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Fasting Megathread

Well, I now know I can go almost two days without food. :) Going to be breaking the fast tomorrow. Twas a short but good fast. I think all the food I bring into the house from now on is gonna be organic. Not positive, but I think. Organic, whole foods, like beans, rice, oatmeal, etc.

Edit: Has anyone experienced wicked insomnia while fasting? I slept for four hours just fine but now cannot fall back asleep... :-/
 
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amapola said:
As your body begins to break down fat as it's primary fuel source, it has to expunge the freshly released toxins that were stored there. If you are feeling this sick after 24 hours of water fasting it is likely because you have a lot of very bad toxins in their (i.e. have eaten quite poorly in the past/are out of shape/etc.). What you can do to prevent this is start off with a juice fast or even raw food fast before transitioning into a true water fast. Also a juice fast means no preservatives or sugars of any kind added, just liquefied fruit and veges.


Regarding fast food and toxins, when you loose weight fat cells aren't actually being destroyed for energy, they are just shrinking as ummm... energy is sucked from them. The energy that is begin sucked out also contains toxins and as they are released they are removed from your body through your pores, breath, urine and bowels making you healthier. You will find after a few days of a water fast your breath stinks, your skin is oily, your pee is still concentrated and most water fasts recommend enemas.

Furthermore along these lines is that your body is smart enough to attack cells which contain more toxins first. Fasting occurred and was highly recommended all the way back to ancient times (bible and stuff). Human's are also the only animals who will eat when sick. These both support not eating as helping your body recover. This is why terminally sick people will go on 40 day fasts until they find "true hunger". The idea being that when starving, your body will eat cancerous bone cells before healthy bone cells thereby curing you.

This is all the water fast fanatics speaking not me.

Personally I will go for a day or two without eating occasionally but its more for clearing my mind and getting a feeling of control over my body than any physical health gains.
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What I have personally heard is good health from sickness comes in the form of fasting for a specific number of days. Three days is the shortest fast to gain any physical healing benefits, since your body finds other things to do than digesting foods all the time. Then, fasts are measured in sevens; seven days, fourteen days, etc.

I'll attempt to think of an analogy here. It's almost like those days when you don't have any actual work to do. It's all been done and you're taking the day off. What do you do? Things that are probably good for your psychological health. Reading, going for a walk, visiting family/friends, etc. Your body does the same thing when it has no real "work" to do (digesting food). It takes a vacation and cleans up the body, but only when done long enough.

Edit: Thank you, AoY, for bringing this thread back from the grave. Saves on space!
 
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Yep, in my experience 3 days is when you first really start to feel the "wow".

I am just waiting for the right time to start my first fast of 2011. I have a juicer now so I'm excited!

Edit: Has anyone experienced wicked insomnia while fasting? I slept for four hours just fine but now cannot fall back asleep... :-/
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Actually I've heard a lot of people say that when the body becomes clean from fasting and uses so much less energy for digestion, a lot less sleep is needed. Some experienced fasters get used to this and can actually expect not to sleep much while fasting and do more reading, writing, meditating, etc. Someone was just talking on another forum about how they were getting bored with all the free time they had now (they were like 11 days into a fast) they had now that they didn't need more than a few hours sleep. :)
 
MynameisnotDeja said:
Yep, in my experience 3 days is when you first really start to feel the "wow".

I am just waiting for the right time to start my first fast of 2011. I have a juicer now so I'm excited!
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I've only done 30 hours before. I'm almost excited to start another fast; the first two were only a day long. It's just convincing my mom I'm not crazy and I won't die that's the problem. Hahaha.
 
Show her the many blogs and video logs and other testimonials of people who have done extended fasting, sometimes even for months, and are very healthy and vibrant and have come out of it fine. It's ridiculous, this idea that people have that we constantly needing to be shoving food down our throats or we are going to starve.
 
I agree with the above poster. However, taking psychostimulants and trying to lose weight is really only effective for people who are overweight. Skipping meals to somebody that is underweight is something to be concerned about.

I weigh 100 kilos and have currently made myself a target to lose some weight, particularly body fat.

Calorie restriction is associated with increases in life expectancy (see wikipedia). Therefore it seems moronic that anybody who is overweight would be advised against it.
 
MynameisnotDeja said:
There will always be people who say [insert whatever cleanse, alternative health thing here] are "ridiculous". I don't know if I'd want to do a water fast, maybe for a day or something. But to call it ridiculous isn't fair, as different people have different needs. I know people who's health got a major restart from water fasting. I also know people who had their hair fall out and other health problems. The important thing is to go slow with this stuff... jumping from a standard american diet (not saying you eat such a diet) directly to a three week long juice fast, for example, would send most people into a healing crisis so bad they might think they were dying and check themselves into a hospital... but someone on a raw diet who did a juice fast might find it easy and have excellent results...

Go slow and listen to your body and trust your instincts.
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Many of these 'fasts' and cleanses are ridiculous in the sense that there is little or no science behind them (and in fact, many times the science is against them.) A person's subjective experience may be different and as far as I'm concerned, that is fine. Where I start to have issues is when people recommend scientifically invalid and potentially dangerous procedures to others.

Smyth said:
I agree with the above poster. However, taking psychostimulants and trying to lose weight is really only effective for people who are overweight. Skipping meals to somebody that is underweight is something to be concerned about.

