All About Fasting

I was amazed when I first read about fasting here. My development was strange. In my childhood, I was rather strong and forced myself to fast. Without success. My hunger was always there. Even though I had eaten less, my weight was the same or even increased. At age 36, I had my first major life crisis. Amazingly, I could not eat anything anymore. For days. There was no hunger or desire. My weight started to decrease very quickly. I only ate when the insulin level was in the basement and I got cravings. After that first crisis something changed in my body. There was no more hunger. So I ate nothing for 1-2 days sometimes. My lifestyle also made regular eating impossible. There were no fixed meals, I ate little but spread throughout the day. At some point, I realized that there was a change. Once I had a normal rhythm, on vacation, I could not stand food anymore. My energy was gone. As soon as I ate and fasted again very little, I was able to work without any problems for 12 hours a day. I also noticed that in difficult times, when my head had to think a lot, my weight had also decreased with normal food intake. At some point I read an article that thinking consumes a lot of energy and calories, which I can only confirm. To this day, fasting is part of my life although I do not intend to fast. There is very little appetite. Strangely, I have an incredible amount of energy and have never gotten sick. Whether there is a connection here, I do not know.
 
There seems to be a line/threshold a person can cross, when it comes to eating. Eating when the body needs food rather than eating when your ego demands food.

An interesting observation from someone experimenting with 12 hour fasting.
 
So I've been seeing some results from IF for the past couple of months. The way I've been doing it is I eat within a 4-6hr window about 4 or 5 days a week, and eat within a 12 hr window(normal work day, breakfast at 6am, dinner at 6pm, very active physical day) 2 days a week. Each 12hr window day is interspersed by 3 4-6hr window days. Low carb most days, but I do introduce more carbs during more physically active days, but not high enough to bring me out of ketosis(going by feel). Been doing this for about 3 months or so now, but I built up the days in which I was fasting before that, and only recently shortened the eating window from 6hrs to 4hrs on some days(sometimes less, just because I'm busy, or too full to eat more than one meal). The reduction of the window came naturally. Paleo ingredient restriction, Keto macro-nutrient restrictions.

My results have been that I've been reducing body fat (visibly), although I haven't weighed myself. There is also a general feeling of well-being(very subjective, but present). I don't get crazy hunger pains, or anything like that, at most maybe a 3/10 hunger, and a bit of fatigue by the time my eating window approaches. I've been drinking yerba mate tea every day, and black coffee some days(on and off, but more frequently than not) outside of my eating window (mornings).
What mostly prompted me to share my results were that I noticed an increase in my immune system strength. Normally, even when taking lots of vitamin C, I wouldn't always dodge getting sick when people around me were getting sick. But this time, my mom who I live with got sick, a lot of my coworkers were getting sick, and I went through a couple of days with low sleep (and one of them, when I was most exposed to sick people around me, we had a really busy shift and spent most of the night out in the cold, soaking wet, and barely got 1 or 2 hours of sleep). So I believe I am seeing a significant difference here, and I'm curious how long I can sustain this for, although I'm feeling very comfortable with it right now.
Anyways, thanks for reading, and I'd encourage others to try it as well. :-D
 
The search results gave no specific results on 'time-restricted eating' so posting this here, as it looked like the next most suitable place.

On Sunday and Monday I work 12 hour shifts. I've noticed that every other day of the week I am able to fast, have one or two meals a day and a 4-7 hours eating window.

When I work these shifts, it's a lot harder. We have short 10 minutes break every 6 hours, which sometimes it's too busy to take fully, and eating locations and options are limited. Recently I either eat a small amount or not at all for the entire shift. I used to take broth with lots of added fat, and found even that didn't help. I tried eating early before work, no good.

I come home after work and it's difficult to not eat then. It's partly comfort eating, as it's difficult to keep a routine these days. The days when I'm not working 12 hours, I'm alright.

There was a Cs session from last year that mentioned time restricted eating and its importance.

So these two days of eating late (around 9pm) though not every week, I really want to address to find a solution that can be implemented as part of a routine. Even moreso now as the sunsets around 4PM in the northern hemisphere and I aim to eat between sunrise and sunset.

What hours between 8AM and 4PM are best? What might be better to eat that will keep me full all day?

When I get back home now, I plan my day to do study reviews before EE so I don't have to go to the kitchen. This is new so will see how it goes.

Sometimes I think it may take redoing the entire kitchen to stop eating late on these days.

@Temperance, thank you for sharing :-) That's great to hear.

I eat within a 12 hour window for these two days also. My concern is that it is 9PM or 10PM that I'm eating and prefer to sleep early and leave 3-4 hours after eating before sleeping.
 
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Laura said:
Back when I was younger I did a 21 day fast, the last ten days of which were water only and I have to say that I felt reborn and it lasted for a very long time.
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I read about water fasting earlier this year and watched many videos of people who did it. I was most intrigued by the purported detox and autophagy effects. I quickly discovered that its proponents absolutely love it and promise miracles, but physicians in the grip of mainstream thought seem to reject it.

I did a minimal water fast (four full days) about three months ago. I felt great for about two weeks thereafter. Because I got through the hard part (Days 2 and 3), I feel like I should have kept going!
 
