In the ray peat forums they found out that too much fat is bad too because it switches your body to using fats which has more waste when "burned". They say keep fat calories below 20%...
It's helped me as I used to do a Paleo with a lot of fats and had issues with energy.
Sugar and carbs are not the enemy, in fact fructose is more efficient than glucose ( which is why it can help the liver process alcohol faster). The issue with fructose is the GMO pesticide crap they use in the USA....
My girlfriend follows a similar diet to me and she's been losing weight and getting stronger. She too hit a wall with Paleo and limiting carbs.
My weight on the other hand is like a rock, it barely changes no matter what I eat 😂.
Fasting is interesting but I rather let my body decide, like when I'm sick, I feel like eating nothing... Makes sense as digestion is energy and chemical intensive.
I also do intermittent fasting, breakfast at 7, and then eat at 3 or 4. It's a soft rule though depending on the situation, like if I'm working late I'll eat more. I think I've trained my hunger to be closer to what my body needs, not my emotions 😂!
Last fast I did was the lemon with maple syrup a decade ago. No light headedness and an easy transition to eating. I think the syrup gives a clean base level of energy... I wouldn't hesitate to do it again if I'm having digestive issues.
Interesting stuff Rob (c137). I'm always experimenting with my body to see what works and doesn't work. I play around with supplements and foods and eating schedules quite a bit. Our bodies change as we age too and that's another reason I wanted to try fasting. I'm definitely going to try it again or maybe a couple of times just to play around with it a bit. I think eliminating everything (for me) and then reintroducing things can give me an idea of what things I may be eating that cause inflammation, etc. I've drastically changed my diet several times in my lifetime as my body has changed. Unfortunately, the 30 years I worked shift work really messed things up because I trained myself to eat in the middle of the night for so long and then had to switch back to eating during the day, etc. The "one meal a day" thing became something that worked for me for many years because of my schedule. I found if I could have one decent meal at 4pm every day, it didn't matter whether I was working days or nights because for night shift I'd be heading out the door and for day shift I'd be getting ready to come home. This made it possible for me to eat food I made myself even when being gone 16 hours a day. Now that I'm home all the time, it's been a real battle over the last 5 years to figure out an eating "schedule" that works. Though I, like yourself, tend to listen to my body. I definitely don't restrict myself if I find that I'm starving to death before my regular meal! Thanks for the input!
Here's the site of the ray peat forums guy.. tons of cool stuff here http://haidut.me/
Search serotonin and you'll see that's also a key thing with aging and health. We actually want less serotonin, as it is a "shut down and hibernate" thing.
Makes you wonder why they pushed SSRIs which boost it and create numbness in people!
Benadryl aka diphenhydramine around 50mg a day is optimal. I dissolve the capsule in a bottle and drink it through the day. You can also use famtodine aka pepcid, but look up the dosing. I have no drowsiness from the dph, but some people do.
Another great booster is niacinamide which boosts metabolism.
I found your post to be interesting, no worries. I don't like fasting. But I do it in the mornings because it just happens. I usually don't eat until at least noon, maybe even not until 3. Then I eat like a freakin horse the rest of the day until maybe 8 or 9, and I crash early, and I don't CARE if I'm full of food when I crash, it's never been a problem that I know of! lol
I would say that three days fasting is maybe too much? Butt, I am not a doctor, I'm a dogtor. ;)
Skipping breakfast is what makes it harder to deal with the afternoon... Already in a deficit of calories, you're in panic mode looking to stock up for the next food less morning lol.
It's like my sister driving her gas tank to almost empty and needing a new fuel pump every other year haha.
What breed of dogtor are you?
I was a wolf... Instinct and feeling. Thinking purely practical.
These days I feel like a Husky. I'm not submissive nor dominant, just fitting in by doing enough but not too much. My fiance is starting to get in touch with her inner husky too.
I don't seem to have that panic mode, really, unless I fast until like 3 pm... I get up early, so I usually eat around 11-12. It works fine, I don't always eat a BIG breakfast. But when I do it's hopefully full of BACON. ^_^
I might have a fair amount of Husky, too... I talk a lot. And I dooooo like the Husky language. ha harf! I've never been quiet enough to be a wolf. ;)
Usually when people ask me what kind of dog I am, I tell them I'm the kind of dog that wags my tail and knocks everything off the coffee table.
