Four-day fasting update; cooking while fasting, home-made Gatorade

I posted about a recent planned 5 day fast in a Reddit fasting sub, cut short to 4 days, which I'll also share here as an update.  The part about making a variation of Gatorade to make the electrolytes more pleasant (sodium and potassium salts) was interesting to me.

It's not a new theme, trying out tisane blends during fasting, but this worked better than earlier attempts. I used lime from the garden, about a quarter of a normal size lime worth, since they were tiny, and stevia for sweetness, along with a bit of jasmine green tea. Then I mixed some of the nasty salt water I've been drinking with that, and it was fine, actually delicious. I drank most of that salt water the normal way though, just working through it.

they're an unusual variation of a lime, maybe even a small type of orange

The first and second days were easier than ever, with less experience of hunger than before. Really that was true of the 3rd through 5th fasts, just in a different sense. Energy level and productivity at work didn't seem disrupted at all (I started on a Thursday, so the crux would be over the weekend). On-site office work ran late on Friday, and I didn't get out until 7, and it was fine.

There isn't much for approach or hacks to pass on. I drank electrolytes without monitoring amounts over the first two days, which is not ideal, just mixing some Less Salt and salt into water a few times a day, and taking magnesium capsules. It's better to figure out how much sodium, potassium, and magnesium intake works for you and mix up a daily drink mix, it's just easier to carry a bit of salt to work than the liquid. I had a calf cramp in the night after the second day; I was probably a little low on potassium, so I went back to a measured approach the next morning.

For me the middle range of electrolytes seems to work out, based on the sodium and potassium recommendations in that Reddit fasting sub reference, just over 2 grams each, with sodium slightly higher. For magnesium taking a supplement pill in the morning and evening seems to work well, adding up to more than they recommend there, but not a crazy amount.

I only drank that one tisane the whole time, that one I thought of as a variation of Gatorade, but perhaps it wasn't that close.  Some people would avoid anything but water and the salts, to really lean into the detox theme, but to me drinking some tisane / herb tea is fine, surely not all that impactful or toxic.  It's a helpful way to be able to experience "eating" something, to settle your stomach, and it helps with reminding you to stay hydrated, versus drinking liters of plain water a day.

For tea I drank shou pu'er in the morning on the first three days, a bit of green tea and tisanes at work the second day, and aged white tea, shou mei, on the last day.  Not lots of any of those teas either; one Western brewing round's worth of shou I split over two days of brewing.

I can do light exercise while fasting, and walked about 3km / 1 1/2 miles as part of a commute on the second day.  In general I limit jogging to 2 miles, nowhere near a routine run, but I was so busy with other things that I didn't run.

I cooked during the fast; that was odd.  On two different days too, making up food to bring to a set of cousins who are in poor health.  I made chicken and dumpling soup, home-made meatballs and spaghetti, and lots of steamed vegetables.  

I ended up going to a grocery store two days in a row, and a bakery on one of them; it's as well to not be around food that much, if it works out not to.  I cooked so much that my mother-in-law and I can eat that for a few days too.  Of course it increased my hunger level some, and I think my stomach producing more digestive fluids came with another odd side effect the next day, as something to expel.  Fasting can be strange like that though, the odd extra body function here or there.

It went great.  The main story line, to me, was being able to stay ridiculously busy and productive while not eating for four days, and feeling mostly normal while doing it.

Why even fast?  I've covered all that in a half dozen earlier update posts.  It's not to lose weight; I didn't weigh myself, and we don't have a scale at our house.  There are lots of likely health benefits, especially related to reducing diabetes risk, eliminating fat content in internal organs, and between them, and offsetting cancer and other risks, through the process of autophagy, your body recycling and using inactive cells for an energy source.  I'm not absolutely convinced it works as promoted, because accounts of all that seem to stop short of research findings about that process, but it probably is quite healthy for you.

It also works as a diet reset.  My diet is pretty good, so there's only so much change to be made, but I think that's probably the main potential benefit for most people.  You can easily recognize when eating habits only relate to triggers, or habitual patterns, and it stands out when genuine hunger cues drive the process instead.  

