Intermittent and longer fasting
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Hey all
Been reading most of @Kirwan thread Fatbusting: Kirwan's log and was impressed and also thinking of my own health and weight struggles.
I've just come off a 3 day water only fast and preparing for a 5 day water only fast next week.
Before I get to that, some background about some recent health issues and other shite over the past couple of years.
To start with, my stats: I'm 52, 179/180 cm and as of a couple of weeks ago, approximately 105 kgs.
From the age of 40 up until 2018, I would play a lot of touch footy, still play Golden Oldies Rugby and kept more than moderately active for the most part. My weight would yo-yo a bit but would usually be around the mid 90's depending on a big weekend or not. I didn't bother to watch my eating or how much I drank, but to be honest, it was probably a lot more than I should, especially drinking.
However, If I put in some effort, in a month or so of watching what I ate and decreasing the alcohol intake, I would get down to the low 90's or so kgs.
But I always got my yearly blood tests and everything was good, cholesterol, blood sugars, liver enzymes, PSA, etc.
Then in early 2018, I visited NZ for my cousin's wedding and was here for about 10 days before my wife came across from Sydney. In that 10 days I pretty much did nothing but eat and drink with my family there in Auckland including my cousins bucks night. Then hired a car and drove down the west coast to Wellington. Stopping and eating the whole way. Spent a night in New Plymouth, met some people at a cool pub there and couldn't remember getting back to the hotel that night. And nope, I wasn't rolled or lose any money or wake up next to someone.
Then in Wellington it was more eating and drinking and even more drinking right up to and including the wedding in Taupo. By the time I flew back to Sydney, I was about 100 kgs and feeling every extra kg.
5+ kgs in 14 days and my face was what shocked me the most, puffy and bloated, horrible!
So I worked slowly at losing the weight and things were looking better and in April/May I really put in some effort by walking 10+ kms 5 to 6 days per week. Then I saw an opportunity to do an F15 trail that for 2 weeks for only $15.
Sweet as because by the end of that 2 week trial I was back down to the low 90 kgs and was feeling much better about myself. And it was footy season so off I went and played a few games and because of the extra fitness, I was killing it.
Was the leading try scorer for the team and probably for the Upper North Shore GO's comp. Then we played a gala night at the Mark Taylor Oval in Hornsby for those Sydneysiders. I took the ball into contact and one of my teammates came flying in for the cleanout and unfortunately, his knee made awesome contact with the side of my head very close to the temple. I saw stars and immediately went off. I had trouble focusing for a few days afterwards and had headaches for another week.
Things were just getting better in the melon when a mate of mine from Sydney came up for a weekend. Friday night we went out in the city to recreate our days of old and ended up at the Marble Bar. Having a great time but neither of us can hold our liquor as well as we used to so we decided to call it a night and stumbled out of the night club.
I had to pee so went off looking for a dark corner and my mate was on the phone looking to book an Uber for us to get home and we got seperated. In our drunken state, he went one way and I went the other.
To cut a long story short, we finally got each other on the phone, worked out where each was in relation to the other (not easy in our state) and had an agreed meeting point in the middle. I started heading that way taking the beer bus, that is, just focusing on what's in front of you and getting to a destination.
As I was approaching an intersection, I saw my mate coming towards me but he was halfway up the next block. What I didn't see until the last minute was two young guys walking towards me, one shorter, one taller, both in their late teens. The tall guy abruptly swerves towards and into me. I took it on the shoulder and kept walking. Looking back I could see the guy was gesturing and being a tool but I ignored him and kept walking. Next moment, his shorter mate comes up on my left hand side and starts apologising for his mate.
Well, the spidey senses started going off, and I put it down to the years of contact sport as I felt something coming from behind and to the right and I managed to tuck my chin into my shoulder and sure enough, a attempted big king hit from behind.
