“Definitely, no question about it. After all that end-of-year partying, I’m going on a new diet to eliminate excess and toxins, and get started on a new basis.” This particular New Year’s resolution seldom lasts very long. The reason is that it’s hard to go from one extreme to another, and your body finds it difficult to cope with a drastic change of diet. If you want your post-New Year detox to be effective, it needs to be gradual and steady, it needs to have a timetable, and it needs to fit in with a few commonsense rules.

In terms of nutrition, remember that limiting yourself to a restrictive diet is not the best way of getting back in shape. What you need is foods that have natural purifying properties, to encourage a natural cleansing process. Fruit is ideal, in particular the lemon, which is rich in vitamin C, potassium and citric acid. To eliminate toxins and fats, there’s nothing like starting the day, even before breakfast, with a glass of lemon juice diluted with water. Think about increasing your consumption of vegetables. Fish, too, with its high levels of phosphorus and vitamins, will be your ally in your quest to get back in shape.

What else? Well, you’ll certainly find it a good idea to eat light, basing main meals on light, varied soups. Ideal for stimulating your taste buds! As for drinks, don’t skimp on raw vegetable juice, and drink plenty of water. On the other hand, avoid alcohol and coffee as far as possible. Contrary to popular opinion, they don’t make a good team. That also goes for tea, except for green tea, which has a lot of antioxidants. It goes without saying that sweet things and rich food should be banned from your table for a while.

That sort of diet will certainly help you restore your system, which must have suffered from all those end-of-year parties. You’ll soon feel the benefits, and you won’t have to carry on with it for longer than three days. After that, you can gradually reintroduce other healthy food groups into your diet. This programme will be even better for you if it’s part of a balanced lifestyle. You’ll benefit if you have a regular sleep pattern and do some of your favourite sport. Again, you don’t have to go over the top. Doing sport in a balanced and varied way is often more effective than pushing it to the limit.

Nu