You are hungry the whole time during a multi-day fast, to an extent, but it's a different form of hunger, more just feeling empty, and I'm talking more about relationship with foods and eating than just that one part.  Fasting helps you reset approach to diet, and eating habits, in ways that are hard to describe.  Or you can go right back to eating junk all the time, but it gives you that short window of opportunity to make a limited amount of changes.

I think fasting helps with my mental clarity, but that part can be vague, and people might seem to experience whatever they expect to.  When people describe how pleasant fasting can be, experiencing unusual clarity and euphoria, I can't really relate to all that, but I think I am slightly clearer mentally as a result, afterwards and even during the fast.

back to my normal diet!  jk; this place is new in Bangkok.

the latest theme is travel; I'll get back to that

Trying out a 7 day fast, settling for 5 days

 

I'd meant to fast again before Eye and the kids come back for Christmas, and weighing 2 kg more than normal when I last checked that encouraged me to try longer.  I thought that I might have been able to stabilize my weight back a bit lower, 72 or 73 kg instead of the normal 74, if I return to a lighter diet the first week.  I haven't weighed myself in the past 7 days (there is no scale at the house); I'll never know how it changed.

It didn't work, adding two extra days.  Nothing too unusual came up, but I think I didn't get electrolyte supplementation right, which I'll say more about here.  I started not feeling well 4 days in, then worse on day 5, and quit.

Again it was about potential health benefits, more than losing weight.  I just saw a news story about Dana White, the UFC (fighting) president claiming fasting reduces cancer risk by 70%.  I'm not sure about that but it may reduce risk.  There's a chance that I'm experiencing reduced aging effects related to fasting for 26 days in the last year (30 after this, really in just over 12 months).  My hair seems to be less grey, down from Keo counting 8 hairs to seemingly even less, and I may be gaining hair back in a pronounced bald spot.  The aesthetics makes no difference to me but related to general better health that would be relevant.

I had been using an easy, familiar cycle of fasting Thursday to Monday, related to the first day being easy, and that only including Friday as a work-day where I'm a bit hungry.  Days 4 and 5 were always easy.  I planned a whole work-week a bit off this time, M to F, then to see how days 6 and 7 go on the weekend.  Day by day notes tell the story.

Day 1:  almost no hunger this time, but mental clarity was a bit off.  In the evening I walked 45 minutes to go get the cats special food they're now hooked on, with the oldest basically living on fish, and ran 40 minutes as well, a 4+ mile route at the usual 6 minutes per km.  It's odd mixing those two units; my phone app is on km, and it seemed like most readers might relate to "freedom units."

The theory was to spend out glycogen reserves, so instead of doing the ketosis transition between day 2 and 3 to get that over with on day 2.  Oddly running feels about the same, with or without eating; my "metabolic flexibility" is pretty good.  That's true for days into fasting now too.

Day 2:  again not much for hunger, although the general off feeling started in.  I tried out drinking an aged sheng to see if that would work (a 19 year old version), related to someone commenting about that specific tea I also owned online.  It's not like drinking young sheng, which would be painful on an empty stomach, but it's not a good idea.  I'll stick to shu pu'er and aged white, maybe adding a roasted Wuyi Yancha when I want to mix it up, but that's pushing it too.

People discussing fasting mention an experience of greater mental clarity; I don't get that.  Usually by day 4 I'm back to normal, maybe even slightly clearer, but for me days 1 to 3 are a bit off.  On day 2 that relates to hunger, and on day 3 typically energy level fluctuation.

I'll see if that plan to rush the energy source change-over shifts more issues from day 3 to day 2 and tomorrow I'm fine.  I'm not hungry at all today; it's strange.  If I see food it sounds ok but it's not like before, when I would crave it.  I didn't hide anything from myself, so I'm walking past peanuts and raisins, and see yogurt in the refrigerator, where I keep the cup I drink water from.

I did a bit of laundry; my energy level isn't too far off.  Even if I feel somewhat normal I want take it easy for a few days to get the most out of the extra rest.

Day 3:  That energy level disruption really did seem to kick in yesterday, and I'm not back to normal early today either.  Hunger hasn't been bad at all; I don't think about not eating much.  I think that if I can stay a bit busy today and tomorrow I'll notice it less, and then it should just seem normal, probably shifting to less impactful tomorrow.  

