a strong immune system you will be able to fight any disease successfully, but NOT if you continue to eat the Standard American Diet. The Standard American Diet is what has gotten you to where you are today. It will take time, but if you follow a healthy mostly raw diet it WILL happen!

There is an excellent thread here on Crohns Forum that should also help you a lot:
Juicing as a Viable Treatment option!
It is under: Diet and Fitness, Juicing
Once you detoxify your body and rebuild your immune system you will feel like a new person, just do not start putting all those toxins back into your body so it will be able to remain healthy. You did not get where you are today overnight, healing will not happen overnight either, but with the proper diet and a good juicing program and Norman W Walkers book in hand it will happen.
 
Thanks Ckk4! I just downloaded it to my Kindle to read next! I just wish that there were more hours in the day.
 
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Just a quick testimony: I started a juice fast a week ago. In Poland there is a book by MD Ewa Dabrowska which explains the rationale behind vegetable/juice fasts. She has had long practice curing people of seemingly incurable diseases by putting them on vegetable fasts, which can last from 7 days to 6 weeks. I was very sceptical about this and especially about if it applies to me. For quite some time raw vegetables seemed to me the most intestine unfriendly food. I had been almost sure I would never be able to eat raw vegetables again till I read her book. I decided to try it out, with the only exception - I didn't start with raw vegetables, but vegetable (mostly carrot) juices. According to the book, the first three days are the worst, since the organism is still in "normal feeding" mode and feels the lack of calories. But usually around the third day there is a sort of crisis (which can even include fever or some other unpleasant symptoms) and after that organism puts itself into "healing" mode, starting to eliminate weak/damaged cells, toxins etc, burning its own energy.

To my surprise, for me it worked out as described in the book. The third day was a crisis (although a mild one) and after that it only got better. I lost about 3 kg (6 pounds) so far, which is not so bad after 8 days fasting, but my disease symptoms have all but vanished. I realise this may be because juices in general put little stress on intestines, but even if this is the case, it means I can digest raw vegetables and generally feel very well.

To give some background: I was diagnosed in 12/2012 after apendectomy as a likely "Crohn case", but the later tests were not 100% indicative of that. CRP was high, colonoscopy and MR showed signs of inflammation, and I certainly had intestine inflammation symptoms, but biopsy was interpreted as "non-specific inflammation". I was put on Entocort, mesalasine and Azatioprine. I took Aza for only about a month and dropped it (after reading about side effects), against my doctor's advice, who seemed to be very keen on it, then stayed only on Entocort and after 11 months reached an uncertain remission (CRP was a bit higher than the norm, but GI decided I had already been on steroids far too long). So I haven't taken medication for about 8 months. Instead I have been taking fish oil, flaxseed oil, curcumin, boswellia and probiotics, and chose a low carbohydrate diet (not 100% SCD), which let me stay in a "sort-of" remission, that is with rather mild inflammation symptoms.

When I finish the juice fast, I shall see if the relief it gave my body, was temporary or maybe it actively promotes intestine healing. The most surprising thing is that doctors (and GIs too!) know so little about
the role of diet and fasting in intestine diseases and if it were not for some hard-to-find books and forums like this one, one would believe the doctors' myth that "diet-contributes-nothing" to Crohn's! This is exactly what I heard from all the doctors in hospital and my GI, too.
 
macminer, It is good to hear that you are doing well.

The reason that most doctors have little or no knowledge of the link between disease and diet is that during their entire education they usually receive at most only one class in nutrition. And, once they graduate almost all of their information comes exclusively from the pharmaceutical industry, who obviously has a vested financial interest in promoting only their products. Many pharmaceutical companies go as far as skewing information that they pass along to doctors in favor of their products, even if the information that they impart is no longer accurate because of the 'spin' they put on that information. Since they can not make any money off of a nutritional or all natural cure they have even been known to peddle what many would consider to be false and misleading information, all in the pursuit of putting as many $$$$$ in their bank accounts as possible regardless of the effect that is has on the people that are sick and in need of help.

If you can, try to find Jordan Rubin's books, The Makers Diet, and The Raw Truth. Jordan Rubin suffers from Crohns Disease, so his experiences are directly relevant to many of the readers of this forum. Virtually ALL pharmaceutical drugs suppress symptoms and do not cure or heal anything, because this would not be profitable for them. This is also why they so aggressively attack any mention of a dietary or all natural cure for anything.

