Day 1

The general consensus seems to be that day 3 and day 7 for some reason are the hardest. For me, it is always day 1. On the first day it is just too easy to give in to cravings in the pm and just decide to start the next day. Today we had a huge snow storm, and I have been stuck inside all day. I tried to read, but I pretty much just was a bum and watched television. The boredom and the cabin fever makes me want to start tomorrow so I can order up some Chinese or something.

Anyway, I have been on fasts before. I did a fresh juice fast for 7 days. I did a pure water fast for 3 days. I had always heard of the Master Cleanse, but never wanted to do it because the thought of consuming maple syrup instead of something like fresh juice seemed crazy to me. But after much reading and researching on the web, and a friend who completed 10 days, I decided to give it a try.

I started a Master Cleanse last month and ended it on day 5. The day I began the cleanse was about 6 days before the start of my period. This is a time when a woman is already moody and bloated and craving food. Not a good time to start a fast. Well, I did it anyway and it wasn't bad at all hunger and cravings wise. The problem I did have was with the salt water flush.

If I was going to commit to do this cleanse, I wanted to do it the correct way. The way recommended by Stanley Burroughs. The salt water flush seemed like a good idea and much more of a flushing of the system than just taking lax tea. The first day I did it wasn't that bad. My bowels emptied after about 45 min. No problem.

The second day did the salt water flush. After about an hour and a half, I had a bowel movement, but out of the quart of salt water that went in, only half came out. That freaked me out a little bit. Day 3, did the salt water flush. NOTHING CAME OUT! I was getting a little freaked. The thought of all that salt water in my system did not seem good. My stomach and intestines were distended and sounded like a water bed when I pushed on them. I decided to take some laxative tea that morning to see if I could push things along. Still nothing. Day 4 was pretty much the same. Salt water flush AND laxative tea. This time only half came out again. Stomach bloated.

Day 5 just did the laxative tea. Not much movement. I decided to break the fast and consume raw veggies for a few days before I started the cleanse again. I thought this would get things moving, which it did. I ended up going for 9 days before starting this cleanse again. Thought it would be better to just wait until my period was over.

So here I am on day 1. I did not do the SWF this morning. Only had some laxative tea. I am wondering if my bad experience with the salt water was because of PMS and my body just naturally wanting to retain liquids.

I guess I will find out tomorrow. I would like to do this cleanse with the SWF, but I will just listen to my body. I have found some other websites that are not affiliated with the Master Cleanse that have positive things to say about a SWF for healing and bowel cleansing.
They suggest you do it at sunrise because it is the natural time for your body to want to vacate the bowels. My first try I was sleeping pretty late and doing the SWF at around 11 am. So I will try getting up early tomorrow and see how it goes...

more later....