I discovered enemas when I booked myself into a health programme somewhere in the Arizonan desert with my best friend, Helen. I was 23, on a budget, and it was a spartan place indeed.

Helen walked out in shock only six hours later and had to check into a hotel to recover. I stayed, and I have been hooked on enemas ever since.

Gut Spring Cleaning

If you compare your body to your home, you will understand that, like a building, your body needs a bit of repairing every now and again. When you do a spot of renovation, you don’t usually limit yourself to the exterior, paint the outside walls, and tidy the garden. The inside of your house is just as important as the outside – in fact, possibly more so. This is where almost everything happens.

The same holds true for your body. The colon is the equivalent of your living room and the center of your home. For your body, the colon is the place through which most waste is eliminated. If it’s not “clean and tidy” (this is the case for most colons) some of that waste just sticks around, literally. You need to remove it, just like you would do if piles of dust built up in the corners of your rooms.

Yet how many of us only pay attention to our exterior appearance and forget about what goes on inside us?

The Sad Story of John Wayne’s Gut

I’ll always remember the horrifying descriptions of John Wayne’s colon. John Wayne, everyone’s favorite cowboy, consumed large amounts of meat in his diet (presumably from all those days on the range). When he died, his autopsy revealed that he had more than 40lbs of compacted faecal matter inside his gut. That, for your interest, is the equivalent weight of a three-year-old child. On average, the rest of us have 5lbs at any one time. They use diagrams of John Wayne’s distended colon in colonic classes (yes, there really are such things, and I have been to many!) to graphically show the sense in doing both colonics and enemas regularly. Trust me, you really want to make time for your colon health!

Inside Your Colon

After years of trying to process unhealthy foods, the muscle walls of the colon weaken. A lining of stagnant waste begins to accumulate along those walls, playing host to many different types of bacteria and parasite. Pockets develop in the wall and fill with debris. Sometimes the weight of that waste material, along with the loss of muscle tone, distends and distorts the colon. Mucoid plaque builds up over a long period of time and lines the intestinal tract. All this comes from eating acidic and unhealthy foods – meat, dairy, coffee, white sugar and processed foods, as well as from taking drugs, drinking alcohol, and taking in toxic metals and chemicals from the environment.

Your colon will start to become a house that hasn’t been cared for in years.

Undergoing a colonic, where the colon gets washed out with purified water, is the equivalent of a thorough industrial clean. But, if you are happier in the less expensive confines of your own bathroom, a series of enemas will get you well on your way.

Why Enemas Should Become an Integral Part of Your Health Regime

1. Clear out the old crap, literally

As you begin to do regular enemas, the walls of your colon soften and the “old stuff” that has accumulated over the years becomes loose and finally flushes out. This leaves your gut walls free and clear, so that nutrients can finally move through them and into your bloodstream, finding their way directly to your cells.

If you don’t do enemas, your colon will continue to slowly back up. It will struggle to eliminate debris and waste, and instead feed it back into your bloodstream and lymph, slowly poisoning your organs and the rest of your body with what it should have evacuated.

2. Get rid of candida, parasites and bacteria

Candida, parasites and bacteria are likely to have accumulated in the mucoid plaque on your gut wall. The water will flush them out, lightening your body’s load. Make sure you take probiotics after each enema to boost the number of ‘good’ bacteria in their place.

3. Hydration

We all know that drinking numerous glasses of water and endless cups of herbal tea is essential for our health. Flooding your colon with water and holding it for as long as you can is one of the quickest and most powerful ways to hydrate yourself internally.

4. Nutrients

An enema is the quickest way to get nutrients directly into your bloodstream. The hepatic vein lies just inside your rectum so, after flushing the lower part of the colon with purified water, you can add an “implant” of wheatgrass or spirulina to the last two inches of water. Those nutrients will go directly to your liver, stimulating and repairing it. While supplements taken orally are helpful, you risk many of the nutritional benefits disappearing in the acidic juices in your stomach. Implanting them with an enema gets 100% of those nutrients directly into your bloodstream.

Wheatgrass juice tones your colon and adds oxygen to your blood. Coffee enemas trigger the release of bile and enable the liver to clear out toxins. They also increase the peristaltic action of the colon.

5. Clean is addictive

In a good way, of course. You may be fascinated – and horrified – by what comes out after an enema: sticky green-grey mucus; small, hard, dark lumps; even tiny gallstones can be expelled. But you will notice that your energy levels soar, bloating and gas will disappear, and your stomach will seem flatter.

So next time you are planning your spring clean and setting your intentions to sort out your diet and fitness regime, clear out your cupboards, and visit the charity shop with your unwanted stuff – make time for an internal spring clean too. Enemas are my favourite resolution.

And if you would like to find out more about how to do an enema, read my book Reboot Your Health published by Hay House in 2018.

Sara Davenport's book Reboot Your Health is now available for pre-order. Find out more about the book here.