I’ll try anything once. (It’s true, ask my high school boyfriend.) So when my friend suggested I take part in a juice cleanse at her yoga studio, I said, Sure! I said, Sounds like fun! It took a week for the realization to sink in: No food. For 3 days.

I like to eat. As a kid I would go to parties just for the cake. I’d take my piece to a spot in the corner and eat it alone, like I wanted to give it my undivided attention. I once convinced a bouncer I was hypoglycemic so I could bring a bag of cookies into a club. But I’d heard a lot about juicing, and I was curious. I’d just never been brave or motivated enough to try it.

I knew I couldn’t trust myself to get in the kitchen and make juices everyday and not eat, so I went with a prepackaged cleanse from Juice Hugger in Brooklyn. For $45 a day, you get six juices per day (one for every 2 hours), already bottled and numbered for you. Each day includes a mixture of juiced greens, fruits, and veggies. The juices were surprisingly tasty and varied enough to keep it interesting. The second day—usually the most difficult for people—featured a tomato soup, sweet potato juice, and a lentil mixture, all of which could be heated and placed in a bowl to simulate the act of eating. (I personally found sipping juice from a spoon to be even more depressing than drinking something called “Lean Lentils.”) Below is a day-by-day blow of my experience.

Day 1

All I think about is food. Not because I’m hungry, but because I know I won’t eat for days. I try to read a book but the main character is painstakingly describing his mother’s job at a bakery, where the doughnuts “roil” to life in grease. I mark the next time I can have a juice, 2 hours from now, on my bookmark.

My neighbor burns toast and my mouth salivates like Pavlov’s dog.

Two hours crawl by. I take small sips of the juice, wanting it to last. I cross out the hour I’d jotted down on the bookmark and write the time for my next feeding. I’m reminded of a prisoner counting down his days.

I clear my fridge of anything chewable and put away the dishes on the dish rack, as if to rid myself of the notion that cooking can and has happened in my kitchen.

My stomach snarls at me. I can’t help it; I start seeping gas. I make a note to leave the house as little as possible. Continue reading →