Things had been bleak on the fitness front for a few months. A combination of injury, several weekends away (Bourneville’s Cadbury World amongst them...) and even a week in Disneyland had all but put paid to my efforts to work out and eat well. Obviously I hadn’t been doing anything totally nuts like indulging in tomato-based cuisine or potatoes, but, even so, I’d eaten my way through far too many calories for a man whose lifting had been sporadic - and it was starting to show on my burgeoning gut. Worse, since August I’d lost over an inch from my biceps.As such, a couple of weeks ago I decided that it was time to draw a line in the sand by rebooting my system with Forever Living’s intensive, Aloe Barbadensis Miller-based cleansing programme known as Clean 9 (“C9”). The particular subspecies of aloe vera used by Forever really is incredible stuff – loaded with antioxidants; minerals; essential amino acids; and even vitamin-B12 (a rarity in plants), it’s a veritable catch-all for the body’s most fundamental needs. For my purposes, it’s also a powerful anti-inflammatory agent, containing salicylic acid and plant sterols, amongst other things, that do wonders for auto-immune disorders like arthritis. It’s little surprise, then, that for thousands of years, this so-called “true aloe” has been renowned as the “Miracle Plant”; the “Burn Plant”; the “Medicine Plant”; and, my favourite nomme de guerre, the “Silent Healer”. Every one of these soubriquets has been rigorously put to the test so that today we can all benefit from it as a central ingredient in everything from topical creams and lotions to shampoos.
The C9 programme is built upon aloe’s anti-inflammatory and immune-balancing effects, which in practical terms means consuming copious amounts of Forever’s stabilised gel. Whilst this wasn’t an actively horrible prospect for me, it wasn’t a particularly appealing one either - after all, it’s hardly Innocent smoothie. A helpful conversation with my wife’s friend Claire, a Forever agent who was, at the time, approaching the final days of her own C9 detox, ultimately convinced me to take the plunge and part with my £97.99. She was almost bouncing with energy, radiating that insufferable healthy-person glow that I’d long-since lost and desperately wanted back. For that, I was prepared to neck a few shots of glutinous plant gel.
When I got the box home and started wading through it myself, I realised that it was actually quite an inspiring piece of kit regardless of its target market. Its literature is abounding with success stories, all of which boast ‘before’ and ‘after’ pictures that are far more credible than those emblazoned on the front of Men’s Health’s many 30-day body transformation manuals, the vast majority of which beggar belief. These people look real, especially in some of their still-imperfect but nonetheless significantly improved ‘after’ pictures. I found this candid approach refreshing and motivating, as it made my immediate goals seem readily attainable rather than slightly far-fetched.
Beginning the first day, another impressive aspect of C9 presented itself: no matter how busy, or indeed how lazy, you are, it’s an absolute doddle to follow. Your pre-printed diary (a couple of extracts from which you can enlarge by clicking on the relevant pictures on this page) breaks down each “meal” (the term is really stretched here, mind) into its components, which you then simply tick off upon consumption. Most things are even handily packed for portability, with the Forever Garcinia Plus Softgels and Forever Therm Tablets even being separated out and labelled for each meal. Even if you’re like me, then, and spend much of your free time planning how you’re going to hit tomorrow’s protein goal or cut some of the carbs out of your refried bean tofu-dillas, there’s a lot to be said for letting someone else do all the brainwork for you for a bit. I even really appreciated not having to laboriously make my morning Nutri Ninja® or pre-prepare all my meals - it was more like a holiday than my actual holidays have been this year, marred as they were by a dearth of healthy-eating establishments (here’s looking at you, Disneyland!)
The Forever Lite Ultra meal replacement shake, in contrast, is absolutely delicious - I’d rank it up there with Holland and Barrett’s Precision Engineered Whey Protein taste-wise. Nutritionally, it’s a fairly even mix of slow-burning carbs and soya protein, duly fortified with an impressive array of vitamins and minerals. It’s ideal for those looking to strip fat but maintain lean muscle, as I was, while offering those who’ve had poorer diets probably the first truly balanced meal that they’ve had in a long while. I was a little anxious about taking it over nine days, though, as it contains far more ingredients that I’m comfortable with these days. Indeed, it has about fifty times as many as my protein powder of choice – Bulk Powder’s Pure Whey Isolate 90, which has just two – and amongst them is sucralose, a non-nutritive sweetener that doesn’t seem to flare up my arthritis in the same way that the likes of the nasty aspartame do, but is still quite a controversial substance. Fortunately I experienced no arthritic pain at all during the entire nine days, and so, at least in the short-term, Forever Lite Ultra needn’t deter you from attempting C9 even if you’re trying to follow an anti-inflammatory diet.