It still contacted my cheek and mouth cutting my lower lip. But I was still standing and turned around to see the tall kid with a rather stunned look on his face, he must have expected me to get insta dropped.
Instinctively, I just hit him and hit him hard and he wasn't expecting it and he went down like a sack of bricks. I then turned to his mate who was looking at his mate on the ground and I just hit him too and he went to the ground and I turned and bolted.
I got to the intersection where two other older guys had witnessed the whole thing and asked if I was okay. I just mumbled yeah I'm good or something like that and started to cross but one guy grabs my arm and points to where I had left the other two guys on the ground. From behind a bus stop a third kid had come out and had his phone out and must have been recording the whole thing. He helped his two mates up and off they went.
In the meantime my mate had joined us as he started running when he saw it all go down. He was really concerned but I was all good other than my lip and a bit of a sore cheek.
That was... I was all good until two days later when I woke up Sunday morning with such a sore neck I could barely move. Was in absolute agony. I've experienced back and neck pains before, but nothing as bad as this. The referred pain down the shoulder and arm was almost unbearable. It would alternate between thumping to searing hot daggers and everything in between.
Because it was a Sunday, not much I could do but eat voltaren rapid 25s and panadol like they were M&Ms. Monday went to the GP and he sent me immediately to get an MRI on both head and neck.
BTW, went and reported what happened to the police and they said this is quite common and that they are recording themselves doing things like this to be youtube heros. Little f#cktards!
MRI showed damage/inflammation at C4/5 and C5/6 impinging a lot on the nerves on the right side. He immediately referred me to a Neurosurgeon.
Of course, it took more than a week to get an appointment and that was one of the worst weeks in my life. Finally got to see the brain guy and he was like we have four options normally:
- Rest and regular icing
- Rest, ice and drugs
- Cortisone injections
- Surgery
His recommendation based on my condition was to book me in for surgery right away. I wasn't keen on neck surgery so I said I would rather try the rest and drugs.
Oh and he thought the injury was a result from both the head knock in rugby and the attempted king hit!
So we agreed, 2 weeks on drugs and resting and if no improvement, then we will reassess but he still thought surgery would be the only way based on his experience with injuries such as mine.
By this time, I'd been home off work for almost two weeks so for another two weeks I was on really strong anti-inflammatories, Lyrica and valium. Man, that lyrica is a horrible drug and will definitely fark you up.
As I had already been home doing nothing and depression was setting in, I started drinking and drinking hard. And of course, for both Lyrica and valium, you shouldn't mix with alcohol but I really didn't care.
So two and a half weeks passed on these crazy drugs and I was back at the neurosurgeon and I had to report no improvement at all. Like before, he wanted to operate but I insisted on trying cortisone next as a last resort.
Also, in this time I had received a second opinion from another neurosurgeon as well as that of my brother in law who is a senior radiologist who took a look at my scans and all agreed that it was likely I would need surgery but give the cortisone a go as there really isn't anything to lose.
So another few days pass and off I went for the CT guided cortisone injections. During prep by the Radiologist and his helpers, they mentioned the procedure will only take about 10 minutes for each injection but there would be 2 injections, one each for C5/6 and C6/7, so about 20 minutes in total.
Sure, they use an injection of local anesthetic but it doesn't go all the way in and down to the bone so you feel every single movement of that bloody needle in your neck.
What seems like an absolute f#cktonne of minutes later, the radiologist finally says "done". What a relief. I was absolutely wringing wet as you have to hold yourself absolutely still the entire time.
Just before he walked away from the table, to let his helpers in to get me off that bloody table, he asked me how I was and I said, not that great and that I was exhausted. He looks at me, puts his hand on his shoulder and said to me that he has literally done hundreds of those injections and that was one of the absolute hardest he's ever done. He said the musculature in my neck kept pushing the needle from where he was trying to place it to get the best result. So he kept having to move and re-adjust before it was positioned just right. 40 minutes that procedure took, twice as bloody long as normal.
