Over the next several days you’ll be receiving most of your calories from a liquid source. The purpose of this part of your cleanse is to give your digestive organs a break so your body can be truly healed from the inside out. Only very recently (the last few hundred years) have people had multiple meals in a day.

In fact, a couple thousand years ago it might’ve been one meal every few days based on food availability, etc. The time between these meals allowed our guts to break down undigested food and, essentially, reboot our guts. So for a period of time we’re going to go “old-school” and avoid solid foods so that our digestive systems can get a break, clean up any mess and be ready to establish normal flora (the healthy bacteria) once again.

People often wonder about the maple syrup component, especially when it comes to killing yeast in the gut. While it’s not ideal to put any sugar into the system, in my opinion, the benefits of giving your gut a break so we can heal and establish healthy bacteria outweigh the downside of using maple syrup in the long run.

For what it’s worth, I know the thought of “no food” is daunting. The great news is you can get as many calories as you need simply drinking more of the detox mixture. Honestly, this is a head game.

In my personal experience (and most of those who have done it before you), you’ll feel “empty” from not eating, but not necessarily hungry since you blood sugar will be stable by drinking the detox mix. You can always add more bottles of liquid to up your calories. Typically, the challenge is not sitting down for meals and the social component often associated with eating. I can assure you that thousands of people have done this successfully over the years and you can too!

One final note, during the detox it’s actually quite common not to lose weight. The reason being that your body is storing sugar from the maple syrup as glycogen (an energy source) causing water gain while still losing fat. If your body is extremely toxic, however, you’re likely already retaining water so the detox disrupts the current balance of water and sodium in your body leading to water loss and, thus, weight loss – meaning your body needed the detox even more!

Do your best, the rewards are well worth it! Promise ☺