Lemon water detox for Psoriasis

Psoriasis is an autoimmune disorder, caused due to faulty immune system. The accumulation of body toxins in your body beyond the safety limit is one of the most common reasons for faulty immune system. I strongly advocate a good detox for psoriasis to flush out toxins from the whole internal body system (particularly the liver).

The working principle of holistic healing of psoriasis is:

• Elimination of accumulated body toxins
• Not to accumulate any further body toxins

Why your body needs detox

Like a machine, your body works day and night without stopping. The food we eat, the beverages that we drink and the air that we inhale- everything has toxins and your body parts like liver, kidney, lungs and skin are working continuously to throw these toxins out from your body. In case of the people having psoriasis, the rate of toxins generations becomes more than the rate of toxins elimination. There can be numerous reasons for it. For example- bad food habits, disturbed lifestyle, high level of stress, nutritional deficiency. This increased level of body toxins imposes a lot of burden on your liver and other body parts involved in elimination of toxins. Gradually, these body parts get impaired and their efficiency reduces. Such a state of high body toxins and impaired liver results in faulty immune system.

Hence, a series of detox programs are useful in getting rid of these body toxins. Detox program is a sort of maintenance of your body system to make it ready for smooth operation.

Read more: How detoxification helps in Psoriasis healing

 Why Lemon water

Lemon water is just amazing for psoriasis healing. It is a good source of vitamin C, vitamin B and various minerals like calcium, magnesium and potassium. It is a natural alkaline drink. It aids in digestion and one of the best liver detox drink. It eliminates constipation and ensure regular bowel movements.

We have already discussed in detail about the benefits of lemon water for psoriasis. Click this link to read: Lemon water benefits for Psoriasis

Lemon water detox program

Lemon water detox is a natural detox program that helps in body cleansing (eliminating toxins from your body) in a gentle manner. In lemon water detox, you would drink enough quantity of warm lemon water throughout the day. Instead of conventional meals, you would be drinking green juice and eating raw fruits and vegetables.

Apart from body detoxification, other benefits of lemon water detox are:

• Healthy skin- Lemon contains vitamin C in good quantity, which is a good antioxidant. It can help your skin to glow.
• Weight loss- During lemon detox, your body would lose excessive body toxins and fats. Also, the calorie intake would be very less. Hence, a lemon detox program would help you to lose some weight.
• Relief in psoriasis arthritis- Lemon water detox for psoriasis helps in the elimination of uric acids from your body along with other toxins to relieve joint pains.
• Improved digestive system- Lemon water is good for stomach. It helps in relieving gastric problems, bloating, indigestion and heartburn.

Getting prepared for the lemon water detox

To follow a detox program is never easy. It is a type of fasting where you would be taking very less calories and you would not be taking all your regular meals. Physical symptoms like- craving for food, weakness, headache and nausea are possible. Hence, it is always advisable to prepare yourself well for a detox program for successful execution rather than just jumping into a detox program immediately.

The best way to prepare yourself for the detox program is:

• Start a vegetarian diet at least 2 days before the detox program
• It should include a lot of fruits and vegetable and a lot of drinking water
• You should stop taking alcohol and tobacco (smoking) in this period
• Cut down on the consumption of caffeine (tea and coffee) and carbonated beverages (cold drinks, soda) in this period

Apart from physical preparation, you should be mentally ready with a lot of self determination and discipline to tackle the food cravings during the detox program. Ultimately, you are doing all for your good health and making your life better.

Mild Lemon detox- 1 day program

Ideally, a 3 day lemon detox is perfect to get best possible detoxification results. But, I would recommend doing at least a few mild lemon detox programs (of 1 day time duration) before attempting a full fledged 3 day detox. Successfully doing a few mild detox programs would act as a preliminary preparation for the ultimate detox program. Also, it would make confident for the lengthy detox schedule.

You can do this mild detox program on any holiday; Sunday would be a perfect choice.