Anyway, next day or so that whole region was sore and I looked like I had been bitten by a vampire. But two days after the injections, I was pain free for the first time in more than a month.
I was told to take it easy in terms of exercising and to work slowly back into it. I was recommended to go to a physio and get them to help with strengthening the area.
I did that and by late 2018 I was feeling pretty good and back to normal exercise. But one thing, now that I was 51, the weight was so much harder to move. I was over 100 kgs and getting down to mid 90s was really tough.
I even gave up on exercise because of frustration for some 3 to 4 months in early 2019. But I eventually got back into it using the coming GO season as motivation.
From May to July, I had lost about 4 kgs and was feeling better, seeing results and feeling good. Then my wife and I started reading about Intermittent Fasting (IF) and as I was planning on taking taking a 6 week Long Service Leave (LSL) break from work starting in August, my plan was to use IF plus ramping up my exercise to get down to the low 90's if not under.
And for the first two weeks of my leave, I exercised every day and did the 18/6 and sometimes 20/4 fast.
In two weeks, I dropped more than 3 kgs and was in the low 90's.
And then another game of GO's, this time at Tallion Oval, Lane Cove. Well, what would you know but after another carry, I was in a ruck and had a finger in the eye, really badly and then next moment, an elbow to the head, in almost the exact same spot as a year ago. And again, from my own teammate... F#ck me!
So for about 4 to 5 days I have blurry vision out of the eye and yes, i went to an optometrist and he said there was scratching but no major damage.
Worse though, I had really bad, I mean blinding headaches every day for about 3 weeks. So for the remainder of my 6 weeks of leave, I just sat on the couch depressed and I drank, heavily. And forgot all about IF or even caring about my diet. Yes, I went to the Doctor and had another MRI which showed signs of a bad concussion.
So in 3 to 4 weeks, I put all that weight back on and more and was in the high 90's again.
Also in that time, I started feeling this extreme fatigue like I have never experienced before.
Then, I had this strange feeling under my left armpit. To me it felt swollen and strange. I ignored it for some time and finally went to the Doctor. He sent me off for some scans, CT and Ultrasound. Nothing was found. But, the CT of my chest had gone just past the chest and showed the very top of my abdomen. The radiologist reported that from what he could see of the top of the abdomen, it looked like an autoimmune disease called mesenteric panniculitis (MP).
Now, MP is something that can cause frequent gastro issues as well as fatigue including extreme fatigue. Also, in 2/3 of cases, there is no cause, it is just an autoimmune disease that can't really be explained. However, in 1/3 of cases, there is a cause and that cause will always be some form of cancer.
So of course, the worry sets in. Off I go for more tests including a CT of the abdomen and blood tests.
At this stage, the GP who has never seen this before, wants to wash his hands of everything and send me straight to a specialist, a gastroenterologist. SoI get the referral and make a booking, 4 weeks down the track on December 18, just days before the holiday break begins.
In the meantime, I'm feeling like shit, depressed, not exercising, watching what I'm eating and some IF but drinking like a fish.
Finally get to see the specialist and he was good, very good but one of the first things he says is, so you got the results from your last blood test right?
And I'm like, ah no, I haven't seen the GP since making the appointment to see you.
Did that get him rather annoyed, he expected the GP would have made more effort instead of leaving it to him so the next words out of his mouth were...
"From the blood tests, one of the cancer markers has come back positive".
Well talk about dying inside! Your whole world suddenly shrinks to nothing but what the Docs next words are.
Fortunately, this guy is really really good and said to not worry so much, this particular marker is more of a generic marker and can come from a number of types of cancer.
And then he sent me off for a full body PET scan, more blood tests and scheduled me in for a colonoscopy/gastroscopy.
I did the PET scan first, then the blood tests, two rounds of them and after the PET scan I looked like an IV drug user, every arm had multiple needle tracks.