I've drank tisanes twice already, more than I typically do for the 5 days, mixing some chrysanthemum into a late round of the shu I had with breakfast on the first day, then drinking some mixed gooseberry, lemongrass, and monkfruit seed tisane yesterday evening.  I wrote these notes before I got to it but I drank rosemary brewed as a tisane later in day 3.

Mentally the idea of fasting for an entire week, including an entire work-week, feels a little more daunting.  That time-span includes the US Thanksgiving--tomorrow--but I probably wasn't going to observe that anyway, living alone, with less access to turkey to make it myself, living in Bangkok where it's a normal work-day.  Maybe I'll do some sort of make-up meal next week.

Day 4:  the end of day 3 was a bit rough yesterday, and today I feel much better.  I went to work on-site, which is slightly more demanding, doing a commute, then being there in-person, and walking by quite a bit of food.  It's funny how your sense of smell for food increases so much when you are fasting; I swear that I could smell the neighbors eating McDonald's yesterday.  In prior fasts the smell of most foods wasn't as bad as food versions that I ended up craving, but I'm feeling the gap now, and seeing or smelling any food reminds me of the fasting status.  I suppose that's still an improvement, that I don't think of it unless something reminds me.

It's Thanksgiving today, back in the US.  I told two Thai co-workers that and they had no idea what that means.  You can try to find turkey dinners but you won't just walk by a place serving that, so it's not something anyone would notice.  For living alone now I wasn't going to try to cook all that anyway.  It was a little extreme just drinking salt water instead of eating anything.

I'm sick of the salt water.  Even for closing in on 30 days of fasting, in just over a year, that only ever seems so natural, and I keep adjusting how much I drink in relation to plain water, or the timing, or to an extent even the dosage.  Per a r/fasting Reddit sub reference you should be ingesting something like 3 grams of both sodium chloride and potassium chloride, which is a lot.  There's no way to know if that's way too much or the right amount.  It's impossible to know how fasting changes normal daily intake requirements for electrolytes.  Per some references being in ketosis increases sodium demands, which are ordinarily around 1500 mg per day, so going up to 2 or 3 grams might make sense.

I'm not feeling mental pressure about the fast, too much, but the extended planned time does seem to add extra weight.  At least hunger isn't so bad, or energy and mental clarity, which is all normal for day 4.  I don't feel close to energetic enough to go for a run.

Day 5:  I feel fine as of the morning; energy level might be a little lower than usual but otherwise quite normal.  Hunger experience isn't an issue at all; all that seems to drop off after day 3, unless you go to where food is, like I did yesterday.  I visited a mall to pick up protein powder for later and walked by lots of grilled foods, ice cream, bakeries, Thai snacks, Japanese restaurants; on and on.  It wasn't so bad but it does trigger extra hunger.

The 5 day routine had felt really normalized, by the 4th time doing it.  This doesn't.  Oddly electrolyte replacement doesn't go as well as the last two trials.  A slightly increased amount seemed like way too much two days ago, as if I couldn't keep up with water input, and I've had trouble getting a balance back.  I'm not certain that the Reddit fasting sub's recommendation page for inputs isn't too high; they recommend about 3 grams each of sodium and potassium, at the middle of the range they specify.  

Maybe you really do need a ton of salts to continue with ketosis energy processing, or maybe not nearly that much.  Drinking a lot of water is probably a good thing, to help your body sort out whatever conditions you put it through, but I couldn't seem to get thirst and indirect effect of drinking salt water to balance.  I cut it back to less than usual yesterday (well under 3 grams of each, closer to 2) and that might be an ok maintenance level.  Magnesium is easier; I take two tablets / capsules of 400 mg per day, since only taking one seems to result in negative effects, mostly sleep disruption.

Day 5 update (evening):  I wasn't feeling well and ended the fast.  A mild sore throat yesterday continued on to today, and energy level issues got worse throughout the day.  Something seemed off related to electrolyte intake; it was getting harder and harder to force myself to drink any of that salt-water mix, even though I went lighter on it yesterday, and only made it through half of a pre-measured amount in the evening today.  

