South Block Juice Cleanse!

I have always been candid regarding my health journey and the ups and downs I have encountered. Over the past few years, my weight has increased and decreased. I am more interested in creating and maintaining a successful health journey than yo-yo dieting. With all that said, I decided that a juice cleanse would jump-start me back into my journey.

There is a local juicery called South Block in Arlington, VA that offers fresh juices, smoothies, breakfast items and vegan items. One of my first blog posts was about the fresh juices they offer. The company also offers juice cleanses for 1, 3 and 5 days. I decided to do a 1 day cleanse which includes 6 bottles of juice to get you through the day. The instructions given are to drink a bottle every 2 hours and if you became “hangry” (hungry due to anger), you could eat raw nuts or plain popcorn.

I did the cleanse on Monday and it went way better than I thought it would go. I didn’t get hangry until around the 3rd juice of the day. The juices are numbered and it works best if you drink them in order.

I started Juice #1 at 8:00AM. It was a green juice called Detox that has cucumber apple, kale, spinach, celery, parsley, lemon and ginger. I was hoping that the sweetness of apple would balance all the greens in the juice, but the celery was so overpowering. It took me about an hour and half to drink half of the juice. Around 11:00AM, I was pumped to drink my next juice. It is called Glow and has pineapple, apple, fennel, aloe, lemon and mint. The taste was amazing compared to Detox. The fruit used created a light and sweet taste that I devoured in five minutes with a handful of pistachios. Juice #3 was called Easy Greens and there was nothing easy about consuming that juice. It has apple, celery, spinach, parsley and lemon. It tastes just as bad as Detox with the bad taste of celery. I swear, I don’t understand how any person could drink that much celery and be ok with it. Instead of finishing the juice, I popped a bag of plain popcorn and finished it for lunch. Juice #4 was delicious. It is called Cure and has pineapple, carrot, lemon, cayenne, turmeric and ginger. I thought that the cayenne would make it too spicy, but it was the right amount of kick with the pineapple and carrot. I attempted to drink Juice #5 around 5:00PM, which I knew would not be good. It is called Renew and has carrot, apple, beet, kale, lemon and ginger in it. I HATE BEETS! If you know me well, I love just about every veggie, except beets. It tastes like dirt and no matter if you drink it or eat it whole, it’s not good. Useless to say, Renew did not renew anything in me. My last juice of the day was a superfood shake called Pink Flamingo. It contains caveman mylk, strawberries, pitaya (dragon fruit), goji berries and Himalayan salt. It was the perfect end to a rough day, but I got through it.

I am proud that I completed the cleanse without cheating, but it was difficult. I believe if I do it again, I will do better research into the ingredients in the juices before I start. The next morning, I felt energized and refreshed. I started by eating fruit and veggies and some light foods. If you want to try a juice cleanse, do your research and try 1 day to see how you feel. Good luck!