The Great Detox Scam

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Category: Style & Beauty

Created on Sunday, 07 December 2014 09:53

Written by Northern Living

There have been fad diets for as long as I can remember. The Banana diet, The Cabbage diet and over the last couple of years various Detox Diets. But exactly what are you supposed to be detoxifying your system from? Environmental toxins, toxins in processed food, free radicals? The truth of the matter is that detox diets like most other fad diets is based on fearmongering, the wish to feel good but no scientific evidence whatsoever. Unless you have a serious medical condition your body is fully equipped to deal with almost anything you throw at it, within reason. I'm not advocating eating Yew leaf stew, deadly Nightshade omelette's or throwing unknown toadstools in your once a week fried breakfast. But if you eat a reasonably balanced diet and don't over indulge in a specific food or beverage which you know will cause protests from your digestive works, there's no reason to presume that there are harmful toxins building up in your system.

The benefits that people ascribe to detox diets are in no way due to some mystical cleansing effect. They are due to simply giving your digestive system a break. A fast, as it were. It's been know for thousands of years that if you have a day without food and only drink fluids once in a while, you will feel healthier. It's not rocket science. If your usual lunch comprises of a plate piled high with macaroni cheese, six fried sausages, a lake of baked beans and half a loaf of bread smeared with margarine – you will most probably feel weary, lethargic and less than focused throughout the afternoon. It's a natural consequence of your over indulgence. Feed you pet dog or cat their whole days meals in one session and changes are they'll waddle of to there bed and sleep it off. Your body is simply diverting it's energies to processing the mammoth meal you've just ploughed your way through. Detox diets usually rely on something which is known to have a laxative effect. A weeks worth of fruits blended into a glass full of sledge, liquefied broccoli etc. But you're being conned. You are not flushing toxins from your system, you are simply purging your digestive tract. More to the point if you indulge in these sessions too regularly and don't drink plenty of liquids you stand an increased risk of dehydration. Which in turn will make you feel rotten.

The old maxim 'Everything in moderating' is as true as it ever was. Eat a balanced diet without too much saturated fat, with plenty of fresh fruit and vegetables, carbohydrates, protein, minerals and vitamins and you won't go too far wrong. Don't put money in the pockets of those who dream fad diets up. Without the millions of pounds people spend on them each year, the industry would soon dissolve and we would all feel much better generally.....

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