Malic acid made all the difference this time around! If you’ve been following, you know that you have a choice the first six days of the liver cleanse to opt for a liter of apple juice per day or a liter of water with a teaspoon of malic acid mixed in. Last month, the apple juice made the week much more memorable than this month’s cleanse. I was so miserably gaseous last month from the apple cider sugar overload that I needed an additional colonic apart from the cleanse’s mandatory colonics. So moving forward I am only going to be ingesting the malic acid mixture. It made the cleanse feel almost nonexistent. Well that and not adhering to the dietary restrictions (no meat, dairy or fried foods) made it easier for me! I had just finished menstruating when I started the cleanse prep, so I felt like I needed some iron and ate meat for a few days. I also drank wine, which I have no excuse for.

Last month, a client gave me some advice on how to half-ass a cleanse and his advice was ringing in my head this month, justifying my choices. He told me that on his fifth or sixth cleanse, he ate like total shit and actually ended up having one of his most successful cleanses (as in releasing the most stones)! Making the cleanse prep DO-able for you is important so that you are encouraged to keep going the following month. So while I’m not condoning the eating of crap, I think the most important thing is to be restrictive on the sixth and seventh day, following Moritz’s directions to the letter. Drink the malic acid mixture in the morning and eat a plain lunch of white rice and steamed vegetables seasoned with nothing other than sea salt. Eat nothing for the rest of the day. At 6pm and again at 8pm, drink 3/4 cup of epsom salt water. At 10pm, drink a mixture of 1/2 cup olive oil and 2/3 cup of freshly squeezed, strained grapefruit juice. Immediately lay flat and try to go to sleep. The next morning, you have to drink that nasty epsom salt water again at 6am and then at 8am, remaining upright. You will start to crap the stones out somewhere in between or after the second epsom salt dosage. At 10am, you can drink freshly squeezed orange or grapefruit juice. One half hour later, you can have a piece of fruit and then an hour later, a normal light lunch.

I didn’t get any cool green stones this time, so I have no pictures to show off, but I think maybe my dark eye circles are getting lighter??

I started my second liver cleanse two days ago, only this time substituting the malic acid mixture (1 tsp of malic acid in 32 ounces of water) in place of the 32 ounces of apple cider. It is such a better experience this time around! The malic acid mixture basically tastes like unsweetened Vitamin Water. It’s a little tart, but not unpleasant, no gag reflexes and no putrid gas… so far.

About two years ago, I got a bad case of ringworm on my left forearm. Ringworm really isn’t as gross as it sounds. It’s basically the same fungus as groin itch and athlete’s foot. Okay, maybe that is pretty disgusting. But it’s not like a creepy crawly worm was wiggling in my skin.

Ringworm forms as a ring of raised scaly skin and is easily recognizable. Just google it and you’ll see what was on my arm. I tried all the natural remedies recommended online including apple cider vinegar and essential oils. Trust me, I am all about natural remedies, but I believe I gave myself a second degree burn from applying the apple cider vinegar and I think the essential oils were only irritating it further. I ignorantly kept telling myself that it was working! I even convinced myself colonics would help flush out the fungus!

It wasn’t until my forearm got so inflamed from all of the itching and scratching (ringworm is itchy as all hell) that I seriously thought I might need to have it amputated, that I decided to go to Urgent Care. That and my mother lecturing me on how it took months to cure her dog, Freddy, of ringworm. The doctor at the Urgent Care prescribed antibiotics because he informed me that since there was puss excreting from the infection, it meant that the fungus was traveling through my system and only antibiotics could kill it at that point. He gave me some antibiotics and a vaseline like ointment to heal the skin. The ringworm cleared within days!

Two days ago, I started experiencing some eczema in the exact area of the ringworm. (I have a scar there to remind me that sometimes you just need meds). So I can’t help but wonder if this is the ringworm coming back to haunt me. It’s not in the shape of a ring, but I’m experiencing that same heated itchiness that I will never forget. Is this one of the side effects from the Liver Cleanse?? Or perhaps the Kidney Cleanse that I’m still in the middle of? The second it starts looking like a ring, I’m running to Urgent Care! Until then, I’ll be applying home remedies of oregano oil mixed with coconut oil even though it smells like B.O. because I’ll never forget how constipating the antibiotics were.

I initially started writing this post because I thought I found a secret remedy called Tropical Tamanu oil, which has been collecting dust in my medicine cabinet for years. I bought this a million years ago because some idiot at Whole Foods told me it would get rid of some scars I have on my legs. It didn’t. And it was expensive. And just like apple cider vinegar, it doesn’t get rid of ringworm either.

So everyone wants to know how I got this fungus on my arm when it normally manifests in moist areas that aren’t exposed to much sunlight. And the answer is: I don’t want to know.

I woke up feeling like crap this morning. I’m not sure if this is related to the liver cleanse, or if I just finally caught the cold that everyone around me seems to have or if my body is just worn out from a long week of clients and shopping at Ikea. I’m hoping for the latter seeing as the author, Andreas Moritz, of the Miracle Liver and Gallbladder Cleanse is dead as a doorknob. Did I forget to mention that he died at the ripe age of 58 from mysterious causes? Well, there are apparently a host of conspiracy theories available about it out there. I heard through the grapevine that the real cause was toxic mold poisoning. His website states that the cause is related to his chronic illness as a child and that his doctors had predicted he would not live past his teenage years.

A part of me is paranoid that perhaps I did not get all of the stones out even after that last colonic. I had gas pains in the middle of the night last night and could not pass any air. I finally had a hot, lava-ish bowel movement in a filthy Bed, Bath & Beyond restroom around 12:30pm. I felt relieved for a few hours, but now I’m feeling some pressure downstairs. I made myself a carrot and spinach juice and microwaved my herb pack to apply to my stomach. Andreas Moritz touts the benefits of drinking carrot juice especially before a meal to help sweep the colon. I find that applying a heat pack on your stomach aids in moving gas out, so I’m feeling better, but may give myself another colonic on Monday for extra measure.

Another possibility for all of this mild discomfort could be from the kidney cleanse. Moritz warns of potential back pain as a result of your kidneys releasing mineral crystals from kidney stones passing through the ureter ducts of the urinary system. He also suggests that during the 20 day kidney cleanse, you try to not consume meat, dairy (except butter), fish, eggs, tea, coffee, alcohol, carbonated beverages, chocolate, or any other foods that contain preservatives, artificial sweeteners, coloring agents, etc. Oops!

Why am I doing this again?? Oh yeah, my 42 year old client who has absolutely no wrinkles or filler. She says a vertical wrinkle between her eyebrows completely relaxed and disappeared after a series of liver cleanses. Mortiz does touch on different facial signals that indicate a congested liver, including dark under eye circles, bags under the eyes, wrinkles, nose tilting to the left, etc. So far, my dark under eye circles have not improved, but stay tuned! I’m gonna be pissed if there are no visible results 😉

Hope you’re having a great weekend!

Resources: The Liver and Gallbladder Miracle Cleanse by the late Andreas Moritz