Steady Changes...

Greetings All,
I hope all it well. Sorry I have been away for a few days.  There are many changes coming up for my family and I. All positive of course.  In any event, I hope all is well with you all and you all are happy and healthy. :-)

To be completely honest, for the past couple days I noticed when I drink my juice, which is still the same ingredients as the past two weeks, I felt like I was starving afterwards! It is important to note that although we are juicing it is still possible to gain weight.  This will defeat the purpose of any lifestyle change unless one is underweight and trying to add on pounds or kilos.  I tried to determine what ingredient in the juice could possibly make me so very hungry within 45 minutes of consuming my juice.  

I am not a scientist nor a Nutritionist as of yet, but I have found that when I eliminate the ginger I do not have that hungry feeling so readily after consuming the juice. I am uncertain if it is because the ginger is spicy which I always thought spices helped minimize hunger. In any event, I placed ginger back in my juices because it changes the taste dramatically and for the best.  

What I did do is make a substantial change in my eating habits. Now I eat raw vegatables all and 2 fruits during the day, that is until 3:00 pm.  At 3 I eat fish and kale or another green as always.  Then in between 6:30 and 7:30 I drink my juice for the day.  That is a major change. But I like doing this because it allows my digestive system to rest and it takes less time for my body to process juices when compared to meals. This is due to the fact that, our body does not have to work extra hard to digest juice it is already broken down and goes rapidly absorbed into our bloodstream unlike whole meals. 

I hope I did not bore anyone, but I will continue this regimen over the next few weeks. As of now, it is working and when or if I feel hungry before bedtime, I drink a glass of water prior to bedtime and then off to sleep I go. I do that same thing when I wake up I take my synthyroid with a glass of water. Doing so cleans out our systems so it can began the process all over again the next day.  

Please inform me if you all are experiencing hunger or your stomach growling when you use ginger in your juices.  Again be mindful that just because we are juicing for healthy does not mean we can have as much fruit and vegetables as we want and eat whatever we want during the day.  The juicing calories add up! This is due to the fact that, the produce you are juicing does what? Yield the same calories as eating the produce in its entirety.  

I will leave you all with that and I pray you all have a wonderful afternoon/ evening depending upon your location. 

Be Blessed,
-GP     

Juicing Tid Bits

Greetings Everyone,
As always I hope all is well. I plan on making this entry a quick one. 

If you plan to juice please allow for time to research your juicers. I have read a lot and still am not versed on the terminology well enough to relay it to you all. When I figure it out I will bring you abreast on my findings. At the moment I have the Jack LaLanne juicer, which was purchased 2 years ago from Walmart. It is holding up very well, although there are times when I have to hold the shoot part of the juicer in place to keep the assembly from vibrating. I experience this mostly when I juice whole apples. 

So far in my research I am leaning towards purchasing the Omega 8006 juicer. It is a bit pricey depending on your perspective but worth it if you plan to stick to it for a lifetime as I am. After watching youtube videos I find it extracts the juice leaving the pulp 60% drier than the pulp from the Jack LaLanne. Since produce can be expensive it is wise to "squeeze" the most out of if by purchasing a product that yields the most juice.

It is important to note that juicing is not bad for anyone. It can be time consuming but in my opinion it is worth it. If you are a beginner to juicing and is doing so for whatever reasons, please take the time to search the internet to determine which types of juices you want to start with. I started juicing oranges for breakfast.  Then I started juicing carrots and apples because they were my favorite produces and when combined with a little ginger juice the final product is heavenly.

This will counter my other post on storing and consuming juices. But, after juicing if possible drink your juice immediately but dont wait more than 30 minutes. I have learnt that the enzymes found in vegetables are most beneficial within 30 minutes of juicing.

Also when you are juicing do not allow the sunlight to touch the juices, as it will break down the product faster. In addition, try to juice more vegetables than fruits or if at all possible juice 90% vegetables and 10% serving of fruit.  I say that because fruits are high in sugar if you drink them versus eat them whole, your insulin can temporarily go up. However, when eating fruit whole the pulp slows down the absorption of the fruit juice.  Additionally if you juice more fruit than vegetables it can cause you to gain weight over the long run which is not benefical to your health if you are overweight or even obese.

More-so, if you are keeping a food diary to track your meals and count calories as I do then you may wonder, "Does juice yield the same amount of calories as whole produce"?  The answer is yes, because the pulp is the fiber of the produce, the calories are primarily in the juice and that is what the juicer extracts predominately juice.  The amount of juice you yield will depending upon what type of juicer you purchase.

In case you are wondering, I am use my Iphone app "Lose It" to track my progess.  What type of apps do you all use to track your daily food intake? As many of you may know the Lose It app does not have produce calories in the form of juice in ounces. That is because the calories do not change when juicing.  Juicing only removes the fiber which makes us feel fuller. However, the calories are still extracted by the juicer in the form of the juice.  Therefore, the calories are the same whether juicing or eat the product whole.

I hope this helps. I do not know everything about juicing; however, I am learning. Nutrition is my passion now and I hope to become a nutritionist within 2 years. My advice to everyone is find something you are passionate about and learn and live all while doing it as much as you can. 

If any of you have questions on insight please comment below or email me. Have a wonderful day and may God Bless you all. 

-GP