What was awesome was that when the results from the PET and blood tests came back, he called me that night at 7 pm and said he knew I would be worried so he called as soon as he could.
And the great news was that everything was negative!!!
What a massive freakin relief!!!
OMG I was packing it, absolutely packing it for several weeks because I didn't tell another soul about the positive cancer marker, not my wife, not my family, no one. I didn't want to burden or put a damper over Xmas and the holidays.
My wife still doesn't understand why I was so happy with the results as I haven't told her the other stuff.
So that was as of the 14th of this month, post colonoscopy/gastroscopy and all the other tests. Everything excellent except showing some early signs of fatty liver disease and quite frankly, I'm not surprised given how much I have drunk over the past two years.
I quite seriously think I've drunk more the last two years of that decade that I did the first 8 years combined. Certainly my bank account tells me that is true!
Anyway, now that I have regaled you with the story of two challenging years, I've now started on the road back to fitness.
The fatigue is better and now that cancer has been ruled out, I can start taking medication for the symptoms of the MP auto-immune disease.
In the meantime, I've been back on Intermittent and longer fasting since the 14th and I'll detail that in my next post as this has gone way way longer than intended.
If you stuck through to the end of this post, then I thank you for your patience and perseverance.
Cheers,
Warren -
holy fucking shit!! there's more in that story than has happened to me in years!!!!!
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Okay, with all that out of the way my experiences with intermittent and longer fasting.
As in the first post, my wife and I have been experimenting with IF on and off for about 6 months. It helps but isn't a panacea, especially when you are drinking like a fish.
Where I started, on the 14th after bowl prep for the colonoscopy/gastroscopy, I weighed at the hospital fully clothed 206.5 kgs. Take away the shoes, socks, shorts, belt, shirt... I'm going to call it 205 wet weight
However, since the 14th of this month, I've been doing IF, mostly 16/8 and 20/4, for the uninitiated, that's fasting for 18 or 20 hours and eat in a window of 8 or 4 hours.
Then last week, I did a 72 hour fast, Tuesday 5 pm to Friday 5 pm. This was a "water only" fast but I did drink black coffee once a day and green tea a couple of times.
After some research and some short trials, I used the Fasting Tracker app for this and all subsequent fasts.
So sticking to IF from the 14th and then the full 72 hour fast, on Friday 24 Jan at 5 pm just moments before I broke my fast, I jumped on the scales and I was 101.8 kgs.
Fark me I was stoked. In that time I hadn't really exercised, only the IF and then the 72 hour fast.
And yes, I had no alcohol in that time.
After the Aussie Day weekend, I drank only Saturday for Chinese New Years with the in-laws and went right back to IF the next day and no more alcohol.
And I've started exercising again, did a 5.5 km walk last night and will do another tomorrow.
Today, I'm 101.3.
My goal... low 90's by the end of March-April and I'm setting a longer term goal of 88 kgs by my 53rd birthday in June. Achievable... I hope so?This weekend will be spent preparing for a 5 day water only fast, from Sunday about 5 pm to Friday 5 pm. I will continue to have black coffee and this time will add some salt to some of the water I consume.
By the way, during the 3 day fast, I aimed to consume 4 litres of water per day.
Then breaking the fast, I started with some kombucha, no added sugar, then a couple of hours later I made a smoothie with Coconut water, some berries and natural greek yoghurt.
The next morning I had a small but very fibre filled breakfast of oat bran, gentle fibre and chia seeds as well as more yoghurt and berries.
But since that night was CNYs we had a feast and I ate relatively normally and drank. The next day I experienced quite bad gastro, much like the bowl prep it was that bad.
So in future, I will take a longer time to ease back into eating once breaking a fast.
So my goal for this next fast is to get under 100 kgs, hoping for somewhere around 98 kgs. I will also exercise during this fast so I'll see how that goes. BTW, my exercising at the moment is just walking quickly, around a 6 km/hr pace for 5-8 kms.