The Gerson Therapy has been proving that they can cure cancer and other serious and life threatening diseases since the 1940's, but the pharmaceutical industry so heavily markets and lobbys against the Gerson Therapy and all other all-natural or dietary cures that virtually no doctors are aware of their effectiveness against cancer and many other serious and life threatening diseases. They even got Dr Max Gersons testimony before congress in, I think it was, 1946 stricken from the record to protect themselves and their hundreds of BILLIONS of $$$$$ of profit from cancer. For information on how effective the Gerson Therapy is read: A Cancer Therapy: Results of Fifty Cases and the Cure of Advanced Cancer by Diet Therapy by Max Gerson, M.D, originally published in 1958 I believe. If you read this and want to know more read: The Gerson Therapy: The Proven Nutritional Program for Cancer and Other Illnesses by Charlotte Gerson and Morton Walker D.P.M. When Dr Gerson testified before congress he brought with him five of his patients that had been cured of cancer using what is now known as the Gerson Therapy, as well as the case files of five more patients that had also been cured of cancer. This is why the pharmaceutical industry fought and fought until his testimony was hidden from the public.

There are also excellent documentaries available on services like Netflix and You Tube that are very good and will help you to see that they are effective and will help you. Norman W. Walkers book entitled Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Juices is also an excellent source of information. I have read the books that I mention here, as well as 25+ others on health and nutrition. There is also a site called Halleluiah Acres, that supplies information on a diet based on Gods Word in Genesis 1:29, the original diet for mankind. The Hallelujah Diet is Hallelujah Acres’ basis for its philosophy, which has helped thousands of people improve their health and even save their own lives.

Two excellent books on the Standard American Diet, the S.A.D. and processed foods, and why they are so unhealthy are Pottrengers Cats: A Study in Nutrition by Francis Pottenger and The Untold Story of Milk, by Ron Schmid.

Norman Walkers book, Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Juices and Francis Pottengers book, Pottengers Cats: A Study in Nutrition are both very short one day reads, yet they are packed with VERY valuable information.
 
I did the juice fast for 7 days the first time. Then I slowly started eating my normal GF diet. I was in a lot of pain again before I knew! So, I began doing the fast again. Only I did it a lot longer this time. 3wks! Only juicing and eating soft fruits/melons and only eating steamed veggies. Then I felt good and slowly started back to normal. I'm a lot better now. Only I'm not sure if it's the Humira finally working or what. Just sharing! There's def something to eating only fruits and veggies and healing.
 
Jeniferny, how are you doing with your own issues? Have you been healed using diet? Also, what is your diet like now? Just curious.
 
If you can, try to find Jordan Rubin's books, The Makers Diet, and The Raw Truth.
Yes, I have already found and read that book (even before the one by Ewa Dabrowska). Their findings are similar. The only thing I didn't like about Rubin's book was noticeable vested interest in promoting his company's products. But the core knowledge and his personal experience is certainly valid.
 
I juice at least 3-4 mornings a week, it seems to make everything I eat for the rest of the day easier to digest. I always feel better when I take the time for it, but it is a pain to clean up afterwards.
 

afidz

Super Moderator
Lam, check out the documentary "Fat, sick, and nearly dead". Watching that was an eye opener for me
 
Yes, I have already found and read that book (even before the one by Ewa Dabrowska). Their findings are similar. The only thing I didn't like about Rubin's book was noticeable vested interest in promoting his company's products. But the core knowledge and his personal experience is certainly valid.
Glad that you could find the books.

I agree about his heavy promotion of his products. I believe that if you eat a proper and all inclusive raw diet and juice daily you will never need supplements, unless your health is seriously compromised by disease.

Normally I take less stock in authors that write books to promote their wares, but Jordan Rubin started out trying to heal himself. When I find an author that does offer good information or supporting information, I take the good from the book and disregard what I do not need. Through years of reading, especially on the subject of health and nutrition, I have found authors that write to help others, rather than writing to hock their wares to be more credible, not always, but usually. This is why I favor Norman W. Walker, Ann Wigmore, Francis m. Pottenger, Ron Schmid and others that have the singular purpose of writing to impart information and help others.

Max Gerson was a medical doctor, and to learn about the diseases that fascinated him, he would many, many times treat patients for free. If you can, watch the videos on Netflix and YouTube featuring Charlotte Gerson. I found them to be very good and very helpful. There are also many other videos that are very good to, like Forks Over Knives, Forks Over Knives: Extended, and Fat, Sick and nearly Dead to name just a few.

Our bodies were originally designed to last 900+ years and to heal themselves. Since the human species has gotten away from the diet we were intended to eat we have begun to get sick, sicker, and even sicker. When we started to eat pasteurized and processed food the rate of this sickness has increased dramatically along with the number of diseases that effect our health and life.

