In last week’s post I outlined 3 clients (Jim, John &amp; Reece) who all lead classic 1st world lifestyles. Commonly their health status reflected this lifestyle (not bad, but not great). CLICK FYI
In this week’s post we test the possibility of balancing long term wellness (that is, continued “good” physical &amp; emotional health , and maintain “around about” their optimum body composition), while accommodating fixed lifestyle stressors like mental &amp; emotional stress, sub-optimal foods including alcohol, and inconsistent exercise – with – a 4 DAY ABSOLUTE GUT HEALTH CLEAN OUT/ ANTI-INFLAM/ &amp; REBUILD.
I should NOTE - while I would much prefer facilitating at least 28 days of food choice education, leading to improved eating habits, coaching 2-5 months in preparation towards an event (eg ½ marathon), allowing this commitment to naturally curb food choices including alcohol consumption, and finally, spending a year reducing lifestyle stress with a few proven de-stressing tricks, I accept, this is perhaps impractical for much of main stream Australia.
So the question is: Is a 4 day gut reboot enough to maintain their good health? (or reset it if you like), or, is it a waste of time.
So what happened?
I will leave comprehensive analysis of their results to the experts (their GP, Specialists &amp; Naturopath – as this is their forte). This post is a simplified version FYI. I’ve included the principles of their 4 day reboot, and their results in a simplified table.
RESULTS
Their initial results were similar (all 3 clients) [see table below]; no serious potential health risks – at this point anyway. Yes, there were some borderline potential health risks, and their fat to muscle ratio could be better, but it was their gut health that presented most interest – that being, an over inflamed sub-optimal result. That is what we will focus on.
There is a plethora of reputable information clearly suggesting continued GUT inflammation is likely to lead to ill-health; namely, sickness, aches &amp; pains, &amp; weight gain
FYI – this TED talk was simple enough
<div align="center"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Af5qUxl1ktI" width="560" height="315" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe></div>
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OUR 4 DAY KEY PRINCIPLES:
Nutrition – NO, we will NOT be using pills &amp; potions. While there’s studies claiming supplements could well offer health benefits, for the purpose of this experiment, I’d rather simple use ONLY real accessible food, as I figure it worked fairly well for.......well......... a few centuries. I am equally aware our world (the quality of our agricultural world) has changed, so, in the event we don’t find an improvement in their health status, perhaps we’ll give supplemental interests a run next time.
John, Jim &amp; Reece consumed food options offering significant cleaning out properties (yep fibrous foods were cranked early – including husk, green leaf, a few herbs and selected fruits etc ). Next they loaded up with foods offering an anti-inflam effect (it seemed some combinations worked better than others, but as you can imagine selected veggies feature heavily), and finally foods offering nutrients with rebuilding properties (and no, not just [animal] protein!). They consumed their largest meal at breakfast while tapering into dinner – attempting to hit the sack, while satisfied, but with minimal GUT processing and congestion. This contributed towards improved sleep. Fluids played a slightly greater role than normal – as with minerals (namely: sodium chloride). While I don’t usually consider value in juicing (well.....fruit anyway), we certainly did during days 1&amp;2. Improving their own intuitive skills on food volume varied between all 3 clients.
I guess much of the effort revolves around TOTAL elimination of inflammatory inducing foods. They were armed with a long list. Yep, there is zero alcohol for the 4 day period.
As a broad rule, we opted (just for 4 days) only consuming food types that (with the right equipment) you could prepare at home – from scratch! I’m finding it harder and harder to label foods real these days. Eg, I consider butter is great, but it comes in a wrapper!!! so does this really make it real?

Exercise intensity – relative to each of them, we dialled back exercise stress – but we exercised every day. While I do prescribe more demanding (relative) training sessions, and certainly have (and sometimes love) bombing myself to smithereens, now is NOT that time. Exercise stress however good, when appropriate, causes a sh&amp;t ton of collective inflammation. So it’s easy conversational rhythmic stuff for now (for this lot). More, but easier is better.
Although (often) I take great interest in analysing heart rate with monitors, blood lactic via blood samples, and performance with GPS units, for our 4 day reboot, they’ll be shelving all technology and relying on perceived intuitive awareness. They didn’t exercise over 65-75% of their maximal perceived effort.

De-stressing with meditation – there’s just way too much evidence out there suggesting extra-ordinary health benefits by taking a couple of minutes out of this world to ignore (void of alcohol that is). While I’d love to send them all off to a specialist in this field - time, coin, and maybe ego could offer road blocks. So, for 10 minutes a day all 3 will be using the free App – Headspace. They will prove to me they have complied with this daily 10min program. I received (some) positive feedback from this practice.

<a href="http://balancehealthprograms.com.au/wp-content/uploads/PAMPYS-POST-RESULTS-GUT-HEALTH-TEST.pdf">PAMPY'S POST - RESULTS GUT HEALTH TEST</a>

Conclusion
Do I believe it’s in someone’s health interest to give a 4 day gut reboot a crack? or is it a waste of time?
If you’re rolling along nicely, pretty much free of illness, fatness and lathery, I wouldn’t bother. If you believe a short sharp committed reset would serve you well, have a crack! It seems to work.
BP

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