I tried going out for a walk after work, and that went ok, so it wasn't energy availability that was an issue, just feeling a bit off.  More than seemed appropriate, I guess; someone should feel unusual after not eating for 5 days, but since this was a 5th time doing that the range is somewhat familiar.

I'll cover what I think happened in conclusions, but maybe I'll never really know.  It feels a little disappointing quitting early, but 5 days is a lot, and with things seemingly going worse and worse the next two days were likely to just be enduring more and more.

Conclusions:

I think a main problem related to electrolyte input variations.  This part is a little awkward to share, me getting that wrong, but communicating about the experiences doesn't work with covering all of it.

Before I was sort of carefully measuring out relatively specific amounts of sodium and potassium based on recommendations from that Reddit fasting sub I keep mentioning, making a mix with water to drink periodically throughout the day.  I don't remember exactly where I tried to be in that recommended range every time in the past; somewhere in the middle, not on the low or high side, but I was probably varying it some since I didn't log it, or any such thing.

In the past I was "measuring" teaspoon amounts using a non-standard measuring spoon, since I've been doing these fasts when my wife is in Honolulu, planning them around that, and I didn't think we had measuring spoons.  We don't bake; they don't in Thailand, and we've only ever had a toaster oven, and that's the only time you tend to use those.  I found where she kept them though, and I think earlier estimates of amounts were lower than measured amounts.  I was going for between 2.5 gram and 3 grams of both sodium and potassium per day, at the lower end of what that reference recommended.

Still sounds like a lot, doesn't it?  It seems that 1.5 grams of sodium is standard for a normal diet, and then ketosis adds extra requirements (maybe; so it seems).  Standard daily requirement for potassium is either 3.6 grams or 4.7, depending on the reference you use.  Surely no one is getting anywhere near that from a typical diet; on the high side that's eating a dozen bananas.  No need to go too far with details here but it's clear from several experiences that if you ingest a lot of sodium and potassium at one time that will have a laxative effect, not only the magnesium input, which is better known.  It's counterintuitive that your digestive system would contain enough for a laxative to work 2 or 3 days after eating, but it does, I guess an odd mix of bile, stomach acid, and whatever other digestive fluids.

It seemed like I ingested more salts than I tolerated well in the middle of that week, and couldn't get back to an equilibrium.  I had been drinking tisanes in the evenings the first couple of days, and adding quite a bit of extra water intake may have made a difference.  I drank plenty of plain water with the salt water, again not measuring total daily intake though, but at some point it seemed to not balance, and I developed an aversion to the taste of it, beyond it normally seeming gross.

Shifting to attempt 7 days made a lot more difference than I expected.  Mentally it seemed a lot harder; days 2 or 3 just weren't that close to it all coming to an end, not halfway through yet.  Fasting for one whole work-week is a lot.  It was much easier doing Thursday and Friday before, then during a weekend, with the first day not impacted at all.  Hunger wasn't an issue, and energy level and mental clarity really weren't problematic either, so it wasn't really so bad for work output disruption, but it adds a limited extra degree of mental stress.

Related to the electrolytes the first and last day of a fast matter less, because you carry over a decent balance on day 1, and plan to get that from food in a meal at the end of the day the last, so for a 5 day span it needs to balance well for only 3 days.  I suppose that's why I probably had moved from the lower side of that recommended range to their recommended middle, to not accidentally fall behind (that was their lower limit threshold; I mean before I stayed in the "minimal" range).  I had ran a couple of times during the last fast, which would reduce salts in your body a lot, along with the hotter weather then drawing them out.

I wanted to have the experience of a longer fast version, a week, as a reference for the broader understanding of the process, but I might just stick to 5 days and call it good, probably not trying it again until next year anyway.

Potential fasting health benefits; normalizing fasting practice

 

The last post about fasting experience settled in on "why?," never fully resolving that, and I'll only repeat that theme a bit here, extending it to two different directions.

The main answer in the past has been "to experiment."  Of course most people fast to lose weight, but my own body weight seems strongly inclined to return to the previous level (about 74 kg or 165 pounds), and since that's reasonable I don't try to adjust that.  Maybe I should shift back to more like 71 kg / 160, and will at some point.

