I'm bracing myself for the raging b-word within me to emerge. Deprived of my morning and mid-afternoon caffeine fix, I can feel my irritability growing. And like clockwork, after my lunch of a (healthy) chicken and kale salad, food coma hits at 3 p.m. and I start nodding off at my desk. Instead of going for my usual coffee run, I go to the kitchen to refill my water cup. I've been making a conscious effort to drink more water than I usually do, which is crucial when you're detoxing. Think about it, says Gittleman: All those toxins your body is releasing have to go somewhere, and ideally that somewhere is out of your body. I run into my co-worker, Zack, in the office kitchen as I'm filling up my eighth pint-size glass of water for the day. I complain a little to him about how zonked I'm feeling, and he suggests I shotgun a tall glass of water, which he says always gives him a quick energy boost. I take his advice and pound that pint of water like it's a beer on my 21st birthday. The coldness of the water jolts my system awake and I go back to work.

Then, the chocolate cravings hit.

I usually get my sugar fix from fruit juices and don't have much of a sweet tooth for cakes and chocolate. But right now, all I can envision is shoving a warm chocolate chip cookie into my mouth. Sadly, there really is no room in this detox for that. Sigh.

My prequel diet is going well so far. This is my typical menu:

Breakfast: Two hardboiled eggs with a pinch of salt and pepper
Snack: A pear
Lunch: Kale and apple salad with olive oil and cilantro dressing along with a fist-sized piece of lemon and pepper roasted chicken breast
Snack: Handful of almonds or dried cranberries
Dinner: Another piece of chicken with asparagus and Brussels sprouts

It's Day 5 and I haven't cheated on my diet in any way. But today, I give in to peer pressure and fail to abstain from a "Detox Detractor": alcohol. My co-workers talk me into going to happy hour with them and of course, we run into our editor at the bar. First thought: Are there no other bars in town?! Second: Uh oh. My editor immediately points at me and exclaims, "Detox!" Since the jig is up I have two -- OK, fine, three -- glasses of white wine.

The lesson? When you're on any kind of detox diet, it's a given that your social life will take a hit. I have to decline a number of weekend activities because I know my willpower isn't strong enough to sip on seltzer while everybody else knocks back cosmos. But abstaining from alcohol is doing my liver a favor -- little consolation when you're turning down Saturday night plans, but something to keep in mind nonetheless.

It's Day 7, the day before my juice fast, and I'm noticing something extraordinary. Right around the second week of every month, I normally start to break out as a not-so-happy reminder that my period is about to arrive. But today, I realize that my skin is completely clear -- no zit in sight. I talk to Gittleman about this happy side effect of her detox plan and she tells me it's due to all the liver-loving foods I've been eating -- asparagus, celery, and artichokes being three of the biggies.

"The liver is the body's most important filter," she says. "One of its jobs, besides detoxification, is being able to break down hormones into water-soluble metabolites, so they're not toxic to your system." And you guessed it: When those hormones aren't broken down, they cause breakouts that'll remind you of your face back in high school.

Wondering if your liver is compromised? Your body is likely telling you. Gittleman says some signs of distress include acne, indigestion, headaches, sleepiness after eating, weak tendons, and depression. This definitely fit the bill for me before I started this detox. And I have to say, not having to bust out the salicylic acid this week is definitely taking the sting out of giving up some of my favorite foods for the past seven days.

Alright, on to the gory details that are part of every detox (feel free to skip to the next slide if you're not into bathroom discussions). From the start of this little experiment, I've had the runs. While I do get them every once in awhile, they stayed with me throughout the week. Sure the extra fiber that I'm getting from all the veggies could account for my frequent jaunts to the ladies' room -- but why was it not, you know, solid? I talk to Gittleman about my case.

"It seems like your body needs a major cleansing of some sort of pathogenic bacteria that's possibly yeast-based," says Gittleman. "This diet illuminates an imbalance in your system." While my body's reaction is not common, Gittleman says it's not necessarily a bad thing, and suggests I consider my bathroom unpleasantries as a "parasitic dumping."

To help stabilize the bacterial balance in my intestines (and as a result, get me back on a more, shall I say, normal pooping schedule), Gittleman suggests I add a probiotic to my diet.

The day I've been dreading has finally arrived: The juice fast. The plan is to drink a cup of "Miracle Juice" every other hour starting the moment I wake up until I go to sleep. I also have to drink a cup of water on the hours that I don't drink the cranberry concoction. Gittleman says this Miracle Juice "helps flush away toxic fluids, which can account for as much as 10 to 15 pounds of water weight trapped in our tissues," which is why people have claimed to lose up to eight pounds overnight on this cleanse.

Wondering what the heck is in this so-called Miracle Juice? Put this in your pitcher: 8 ounces of cranberry juice, 56 ounces of water, a bit of freshly squeezed orange and lemon juice, and warming spices like cinnamon (the cinnamon helps stave off hunger). And so it begins:

9 a.m. I start drinking a cup of Miracle Juice every other hour, pounding water on my "other" hours.

1 p.m. I'm surprised I don't actually feel hungry, even though the scent of my co-workers' lunches are wafting through the office. Note to self: Sprinkle cinnamon on my lunch to see if it helps me avoid a mid-afternoon snack craving, post-detox, of course.

2 p.m. I start getting a headache and ask my co-worker, Anna, if I can borrow her Snuggie because I am freezing -- they must be blasting the air conditioner.

3 p.m. The coldness isn't going away. I'm starting to realize that it's just me. Anna feels my forehead and says I'm burning up. I think I have a fever.

4:45 p.m. The fever persists, I'm peeing every hour, and I'm still not hungry.

9:00 p.m. I get up from the couch for my scheduled cup of water and feel dizzy after standing.

10:00 p.m. I still have two more cups of Miracle Juice to go through, but I can't do it. I'm used to feeling mentally drained at the end of the day, but today my body is just shutting down. I'm going to sleep.