Extended Fasting
While intermittent fasting is all the rage these days, I just wanted to take a moment to mention extended fasting as well. Generally speaking, an extended fast is any fast longer than about 24 hours. Personally, the longest I've done so far is 72 hours (three times now), with six or seven 60-66-hour fasts in there, too.
Why do it? Here's a list of reasons that someone recently posted in a fasting forum that I follow:
This mention of dementia and new brain cell creation is yet another important factor in fasting & ketogenic eating. There is a movement in the medical community to rename Alzheimer's Disease as Type 3 diabetes, because the connection to high insulin, high blood sugar, and eventual obesity followed by dementia has been solidly linked. Anything we can do to avoid falling into this pathway is obviously to our own benefit, along with doing whatever we can to avoid cancer! Dr. Jimmy Moore's well-known book Keto Clarity talks about the clear-headed thinking that comes with following the ketogenic lifestyle, and this is even truer of fasting.
As I've discussed before, a lot of people are afraid of fasting for a few different reasons. I would say that the primary reason is that people are afraid of feeling hungry. It's amazing how powerful that fear can be! Other people, primarily athletes, tend to fear the loss of lean muscle and energy. Because of the exponential growth of HGH while fasting, there's no need to fear this, either! Third, people tend to think that fasting will make them tired, unenergetic, dizzy, or unable to do the things they need to do. The vast majority of fasters I know, myself included, find it's just the opposite - on my fasting days, I tend to be more energetic, focused, and ready to go. If you're afraid of trying a longer fast, I would suggest just getting yourself used to shorter fasts of 18-24 hours. Then you could try expanding, just once per week. If you start on Sunday night after dinner, breaking it with dinner on Monday would put you at 24 hours. If you can extend that to Tuesday morning at breakfast, you're already at 36. I usually go in blocks of 12 or 24 hours, just because it's easier to keep track of, but there are also dozens of free fasting timer apps around. Popular ones are MyFast, Zero, Vora, and there are plenty of others.
Give it a try! You won't die of hunger, I promise! Instead, you're giving your body a chance to do some real housecleaning, since its energy isn't completely bound up with digestion. It's the best cleanse you could give yourself! It's not as scary as it sounds, I promise! And don't forget - the world record for fasting is 388 days! I'm not going to be attempting that at any point, but I'm working my way up to a week. We can do this!
Why do it? Here's a list of reasons that someone recently posted in a fasting forum that I follow:
- Fat loss. The longer you fast, the more effective your body's fat-burning becomes.
- Increased lean muscle mass. The reason behind this is that, the longer you fast, the more growth hormone (HGH) is produced. It gets produced at an exponential rate while fasting, making your workouts more effective and easier! Many people have a superstition that any form of dietary restriction including full abstinence from eating (fasting) will cause a breakdown of lean muscle mass. This just isn't the case, thanks to this boom of growth hormone. It's the most effective when we workout while fasting, however!
- Longevity. Studies have shown that lab animals who were subjected to fasting lived 30-50 percent longer, across a wide variety of species.
- Autophagy. This is a process of the body recycling old, partially broken down amino acids and reusing them. This process is hugely important and needs to happen, as these old, unused chains can block the growth of new cells and organelles (think mitochondria, etc!). We stop eating, so the body goes hunting for amino acids (protein) and finds and gets more and better use out of these acids that we need to get rid of, anyway! Autophagy is super important, so this is good!
- Cancer blocking! This is another super important part of fasting! Cancer cells feed primarily on sugar, which is yet another great reason to cut it out of your eating plan. One of the very first things in cancer treatment these days is that the patient is put on a ketogenic way of eating (almost no carb, no sugars), because cancer cells feed on sugar. Fasting is another great way of blocking cancer, because cancer cells cannot adapt to a body in a fasted state!
- Stem cell creation. After a fast, the body makes an enormous number of new stem cells. Up to 40% of your immune system can be replaced after five days of fasting!
- Removal of misfolded proteins. This probably sounds like nonsense to most of us, but this is something thought to be directly related to dementia. Fasting gets rid of these!
- Increased BDNF (brain-derived neurotrophic factor). This is a protein which promotes neurogenesis (the growth of new brain cells).
This mention of dementia and new brain cell creation is yet another important factor in fasting & ketogenic eating. There is a movement in the medical community to rename Alzheimer's Disease as Type 3 diabetes, because the connection to high insulin, high blood sugar, and eventual obesity followed by dementia has been solidly linked. Anything we can do to avoid falling into this pathway is obviously to our own benefit, along with doing whatever we can to avoid cancer! Dr. Jimmy Moore's well-known book Keto Clarity talks about the clear-headed thinking that comes with following the ketogenic lifestyle, and this is even truer of fasting.
As I've discussed before, a lot of people are afraid of fasting for a few different reasons. I would say that the primary reason is that people are afraid of feeling hungry. It's amazing how powerful that fear can be! Other people, primarily athletes, tend to fear the loss of lean muscle and energy. Because of the exponential growth of HGH while fasting, there's no need to fear this, either! Third, people tend to think that fasting will make them tired, unenergetic, dizzy, or unable to do the things they need to do. The vast majority of fasters I know, myself included, find it's just the opposite - on my fasting days, I tend to be more energetic, focused, and ready to go. If you're afraid of trying a longer fast, I would suggest just getting yourself used to shorter fasts of 18-24 hours. Then you could try expanding, just once per week. If you start on Sunday night after dinner, breaking it with dinner on Monday would put you at 24 hours. If you can extend that to Tuesday morning at breakfast, you're already at 36. I usually go in blocks of 12 or 24 hours, just because it's easier to keep track of, but there are also dozens of free fasting timer apps around. Popular ones are MyFast, Zero, Vora, and there are plenty of others.
Give it a try! You won't die of hunger, I promise! Instead, you're giving your body a chance to do some real housecleaning, since its energy isn't completely bound up with digestion. It's the best cleanse you could give yourself! It's not as scary as it sounds, I promise! And don't forget - the world record for fasting is 388 days! I'm not going to be attempting that at any point, but I'm working my way up to a week. We can do this!
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