After 20 days of experience of not eating that initial experimentation phase is kind of done; so what's next?  Any answer would relate to potential or expected health benefits, so lets summarize that, after placing why I'm trying to communicate this.

I would like to share these ideas to make the option to practice fasting open to more people.  I don't need to validate what I'm doing, to get others to join in so it makes it seem like it really does make sense.  For the most part I don't care what other people do, or think.  Related to helping other people I make an exception, and then if I can I do.  So I guess all this is a claim that I buy into the health benefits?  I'm a bit skeptical, but otherwise I do.

On to potential benefits.

Fasting may enable metabolic flexibility.  This would allow someone to use body fat energy more effectively, which could apply well to exercise, not just to not eating, although I guess also to being able to skip lunch.  I do seem to experience improved energy level on longer runs.  

I last tested out running four miles on day 4 of a fast, so completely into ketosis, with glycogen reserves long since expended, and that went ok.  I was experiencing minor knee soreness (so probably shouldn't have even ran that), so I didn't try out a longer test.

Fasting reduces insulin resistance:  This actually seems to work; it seems more clearly documented as an actual positive effect.  For people at risk of developing adult onset diabetes--which is a significant risk for me; both of my grandmothers and one uncle developed that--they can reduce that risk through fasting, moderating body weight, and reducing high levels of intake of carbohydrates, especially refined sugars. 

There's nothing necessarily dangerous about all refined sugar intake, per my understanding (which is not necessarily well-informed), it's that it's easy to bump that to very high levels, and then actual risk does come up.  Drinking 32 ounces of soda relates to about 100 grams of sugar consumption, at around 336 calories, or one sixth of a normal day's dietary caloric intake.  That's like eating 6 1/2 apples; which would take longer to digest for all that fiber, even if you could eat that many.  Risk also relates to that being empty of any other nutrient content, to that potentially adding to a positive caloric balance (more taken in than used), and to problems with your body handling the related blood sugar.  Conversion to body fat can occur, and some other negative side effects, and to developed insulin resistance.  

It's probably better to moderate body weight and mind dietary inputs than to use fasting to offset impacts of being overweight and eating a bad diet.  Or doing both is an option.  Maintaining significant muscle mass also helps (not like bodybuilders, I mean average or more than average), for different reasons, especially since muscle tissue stores glycogen (reserve energy), but I don't want to write out too many tangents in this.

Fasting may reduce visceral body fat.  There are tests for this sort of thing, so I could be documenting this (my actual proportion of body fat by location), but I'm not.  The idea is that fat in or between organs is used first when fasting, and that first change is not at all just a cosmetic concern.  Liver function should improve as a direct result of regular fasting, if fat deposits in the liver were an issue to begin with.  How often is that relevant though?  Who knows.  Blood compound markers would show that, but I'm not minding those, and missed my last annual health check at work due to being out of the country then.  

I can add that I've put on about 3 kgs (6 1/2 pounds) over the last two years and my waist size was a little larger a year ago, and then bumping running volume and perhaps fasting dropped it back to where it had been.  Thinking it through storing visceral fat in the form of what is in between internal organs may or may not be a bad thing, but it seems clearer that storing fat within your liver is a problem.

More mental clarity, reduced aging effects:  hard to say about these kinds of changes.  I feel ok, probably a little clearer, but that's hard to track.  Maybe I do have slightly less grey hair than a year ago, which is odd.  I can even sometimes see eyebrow hair change from white to brown again, since those being two colors stands out more--hard to place that.  I've been running more since then too, really keeping up with sleep, exercising a lot more, and my diet has improved a bit.  

And I've ramped up intake of goji berries as a daily supplement; that might've helped.  I finished a kg I bought in mid-June recently, so I seem to be consuming 350 grams or so per month, just over 10 grams a day, a good bit.  Why?  My thinking was that I try to eat a lot of fruit but don't get to that every day, and I definitely can put 10 grams or so of dried berries in hot water and then consume the infusion and fruit, every day, regardless of what I happen to be eating that day.  Supposedly one compound in those offsets aging impact, but even if it's the nutrients in them that are healthy instead that also works.

