Is colon cleansing over-rated?

I stumbled across a website today while looking up some information on juice fasts. It was a website about colon cleansing. I admit I had no idea what colon cleansing was ‘really’ all about until I did some reading this morning. The first time I heard someone talk about getting their colon cleansed I was watching Eddie Murphy’s version of “The Nutty Professor”….

So I stumbled across the website for the product DrNatura COLONIX and I started reading an article by Dr. Heather Johnstone, Ph.D., R.N., A.P.N., Director and Chief Academic Officer of the Global College of Natural Medicine titled Are You Clean Inside?.

By the time I had finished Heather Johnstone’s article and looked at some of the horrendously disgusting pictures of what users of DrNatura COLONIX reported ‘passing’ from their colons while on the program, I was quite seriously terrified at the thought that I had things like that inside me. So terrified, in fact, I went researching whether or not colon cleansing is absolutely necessary because I really didn’t want to experience passing anything 3 feet long with bulbous sacks.

What I discovered in my search is that the strongest supporters of colon cleansing and the most stalwart propagators of the “death begins in the colon” propaganda are the people with colon related products to sell. Now I’m not suggesting this industry is out to scam anyone, just based on a single observation. A few hours of research doesn’t qualify me to comment on colon cleansing being necessary or over-hyped to scare people into buying colon cleansing products and making their manufacturers rich; but I did find it curious while reading the testimonials of users of DrNatura Colonix that some people were saying they tried other products that didn’t work, but the DrNatura Colonix product resulted in weeks of passing green things, orange things, black things, slimy things, things that were 3 feet long and bulbous, worms and the like. Somehow it seemed to me that if these things are in your colon and DrNatura Colonix can get them out, other colon cleansing products should be able to get them out as well. Surely the manufacturers of DrNatura Colonix wouldn’t know a secret ingredient for getting those nasty things out of your colon that other manufacturers of colon cleansing products know nothing about?

But what about all those testimonials from people with all those disgusting pictures they took of the things they passed, lining them on on newspapers, lining them up on the seats of their toilets? Seeing is believing right? Unless, as Lisa Barger suggests in her article “Is Colon Cleansing a scam?” those things weren’t inside these people before they started using DrNatura Colonix. She maintains that colon cleansers trick people into believing that they work.

Here’s how Lisa Barger explains the trick:

To fully understand how colon cleansers trick people into believing that they work, it’s important to explain exactly what they are. And what the vast majority of herbal-based colon cleaners are, is just plain old fiber. Now, some have herbs and other ingredients with believed anti-parasitic and/or laxative propeties, but colon cleansers are mainly just fiber. And fiber “bulks up” when when it comes into contact with moisture. In fact, you can demonstrate this yourself by dropping a capsule into water and watching how it expands as the shell dissolves.

So let’s assume that you’re a typical American. You probably eat a diet that’s relatively low in raw fruits, fresh vegetables and whole grains. In other words, you probably have a diet that’s pretty low in fiber. And you probably have only a few bowel movements a week.

But let’s say that you begin a cleansing regimen. Your dietary fiber probably doubles (or even triples) and you now have 2 or 3 bowel movements a day for 2 or 3 days in a row. Maybe your bowel movements are more comfortable and, maybe, you feel “finished” for the first time in a very long time. That’s exactly what fiber does–it speeds up your colon, bulks up your stool, and helps some people feel “empty” after they use the toilet.

Now, isn’t it easy to understand why so many people feel that they’re being “cleaned” when they use a colon cleanser? After all, what could possibly be wrong with bigger, more frequent and vastly more comfortable bowel movements? Excerpted from Lisa Barger’s Is Colon Cleansing a scam?

I’m not saying not to clean your colon. I know I’ve had some days when I’ve left from a bathroom session feeling physically relieved, like I’d dropped a boulder that had been slowing me down without my realizing it; so if cleaning your colon will give you that feeling of relief and renewed energy hey, go ahead and clean your colon; but for now I’m going to pass on the colon cleansing.