I sometimes think that every woman I know is on a diet, and if they're not on one, they're about to start one or they're just coming off one. You can tell, because they're cranky. And hungry. I've found some odd fad diets that made me cranky just reading about them.
Here's a fun one called the Lemonade Diet.
The first time I read about this diet I thought, "Hey, finally a diet that will give me some vitamin C!" OK, I didn't really. My first thought was I could do without this diet.
Of course you might like it. You might also like sleeping on a bed of nails and taking long walks barefoot on hot coals, but that's between you and your psychiatrist.
You may know this diet by the name of The Master Cleanse. I tend to think of this diet as The Master Diarrhea-maker, because it will turn everything in your body to liquid and shoot it out your butt.
Was that too subtle? Still want to know about this diet? OK, but you've been warned.
First of all, it's less of a diet and more of a starvation technique in that you won't actually be allowed to consume food while you're on it. Liquids yes, food no.
The diet goes something like this:
Take 2 ounces of fresh-squeezed lemon juice. No, you may not use the bottled kind or 2 ounces of frozen lemon concentrate with added sugar. You not only get to not eat, but you will also run the risk of getting freshly squeezed lemon juice in any paper cuts you might have.
Mix the 2 ounces of lemon juice with 2 ounces of maple syrup, 2 cups of water and 1/4 teaspoon of cayenne pepper. Yes, pepper. Now I don't know about you, but that's a flavor combination that's never occurred to me before. I'd really rather it not occur to me now either.
That's it for your food for each day for the duration of the diet, except for the lovely early-morning Salt Water Flush. As if the Lemonade Flush you're getting during the day just isn't enough flushing for you. If you're big on flushing, this is the diet for you.
The Salt Water Flush consists of 2 teaspoons of salt mixed with 1 quart of water. This is done in the morning, and I wouldn't suggest going anywhere for an hour or so after, because of the flushing. You'll be doing a lot of it.
Some people stay on this self-imposed starvation cleanse for up to 10 days. In that time they can expect some fun side effetcts, like diarrhea, dizziness, diarrhea, vomiting from ingesting salt water (there's a reason we only drink fresh water, people!) and diarrhea. Did I mention the diarrhea? Oh, and lethargy.
You may flush up to 8 whole pounds while on this plan. Expect to put it right back on once you start eating again. It's a shame you can't flush away stupid.
I wasn't too bright about dieting when I was younger. Case in point:
I attended Ingraham High School and I sang in the school choir. One year we went to Hawaii. Our excuse was that we were going to sing in some festivals there, but the real reason was we just wanted to go to Hawaii.
Hawaii = bathing suit weather, so every girl in the choir was doing some heavy-duty dieting in order to make sure they looked great on the beach. I, wise 17-year-old womanchild that I was, devised my own crash diet, and it went something like this (and no, this is not a sanctioned use for SlimFast):
DAYS ONE AND TWO - 1 slim-fast drink for breakfast, 1 slim-fast drink for lunch, 1 slim-fast drink for dinner
DAY THREE -1 slim-fast drink for breakfast, 1 slim-fast drink for lunch, a small green salad for dinner
I repeated this cycle for one month. Every third day I'd have a small salad for dinner, then go back to my liquid diet.
The results? I lost weight. Of course I lost weight. I suffered horrible bad breath and my friends around me said I was cranky. Of course I was cranky, I wasn't eating!
I perked right up when I got to Hawaii though.
That's when I started eating again.
[[In-content Ad]]
