Hello fellow travelers.
It’s Thursday afternoon. I just had my first bite of food since Sunday night, my longest fast by nearly double and my 6th fast since I started doing IF/EF in mid-December (started Keto in early Nov). I consumed only coffee, water, and ketoaid (water, lite salt, magnesium citrate, lemon slice).
Refeed plan: Just now I cooked a small meal of veggies, an egg and a pork rind to soak up the yolk. groans The first morsel was a sliver of butter. It made my eyes roll to the back of my head. double groans In an hour, assuming my system doesn’t rebel, I’ve got designs on a garlic butter-soaked steak with sauteed mushrooms, more veggies plus some cream cheese, peanut butter, a square or three of 100% chocolate and a couple packets of stevia I stole from Starbucks, mixed up and chilled. infinity groans
It continues to amaze how POSSIBLE fasting is. If you told me four months ago that I would not only be able to not eat for ~4 days but that I would overwhelmingly enjoy it and that it would deliver a list of benefits, I would have considered you out of your mind. “Get out of here!” I would have said. “That’s dangerous!” “Hand me another box of sugar and a side of sugar and put some sugar in my mouth.”
I even played tennis twice and did pushups every day. I got such a kick out of telling my tennis partner I hadn’t eaten since Sunday. Her reaction was priceless. I felt like a badass. Then I worked up a nice little sweat and never once felt weak or light-headed. (we don’t play real hard)
It’s not fun, to be clear. It takes dedication and knowledge but what I continue to enjoy discovering during each fast is how little willpower it takes. It’s not a struggle. It feels good. Like a healthy project. There are long periods of mild pleasantness, sustained energy and concentration. I got a lot of work done. There were moments of mild downturn, but that’s true when not fasting.
When hunger arrived, I would chug water with a pinch of lite salt and say bye to the wave. Easy. I had a stressful work thing occur during a 5:30pm hunger pang (~hour 68) and almost broke the fast to alleviate the stress but I held strong. I didn’t want to eat to soothe a negative emotion like old me did pretty much all the time. Not that doing so is necessarily bad. It’s perfectly okay for food to be comforting, to a degree, but in that moment I didn’t want a negative cascade of emotions to interrupt the goal I had.
Even if I did break the fast at that moment, I would have done so with Keto food. Didn’t even occur to me to eat an old comfort food. That’s another sign of positive change.
poop talk warning
Other than a few very minor bouts of low-velocity hershey squirts, I was in tip top shape. Even those felt more like a simple valve release than what a “traditional” diary entry entails. Kinda like the difference between a throat clear and an elbow-soaking sneeze. I mean, it would almost be weird if nothing made its way to the exit portal.
It’s also great not having to cook and fart around with dishes. Saves $ too.
The main downside I can report was feeling cold. My hands, feet and overall bod were noticeably chilled. I had to wear an extra sweater and kept a small desk heater close by. It would come and go but was fairly consistent. No big whup. If that’s the worst side-effect, then call me Captain Sweater Boy.
Fat-adapted, fat-educated me is an entirely different person than the chubby guy (still working on it) who divided his time between general tso’s chicken and burritos. Oh, and I lost almost 4 lbs (I know some will come back). I’m over half way to my goal. So grateful to have discovered this tool.
Well, that steak is calling my name. Thanks for reading! Keep traveling!