It will come as no surprise that I’m not into the “get slim quick” approach, and anyone who has read my first book, Slim For Life: Freedom from the Food Trap, or the best-selling The Juice Master: Turbo-Charge Your Life in 14 Days will know this already. I’m into lifestyle change, mind change, a change that lasts—no quick fixes to the detriment of future weight and health.
However, I’m also aware that people want to see results … FAST! And I’m also aware that sometimes quick results can create unbelievable momentum for people—momentum that can lead to amazing future success on the health and fitness front.
The Price Is Right
In 2005 I was asked if I would put together a nutrition plan for a very famous model in the UK, Katie Price. She is otherwise widely known as “Jordan,“ and in the US this could get confusing because Jordan here is a basketball legend, not a glamour model! Katie had never been near a juice extractor in her life and was living on a diet consisting of nothing but takeout and fast food such as pizza and McDonald’s. Katie had been pretty lucky on the weight front most of her life. Despite her awful diet and no exercise, her system managed to keep her slim—even springing back to its flat-stomach self immediately after the birth of her first child, Harvey.
However, despite what people may think, Katie wasn’t so fortunate after her second child. She needed a cesarean and even after the baby was born she still had 28 lbs (13 kg) to lose! Contrary to popular rumor, Katie did not have a tummy tuck, and from what I now know of her she never would.
Like most women who have recently given birth she had weight to lose, and like most she wanted to lose it in super-fast time. Her main reason for wanting to lose the weight fast—in addition to her work as a model—was her impending wedding. Katie, like most brides to be, wanted to look amazing for her wedding day, and even though she had 3 months to lose the weight she wanted some results fast.
I devised a specific 6-week juicing/eating plan and explained that as it was new to her it would take a short time to get used to juicing. I also explained that it would take time to lose the weight but asked her to be patient and her body would do what it needed to do.
Asking Katie to be patient is like asking Jim Carrey to keep still! She is a woman who wants results in the fastest possible time and the initial plan wasn’t producing changes quick enough for her. At this stage people often do one of two things. They either go back to what they were eating before—which clearly doesn’t help their cause—or they do something incredibly drastic like living on nothing but water and doing 4 hours of exercise a day, which is again far from good and far from being in the same ballpark as healthy.
This is when I suggested she go on nothing but specially designed juices and smoothies for 7 days. I explained that the average person loses 7 lbs on the program, that it is extremely healthy, but that it requires a great deal of preparation and a certain mind-set in order to achieve it. But I didn’t realize at the time who I was dealing with. Katie is perhaps the most determined person I have ever met and if she says she’s going to do something she will do it whatever it takes to make sure it gets done.
I would say Katie kept to the program 90–95% of the time and saw some great results at the end of that week. More importantly, she then knew that there was indeed something to this juicing lark as she wasn’t anywhere near as hungry as she thought she would be and often not hungry at all. This, along with the dramatic weight loss, gave her the momentum to continue to Phases 2 and 3 of the program. (These phases are included in this program to make sure the change sticks.)
Katie not only lost the weight she wanted to lose but, much more than that, she has kept it off. At the time of writing this book, some 7 months after she finished her juice plan with me, Katie is weighing in at an average of 112 lbs (51 kg). This would be way too thin for some, but for Katie’s height and frame it’s a perfectly healthy weight.
The point I want to make is that having juice as part of her daily diet is not a diet to her; it is now a lifestyle, and without it the chances are she would still be on a diet consisting largely of takeout. As she says:
“This is the first time I have ever stuck to any sort ofdiet plan … I love the juices and I don’t feel hungry.”
This is why I make no apologies for this perfectly healthy, amazing results, super juice plan. If it juices people to initiate lifelong changes and embark on a healthier lifestyle, then I’m all for it.
I have told Katie’s story because her body, health, and weight are often in the media, especially in the UK. But nearly all of the most amazing juicy stories are from “regular” people.
Not Such a Regular Guy
I remember a guy at one of my “Weekend Retreats” who arrived very skeptical, left very skeptical and—if it weren’t for the rapid results he achieved after doing a specially devised “8-day challenge” when he left the weekend—probably would have remained skeptical … and fat! This man was about 250 lbs (113 kg) when I met him; he is now just over 170 lbs (77 kg)! That’s a massive, massive change. It’s the difference of being able to walk without a constant chafing on your inner thighs; it’s the difference of being able to run and play; it’s the difference of being able to go into a store and buy whatever clothes you like; it’s the difference of being able to get into a swimsuit without the constant paranoia that everyone and their mother is looking at and judging you. This man is happier than ever, more passionate about life than he has been in years, has much more energy—and he looks good! This is the power of what juice can do and the power of seeing good results in a short space of time; it can boost you into major life change and inspire you to continue. Coincidentally, as I write updates for this US version of the book, a letter has just come into me. A woman completed the 7 lbs in 7 Days juice program one year ago and has just written in to say that a year later she has lost 98 lbs (44 kg) and 8 dress sizes and has found herself a “toy boy”—her words! You cannot even start to imagine how this woman’s life has changed in every single area. This is not a quick fix; it’s a catalyst to lifelong change, as long as if you understand it and do it right. This is why it worked for Katie Price, the guy you just read about, and the now hundreds of thousands who found that good, fast results on the juice program have enabled them to have faith in juicing and continue to do it, and now they have a very juicy lifestyle. And it is why it can work for you.
It’s all well and good telling people to “be patient” when they change what they eat and that “the body will drop the weight when it is ready,” but that is hardly going to help you fit into that little black dress or tuck into those jeans in time to party!
Yes, I’m being slightly facetious, but no matter how much we try to cover it up or ignore it, the fact is that this is no longer a world where patience prevails. Whether we like it or not, the instant gratification society has taken over in what can only be described as a …
2
We live in a world of fast cars, fast trains, fast planes, fast TV, fast games; we eat super fast, drink fast, speak fast, and of course—the big one—we have plenty of fast food. We also live in a world where change in technology happens in a nanosecond. Where we were once amazed that it is possible to communicate and send pictures over the Internet, nowadays if our computer doesn’t do what we want in two seconds flat, we’ll start swearing at the darned thing in no time.
We live in a world where we want, and expect, super-fast results with everything—including weight loss and improved health. This is why if there is a safe, highly nutritious way that will enable people to see quick results, then I’m all for it. Especially when the likelihood