You might remember that movie Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead made by Joe Cross, a former finance guy who gained so much weight he looked like he “swallowed a sheep.”

He was living on junk food, sugar, soda and beer, and he developed this unbearable autoimmune disease called chronic urticaria, otherwise known as uncontrollable hives. He was on steroids and other meds for his lifestyle induced diseases.  He was, in a word, fat, sick and nearly dead.  He suffered from a severe form of what I call FLC syndrome (Feel Like Crap). The more advanced version is FLS Syndrome!

Then he woke up. He rebooted. He said no more. He needed a rapid, powerful infusion of life giving food, phytonutrients, micronutrients while he ditched the junk, sugar and processed food that was making him fat and sick. He picked a 60 day juice fast and documented his journey in his movie. Not for everyone for sure, but he lost almost 100 pounds and reversed his autoimmune disease and got off his medication. In just 60 days.

Of course no one can live on juice forever, and Joe is the first one to say that. But what we need to do is shift from eating only 10 percent of our diet as plants (fruits, veggies, nuts, seeds, whole grains, beans) to 70 percent of our diet from plants (mostly veggies and some fruit).

In his new book, Joe provides a path to re-programming our relationship with food to quickly and dramatically getting your body back to its original factory settings. Most people never connect the dots between what they eat and how they feel. Is your fatigue, brain fog, joint pain, depression, migraines, sinus problems, allergies, autoimmune disease, digestive problems, diabetes (and the list goes on and on) connected to what you are eating?  The answer is most likely yes! But most people don’t have a clue. And sadly, most doctors don’t have a clue how food is the most powerful medicine on the planet—the bad medicine makes you sick and fat, and the good medicine heals, and quickly.

I was recently on the Today Show discussing the power of elimination diets to help cure chronic symptoms and diseases and powerfully promote weight loss.

The ultimate elimination diet would mean that one would consume only vegetable and fruit juices for three, five, 10, 15, or 30 days: A powerful, mostly plant based diet that eliminates the toxic food we are eating, and replaces it with a whole food, plant based diet that uses animal protein as a condiment. It is the cure for so many of our chronic diseases, not just obesity or diabetes. Sorry, you cheeseburger lovers!  It also gets rid of dairy and gluten— very inflammatory foods for most people.

If we want a great way to reboot, if we are looking to get a quick jump start on our health and are looking for a powerful, safe, delicious way to get healthy, rebooting is a great way to accomplish that. After you finish your reboot, you need a plan for lifelong health. It’s easy to transition to a detox diet, which includes food (not just juice), and helps one create a plan to get healthy for life.

Many of us writing and teaching about this are health evangelists promoting the same message. Eat real food, get off the junk, you can heal. And you need a plan. Honestly, it doesn’t matter what plan you follow, as long as it is focused on two things: 1) Getting rid of the bad stuff (sugar, flour, processed foods) and 2) adding in the good stuff (whole real, fresh foods—veggies, fruit, nuts, seeds, whole grains, beans, fish, sustainably raised clean chicken or meat).

The truth is you are only a few days away from health and happiness.

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Editor: Jenna Penielle Lyons

Photo: Wikimedia Commons 

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