August 2026 Extended/Intermittent Fasting

(Jane) #1

I am starting a 72-hr fast after lunch today and didn’t see an August fasting thread, so starting one.

KCFO!

(Jane) #2

I also applied a Stelo CGM and waiting on the 30-minute warm-up to see where I am at this morning. Have had coffee and a few spoonfuls of cottage cheese with chopped tomatoes and green onions in it.

(Bob M) #3

That might not give you any rise. Let us know.

(Bob M) #4

Trying a 3.5 day fast. Had high blood sugar (115?) and low ketones (0.2mmol/l) the first day due to having ice cream cake on my wife’s birthday. Forgot to take them last night. Second day, morning: 89 blood sugar and 0.4 mmol/l ketones.

By the way, I will eat tomatoes in season. My burgers now have tomatoes on them, and we had tomatoes/mozzarella cheese/basil/olive oil/salt for my wife’s birthday. I try to keep things like tomatoes or any fruit (which I rarely eat) to be seasonal for where I live.

(Jane) #5

Not much at all - 5 points. The tomatoes are from my garden and I do not pass up the opportunity to enjoy them. The only thing I sprayed on them was peppermint essential oil to ward off some bugs.

(Bob M) #6

Yeah, my dad’s family was from Italy, so they always grew tomatoes and other stuff for pasta sauce. They were great out of their garden. Sadly, my dad developed type 2 diabetes because of the amount of pasta he are. They, however, did not. Genetics? Or something else? I’m not sure.

(Jane) #7

How’s your fast going?

Mine is ok - a few waves of hunger as usual around the time we eat lunch and dinner, but nothing some pink salt under the tongue couldn’t fix or at least help me ignore it. Currently 36 hours in.

Tomorrow is typically easier for me and I plan to break at lunch on Thursday.

I don’t sleep as well when I fast but that is normal for me and not unexpected. I just tend to walk up a lot of times during the night. Go right back to sleep but is annoying.

(Jane) #8

CGM read 77 when I woke up this morning. Currently reading 85, so all is good. I haven’t gotten my Keto-Mojo out for this fast yet, but I think I will test after my 9:30 am meeting.

Be interesting to see how the finger stick glucose compares to my CGM. In the past, my GCM always read lower but tracked.

(Jane) #9

CGM: 75

Keto-Mojo:
Glucose: 85
Ketones: 2.0
GKI: 2.0

CGM reading 10 units below KM meter, which I have found is typical.

I am coming up on 48 hours of a 72-hr fast so happy with those numbers and should be getting some decent autophagy going on, which is my goal.

(Bob M) #10

Jane, what I’ve been doing is planning the longer fasts when I go to work, because I typically get home at 7pm, and I’ve been staying later to get home later.

I find that I get hungry in phases, and I have to stop using some media like Instagram. I made the mistake of saving a “Mediterranean” recipe and following that person/company. (Basically a “pizza”-style casserole without crust and very low carb.) Now, all I get are recipes with food in them.which of course show the end result. Most are not low carb though. Not good when you’re fasting. I also went to Costco 3 days into the fast and bought way too much food. Man is beef expensive now. EASILY spent $150 in meat.

I find that staying away from home and having two servings of LMNT during the day help. I plan so that at least the last day is at work. Day 2 is typically hardest, but it seems to vary fast by fast.

I’m trying to hit 3+ days because supposedly more immune-system effects take place around day 3. I’m concerned about my endothelium, because I went from a CAC score of zero to 30. I believe it’s because of Covid, and I’ve unfortunately had Covid twice. Not great, as Covid damages the endothelium.

I forgot to take readings at night, but
Day 2 morning: 76 and 2.0
Day 3 morning: 68 (or 64?) and 3.2

Higher ketones and I don’t get along. Went upstairs from the basement this morning (day 3) and couldn’t remember why. (I work in an “office” in our unfinished basement.) My mind is all over the place.

I’m drinking coffee and tea (as normal every morning) with cream to start the process of eating. I’ll have home-made broth later. Then a small meal sometime after that.

(Jane) #11

Fantastic glucose/ketone numbers - you should be getting some good repairs with that, alhough we don’t have any control over what part the body decided to repair, but its all good.

(Jane) #12

Will be breaking my fast in a few hours.

GCM: below 70 (I guess it can’t read below 70)

Keto-Mojo:
glucose: 74
ketones: 4.5
GKI: 0.9

Yay - Got my GKI below 1, so I should be gettting some decent autophagy until I break at 11 am.

