Master Cleanse Forum - Master Cleanser Lemonade Diet

Hello, Folks. Thank you very much to everyone who posts here--it is so helpful to read about other people's stories.
I'm posting my experience because I find myself looking for people who have a situation similar to mine, since, for example, the results of a 225-pound guy will probably be different from mine.
I did the MC for the first time about three years ago. I managed to get through all 10 days, but on day 11, I ate ice cream because felt like I was skinny enough to eat anything, and I had been thinking about it for so long. Also, I sort of thought I would throw up from eating it, but I didn't (haha, I guess my body still liked ice cream after the MC).
This time, I started at around 140 pounds. I had been struggling to stay motivated to lose the weight, so decided to do the MC. Note--I am heavily addicted to caffeine, so during the cleanse, I continue to drink tea. I like the idea of getting toxins out of my body, but I'm not willing to endure the pain of both starvation and caffeine withdrawal, especially since I have a day job. I pretty much spend my whole day sipping the MC Lemonade, tea, seltzer, and water. It keeps me feeling like I'm consuming. For people who would criticize the tea, I'll just say, at least I'm not drinking the Diet Coke that I usually drink.

Day 1 was pretty easy, since I knew I was capable of doing 10 days. I was occasionally hungry, but very motivated. I had seven Lemonades and went to bed feeling hungry.
Day 2: I weighed myself in the morning and the scale said 140, so I guess maybe I was a little more than I thought on Day 1. My skin developed a very healthy glow. I had seven lemonades, and I felt light-headed walking home. The idea of quitting popped into my head, but I managed to just drink seltzer and go to bed.
Day 3: I didn't weigh myself, but I was feeling "skinny," which made me happy. I noticed the "pooch" of my belly seemed a little smaller. I did the SWF at night. I'm really glad I re-read other people's comments on that, because I almost made the mistake of farting, but remembered other people's comments and thankfully went to the bathroom instead. I tried to read for a while before going to bed, but I couldn't really concentrate, so I just watched TV. The hunger feeling is pretty much gone, except for an occasional ting. I went to bed feeling skinny
Day 4: I weighed in at 135 this morning. Probably most of the loss is water weight, but I can see a difference in how my face and belly look. It's about 5 pm now and I'm feeling pretty good, although I have noticed some typos in emails that I don't usually make, so I think my brain is a bit fuzzy. Thankfully, it's Thursday and this wknd is Labor Day, so I can stay home through Day 8 without having to use my brain much.

I'm thinking of trying to keep this up for 15 days instead of 10, because I'd like to get down to 125, but I'm not committed yet. I welcome suggestions from people who've made it to 15 days.

Good luck to all the newbies out there! You CAN do it!

Day 5: didn't weigh myself. felt great all day. no fatigue in the evening, which was a nice change. only had five lemonades. didn't even realize it until i noticed at the end of the day that i hadn't used as many as usual. did the SWF at night. the first time i did the SWF, it was "complete" within about three hours. this time, i drank it around 8 p.m. and it didn't kick in until around 10 p.m., but not everything came out at once. i went to bed around 11 p.m. thinking maybe i did it wrong, but woke up at 2, 4 and 8 to use the bathroom. weird that it went through me so slowly this time...

Day 6: weighed myself on a more accurate scale (the other scale was the dial-kind at my gym that's hard to read, and i noticed that before i get on the scale, sometimes it's above the "0" and sometimes below, but i can't figure out how to adjust it to 0). the new scale is the kind that uses those weight things at eye-level that you slide back and forth. it came up 136 pounds, which made me sad, because i thought i should be under 135 by now. i've been exercising 20 to 45 minutes on the elliptical every day and haven't cheated a bit. but my face and stomach are much slimmer and this morning i noticed that my upper arms look slimmer (i hadn't thought about losing weight there, but i noticed in the mirror that i can sort of see the muscle definition, and i never noticed that before). i know the scale isn't what matters, but it feels so good to see the number go down...

i'm still thinking i'd like to go 15 days, but now i'm thinking that i probably won't be at my goal of 125 by then since my experience last time was that the weight loss slows down after the first few days, and i only lost 5 pounds in five days.

but maybe i can at least get below 130. haven't seen the 120's in a couple of years, so it would be a great accomplishment, but just wouldn't leave me the extra cushion that i wanted.