I weigh 100 kilos and have currently made myself a target to lose some weight, particularly body fat.

Calorie restriction is associated with increases in life expectancy (see wikipedia). Therefore it seems moronic that anybody who is overweight would be advised against it.
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Calorie restriction ≠ fasting. Calorie restriction can be a good or bad thing, depending on how nutritionally balanced one's diet is.
 
Smyth said:
I agree with the above poster. However, taking psychostimulants and trying to lose weight is really only effective for people who are overweight. Skipping meals to somebody that is underweight is something to be concerned about.

I weigh 100 kilos and have currently made myself a target to lose some weight, particularly body fat.

Calorie restriction is associated with increases in life expectancy (see wikipedia). Therefore it seems moronic that anybody who is overweight would be advised against it.
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We aren't talking about skipping meals... we are talking about fasting. Totally different deal. Weight loss is usually not the purpose for most people's fasting practice.
 
dokomo said:
Many of these 'fasts' and cleanses are ridiculous in the sense that there is little or no science behind them (and in fact, many times the science is against them.) A person's subjective experience may be different and as far as I'm concerned, that is fine. Where I start to have issues is when people recommend scientifically invalid and potentially dangerous procedures to others.
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There's little science supporting fasts because all the scientists want you to take drugs. It helps them keep their jobs.

It's all about wording in a scientific journal / study. We all know being hungry sucks, so when reading an article against fasting, don't you think they'll focus on the types of things we all really dislike?

On that note, no, fasting is not for everyone. It may only bring really superb results for some people. But why not give it a try? That's what alternative medicine is all about -- Trying things out to see what is right for you, instead of taking 'one-size-fits-all' prescriptions and the like. Don't knock it before you try it.
 
Starting a fast tomorrow night. Yay! :)

We need a thread for fasting support, not only discussion/debate. But I'm not sure if enough of us will be fasting at any one time to make it worthwhile. Anyone interested?
 
I'm interested in a thread like that. :) Good luck on your fast, notDeja.

I'm planning on fasting for at least three days once a month, starting in Feb. It'll probably be the first to the third of the month, but it might fall more around the sixth in March--When I fasted last, I noticed my period was way less painful. So, mayyyy move the monthly fasting closer to my monthly. :P Sorry if that was TMI for anybody.
 
I'm currently doing a diet of calorific restriction eating maybe a meal a day on average but the idea of complete starvation seems a bit drastic, although for somebody that is overweight I dont think it can be that bad to their health in the short-term.
 
I once water-fasted for 14 days. I haven't had any lasting health effects that I know of, and I quickly regained the 20 lbs I lost. I don't know if I'd do it again. Maybe if the mood strikes me.
 
Smyth said:
I'm currently doing a diet of calorific restriction eating maybe a meal a day on average but the idea of complete starvation seems a bit drastic, although for somebody that is overweight I dont think it can be that bad to their health in the short-term.
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You'd be surprised, those who are overweight or extremely unhealthy have very harsh, adverse side effects. They experience headaches, stomachaches and can even feel sick in some cases. This might even happen within the course of 24 hours. Basically, I see it this way: the quicker you have these types of adverse side effects and the more drastic they are, the more you could use a total-body cleanse.

For Abracadabra: You may not feel like you're being cleansed. You may regain the weight quickly. But then again, when we eat crap foods for a while, how many of us actually feel it harming our bodies? Not many, other than a change in our poop.
 
Most people are so cut off from their bodies they don't feel anything. I can feel every single thing that happens in my body. People never believe me when I say that but it's because they probably can't imagine it. But if you venture down this path long enough, you will increase your awareness and begin to feel things a lot more.

Also, if you go back to your bad diet right after fasting (not sure what you were eating Abracadabra) then the good effects won't last long. FOOD is the most important thing when it comes to healing our bodies. Daily food, not just a cleanse once in awhile. The right foods and the right sleep, exercise, thoughts, etc and THEN when people have all of that worked out they should attempt fasting. People who haven't detoxed a lot with their diet will only have more hell to go through once they cleanse, and if they are going to go back to the shitty food and way of life it's basically wasting their time and putting themselves through needless torture.

Of course, there are other reasons to fast which have nothing to do with detox in the physical sense (spiritual fasting) so I guess for those people it is not of importance.


Starting my fast today! I'm eating a big breakfast, then stepping down to a light, all raw lunch. Then beginning my juicing when I get home tonight. I'm going to do a lot of green juices like kale, collard greens, cucumber, celery... plus some fruits like apple, pear and pineapple. :) Will update how it goes.

Mods should I start a fasting support thread for support ONLY (no debate or attacking the fasters) or should I just talk about it here? I just feel like we need somewhere fasters can discuss and seek support without worrying about people coming in and telling us we are stupid and wrong for what we are doing....
 
This thread has seemed supportive so far, I'd just do it here.

Years ago, whenever I tried to fast, I would get horrible diarrhea and stop the fast after 2-5 days. That was due to my bad diet I guess. This past time I had been eating healthy for several months prior, and the fasting was very easy and natural.
 
I have done many fasts, and almost always feel that healthier when I am finished.
My history of fasting has been published here:
http://www.erowid.org/experiences/exp.php?ID=52150

I have not done a fast in several years.

When I fast, I tend to get cold, so I would recommend against doing a fast in the winter.

I want to do a fast again; looking at next spring/summer.
 
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