The Fall season is an excellent time to offer your system a little extra support in the way of deeply nutritious rejuvenatives. If you just completed or intend to complete a cleanse this fall, your body will be craving deep nourishment in the upcoming months.

The idea to nourish yourself deeply, on all levels, for a designated period of time. This allows your body to repair, regenerate, and revitalize all your organs, tissues, and systems–including your mental, emotional and spiritual state of being. Rejuvenation therapies can include dietary changes, specific to lifestyle choices, the use of rejuvenative herbs, or a combination of all three. The process is about building and nourishing the entire organism, so people find the rejuvenation process to be soothing, sweet, grounding and enjoyable.

Rejuvenation

• Improves strength, energy, and vitality
• Bolsters Immunity
• Promotes Courage, Confidence, and Success
• Slows the Aging Process
• Increases Longevity
• Improves Memory
• Promotes Cellular Intelligence
• Brings Balance, Awareness, Joy and Clarity into one’s Life and Relationships

Your body is remarkable intelligent and incredibly hard working. Day in and day out, it processes all kinds of inputs–distinguishing what’s good for you from what’s not, doing its best to eliminate harmful substances alongside routine metabolic waste. However, now days, our bodies are inundated with a never-ending barrage of stressors: environmental toxins, processed foods, unresolved emotions, and psychological stress — to name a few. Inevitably, in attempting to ‘digest’ it all, we accumulate some degree of toxicity–which, over time, can build up in the system, deposit in the tissues, and compromise our health. But there is something you can do to give your body a break. Actually, this is what I do both in the Spring (think of it as Spring Cleaning for the Body), and in the Fall every year — a herbal type of cleanse: to slow the flood so that the body can rest, recuperate and repair itself. And amazingly, when the stream of input slows, your body will immediately take advantage of this lull to do some deep cleaning.

The practice of cleansing is considered a vital part in Traditional Chinese Medicine and Ayurvedic Lifestyles, with a great potential for improved energy, strength, and immunity, as well as a renewed love of life. A cleanse serves to rest and purify the digestive system while addressing the root cause of any imbalances. The entire process works to draw toxins out of the tissues and into the digestive tract so that they can be eliminated, along with simultaneously removing excess to promote improved balance and overall health.

Below you will find what you need to implement a simple food-based cleanse at home for the fall. However, even a gentle cleanse like this one is not appropriate for pregnant or breast feeding women, or anyone who is extremely weak and debilitated. On the other hand, if you are considering becoming pregnant, it’s beneficial for both partners to undertake a cleanse approximately 3 months prior.

What to Expect

A traditional cleanse involves four distinct phases, each critically important to your success:

Preparation

Three Days Prior to the Cleanse (longer, if possible)

For a few days leading up to your cleanse, focus on cleaning up your lifestyle and eating habits to prepare the body for an effective cleanse. You will want to eliminate (or dramatically reduce) your use of coffee, caffeine, tobacco products, alcohol, an any recreational drugs. At the same time, reduce your intake of fast foods, processed foods, meats, refined sugars and sweets. During this time, eat as many simple, whole foods as possible (fruits, vegetables, whole grains, nuts and seeds).

Active Cleansing

Core 10 days of the Cleanse

This is the heart of the cleanse. During this time, you will eat very simplified food. It is enough so that you can maintain your essential responsibilities, but it simultaneously resets the digestive system, supports the elimination of toxins, and balances your energy body. During this period, other cleansing practices such as gentle exercise, detoxifying herbs can enhance this part of the cleanse.

Shop Green Skinny Girl for Detox Book (The one I use and Recommend) and read my blog Article Healthy from Inside and Out to learn more about the herbs that I use.

Reintroduction

Ten Days Following the Cleanse 

Even after you complete the 10th day of the cleanse, your body will still be processing toxins that were stirred into circulation. In addition, your digestive system will have been accustomed to a very clean diet and will be somewhat sensitive to overly stimulating or processed foods. Therefore, a slow transaction back into your normal routine and a more diverse diet is critically important. This three-day period is a chance to buffer your system and rekindle your digestive fire so that it can handle more complex foods. Again, eat primarily simple, whole foods, diversifying your menu very gradually. If possible, take this time to test the waters with foods that are potentially aggravating like dairy, wheat, and soy–ideally, reintroducing these foods one at a time and giving yourself up to twenty-four hours to observe how your body to each one.

Rejuvenation

Up to Three Months Following the Completion of the Cleanse

Now that you have cleared your body of accumulated toxins and imbalances, your tissues are primed to receive very deep nourishment. Rejuvenating foods and practices are usually sweet and comforting, and most people find this phase of the cleanse quite enjoyable.

Planning for Your Cleanse

As you can see, the active cleansing phase of this particular cleanse is ten days in length, but the full cleansing process is 30 days, followed by a period of rejuvenation. This timeframe  allows for proper preparation before the cleanse, and eases you slowly back into your normal routine afterwards.