If you are doing the machine 20-45 minutes a day, then drinking only 5 rounds of lemonades is way too small. That's too small when it comes to calories, and you body will be holding up the calories instead of using it to burn fat. Try to aim for atleast 8 a day. You can drink 2 when you are done working out. I'm a 32 years old female. Maybe because this is your second time doing it, but you are lucky that you have energy to work out so soon. The first few days, on the diet, I didn't have any energy to even think of exercising. But I will start on Monday, which will be my Day 10. Even then, I'm afraid of exercising with only lemonade to drink before and after. When I usually exercise, I start with some good carbs to get me through an intense 45 mins running and weight training. So I a bit scared to begin working out, but I will try.

Anyway, I enjoy reading your diary..Good luck.

thanks for the note, LadyB1. you're probably right--i'll be sure to drink all my lemonades for the rest of the MC. it's tempting to feel like consuming as little as possible, but i don't want to entirely destroy my metabolism...
as for the workouts, i couldn't work out at all on my first cleanse, and i don't think it makes sense to push yourself if you're not feeling up to it. i tried once on my first cleanse, and i only walked for about 10 minutes before i felt light-headed and gave up.

i think that this time, knowing in the back of my head that i've done it before, and constantly telling myself that i'm feeling great and energized, makes the difference. that said, a couple of evenings on this MC, even my self-talk couldn't get me over the fatigue, and i went to bed at 8 p.m.
also, since the scale is at the gym, i feel excited to go there first thing every morning to check out my weight loss, so that's keeping me motivated to get there

Day 7: YAY! I weighed in at 133 on the "good" scale this morning!! I think that my Day 6 weigh-in was messed up from the SWF the night before. It's been at long time since I weighed 133

LadyB1, I took your advice and drank seven lemonades yesterday.
Since I have four full days left (including today) before Day 10, and I know I won't lose more than one pound every two days, I've decided to commit to going at least 15 days, so I can get below 130. I'm trying to recruit my sister to start the MC tomorrow, and if she does, I said I'd do 10 days with her, which would take me to 17 days. This is so much easier with a buddy.

This morning I remembered a friend who was trying to raise money for a homeless shelter a couple of years ago, and told me that people like us "have no idea what hunger actually feels like." While I am sympathetic to people who are hungry and unable to get food, at the time (having done the MC before), I didn't say it, but I was thinking, "well, actually, I do know what hunger feels like."

So, I decided come up with a Top 10 list for How you Know You're Hungry (on the MC).
Here's what I came up with.

12. You find yourself looking longingly at the simplest foods--like apples, watermelon, lettuce, hard-boiled eggs
11. You have a list of about 20 foods you are going to eat as soon as you are off the cleanse
10. When reading a novel, you skip over any mention of foods or drinks
9. When watching television, you leave the room or turn it off during food-related commercials
8. Walking down the street, you will cross the street for the sole purpose of avoiding walking past an outdoor restaurant during business hours
7. You start putting on chapstick more frequently as a guilty-pleasure, because you like the taste
6. If a small piece of lemon falls into your lemonade, your mind launches into a moral debate about whether it's okay for you to "eat" it (you're just supposed to have the juice; but it is part of the lemon; but you're not supposed to have solid food; but you didn't put it in their ON PURPOSE, it just fell in; etc)
5. When you smell deep-fried foods, the smell is so intense that you begin to fear that maybe somehow you are consuming calories just by smelling it
4. When you bite your lips and a little piece of skin comes off in your teeth, you wonder if there are calories in it
3. When walking with your lemonade, if a little bit spills onto the side of the glass, you check to make sure no one is watching, then lick the spilled part off the cup
2. You sometimes go to Starbucks just to smell the yummy creamy coffee smells, which ALMOST feels like eating
1. You look forward to sleep because you know that in your dreams, you are about to eat the most wonderful, tasty foods

I'd love to hear some other people's experiences

Raging headache evening of Day 7. I've been doing so well until now...
I hope it goes away soon. I won't be able to work with a headache like this. Thankfully, tomorrow is Labor Day...

Day 8: didn't weigh myself because the gym is closed for Labor Day. probably for the best anyway, bc I did another SWF last night and I think they make me retain water the next day.