Because of all of the pollution in the world today and our history of eating an unhealthy diet, we will never again be able to obtain the 900 year mark. We can however extend our lives and be much, much healthier during our time here on earth if we begin to eat a healthy and raw diet and juice daily.

Hippocrates said: Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food.
I strongly believe this statement to be the key to a long and healthy life.

 
If you're not sure about juicing just start with a blender and cheesecloth. You won't get as much juice as you would with a juicer but it's a cheap way to try it out. My two favorites are apple and carrots (equal amounts of each) and apple, cucumber, ginger (2 apples, 1 cuke and 1 thumb ginger). Blend them up, strain it through the cheesecloth and drink it right away. You don't want to store juice. If you like it and tolerate it well, then look for a juicer.
 
As for Jordan Rubin and the like, I fully understand the zeal one aquires after winning against one's seemingly incurable disease. This is similar to religious zeal of a convert whose life has been transformed. The zeal is usually expressed in trying to "convert" everybody or help everybody around. And basically, there is nothing wrong with it. If you find something valuable, something life-changing, you want to share it with the others. That's natural. But once you start to capitalize on this, it is very easy to cross the thin line between sharing valuable knowledge and just making money on one's product (be it some magic potion, powder, supplements, special prayers, books whatever). And when the ex-zealot's just earns his/her life on the product, there's always the risk he will try to sell it to just anybody, to expand his market - that's what business is about. However, I am here (like most people on this forum) not just as a customer looking for one product over another. I am a sick person, trying to fight for my life and health. And basically, in this position, I find ruthless market strategies in both pharmaceutical companies and the zealots, quacks etc. equally repulsive.

Even so, I think the Rubin's book has a lot of sound knowledge and supports what I've found in other books. This made me try the juice fast and I am quite happy I did. I am now on the 10th day and feel very fine! And this is without any medication, apart from some herbal teas. I always try to use herbs before I am forced to use any chemical drug. I typically mix several different species to achieve better effect. In Poland you can easily buy different dry herbs, either in teabags or in 50g packets and then mix whatever you need. But I see that with Crohn's herbal teas are not enough. Perhaps together with the juices they will be just right for me.
 
read that the fiber is lost in the process, but nutrients are still in the juice. Anyone use a juicer? Are nutrients lost?
Yes, a juicer will remove the fiber and that is the whole point. Although having said that, some fiber will still get through. To prevent this I sieve the juice before drinking it.

Yes, the nutrients are still in the juice. Juicing is the best way to release nutrients from the tough fiber and plant cells.

You only risk losing nutrients if you have a poor quality juicer that overheats the juice, or you use pre-chopped veggies, or you wait too long to drink your juice and it oxidizes.

I have a juice every day, as it is a fantastic way to absorb nutrients that would otherwise be difficult for me to do with UC. I find carrot and kale the best juices for settling down a flare.

What juicer do you have? As that is very important in the scheme of things.
 
A good book for beginners is:

"Raw Juices Can Save Your Life: An A-Z Guide to Juicing"

Published in 2001 by by Sandra Cabot M.D.

But really you do not need a book, as there are plenty of free recipes on the internet and you can just experiment yourself.

Through experimentation, I discovered that carrot and kale juices are magic miracle workers that either help me avoid flares or will help to settle me down if I am flaring.

I also add turmeric root to my juices, as this herb is renowned for assisting with C&UC .........and of course it tastes nice too :)
 
I'm not exactly sure. Any brands u recommend?

Well I do not recommend Breville. They tend to cause separation and foamy juices because they spin at such a high speeds of anywhere from 1,000rpm to 15,000rpm.

Breville are OK as a stop gap if you have nothing else.

But better to get a cold press juicer; something at a low 80rpm speed.

I use a Omega J8005 Single-Gear Masticating Juicer. But there are quite a few similar ones that are just as good.

The difference in taste between a Breville and any decent cold press juicer has to be tasted to be believed. You also retain more nutrients with a cold press / masticating juicer. This has been tested and proven.

I had a Breville years ago. But got rid of it because it would not juice parsley or wheat-grass; which are both very beneficial for C&UC.
 
Does anyone find oranges when they jucie it messes with them and makes them sick? Or any other fuit I'm new to jucing and still trying to muddle through the fuit and find out if it's ikay for me ? What do you guys avoid or use the most in jucies
 
I think the trick is to start out with more vegetables than fruit at first because of the sugar content and then slowly add more fruit in as you feel less inflamed. Sugar can be an aggravant.
 
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