Thanks for telling us about your experience, Rob. I usually only eat 2 meals/day (and I admit, I snack although I'm trying to stop doing that in the evenings since I've heard it's healthier to quit eating completely before 9 pm). I don't think I could fast. I'm not diabetic but my blood sugar drops (I'm guessing here) and I experience what you described on day 3 of your fast, only just hours after not eating. Other people may find fasts beneficial, however. Keep us posted on your progress!
Thanks for your input Anna. I agree completely with others who mention that *all* of us are different (that's why I rail against this "one size fits all" medical establishment that's been set up over the last couple decades). That being said, from my experience, I sure wouldn't recommend fasting for everyone. If what someone is doing with their health is working for them... why change it? I really did want to do this experiment though. I'll let you know if I do the 4 day. I'm a bit nervous about that one. Haha.
Different people are different. You probably have a higher metabolism that some others. I eat like a HORSE, and I'm thin, and I get hungry very frequently unless I eat a bunch of bread or like stuff. I'm also a gal. High metabolism for me, too, I think. It seems like I burn things off in like 2, 3 hours! I try not to eat sugar because I become addicted to it in about 2 seconds...
I am a real mutt!! Irish, English, Viking, French, German, a wee bit of Cherokee and Choctaw. I just look like a white girl (dog). ;)
But I eat plenty of fats, and when I do eat breakfast, because that's the first meal, it's usually around midday, but regardless of time, I eat a BIG one, then I keep eating, every couple of hours, snacks, a lot and sometimes another decent meal around 6 or 7, other times I don't eat again at all until maybe 7 or 8. Depends on what I'm doing.
But one thing I did notice on a list of EMF Overload Symptomology is ravenous hunger.
That could be it. I can go quite a while without eating if I'm not active, but if I am... CHOW. ;)
I was happy with myself having the willpower to not eat for almost three days, but my annoying family wanted to call an ambulance when I collapsed in the hallway.
AND THEY KNOW THAT I DO NOT WANT TO BE IN ANY HOSPITAL.
There's always confounding factors so I don't know what they were.
But I did learn that I can't trust my family. If I do another fast it will have to be when they are away.
BTW, I did lose all interest in eating. That was part of how my family thought that I had gone crazy.
Of course collapsing is not a good idea, so I have a tinsy bit of understanding for my family's reaction.
Interesting (about losing desire for eating). I have read that can happen to some people. I'm glad I'm not alone in that. It was weird that I felt that way. It made me wonder if I could have kept on going for lots more days. Yeah, the collapsing is not a good thing. If/when I do this again, I am going to make sure I take it really easy on that 3rd day and maybe not even do hardly anything. I scrubbed my whole house on this go around and so I was pretty busy. Haha. Sorry about family. Yeah, friends and family can be a pain when it comes to these kinds of things. I'm fortunate to have a family that also does a lot of experiments with their bodies as well, so they understand.
Since you've no underlying issues, the 4 day fast shouldn't be a problem physically. My longest fasts are 5 days, usually done between undefined sets of 3 day monthly fasts.
As Cairn correctly observed, it's more a mental exercise, the farther you go. When you start giving yourself the MSM, catastrophized, mental self talk about gnawings, dangers and maddening possibilities (not saying you did any of this, but I've heard allot from those who are terrified to live a second without some taste in their mouths) remember that throughout time, people have been subjected to intentional, very real starvation AND been pressed into hard labor, with very minimal physical recovery opportunities - and they survived. You need only read accounts of the Holocaust, Holodomor, or Gulags to understand the extreme limits the human organism can survive in.
Usually at three days, I lose the want to eat. I keep a light workout schedule (weights and walking 2-4 miles a day). Also cold showers (which are daily, regardless of the fasting) - if you have the ability for an ice bath, that would be ideal.
I definitely sleep sounder during a fast and wake very clear headed.
As you correctly alluded to though, we all are different, so as you have done, listen to your body. It's your best indicator of how things are going and when change/cessation is needed.
Breaking a fast always seems bitter sweet and where the most mental control is exerted (for me at least). I hate thinking of messing up what must be a pristine GI tract, for the trivialness of food, but then my primate brain kicks in and memories of flavors have me planning the road ahead.
