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Just finished a 20 day water fast

Hartmann

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Originally Posted by wannabeagiant
I don't know if 20 days without food is healthy but, historically at this time of year, we would pretty much be fasting. We would have carb loaded at the end of summer and most of our energy would come from that stored fat since food would be scarce during the winter (little bit of greens and whatever meat we could get our hands on). Modern ways of eating/gorging are but a speck on the evolutionary timeline.

What if you live in the tropics? Did I just blow your mind?
 

mm84321

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Originally Posted by Mandrake9072
Would you say that the intermittent fasting that came with your low carb diet prepare (of course... 1 day fasting vs 20 days...
sarcasm.gif
) you for the real deal?

And this bit worries me:



Did you literally not have the energy to get out of bed at all? My worry would be trying to sleep at night!


I was pretty well experienced with fasting for short periods of time (2-3 days). I usually ate between 12pm and 8pm every day, thus giving my body 16 hours of fasting on a daily basis. This did probably help me overcome the initial cravings and "hunger". After day 4, those feelings disappeared.

There were only 2 days or so where all I did was rest in bed and did nothing more than read books. I would take lots of showers to warm my body and they would make me feel even sleepier for some reason.

My bedtime was pretty erratic the first week and a half (going to bed at 6am), but then I transitioned into a sensible pattern. I slept extremely well and my dreams were the most vivid I've ever had; I remembered them every morning. I even experienced some lucid dreaming which was really cool.
 

Scooba

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Originally Posted by speedy4500
To the OP: be sure to come back on and let us know how quickly you pack on 15 lbs of pure fat. I'm gonna guess about 2 weeks.

Yeah, I was just going to say the same thing. After being in starvation mode for 20 days, your metabolism is going to be extremely low so eating solid food will cause you to retain calories and therefore you will gain back the weight rather quickly.
 

gort

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facepalm.jpg
This just sounds like a guy who wants to lose weight but has no freaking clue how to do it properly. Not eating for 2-3 days sounds like a person with an eating disorder who would make knee jerk decisions out of guilt or something of that nature. Rather than a proper lifestyle change to drop weight and keep it off permanently he has little bursts of marsupialation that result in initial weight loss but won't keep him healthy and fit long term.
 

Decahedron

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Originally Posted by mm84321
I was pretty well experienced with fasting for short periods of time (2-3 days). I usually ate between 12pm and 8pm every day, thus giving my body 16 hours of fasting on a daily basis. This did probably help me overcome the initial cravings and "hunger". After day 4, those feelings disappeared.

There were only 2 days or so where all I did was rest in bed and did nothing more than read books. I would take lots of showers to warm my body and they would make me feel even sleepier for some reason.

My bedtime was pretty erratic the first week and a half (going to bed at 6am), but then I transitioned into a sensible pattern. I slept extremely well and my dreams were the most vivid I've ever had; I remembered them every morning. I even experienced some lucid dreaming which was really cool.



I won't pick ya apart the way the others have. Though I agree with them, they seem to have picked apart your perceived benefits with, yanno, actual science.


Anyhow, warm showers always make you sleepy.
 

mm84321

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Originally Posted by Scooba
Yeah, I was just going to say the same thing. After being in starvation mode for 20 days, your metabolism is going to be extremely low so eating solid food will cause you to retain calories and therefore you will gain back the weight rather quickly.
Again, fasting and starvation are not one and the same. You are only starving when all your non essential fat reserves have been depleted and muscle begins to be catabolized. Next time you hear a fat person claim to be hungry...that's not true hunger. Rather, they are internally starved, most likely due to a diet high in carbohydrate. High levels of insulin are storing away the nutrients from their diet into their fat cells, thus requiring them to eat more to feel sated. Most people won't ever experience the feeling of true hunger in their lifetime. I recall an excerpt from Good Calories, Bad Calories that spoke of a trial where a number of obese individuals were fasted for an entire year with taking in nothing more than vitamins and minerals. They didn't die, instead their bodies lived off their stored energy source, which is simply what fat is.
Originally Posted by gort
facepalm.jpg
This just sounds like a guy who wants to lose weight but has no freaking clue how to do it properly. Not eating for 2-3 days sounds like a person with an eating disorder who would make knee jerk decisions out of guilt or something of that nature. Rather than a proper lifestyle change to drop weight and keep it off permanently he has little bursts of marsupialation that result in initial weight loss but won't keep him healthy and fit long term.

And again, I didn't do this for weight loss, although that was an added benefit. I didn't have that much weight to lose to begin with. I did it more as a challenge for myself and a test of strength and willpower, that I ended up gaining so much more from. Believe me, I am pretty knowledgeable with regard to weight loss and how to do it properly and effectively. I am breaking my fast the proper way by slowly reintroducing high water content fruits and vegetables to reawaken my digestive system and get my metabolism going again. I will definitely let everyone know if I gain back any of the fat I lost. This guy does a good job explaining the controversy surrounding this topic http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqU2q...AF18C&index=24
 

enginerd917

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In this thread, OP defies science.