So what I wanted to ask was others experiences with intermittent and longer fasting. How do you prepare for and break a fast? What do you take, if anything, during a fast?
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Ok, that was a hell of a ride. Glad you are coming out the other side of all that!
I can certainly relate, my last 4/5 years was also pretty crap and I got to see more of the health system than I ever cared to. I sincerely hope that's all behind you.
You are doing the full on version of fasting, I never made it to the multiple day fasts so kudos for the willpower there. Regarding the fatigue, I found the fasting increased my energy a lot, so hopefully you get the same effect.
I'll be interested in the effectiveness of the multiple day fasts for you. I've found it harder to maintain the calorie restriction part of it while exercising, so upped what I have the day after exercising.
Specifically, how much you lose and what the bounce back is like when you go back to normal food schedule. How did you handle the hunger pains, lots of water?
Did you read that Dr Mosley's book on it all?
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i don't know how you guys do it. if i skip a meal (which i do pretty regularly) i am feeling it within about an hour.
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@mariner4life said in Intermittent and longer fasting:
i don't know how you guys do it. if i skip a meal (which i do pretty regularly) i am feeling it within about an hour.
You start at 12 hours, then build up from there. I drink 2 to 3 litres of water a day, which fills you up, and start the day with black coffee. Have worked it to this week was averaging 22 hours and one meal a day.
Way better concentration and energy levels, and I do two hard workouts a week on that amount of food with no problem (other than my lack of fitness...)
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@Kirwan said in Intermittent and longer fasting:
@mariner4life said in Intermittent and longer fasting:
i don't know how you guys do it. if i skip a meal (which i do pretty regularly) i am feeling it within about an hour.
You start at 12 hours, then build up from there. I drink 2 to 3 litres of water a day, which fills you up, and start the day with black coffee. Have worked it to this week was averaging 22 hours and one meal a day.
Way better concentration and energy levels, and I do two hard workouts a week on that amount of food with no problem (other than my lack of fitness...)
that's impressive
i drink that much water as well, but doesn't make a difference
i am sure you condition to it though
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@mariner4life yep, according to the Zero app I use, I'm up to 277 fasts (and I had done more before that).
My longest fast is only 25hours though, so I'm facinated on how RoninWC pushed through.
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@Kirwan said in Intermittent and longer fasting:
@mariner4life said in Intermittent and longer fasting:
i don't know how you guys do it. if i skip a meal (which i do pretty regularly) i am feeling it within about an hour.
You start at 12 hours, then build up from there. I drink 2 to 3 litres of water a day, which fills you up, and start the day with black coffee. Have worked it to this week was averaging 22 hours and one meal a day.
Way better concentration and energy levels, and I do two hard workouts a week on that amount of food with no problem (other than my lack of fitness...)
That is exactly how I started. IF of 12/12 then went 16/8 and finally 20/4.
I found the 3 day, 72 hour fast to be really good. I found energy levels improved, clarity of thought improved and quite honestly, I was not hungry for most of the time.
The worst of it was the last few hours of the fast when you start thinking about food and planning how you will break the fast.
The results and expected bounce back have been really good. Even though I had a massive pig out session for Chinese New Year with the in-laws, I went straight back to IF, started some exercise and I am 0.5 kgs less than when I finished the 3 day fast.
The 5 day fast I'm planning for this coming Sunday arvo to Friday arvo will be interesting. To be honest, I did feel like I could have continued for another two days easily.
I look forward to it and will log here daily my experience before, during and after.
In terms of water, when IF I normally drink between 2 to 3 litres of water, black coffee once a day and a couple of green teas a day.
The black coffee once a day and 4 litres of water worked really well for me during the 3 day fast and that is what I will stick to next week.
I found the green tea would give me a slightly nauseous feeling in the gut but that was it.
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@Kirwan said in Intermittent and longer fasting:
Ok, that was a hell of a ride. Glad you are coming out the other side of all that!