I'm thankful in those times that I went vegan over 5 years ago, as before that, I'd have gone broke buying every slice of bacon in a 100 mile radius and then regretted the nitrite induced comma after an afternoon of gorging.
Best of luck with the 4 days. It really is all mental and perspective, past a certain point.
Thanks so much for that input! I agree with all of it. I had the exact same feeling when I was getting ready to "break the fast"... thinking all of my hard work is now going to be messed up. Haha. I'm feeling pretty darn good though after that first 3 day fast. I have also thought a lot about times of famine and things like that when it comes to humans and their "need" to consume food all of the time. Not to mention, that in ancient times, there would have been no way for anyone to have 3 or more meals a day. If someone was lucky, maybe they would have been able to find a few extra berries or something for a snack. Personally (even though I *don't* eat all of the time), I think humans (especially Americans) have become much too used to having 3 meals a day and snacks, etc. I could go into an even deeper discussion about how corporations have used advertising and propaganda to convince people they need to eat all of the time, not to mention the companies that literally have whole departments dedicated to finding ways to make food taste better, etc., but I'll leave that for another time (I'd go on for pages). Thanks again for your comment! :)
LOL...I have a well worn soap box for those corporation, advertising and R&D rants.
You are correct, the 3 meals a day and snacks are a modern profit driven construct - part of what has made us softy as societies and living beings.
Progress - on the whole - is regression and decay. People today are in no way as strong (mentally/physically) as those who lived a 1000 or more years ago, with no A/C, white lab coats or fast food.
In the ray peat forums they found out that too much fat is bad too because it switches your body to using fats which has more waste when "burned". They say keep fat calories below 20%...
It's helped me as I used to do a Paleo with a lot of fats and had issues with energy.
Sugar and carbs are not the enemy, in fact fructose is more efficient than glucose ( which is why it can help the liver process alcohol faster). The issue with fructose is the GMO pesticide crap they use in the USA....
My girlfriend follows a similar diet to me and she's been losing weight and getting stronger. She too hit a wall with Paleo and limiting carbs.
My weight on the other hand is like a rock, it barely changes no matter what I eat 😂.
Fasting is interesting but I rather let my body decide, like when I'm sick, I feel like eating nothing... Makes sense as digestion is energy and chemical intensive.
I also do intermittent fasting, breakfast at 7, and then eat at 3 or 4. It's a soft rule though depending on the situation, like if I'm working late I'll eat more. I think I've trained my hunger to be closer to what my body needs, not my emotions 😂!
Last fast I did was the lemon with maple syrup a decade ago. No light headedness and an easy transition to eating. I think the syrup gives a clean base level of energy... I wouldn't hesitate to do it again if I'm having digestive issues.
Interesting stuff Rob (c137). I'm always experimenting with my body to see what works and doesn't work. I play around with supplements and foods and eating schedules quite a bit. Our bodies change as we age too and that's another reason I wanted to try fasting. I'm definitely going to try it again or maybe a couple of times just to play around with it a bit. I think eliminating everything (for me) and then reintroducing things can give me an idea of what things I may be eating that cause inflammation, etc. I've drastically changed my diet several times in my lifetime as my body has changed. Unfortunately, the 30 years I worked shift work really messed things up because I trained myself to eat in the middle of the night for so long and then had to switch back to eating during the day, etc. The "one meal a day" thing became something that worked for me for many years because of my schedule. I found if I could have one decent meal at 4pm every day, it didn't matter whether I was working days or nights because for night shift I'd be heading out the door and for day shift I'd be getting ready to come home. This made it possible for me to eat food I made myself even when being gone 16 hours a day. Now that I'm home all the time, it's been a real battle over the last 5 years to figure out an eating "schedule" that works. Though I, like yourself, tend to listen to my body. I definitely don't restrict myself if I find that I'm starving to death before my regular meal! Thanks for the input!
Here's the site of the ray peat forums guy.. tons of cool stuff here http://haidut.me/
Search serotonin and you'll see that's also a key thing with aging and health. We actually want less serotonin, as it is a "shut down and hibernate" thing.
Makes you wonder why they pushed SSRIs which boost it and create numbness in people!
Benadryl aka diphenhydramine around 50mg a day is optimal. I dissolve the capsule in a bottle and drink it through the day. You can also use famtodine aka pepcid, but look up the dosing. I have no drowsiness from the dph, but some people do.
