Why Cleanse During the Holidays?

The time period from Thanksgiving to The New Year is a special month but it often has a major impact on our metabolism and our health. Just think of these three facts:

1. More Americans get sick or have life changing illnesses in the month of January than any other month, and it isn’t even close statistically.

2. More weight is gained, on average, per person during the holidays.

3. More people say that they feel the most stressed out during December, than any other month.

What does this tell us? That we shouldn’t wait until after the holidays to start on some sort of detoxification program or cleanse, as the extra burden of all that egg nog, fruit cake, alcohol, and animal protein can push us over the preverbal cliff.  Our bodies (if we are living in modern society) are already dealing with as much stress and metabolic clutter (sugar, inflammatory foods, and liver burdening foods) as they can handle. Why would we want to throw more on the heap at the time of the year that we want to be thankful for our health, our families, and all of the other great things in our lives?

Here is a short list of the good things you will be doing for yourself and your various organ systems by enjoying these holidays with a cleaner diet and more exercise:

1.  Reduce the inflammation in your arteries and give your heart some support.  The stress of trying to be at 5 places at the same time is enough. Eat a generous amount of pomegranates, raspberries, leeks, parsley, turmeric, ginger, cinnamon, watercress, lemons, and more.  These foods can truly put the fire out and spare your cardiovascular the unnecessary risk that unfortunately accompanies this time of year.

2. Give your kidneys a break.  Stop asking them to continuously buffer out that acid-loaded diet that so many of us live on day to day.  A well designed cleanse will offer enormous amounts of alkalinizing nutrients (potassium, magnesium, and calcium) from dark greens and other select foods that can offer much needed relief to a body that has had to make up the difference the rest of the year.

3. Build your organ reserve! Eat a vegetable and fruit-based plan that contains the phytonutrients, minerals, and vitamins that have become depleted over time.  These foods build up our bodies’ reserves while sweetened foods, breads, alcohol, and stress tear them down.

4. Improve your blood glucose control. Insulin has a tall order to accomplish, especially in today’s world.  Increase how sensitive your body is to insulin by asking your pancreas to secrete much less of it.  Get the flour and sugar out for a month and this will happen.  Every part of us needs to be rebooted at one time or another and the pancreas is no different.

5. Curb your cravings, for good! Get control of your leptin levels. This hormone is responsible for our cravings, mostly sugar and carbohydrates. The holidays add fuel to the fire by further increasing leptin levels.  The increased consumption of sweets, breads, and grains in general, feed the wrong bacteria in the wrong places within our GI and in turn this ratchets up our leptin levels.

While we hope that this doesn’t scare you at the most festive time of the year, we do hope that it gets your attention and emphasizes the point that you don’t want to wait until 2015 to cleanse.

Header image courtesy chany crystal