The Forever Aloe Vera Gel is, admittedly, an acquired taste. As I’ve intimated above, it’s quite a thick liquid – its consistency is closer to shampoo than it is juice – but its taste isn’t bad. I’ve been habitually necking shots of it for months now, but had to consume my usual daily measure tenfold during the first two days of C9. To my surprise, by the second day, hunger and taste deprivation had actually made me look forward to each gooey 120ml glass. There I sat at the dining table, popping my pills and sipping at my gel as the missus devoured a roast chicken dinner.Indeed, it goes without saying that the programme’s first two, foodless days are its hardest. Claire spoke to me at length about the importance of timing when to start the programme, as a nine-day programme obviously has the potential to disrupt two weekends if you start on one, but you have to weigh this against the fact that you are going to be feeling rather feeble for the first couple of days, and so starting on a busy workday might not be sensible. I decided to start on my next workday anyway, my reasoning being that at work, I’m so busy that I often struggle to find the time to eat and usually end up munching at my desk, dropping crumbs and spilling green tea all over ancient and already illegible-enough title deeds. I therefore started on Friday 27th November, even putting a day’s overtime in on the Saturday to keep myself as far away from my fridge and thoughts of food as possible. Starting on a Friday also meant finishing on the following Saturday, leaving half of my next weekend untouched.
Surprisingly, I wasn’t as hungry as I feared that I’d be. The Garcinia Plus Softgels and Therm Tablets conspired to keep me ticking over and suppress my appetite, and the lunchtime scoop of Forever Lite Ultra even went some way towards sating what was left. Had I been minded to, I could have increased my caloric intake slightly with some of C9’s “free foods”, which are all low on the glycemic index. Favourites of mine on there include apples, blueberries, cherries, red/purple grapes, raspberries, strawberries, kale, soy beans and spinach. I could have even made my Forever Lite Ultra shake with up to 300ml of skimmed milk instead of water, but to me it felt like cheating. I was hell-bent on starving myself clean, no matter the cost.
Yet the difficulty for me wasn’t so much hunger, but habit; it’s quite a galling moment when you realise how much of your daily routine revolves around the preparation, eating and cleaning up of food. I had to busy myself in the evenings – sitting down in front of the telly would’ve been fatal. Fortunately I didn’t have to busy myself for long as, by about half ten each night, I’d just run out of fuel and collapse into a deeper sleep than I’m accustomed to. If normal sleep is swimming a few metres beneath water, C9 sleep is deep-sea diving.
Exercise-wise, I didn’t push things too hard on days one or two. I did about eighty minutes’ walking at around 3mph on the Friday, and about seventy minutes’ worth on the Saturday. By the Saturday night I was at my lowest ebb – I felt like a had a hangover. I couldn’t sleep for sweating and my stomach was in knots. My body was, quite literally, detoxing. On the Sunday morning, though, I was a different man. For the first time in a couple of weeks, I went in the garage and threw some weights around for half an hour. My recovering groin didn’t ache. I even had a meal to look forward to – albeit one capped at 600-800kcal, and thus one that had to be carefully thought out. In the end, I went for a simple-but-filling poached eggs on toasted soya and linseed bread. High in protein and healthy fats, it seemed like the ideal starter meal for my first day back on grub. For my pudding, I delighted in making a heaven-sent apple last about forty minutes, sitting down with a plate and a knife and eking every ounce of pleasure out of it that I possibly could. On C9, mindful eating is a must.
After that, whilst I wouldn’t say that it was easy, it was certainly easier. I kept myself as busy as I could with overtime at work, cycling, working out – I even braved half an hour of the missus’s Jillian Michaels DVD. I was regularly spurred on by my ever-improving stats – the programme encourages weigh-ins and measure-ups on days one, three, six and nine to maintain motivation – not to mention an increasing sense of well-being that still persists now, as do some of the good habits that C9 helped me to resurrect.
For many, the C9 cleanse is just the start of a 69-day journey to fitness, with its two follow-up programmes - FIT1 and FIT2 - designed to help shred more fat and then increase lean muscle mass. For me, whilst it’s tempting to have another sixty days’ worth of meals mapped out for me, I think I’m going to go it alone (with perhaps a little help from MyFitness Pal and a side order of Forever Garcinia Plus Softgels …), but should I ever falter again, I’ll be sure to reboot my lifestyle with C9.The Clean 9 pack is available through Forever Living. Prices may vary. I would recommend ordering through Claire Kemp at Sparkle with Aloe Forever as she is able to offer support throughout your C9 journey. You can visit her Facebook page or drop her an e-mail if you would like to discuss the programme further before purchasing.