Another great booster is niacinamide which boosts metabolism.
I found your post to be interesting, no worries. I don't like fasting. But I do it in the mornings because it just happens. I usually don't eat until at least noon, maybe even not until 3. Then I eat like a freakin horse the rest of the day until maybe 8 or 9, and I crash early, and I don't CARE if I'm full of food when I crash, it's never been a problem that I know of! lol
I would say that three days fasting is maybe too much? Butt, I am not a doctor, I'm a dogtor. ;)
Skipping breakfast is what makes it harder to deal with the afternoon... Already in a deficit of calories, you're in panic mode looking to stock up for the next food less morning lol.
It's like my sister driving her gas tank to almost empty and needing a new fuel pump every other year haha.
What breed of dogtor are you?
I was a wolf... Instinct and feeling. Thinking purely practical.
These days I feel like a Husky. I'm not submissive nor dominant, just fitting in by doing enough but not too much. My fiance is starting to get in touch with her inner husky too.
I don't seem to have that panic mode, really, unless I fast until like 3 pm... I get up early, so I usually eat around 11-12. It works fine, I don't always eat a BIG breakfast. But when I do it's hopefully full of BACON. ^_^
I might have a fair amount of Husky, too... I talk a lot. And I dooooo like the Husky language. ha harf! I've never been quiet enough to be a wolf. ;)
Usually when people ask me what kind of dog I am, I tell them I'm the kind of dog that wags my tail and knocks everything off the coffee table.
hahahaha
Kitties knock stuff off of all tables, because they can
LOL!!!! They SO NAUGHTY!!! Cracks me up, but only on videos, not in MY life, LOL.
Wow, that is a lot of effort, you could have probably gotten a rx for a quickie CT scan of your abdomen and assorted other areas being so emptied out.
I could never fast. I am thin, but I am addicted to crunchy cheese puffs and cookies
Haha! I love crunchy cheese puffs but I haven't eaten those in many years. Thanks for stopping by! :)
I'm addicted to them, too, so I try to never eat them. Or else... I eat ALL of them that exist in the entire WORLD. All at once. Like a HOOVER.
Thanks for telling us about your experience, Rob. I usually only eat 2 meals/day (and I admit, I snack although I'm trying to stop doing that in the evenings since I've heard it's healthier to quit eating completely before 9 pm). I don't think I could fast. I'm not diabetic but my blood sugar drops (I'm guessing here) and I experience what you described on day 3 of your fast, only just hours after not eating. Other people may find fasts beneficial, however. Keep us posted on your progress!
Thanks for your input Anna. I agree completely with others who mention that *all* of us are different (that's why I rail against this "one size fits all" medical establishment that's been set up over the last couple decades). That being said, from my experience, I sure wouldn't recommend fasting for everyone. If what someone is doing with their health is working for them... why change it? I really did want to do this experiment though. I'll let you know if I do the 4 day. I'm a bit nervous about that one. Haha.
Different people are different. You probably have a higher metabolism that some others. I eat like a HORSE, and I'm thin, and I get hungry very frequently unless I eat a bunch of bread or like stuff. I'm also a gal. High metabolism for me, too, I think. It seems like I burn things off in like 2, 3 hours! I try not to eat sugar because I become addicted to it in about 2 seconds...
I have the same metabolism as a guy.... Lol what's your ancestry?
I was regularly hungry like you until I added more fats and stuck to having a good breakfast.
Now I'm good till my next meal at 3-4!
Check out my other comment here for more info.
I seem to have a guy metabolism, too! lol
I am a real mutt!! Irish, English, Viking, French, German, a wee bit of Cherokee and Choctaw. I just look like a white girl (dog). ;)
But I eat plenty of fats, and when I do eat breakfast, because that's the first meal, it's usually around midday, but regardless of time, I eat a BIG one, then I keep eating, every couple of hours, snacks, a lot and sometimes another decent meal around 6 or 7, other times I don't eat again at all until maybe 7 or 8. Depends on what I'm doing.
But one thing I did notice on a list of EMF Overload Symptomology is ravenous hunger.
That could be it. I can go quite a while without eating if I'm not active, but if I am... CHOW. ;)
I was happy with myself having the willpower to not eat for almost three days, but my annoying family wanted to call an ambulance when I collapsed in the hallway.