I can certainly relate, my last 4/5 years was also pretty crap and I got to see more of the health system than I ever cared to. I sincerely hope that's all behind you.
You are doing the full on version of fasting, I never made it to the multiple day fasts so kudos for the willpower there. Regarding the fatigue, I found the fasting increased my energy a lot, so hopefully you get the same effect.
I'll be interested in the effectiveness of the multiple day fasts for you. I've found it harder to maintain the calorie restriction part of it while exercising, so upped what I have the day after exercising.
Specifically, how much you lose and what the bounce back is like when you go back to normal food schedule. How did you handle the hunger pains, lots of water?
Did you read that Dr Mosley's book on it all?
Thank you @Kirwan , having read your post/blog here which inspired me to write all of this... my trials pale in comparison to yours but I am grateful for your words of support.
Isn't it funny, I normally don't share much of this sort of stuff and like I said, my wife and family don't even know about the false positive cancer test. But then I'm happy to spill my guts and tell all to you strangers here on the Fern.
Actually, having been here for more than a decade, you lot often feel more like family than real family at times.
Cheers
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@RoninWC said in Intermittent and longer fasting:
@Kirwan said in Intermittent and longer fasting:
Ok, that was a hell of a ride. Glad you are coming out the other side of all that!
I can certainly relate, my last 4/5 years was also pretty crap and I got to see more of the health system than I ever cared to. I sincerely hope that's all behind you.
You are doing the full on version of fasting, I never made it to the multiple day fasts so kudos for the willpower there. Regarding the fatigue, I found the fasting increased my energy a lot, so hopefully you get the same effect.
I'll be interested in the effectiveness of the multiple day fasts for you. I've found it harder to maintain the calorie restriction part of it while exercising, so upped what I have the day after exercising.
Specifically, how much you lose and what the bounce back is like when you go back to normal food schedule. How did you handle the hunger pains, lots of water?
Did you read that Dr Mosley's book on it all?
Thank you @Kirwan , having read your post/blog here which inspired me to write all of this... my trials pale in comparison to yours but I am grateful for your words of support.
Isn't it funny, I normally don't share much of this sort of stuff and like I said, my wife and family don't even know about the false positive cancer test. But then I'm happy to spill my guts and tell all to you strangers here on the Fern.
Actually, having been here for more than a decade, you lot often feel more like family than real family at times.
Cheers
No worries, a good part of this area is the anonymity, there are no consequences to sharing that information here. So hopefully a good sounding board.
And while I had some narly experiences/surgery, I don't think your trials pale in comparison at all! Sounds like a tough experience, and without getting all happy clappy, it's worth talking it out with your wife. Just taking care of the stress helps enourmously.
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@Kirwan said in Intermittent and longer fasting:
Gee, you have me tempted now. Good results over the three days?
I would have to say excellent results.
I walked into work on Friday on the last day of the fast and I was getting compliments left and right.
I had dropped over 3kgs and kept them off dropping another .5 over this past week.
This weekend will be about preparation for a 5 day fast. The one thing I found is that eating normally then nothing, my poop was pretty foul for the first half of the fast. I also think I had too much carbs in my last couple of meals on the Sunday and will look to cut down significantly on carbs Saturday and Sunday with the goal to start the fast at about 5 pm Sunday.
The thinking is to get into ketosis quicker where as last time I think it took a good 12/16 hours before ketosis hit.
So I've asked my wife to help me with this and to avoid carbs and just go with meat and veggies this weekend.
Also, I'll start drinking 4 litres of water per day from tomorrow also in preparation.
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That is excellent. I just got back from holiday where I put on 2.5kg taking a complete break from fasting (which are supposed to periodically so your body doesn't get used to it) and it took 5/6 days to take it back off again just jumping back on the schedule.
I do want to get well under 80 though, so not the holiday season is over I'm getting geared up to take step back to where I started. Your thread is perfectly timed for motivation.