The more completely you can clear your schedule for the process, the better. At a minimum, eliminate any unnecessary obligations and give yourself as much unscheduled time to rest as possible–especially during the active cleansing phase. Also, a menstruating woman should schedule her cleanse around her cycle to ensure that she is not bleeding during the active cleansing phase.

Please Note: the 30 day time frame is ideal, but if you don’t have time to give to a cleanse, you can shorten the phases in proportion to one another. For example, you might do one to two days of preparation, three to four days of cleansing, one to two days of reintroduction and one to two months of rejuvenation.

Daily Routine During the Cleanse

Freshly-prepared foods are best for your cleanse, so you will want to prepare a day before or the day of – whatever works best for your schedule. It is perfectly fine to prepare all of your food for the day first thing in the morning, but you will want to avoid eating leftovers from the previous days throughout the cleanse.

Morning Routine

• Rise early so that you can complete your morning routine before breakfast.
• Upon waking (I like to do a morning meditation first), brush your teeth
• Do a Nasal Cleanse
• Sip 8-16 ounces of warm Lemon Water to cleanse the system and awaken the digestive capacity.
• Optional: Perform a self massage –
  • this helps to loosen and move toxins stored in the tissues toward the digestive tract so that they can be eliminated.
  • I use one of the Phyto 5 Massage Blends – Zen, Yin or Yang
  • For maximum benefit, let the oil soak in for about twenty minutes.
• Optional: take a steam bath, sauna or create an improvised sweat
  • If you have access to a steam room or sauna, let the oil soak in as you sit just long enough to break a sweat.
  • Otherwise, you can warm your bathroom with a space heater and create a little steam with hot water from your shower too.
  • It is important not to get chilled.
• Take a bath or shower, using soap only where needed (ideally, not all over the body). If you’re doing the oil daily, here are some additional considerations.
  • Take care not to slip on oily surfaces; consider washing your feet first.
  • Excess oil will rinse off with water.
  • If you do not need to go out, it is fine to leave some oil in your hair.
  • Otherwise, you may need to shampoo more than once to remove all the oil. You can also try applying shampoo to your dry hair (before you get it wet), lather then rinse. For many, this method cuts the oil more effectively.
  • Use a designated towel to pat dry(this towel will become oily over time).
• Do Some Gentle exercise.
  • Slow, gentle movements will support cleansing; more than that can be counterproductive.
  • This is not a time to push yourself.
  • Consider walking, tai chi, qigong, or a grounding yoga practice.
• Eat Breakfast
  • Make it a Light Breakfast: Do not over eat

Throughout the Day

• Try to stick to three meals per day, allowing at least three hours between meals.
• It’s best to avoid snacking, but if you need a little something extra, you can enjoy some fresh fruit or a few raw nuts.
• It is very important not to feel deprived during your cleanse.
• Be sure to eat enough food and a variety that you truly feel satisfied and at peace with this process.
• Try not to eat after 6 p.m. or 7 p.m. at the latest.
• Drink at least three liters of room temperature, warm or hot fluids each day to ensure adequate hydration and to help flush toxins as they are released.
• Ideally, take most of your fluids in between meals. Appropriate fluids include water, Tea, and detox teas–drink as much as you like.

Evening Routine

• Retire for the night.
  • Sleep is the bodies best time to detox so be sure to get plenty of rest during the cleanse.

Making Supportive Lifestyle Choices

• Keep your activities as quiet and mindful as possible.
• Surround yourself with things that you find uplifting and nourishing.
• Minimize stress and exposure to frantic or disturbing environments.
• A cleanse can stir up unresolved emotions so it is important to be prepared for some emotional purging as well. If intense emotions arise during or after your cleanse, greet your emotions with compassion, observe them with detached awareness, and allow them simply to move through–honoring yourself in the process.
• REST as much as possible. You can ensure that the bulk of your energy is devoted to cleansing by minimizing the number of resources that your body allocates elsewhere.

A New Beginning . . . Transitioning Back Into Your Normal Life

Towards the end of the cleanse, take some time to reflect on your life so that you can move forward with whatever new intentions feel important to you at this time. One of the greatest gifts you can give yourself as you wrap up your cleanse is to honor the effort you’ve made by slowly and gently easing back into a more diverse nutritional Lifestyle and a more typical routine. Even after you have moved through the reintroduction period, understand it may take some time–two weeks, a month or longer–before you are able to fully appreciate the benefits of your cleanse. The body is often still working to eliminate toxins released during the cleanse, so this is completely normal. It is really important to cultivate inner awareness and listen to your body as you transition back into a healthy lifestyle, this is the phase of rejuvenation–the final phase, a period of time to offer your tissues deep nourishment.