My headache yesterday was KILLER. I thought I would have to quit if it didn't go away. I think I got it bc I was not keeping track at all of what I was consuming, and I realized I had only had three lemonades by 5 pm, even though I worked out that morning and took a long walk in the afternoon. I was just busy, and didn't notice that I wasn't eating/drinking enough. So, I had a lemonade with two heaping tablespoons of Maple Syrup and some Aleve. Put on Norah Jones and took a walk in the park focused on deep breathing. I felt much better within an hour, but not 100% so I had another lemonade then. Within another hour, I was back to feeling really good.

It seems I swing between feeling GREAT and poorly on this diet. When I'm on-schedule, I feel much better than a normal heavy, bloated day. But if I veer off-schedule or when I get fatigue at night, it's overwhelming.

I will be much more diligent about drinking my lemonade every two hours, whether I feel hungry or not. The 15-day cleanse seems very achievable now that I'm on Day 8. If I still feel good at Day 15, I'll try for 20 days.

Day 9: weighed in at 132.5. A little disappointed that I only lost a half-pound in the last two days, but I just started my period, so maybe that's affecting me.

I can't believe it's Day 9 already. When I started the MC, I read some journals where people said, "it went by so quickly." That really helped me get into the right frame of mind. The last eight days are gone and I am so happy that I chose to use them wisely. I feel incredible. I had a great workout this morning--I was able to push myself with some intervals on the elliptical that I previously thought I'd be unable to do after eight days on the MC. (Thanks to LadyB1 for telling me to not skimp on lemonades, bc I've stayed on a tight schedule--every two hours--and it works well.)

I feel completely awake and alive

I'm now hoping to go for 20 days total--if I can do this much, and feel this good, I should be able to do it for another 11. For the first ten days, I completely cleared my schedule, so that I had no temptation. But as a result, I have a lot of things on my schedule for the next ten days, which will make it harder. Now that I'm settled into a comfortable place with the MC, I'm hopeful that I can begin to live my normal life while on it. I guess I'll drink seltzer at parties--I'm planning to tell people that I can't drink because I'm on antibiotics. I have one "lunch" meeting regarding a potential new job, so I'll have to eat something. I'm hopeful that it doesn't completely throw me off. I'm hoping there's a veggie soup on the menu! I even have a couple of dates, which I'm going to push toward just drinks instead of dinner... (and how much fun will they be, now that i'm almost ten pounds lighter!!)

Anyway, I'm thrilled that I've made it this far and am curious to see how far I can take it from here.

Good luck to everyone out there who's just getting started--you CAN do it, too!

Well, I'm back after a three-day hiatus. I completed 10 days but had the monster headache again on Day 10, so decided to return to normal food when I woke up the next day. What would have been day 11 was a friend's bday, so I decided to eat veggie soup during the day and enjoy the party that night.
Of course, my alcohol tolerance was low after coming off the cleanse, so I ended up with a hangover on Day 12 and as a result of feeling awful, I ate quite poorly that day. Then I had a BBQ party on the 13th day, and just decided to enjoy it, while eating as healthy as possible.
Now, I'm ready to return to the MC and focus on my 125-pound goal.
I have no idea what my weight is. I don't want to de-motivate myself by seeing how much damage three days caused, so I'm just focusing on getting back onto the MC for a while and I'll check my weight when I feel ready.
I hope you other cleansers are feeling positive and healthy today. Hang in there, everyone!

Hey there- how's it going second timer? Are you back on?

Hello again, Master Cleansers!
I didn't have the will-power to get back on after my three-day hiatus post 10-day cleanse last time, but now I'm back and motivated.
My primary focus this time will be on coming off the MC more smoothly, since my last two cleanses both ended with me eating WAY too much. I just get giddy with feeling like I can eat whatever I want, and do all kinds of damage... which, of course, is the reason that I'm back for MC number three.

Today is Day 1 for me. As usual, I have a lot of motivation today, and will work hard to hold onto it through the more challenging periods. My boyfriend is out of town for ten days, so I'm using that as an opportunity to do the cleanse (since we usually eat at restaurants).

I haven't weighed myself in a while bc I have been afraid of what the scale will say, but I will weigh myself tmrw morning and be honest with myself about my weight.

Good luck to everyone else getting started today