AND THEY KNOW THAT I DO NOT WANT TO BE IN ANY HOSPITAL.
There's always confounding factors so I don't know what they were.
But I did learn that I can't trust my family. If I do another fast it will have to be when they are away.
BTW, I did lose all interest in eating. That was part of how my family thought that I had gone crazy.
Of course collapsing is not a good idea, so I have a tinsy bit of understanding for my family's reaction.
This about two years ago.
Interesting (about losing desire for eating). I have read that can happen to some people. I'm glad I'm not alone in that. It was weird that I felt that way. It made me wonder if I could have kept on going for lots more days. Yeah, the collapsing is not a good thing. If/when I do this again, I am going to make sure I take it really easy on that 3rd day and maybe not even do hardly anything. I scrubbed my whole house on this go around and so I was pretty busy. Haha. Sorry about family. Yeah, friends and family can be a pain when it comes to these kinds of things. I'm fortunate to have a family that also does a lot of experiments with their bodies as well, so they understand.
It's part of being in charge of one's own body isn't it.
They forced me to eat a mashed banana.
How I hated it, but better than an ambulance.
So yes I could mentally have gone on fasting, but I wonder what would have happened considering I became so weak.
In February when I was out of town on business, by myself for three days I did just a one small meal a day of a couple of slices of cold meat.
Felt great for two days and on the third I felt that I should not be driving due to light headedness.
Again, no desire to eat.
Since you've no underlying issues, the 4 day fast shouldn't be a problem physically. My longest fasts are 5 days, usually done between undefined sets of 3 day monthly fasts.
As Cairn correctly observed, it's more a mental exercise, the farther you go. When you start giving yourself the MSM, catastrophized, mental self talk about gnawings, dangers and maddening possibilities (not saying you did any of this, but I've heard allot from those who are terrified to live a second without some taste in their mouths) remember that throughout time, people have been subjected to intentional, very real starvation AND been pressed into hard labor, with very minimal physical recovery opportunities - and they survived. You need only read accounts of the Holocaust, Holodomor, or Gulags to understand the extreme limits the human organism can survive in.
Usually at three days, I lose the want to eat. I keep a light workout schedule (weights and walking 2-4 miles a day). Also cold showers (which are daily, regardless of the fasting) - if you have the ability for an ice bath, that would be ideal.
I definitely sleep sounder during a fast and wake very clear headed.
As you correctly alluded to though, we all are different, so as you have done, listen to your body. It's your best indicator of how things are going and when change/cessation is needed.
Breaking a fast always seems bitter sweet and where the most mental control is exerted (for me at least). I hate thinking of messing up what must be a pristine GI tract, for the trivialness of food, but then my primate brain kicks in and memories of flavors have me planning the road ahead.
I'm thankful in those times that I went vegan over 5 years ago, as before that, I'd have gone broke buying every slice of bacon in a 100 mile radius and then regretted the nitrite induced comma after an afternoon of gorging.
Best of luck with the 4 days. It really is all mental and perspective, past a certain point.
CTD
Thanks so much for that input! I agree with all of it. I had the exact same feeling when I was getting ready to "break the fast"... thinking all of my hard work is now going to be messed up. Haha. I'm feeling pretty darn good though after that first 3 day fast. I have also thought a lot about times of famine and things like that when it comes to humans and their "need" to consume food all of the time. Not to mention, that in ancient times, there would have been no way for anyone to have 3 or more meals a day. If someone was lucky, maybe they would have been able to find a few extra berries or something for a snack. Personally (even though I *don't* eat all of the time), I think humans (especially Americans) have become much too used to having 3 meals a day and snacks, etc. I could go into an even deeper discussion about how corporations have used advertising and propaganda to convince people they need to eat all of the time, not to mention the companies that literally have whole departments dedicated to finding ways to make food taste better, etc., but I'll leave that for another time (I'd go on for pages). Thanks again for your comment! :)
LOL...I have a well worn soap box for those corporation, advertising and R&D rants.
You are correct, the 3 meals a day and snacks are a modern profit driven construct - part of what has made us softy as societies and living beings.
Progress - on the whole - is regression and decay. People today are in no way as strong (mentally/physically) as those who lived a 1000 or more years ago, with no A/C, white lab coats or fast food.
Best of luck going forward.
CTD