Below is the detailed schedule for one day mild lemon water detox for psoriasis:

• Prepare yourself for the Sunday detox program by eating vegetarian food on Saturday with a lot of raw fruits and vegetables. Apple, pear, papaya, guava, broccoli, cabbage, cucumber, carrot, celery, avocado, kale, spinach. Don’t drink or smoke. Cut down on tea, coffee, cold drinks, soda and other carbonated beverages.
• Sleep early on Saturday night, preferably before past midnight.
• Wake up early on the Sunday morning. Around 6AM.
• Do some little stretching to warm up your body and kick start the internal body metabolism.
• Drink a little water and go to the toilet if you feel the urge.
• Take 2 liters of warm water (about 0.6 gallons) and take 4 normal sized lemons.
• Squeeze the juice of lemon directly into warm water and stir it.
• Add about 1/2 tsp of himalayan salt (rock salt) into it and stir well.
• Now drink 500 ml of this detox solution in one go and do some light stretching exercise or a brisk walk. This light activity will help in channeling of detox solution throughout your body.
• Now drink another 500 ml of this warm water and repeat the same physical activity, but more intensely (more quickly) than the previous cycle.
• In the same fashion, drink rest of the one liter of detox solution in 2 installments of 500 ml each and after every 500 ml consumption, do some exercise. The intensity of physical activity should increase with every installment.
• In this way, you would be consuming the whole detox solution of 2 liters in 4 equal installments. Even if you feel a little unease, drink the whole detox solution.
• After the 3rd installment, you may feel a strong urge for bowel movement. Whenever you feel the urge for toilet, don’t suppress it. Remain in the vicinity of toilet as you may feel a sudden urge for toilet any time during the whole process.
• Don’t sleep or lay down after drinking the whole detox solution. Even if you feel tired, keep doing the light physical activities for around half an hour. Don’t sit or sleep. By doing physical activities, you are helping the detox solution to reach every part of your body to flush off the accumulated toxins.
• For breakfast (after around 2 hours of drinking the detox solution), take 2 full glasses of freshly prepared juice.
• For Juice recipes, check this article- Juicing for Psoriasis
• At lunch, take green salad and fresh fruits. For salad, use cucumber, carrot, cabbage, broccoli, green leafy vegetables. In fruits, you can eat apple, pears, guava, papaya. Eat as much as you feel. No restriction.
• In the evening, drink green tea. You can also opt for ginger tea.
• Take your dinner before 7 PM. Repeat the same menu as in lunch.
• Before sleeping, take some mild laxative to accelerate the detoxification process. Psyllium seed husk (isabgol) is an easily available herbal laxative which can be taken with warm water (never use cold water) to have an adequate bowel movement the next day. Dosage of psyllium husk can be decided by reading the dosage instructions, mentioned on the psyllium husk pack.
• Drink enough water throughout the day.

Important note:

• Always use fresh lemons to extract lemon juice. Don’t use commercially available lemon juice bottles. Generally, they contain preservatives and sugar. Also, the quantity of healthy enzymes would be far higher in fresh cut lemons than lemon juice bottles.

• Neither do any heavy physical work throughout the day nor try to sleep. Spend time in reading books, newspaper or watching TV etc. A short walk after every short interval is also beneficial.

• You may experience uncomfortable symptoms like- diarrhea, headache, craving for food and weakness. Don’t worry. After 1 or 2 detox programs, these symptoms would gradually disappear.

• Don’t expect miraculous results overnight. Have patience. Some people may get good results after the very first detox program, while it can take 3-4 detox programs for others to get good results.

Next day after detox

The lemon detox program should not be ended abruptly. After this Sunday detox program, it is very crucial that we don’t eat complex animal proteins like fish, chicken, meat and dairy products on Monday because these foods impose a lot of work load on your internal body metabolism to process them.

We should eat light food on Monday, preferably fruits, vegetables and juices. Also, drink a lot of water. From Tuesday onward, you can go back to your regular diet schedule.

Lemon detox program- 3 day program

After doing at least 3-4 mild lemon detox programs (of one day duration), opt for a full fledged lemon detox program of 3 days. Detox solution and daily routine would be the same as explained above. You should not do these detox programs (of 3 days) too frequently. There should be a gap of at least 2 months between two such detox programs. After doing such a detox program of 3 days, take light food for at least one day (as suggested earlier) and then gradually go back to your regular diet schedule.

Important Links

Dr Pagano Diet for Psoriasis

Omega 3 fatty acids for Psoriasis