Hi Everyone,
I’ve just begun my first ever juice cleanse, and I thought I’d give you guys a little review of it in case you were thinking of doing one. I’m going to write this in stages so that I can give you my true first impressions at each point.
So, I chose to do the JuiceToU 3 day juice detox (which you can check out on their website: http://www.juicetou.com). One of the biggest reasons why I chose to do this one was price. The 3 day cleanse is £79 with £12 p+p, which although is quite a large payout, in comparison to some other juice cleanses on the market, it’s actually surprisingly good value. As an example, the Radiance cleanse starts at £214 and the Raw Fairies is a whopping £249!
I ordered my juices on a Sunday evening about 9.30pm and they had arrived by the Wednesday evening. They only deliver once a week; usually if you order before 10pm on Sunday it will be delivered by Tuesday so you can begin on the Wednesday (mine was only delivered on a Wednesday because I ordered them over a bank holiday). The packaging was great, and they even included a couple of lemons for my water, nice little touch. In your box you get four juices for each day. The bottles tell you everything you need to know; they have the ingredients on the side and give you a time at which you’re supposed to drink them and an expiry on the bottom. In the three day cleanse you get a ‘Clean Green’ for 9am, ‘Let’s Glow’ for 12pm, another ‘Clean Green’ at 3pm and finally a ‘Berry Good’ at 6pm.
Day 1, 9am – I have just finished my first 9am ‘Clean Green’. I’d read quite a number of reviews beforehand and most people said that they did not like this one at all. But! I was pleasantly surprised. I’d built myself up for it to taste horrendous but I found it to be quite refreshing. The ingredients in this one are spinach, cucumber, celery, lime and apples. To be honest the overwhelming taste was cucumber with a celery type aftertaste, but it’s not too bad at all. Which I’m relieved about since you have to drink this one twice a day! Not feeling particularly hungry yet, which is my main concern when doing this.. so fingers crossed my tummy doesn’t start grumbling at any point.
Day 1, 12pm – Just had the ‘Let’s Glow’.. and it was unfortunately not as tasty as I would have hoped! The taste is quite earthy, which is confusing to me since the ingredients are; Oranges, Apples, Kiwi, Grapes and Strawberries. I’ve had these in the fridge for a few days so I wonder if this is maybe not as fresh as it would have been if I’d started the cleanse immediately upon receiving them, although the juices are all still well within their expiry. After drinking this however I do not feel hungry at all, which is a relief since I was feeling the pangs!
Day 1, 3pm – My second ‘Clean Green’ and again, not too bad at all. I really wasn’t hungry when I drank this one but wanted to stick to the schedule. I’d had some water with lemon before this as well. So far so good.
Day 1, 6pm – Time for ‘Berry Good’ which has pineapple, blueberries, strawberries, apples and raspberries and this one is delish! I’m so relieved that I love this one, it feels like such a treat at the end of the day! I also had a fruit tea (no green tea allowed) which was nice and a sweet way to end the juices for the first day. Still a tad hungry though…
Day 2, overview – I really struggled with hunger today. I’ve been very good and stuck religiously to the programme since I want to get the best results I can. I drank a lot of water (some with lemon, some without) and when that wasn’t stopping my tummy growling I went for a fruit tea, which helped a lot. I suspected that the second day would be the most difficult since it doesn’t have the novelty of the first day or the relief of the third, and it was without a doubt harder than yesterday. I definitely felt some serious envy watching my colleagues tuck into their lunches, and this was perhaps the worst day ever to choose the menu for our staff event! But, I’m proud for sticking to it today, and only one day left. I cannot say at this point that I feel any kind of ‘rejuvenation’ or ‘invigoration’ as they suggest on the website, in fact at several points today I felt a little tired and even very occasionally a bit spaced out. So, we’ll see about tomorrow.
Day 3, overview – I have just finished my final juice and am relieved to say that today was significantly easier than day 2. Don’t get me wrong, I was still hungry here and there, but once again I didn’t stray at all. I did the same as the previous days and had just water and fruit teas in addition to the juices. With regards to any kind of revitalised feeling I have to say that after feeling fairly grim all day yesterday, about 9pm I, all of sudden, didn’t feel so bad anymore. Perhaps I was getting used to it, but my head cleared and the haze-like feeling I’d been experiencing a little dispersed, and I had much more clarity. But, I cannot safely say that I felt any more ‘clarity’ than on a non-detox day.. I almost certainly did not have more energy, nor did I feel lethargic.. just, sorta.. normal. My stomach is without a doubt much less bloated so that’s a massive bonus to this detox. In addition, I feel as though my skin has improved a little; I don’t suffer from particularly bad skin but I had been having a few blemishes that are now clearing up nicely. Could be due to the detox, could be due to my cleanser, could be both! I’ll wait until the morning to have a final weigh in and see what the results are there.
Weigh in – For any of you who are wanting to do this detox to kick start weight loss, I just weighed myself and I lost 7lbs (just over 3kg) over the three days. That is sort of incredible.. I am stunned.
Final thoughts – I think overall this juice detox gives good results in some areas but in others I didn’t notice any improvement at all. If you are preparing for an event or holiday or perhaps just want to kick start a healthy eating programme, then I think this is for you. It gives good weight loss results, in a shockingly short time frame. I am a bit concerned about the follow up to this, since where the body is essentially ‘starved’ for the 3 days, my worry is that anything remotely fattening/sugary/carb loaded will immediately be stored in my body as fat and I’ll have gained double what I lost before the week is out! JuiceToU do send you a follow-up programme with meal suggestions if you request one – I actually got mine via twitter (@juicetou). I personally am planning on continuing for the next week or two with minimal to no carbs and generally keeping it low refined sugar etc. just to try and prevent any kind of ‘shock fat storage’ situation.
If you’re looking to improve your skin via this detox, again I think this is for you. I did notice a difference in how my skin looked and I can only assume that was aided by all the goodness in these juices. However, if what you’re after is a clean, rejuvenated, energetic, glowy feeling inside and out… do not go for this. I personally did not experience that in the least, but please let me know if you did, I’d be so interested to hear your experiences.
Lastly, I wonder whether you might get these same effects by just eating the fruit/vegetables these juices use, exclusively for three days. Or, alternatively blitzing your own. However, you are paying for the convenience of having them pre-prepared and packaged for you, so you’re just good to go. If you were not wanting to spend money on a branded juice cleanse, my main suggestion would be to make sure you prepare all of your juices in advance, since you will probably not be feeling pumped to blend them once the detox has begun. Convenience is the key, otherwise it would be SO easy to stray.
I found this detox a real challenge. I’m proud of myself for sticking to it, since I thought I had no will-power whatsoever, so this is news to me! Would I do it again? I’d need to think about that… maybe in a few months when I’ve forgotten the hunger pains!!
Thanks for reading and I hope you pop by again soon,
Becky x
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Miss Becky Shea 