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@Kirwan Iāve had an interesting 12 months with what turned into intermittent fasting. Iām retired and active on my small farm. I raise and breed poultry and my feeding/ watering round in the morning jumped with an expansion in what I was doing.
I started to regularly have breakfast when Iād finished, usually around 10.30. No big goals or anything. I still had a supper snack at night. But I started to lose weight. Interesting, I thought, did a little reading and sharpened my understanding of Int Fasting. Without setting myself up with too many rules, I tweaked things when It seemed time. So the night snack went, for example. I usually go 14 hours, sometimes more.
Iāve lost 15 kg over the year and am still dropping. It hasnāt been hard and I see this pattern as life-long, really. Valuable for oneās wider health including the insulin metabolism.
Iām quite relaxed about all this but surprised and grateful. If Iād set out to lose weight I doubt I would have been as successful. Iāve dropped from 94 kg to 79. Have been as high as 104 in the past. Iām 70.
The key things are that I stumbled into it and had complete confidence in what was happening before I read any detailed rules and systems. My lifestyle helps. My morning round is like a light workout with lifting, carrying, walking, bending. Iām busy and occupied and in fact have never had much trouble delaying breakfast although I followed the ābreakfast like a kingā myth.
The only rule I follow is to generally go 14 hours. I eat passably well, but donāt lay too many rules on myself otherwise.
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@beardie One book I found useful is āThe Natural Prescriptionā by Dr. Andreas Michalsen. Heās a highly credentialed German doctor who also works with and researches some of the traditional natural remedies. The chapter on fasting is informative.
Iām not keen on some of the popped up, pepped up programmes that get hustled online.
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@Kirwan Yes, itās a clear and simple eating pattern. I was fortunate the effectiveness of doing it was proven before I was even labelling what I was doing ! That sidestepped the emotional
snags and has made it fairly easy. I still shake my head about it from time to time. -
Second day into this planned 5 day water fast or as my app tells me, 39 hours done, 81 to go!
As planned I started at 5 pm Sunday afternoon Sydney time.
Doing really well, not feeling hungry now at all. Yes, for the 8 hours when you wake up that first morning, you are naturally hungry. But after that, I haven't felt hungry at all including waking up this morning.
Ketosis should be setting in now well and truly and autophagy should be kicking in now.
Obviously, these are the two biggest benefits of a water-fast for both weight loss and over all health benefits.
I strongly recommend to anyone to do some research about autophagy and the benefits it has on the human body.
Prep wasn't as good as I hoped, on Friday afternoon, the wife who had had a pretty shitty week and day says, let's have a drink tonight. Well those are the magic words so as soon as I got home, I had a gin whilst getting the ingredients to make margaritas and putting together some finger food.
Wife got home and it was margaritas and then a bottle of wine with some light finger food. Saturday was better making a concerted effort to lower carb intake and better quality protein and lots of veggies.
Sunday went a bit array when the wife announced she wanted to make home made pizzas. Can't turn those down so that was lunch. Dinner was at 4 pm and was again, focusing on good quality protein, in this case salmon for the protein and fatty acids.
I actually stopped eating at 4 pm but calling it a 5 pm start.
About to have the only non-water drink I will allow myself, a morning coffee and this time I'll put in a pinch of salt.
Still tossing up as to whether or not I need to supplement some minerals, more salt as well as potassium and magnesium which tend to be the ones most often recommended.
Anyone got any thoughts on this?
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For the longer ones, I've seen people say they have better results keeping their electrolytes up, in terms of health. So the mineral approach is a good idea.
You must have a large amount of willpower, I tried out a longer one over the weekend and got to 44 hours (I had crossfit so can't do that fasted). I can see a 72 hour one as doable, but I was really ready to end at 44. Only hungry during my normal feeding window, rest of the time was fine, just have to keep busy.
Still, I'll give it another spin this weekend and see how part two works.
Five days is impressive!
