The best thing you can do for your body, as I mentioned in the thread on saturated fats and elsewhere, is not to eat processed foods loaded with fats and sugars. Did you know that nearly HALF of the daily calorie intake of the average American, some 1,000 calories, is from added fats and sugars (including more than the recommended daily fat intake, not counting naturally occurring fat in other foods, and of course truly bad fats like trans fats)? Which provide no nutrition whatsoever (besides calories). Not to mention half the increase in caloric consumption in recent decades is due to these (the other half is grains, mainly refined, so I presume people are eating more foods like doughnuts and cake). Replacing this with fruits and vegetables (which average only about 200 calories per day) would increase their consumption to six times current levels (less the decrease in calories needed to stop the obesity epidemic, which would still be well above recommendations).
I know. It am not saying it applies to everyone but buildup can happen. I felt like things weren’t moving well for about a month and then the discomfort intensified for a few days before I collapsed at work and got spend two weeks in ICU with little hope of survival. It didn’t work out that way obviously and I started to get better as soon as the sludge started moving. It took months to get to normal GI health with extreme weight loss in the mean time. That is a clinical situation but I still see lots of people walking around who look obese but they just may be malnourished and carrying lot of water weight. Good diets can bring shocking results just by correcting parts of those conditions.
That is where the fad diet business fools people. They induce rapid weight loss for many people leading many to believe it is a miracle. In reality, all they did was get people off their normal terrible diet and let their body process food the way it should be. Variations on that trick are why the industry exists. Some people really do get rapid results, they just aren’t sustainable without major, long-term changes.
There is clinical evidence that moderate fasting has some benefits as well. It is the same idea but not one people can make money off of.
Shagnasty, when you had your collapse, what was your diagnosis if you don’t mind my asking?
Specially trained priests wearing blessed hazmat suits.
Multiple organ failure starting with liver failure brought on by a bad combination of prescriptions drugs combined with a bad diet in general. Like I said, it doesn’t apply to everyone but I have been watching my diet and health very closely since then. I abandoned the typical American diet almost completely. Since I made a full recovery, I can see why some people get fast, positive results from alternate diets and I am much more open to alternate diets now because I don’t think the typical American one is healthy at all. That doesn’t mean any fad diets are either but some of them contain elements to get people feeling better quickly just by trying an alternate approach that stops the constant eating and processing of foods that aren’t that good for you to begin with.
Pretty nonspecific if icky photos (one purports to show external signs of megacolon (which entails massive dilatation of the colon, but not because it’s full of “sludge” or fecal material, but rather is due to infection/inflammation in acute megacolon, and typically neuromuscular disorders in chronic forms).
And while prescription drug use/misuse can certainly cause acute organ failure, not so for typical Western diets that contain too much saturated fat, sugar, calories etc. Their effect is on a chronic basis.
*I love the following quote from the colon hydrotherapy site which generated the second link runnerpat provided:
“Just As Deep Cleaning, Both Inside And Out, Makes A House More Livable,
The Human Body Is No Exception.”
Yeah, but when I’m feeling sluggish, I’m not about to call the people with long hoses, whether it’s you or Stanley Steemer. 
This reminds me of something Ben Goldacre is fond of saying, except about pharmaceuticals instead of diets.
Ben Goldacre is highly critical of certain unscientific practices that major pharmaceutical companies engage in, such as failing to publish any drug trials they perform in which their product looks bad, or comparing their product to placebo instead of to other drugs which treat the same condition.
But if you think that means you should turn to alternative medicine instead of mainstream pharmaceuticals, this is what he has to say:
"Repeat after me: pharma being shit does not mean magic beans cure cancer."
That’s worth framing.
My observation is that all alternative medicines start with the mantra, “We all know big medicine is bad for people and refuses to listen to [insert ancient wisdom here], so it doesn’t matter what they say about this.” Often condensed to just the first nine words, so…
Seems like Dr. John Kellogg would be at home here! How about a nice healthy yoghurt enema, follwed up by a no-meat diet!
The detox diets are typically a modified fast lasting about 48 hours. I’m thinking of the “Hollywood Diet” that was a quart bottle of some sort of Gatorade woo and you drank that plus lots of water for a weekend.
Yeah, you’ll lose weight.
If you ingest zero carbohydrates and a very modest amount of protein, your body metabolism goes into ketosis. The byproducts of this are caustic to the kidneys, and the body searches desperately for any extra water to help flush the nastiness from your kidneys.
Even if you are drinking a lot of water as part of the detox process, you will still pee a LOT.
With a minimal amount of fat being burned for energy, and with the removal of any surplus water in the body (along with some necessary water, too!), you’ll end up with a net weight loss over the 48 hours.
Ketosis also produces a mild euphoria in some people.
But hey, break the fast with a bag of BBQ potato chips and a couple of sodas and maybe a candy bar or two, and you’ll be just fine again!
~VOW
Shagnasty, if you had 30 pounds of shit sitting in your gut for years, you would have been in excruciating pain. Snopes did a debunking of the urban legend about John Wayne dying with 40lbs of fecal matter in his colon.
They mention the most ever found in someone’s colon: 1lb. The guy was suffering from severe constipation, agonizing pain and rectal bleeding. If you had 30 pounds of shit sitting inside you, you’d know it.
Well, there’s a kernel of truth there. Overweight dudes are often constipated and few Americans get enough fiber.
So, if part of the “detox” is making sure you have a couple of good BMs everyday, then yes, you will lose some weight and feel better.
True, but you can ensure that by eating more fiber. Starting a laxative habit can cause permanent damage to one’s health.
True , unless one is talking about that orange powder bulk forming laxative, which is basically a fiber supplement .
A lot of woo medicine and diets and cures presuppose that the inside of your colon looks like a bag of dog shit and has to be scraped out, flushed out or just plain removed (colectomy was apparently popular as a “cure” for many ills in the 1930s).
I think it must be due to an extreme in anal retentive thinking. (Seriously.)
Off topic: why is everyone using the word woo?
It’s some fancy pants internet pejorative for everything that’s newagey/magic, or otherwise bunk science. Crystals, tarot cards, reiki, homeopathy, etc. I think I heard it comes from “Woo woo!” the sound that a ghost would make in cartoons.
Unless you’re asking why people feel compelled to throw out pejoratives in every conversations on this board. That’s another question entirely. 
It’s in the thread title, to wit: Detox diets: woo?
As for why the term exists: it’s short and descriptive. Besides, there are no good synonyms that won’t sound pejorative to the woo-ful.
What about “fake?”
I don’t disagree that the fad diets are “woo,” but surely if you are used to a diet of whiskey and deep dish pizza, stopping that for a few days and drinking lots of water will certainly make you feel better, no? And continuing that with a healthy diet of high fiber and low carbs will make you feel that much better, right?
To the extent that no longer putting “toxins” into your body will “de-toxify” you, that is certainly true.