KCFO

#13

I wonder if it would be easier to fast than to eat little enough. As I fail the latter now. But I don’t wait for true hunger either, it’s still a problem for me. Usually have 2 meals, maybe 3 but in the same eating window when my first meal gets too tiny so I can’t last an hour.
I start to miss feeling hungry. But with the heat melting my brain and ruining whatever little mood, restraint and other useful things I had, it’s tough to hold myself back, I even can eat without my conscious mind fully noticing when my SO eats.

I eat tomatoes too, it’s season, even in my garden but that’s almost nothing. The store-bought ones have barely any taste - as flavor was sacrificed, it’s good enough if they are firm and red and pretty so people buy them - but they are cold and juicy and that’s tempting. I eat more ice cream too as it’s cold. And it’s not good for my fat-loss as ice cream is super fatty. Depends on the recipe I happen to use but yolk is the lower-fat ingredient (in percentage) unless I use fruit :slight_smile: At least I don’t eat much. Today it’s leftover ice cream, about 26 grams? But I will add whipped cream and chocolate so it possibly will be 50g. I never understood people eating lots of ice cream, 1 liter ice cream is for a small family even using those super watery low-fat things in the store (low-fat from my viewpoint, at least but a not chocolate covered is apparently around 8% fat in weight? that’s pretty low-fat if you ask me. mine is 20-30% in weight and my fav is 83% fat in calories - without adding chocolate, that raises it).
Tomato is fine for me, I eat so, so much fruits now (it’s barely any from a fruit lover’s viewpoint but compared to the ideal virtually zero and the wishes of my body sometimes…). But it’s season again. It’s almost always fruit season, it’s actually a problem. Even the dangerous, very sugary major fruit seasons are a big part of the year. I would say oh, so much time to get desensitized! But I don’t ever get desensitized. Just sugar poisoned/put off from acidic fruits if it really gets bad but it’s not enough to resist them. I mean, I do avoid most fruits (I keep lemon) when actively sugar poisoned but alas (and fortunately), it goes away quickly. I never eat really high sugar, after all, fruit is just very skilled and I can do overdo them even on keto occasionally.

Yeah I think I should try to do EF somehow. But I always have plans. Or leftovers. Or hunger. Or temptation but the latter should be easy when well-fasted and not very hungry.
I better prepare myself mentally. (While my brain is melting in the heat. Fat chance).
Maybe I should watch fasting videos instead of cooking ones (the latter will be great when fasting gets hard, my body and mind works in mysterious ways but yep, those bring food joy without eating when I miss food joy in general).
My SO will go on holiday, that usually doesn’t help but at least he will eat lunch early (as natural for him but he can’t do that on workdays) and I don’t so in the worst case I end up with dinner(s)…? I wouldn’t complain. I couldn’t even bring myself to go for OMAD lately. Had some nice 2MAD days though, with deficit. And then with surplus.
(Of course in the worst case I would end up with early lunch but I will cultivate some basic determination asap.)

I want coolness and RAIN. Lots of rain (we won’t get that much but I appreciate every visible liquid precipitation). Our nuclear plant very very nearly completely shut down due to the low water level in the Danube. But it got better so one turbine still functions.
More and more plants get burned by the sun… The zoos get rescued animals in record number… People suffer and die… It’s a small Hell here.
And I still can’t just stop eating and continue drinking water. Annoying.

Congrats for everyone who manages EF - or IF but properly, without overeating like I tend to do. Some days are great, other days are not. But my metabolism has to be quicker than I have thought (not like I track every day but I know I don’t eat little on average) as I have just checked and I am 78kg! Yay! Not much below my personal maximum but it still went down. (Maybe I have dried out a little? It’s not a morning number.)
Still want to do better and try to wait with my meals until they become needed!

(KCKO, KCFO 🥥) #14

Thanks for getting this thread started.

I am doing well so far this month continuing to mix up 2MAD and 1MAD fasts.

Wasn’t trying to drop any wieght, but I did go down a lb. could be just sweating it off due to the heat. :sunglasses:

I have been doing keto and fasting for 10 yrs. now at my goal weight range.

(Bob M) #15

@Janie Mind if I ask how you broke your fast? I used to eat a normal meal, but I found that easing into it is better. I have some home-made broth, wait a while, then have the smallest meal I can do. Wait a while and have more, then start eating “normally” again.

@Shinita That’s interesting about the overeating. If that’s the case, then you might not be a candidate for fasting. Everyone is different. I will eat things like tomatoes and sometimes fruit, but I try to eat them when they are in season locally. That way, I eat them maybe about a month out the year.

(Jane) #16

I technically break my fast in the morning whern I have cream in my coffee, but I really don’t count that since such a small amount.

I broke with some grilled chicken strips since we ate out for lunch. Only ate a small amount and then had a normal portion dinner. Dog was happy to get the leftovers LOL.