Back in about '85 I went on a ten day water fast. The first three days were incredibly hard, but after that I stopped feeling hungry, slept like a baby, lost twenty pounds, and felt incredibly good.
Actually, that's why I'm on this topic. I'm gonna have another go at it.:thup:
 
Redrock12 said:
Back in about '85 I went on a ten day water fast. The first three days were incredibly hard, but after that I stopped feeling hungry, slept like a baby, lost twenty pounds, and felt incredibly good.
Actually, that's why I'm on this topic. I'm gonna have another go at it.:thup:
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Sounds good @Redrock12, keep in mind though that you were 35 years younger then. I would not expect the same results 35 years later. I have had positive experiences with fasting, but then I did a long fast of more than 20 days. That was not such a good experience, and has had consequences. so take it slow and listen to your body, and your heart. best
 
Engaging lecture with some amazing new insights on benefits of fasting

Take away messages - fasting is good on multiple levels, insulin regulation, inflammation, autoimmune disease, gene expression, rejuvenation.
If you want to maintain health even restricted eating is beneficial or intermittent fasting , magic starts at 36h.
Be careful how to break the fast.
 
Deckard said:
Engaging lecture with some amazing new insights on benefits of fasting
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I can attest to this: due to a health condition, did four consecutive weekly 3-day fasts (3 days fast, 4 days eat). I prepared by fattening myself up for about 10 pounds, and by the end of the ordeal was back to my normal weight. There for sure has been some positive changes in the body, and I plan to eat normally for some time, gain weight and repeat the procedure at the beginning of the new year.
If the health condition eases, I will definitely do a monthly 3-day fast repeatedly to "keep up the good work"!
 
Would like to chim in and share my experience with fasting. Most of the time I'm working on night shifts therefore I'm dining before going to work. During the night while working I'm drinking water, having sugarless coffee and smoking cigarettes. In the morning, after work I'm going straight to bed without eating anything, I'm waking up in the afternoon, I take a cup of coffee to wake up and doing my usual routine, cooking, cleaning, laundry and so on till it's time to go to work. Before going to work I'll have my dinner and thus I'm fasting 24 hours a day, 4-6 times a week.

From my own personal experience I'd say that fasting has helped me a LOT to keep my metabolism in check along with working out 2-3 times a week, it helped me also to counteract the side effects from the night shifts, helped me to improve my health in a wonderful way and I'd say made me more resilient, body, mind and soul.

So fasting offers a lot of healthy benefits that I can confirm from my own experience. However one should be careful while fasting, if one isn't able to fast 24 hours a day, 12 to 16 hours a day will be more than enough and I'd say it's more practical to fast this way for most of the folks.

Edit: grammar.
 
Fasting also forces you to see all of your STS desires and inclinations and programs whether they be material (they are eating my favorite food and I don’t get any -pout) Or psychological or emotional. Like “I am missing out”. “ This is a sacrifice”. “People are looking at me like I am crazy”. Etc. “They are having fun drinking and I am a party pooper”. Etc etc.
 
Andrian said:
Would like to chim in and share my experience with fasting. Most of the time I'm working on night shifts therefore I'm dining before going to work. During the night while working I'm drinking water, having sugarless coffee and smoking cigarettes. In the morning, after work I'm going straight to bed without eating anything, I'm waking up in the afternoon, I take a cup of coffee to wake up and doing my usual routine, cooking, cleaning, laundry and so on till it's time to go to work. Before going to work I'll have my dinner and thus I'm fasting 24 hours a day, 4-6 times a week.

From my own personal experience I'd say that fasting has helped me a LOT to keep my metabolism in check along with working out 2-3 times a week, it helped me also to counteract the side effects from the night shifts, helped me to improve my health in a wonderful way and I'd say made me more resilient, body, mind and soul.

So fasting offers a lot of healthy benefits that I can confirm from my own experience. However one should be careful while fasting, if one isn't able to fast 24 hours a day, 12 to 16 hours a day will be more than enough and I'd say it's more practical to fast this way for most of the folks.

Edit: grammar.
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I have been fasting for 24 h three times a week for few months now.
It gets easier with the time and now I actually look forward to those days.
I make sure to book full days of work on fasting days, after work i meditate, go to yoga class and then early to bed. I sleep like a baby on those days and get up ready to move mountains.

During the fast i drink bay leaf infusion ( it is supposed to help with detox process) or herbal teas. I think its very important to have something warm to sip when hunger pangs strike but as the time passes this is easier and easier.
I am gearing towards 3 day fast hopefully this month and then if all goes well I will do 7 days fast in coming months.
I definitely intend to continue eating only 4 days a week till the rest of my life.
Also trying to not smoke at all on fasting days but its a work in progress.
 
I have also practiced intermittent fasting for many years, eating just once every 24 hours 5-6 days a week. On a day off I tend to eat twice.

The timing of eating is different for me than most people I have interacted with. I don't eat in the morning. I eat before sleep, and the heaviness of eating helps me to sleep. Although eating at night can have detrimental effects, I enjoyed the fact that this doctor said your body doesn't know a difference. In my experience, when you eat doesn't seem to matter much. That could be wrong, so FWIW I have done this for at least a decade. I haven't gained weight, or have found a reason to change this body pattern. It works for me, so I continue it.

After watching this last video, I have decided to undergo a water fast for 4-5 days max in the next week (which is the only opportunity for me to do so in the foreseeable future). I will report back results, and some research when I can.
 
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