Mirin self sufficient body, wish I could produce energy and not eat.
 

Coburn

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Originally Posted by feabt6
Let's be serious - every bit of Eastern & Western science (and emprical evidence) has proven that humans are able to survive for weeks at a time without food, that shouldn't be surprising.

. A better idea would be a raw food diet to let the body heal itself naturally.


+1
Fasting is not particularly dangerous if less then 30 days. But, a disciplined diet of raw food is a much better choice.
 

AlmostFullBenefits

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teacha.gif


For those who can't discern between bullshit pseudoscience, trolling, anecdotal evidence, and scientific research, let me just say this:

I've got some magic beans that will help you lose weight, grow hair, increase lean muscle mass, help overcome social anxiety and build confidence, help sexual performance, help sports performance, increase bone density, help interpretative dance performance, grant telekinetic powers, cure herpes, resurrect the dead, cure hangovers, and vanish wrinkles.

And I've got THIS research article to prove it!
 

AlmostFullBenefits

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Originally Posted by Coburn
+1
Fasting is not particularly dangerous if less then 30 days.


There are no studies that have ever conducted, outside those conducted by Josef Mengele, that even come close to testing this claim, because such a study would be deemed too unethical by any sort of Internal Review Board. The only thing I can even think of are a very, very few case (i.e., number of subjects = 1) studies performed on extremely obese people, under very strict doctor supervision.

I had a good laugh at most of this thread, but all joking aside, ****** advice is one thing, but potentially lethal ****** advice is morally inexcusable.
 

Harold falcon

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Originally Posted by mm84321
Again, fasting and starvation are not one and the same. You are only starving when all your non essential fat reserves have been depleted and muscle begins to be catabolized.
You have absolutely no idea what you're talking about. If you were to have done this properly you would almost certainly have found that you lost just as much in muscle weight as in fat weight during your fast. You didn't work out and you didn't provide your muscles with the nutrients they needed to maintain, so they disappeared. It is doubtful you lost very much fat weight, and you'll almost certainly gain it back in no time, but you won't grow back the muscles at the same time, so you'll look much worse than you did a month ago.
Next time you hear a fat person claim to be hungry...that's not true hunger.
Please point us to a medically accepted definition of "true hunger".
I recall an excerpt from Good Calories, Bad Calories that spoke of a trial where a number of obese individuals were fasted for an entire year with taking in nothing more than vitamins and minerals. They didn't die, instead their bodies lived off their stored energy source, which is simply what fat is.
I don't remember that trial at all. There was mention in that book of various "semi-starvation trials" in the obesity section of that book, and the results were that reduced caloric intake resulted in reduced energy levels, but I don't recall anything like what you've discussed. You are either lying again, or you are misinformed. Did you actually read that book?
This guy does a good job explaining the controversy surrounding this topic http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqU2q...AF18C&index=24
Lol, the man in that video does not look healthy.
Originally Posted by AlmostFullBenefits
I had a good laugh at most of this thread, but all joking aside, ****** advice is one thing, but potentially lethal ****** advice is morally inexcusable.
x2. And the worst part is that the people selling these "fasting and sun-bathing diets" know that it's all bullshit, but they sell it anyway. Despicable.
 

Gibonius

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Originally Posted by rach2jlc
Actual question to the experts: he said for the "last five days" he felt particularly increased energy... how would this be in any way possible without calories/food? What is producing this energy and is it real? Or is it some chemical the body is injecting in order to compensate? And, finally, did this OP find some way of disproving the law of Conservation of Energy?
lol8[1].gif
j/k


Feelings of "energy" are frequently purely psychological or sometimes neurological. Taking caffeine or ephedrine etc doesn't give you caloric energy, but you FEEL more energetic because of the stimulant effect. Obviously nobody is violating conservation of energy here, his body fed off of fat (and muscle and bone and organ) sources for those 20 days, and either it got somewhat more efficient at doing that towards the end and he felt relatively more energetic, or he got some mental effect from the stress/deprivation that led to perceived increases in energy.

I bet if we threw him on a treadmill in a fed vs unfed state, regardless of perceived energy level, he'd do better in a fed state. Same with mental acuity tests.
 

Eustace Tilley

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The OP needs to go see a doc asap.

And the mods need to move this thread to DT.
 

Reggs

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Originally Posted by mm84321
This guy does a good job explaining the controversy surrounding this topic
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqU2q...AF18C&index=24


When you listen to this man speak, you know he's an idiot. How you can seriously watch this video, then give it to us as a means of backing up your point just proves how lost you are. You would really trust this idiot over a doctor? Over science?

"...foods that contaminate your brain the most."

"religion is in favor of fasting."

"This is really the foundation of the beginning of expanding your level of consciousness."

ffffuuuu.gif
 

FtRoyalty

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Isn't there a Kafka short story about this? The Starving Artist?
 

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