Fasting may offset cancer

This is a big one, and this tangent runs longer than I intended, since I've been reviewing this subject a good bit lately, just not necessarily in a focused form.  

I have no idea if fasting does really offset cancer risk or assist with resolution, but many, many sources claim that both do occur.  I can't sort out which potential claims work or don't work, or when and how they apply.  From catching a bit of cancer experience related Youtube content--which I'll say more about here--cancer cells do consume a lot of blood sugar, so that a main way of tracking growth of such tissue is to just monitor where the most is being consumed in the body (after you ingest some radioactive sugar; kind of a strange process).  I'm not really caught up on what my cells are using for an energy source right now (it's day 2 of a fast, as I write the first draft, long before posting this), but of course my carbohydrate intake is over, for now.  I'll probably be "in ketosis" later today, whatever that means.  

Autophagy is said to occur during fasting (and it really does, but exactly what that means is harder to pin down).  At a minimum your body consumes internal body fat (of course; how else could you stay alive, since only using muscle tissue as an energy source would make less sense), and it may recycle all sorts of damaged cells.  It's a complicated subject though, one that's hard to sort out.

Someone could easily turn up a lot of content saying that fasting really does offset cancer risk (this is an interesting example), or support treatment / resolution, but how good any of those sources are would be hard to settle.  Cancer isn't just one thing, and experiences would vary, and a topic like that naturally relates to a lot of people repeating what they want to be true, filtering their own reference source input.  A lot of light medical advice looks more solid than it might really be, and a source citing other sources isn't clearly well-grounded until you also evaluate those.  That linked video reference cites a lot of research background, but even for those kinds of sources you need to be careful; you might read only about studies supporting some claim, when conclusions from other studies also reject that connection.

Those cancer related accounts come from running across a Youtube channel about someone experiencing cancer, Paul in Perth, and then the Youtube algorithm showing me plenty more of that since that's how it works.  If you watch one channel about puppies, even if you're not subscribed to it, you'll see lots more of that in your feed there.  It can be a little depressing, watching people talk about dying, but for the most part those stories are about being hopeful and positive when things are dark for them.  To me those people tend to be more inspiring than any other accounts of any subjects.

In a comment I asked Paul in Perth if he could use fasting for cancer resolution and he said that it could have potentially helped at an earlier stage, but for his disease being so far progressed negative effects related to recovery from chemo treatments made it relatively unsuitable (per his understanding, related to his own condition and type of cancer).  

I just saw a video of a guy literally at the end, Daryl, saying that he was signing off since he would die within a day or two, and he was much more positive and upbeat than almost any movie review content.  He showed a box / urn he picked out, shook it, and said "this is light; I guess I'm not in there yet."  A 16 year old girl, who goes by So Fia, ended a long series of posts about her struggle focused entirely on the positive, about her love of life, and appreciation for what she had.  She was so much stronger, braver, and more wise than any other "healthy" influencer type I've ever seen.  The main message is usually one of hope and optimism, about appreciation for life, not fear of death.

None of this related to fasting, to be clear.  None of them even tried it out as a form of partial resolution, although there surely are videos out there about people who did feel fasting helped them, which again would be hard to evaluate, or people trying it and not noticing any positive difference.  

Should those people have tried it out?  I have no idea.  According to health claims within "fasting circles" of course they should have, but personally I can't place that.  There is no clear cause and effect for why they developed cancer, or why others experienced miracle recoveries that they did not, some related to fasting and many more not (the first guy I mentioned a video channel for is still alive; the other two are not).  

In many cases people link cancer experience to high carbohydrate diets (back to hearsay input from cancer patients, to be clear).  Discussion of treatment experimentation comes up more related to keto-oriented diets (more than fasting, I suppose, at least per limited and random sampling).  That's not intended as a claim that generality or that resolution practice is effective, I'm referencing their understanding.  In looking up those video links this content creator thinks his cancer stemmed from a vitamin D deficiency, oxidative stress (from multiple inputs), from alcohol exposure, and a high carbohydrate diet.  Who knows; maybe those were the main causes, surely along with genetics.  

I've skipped including links to people claiming fasting helped them resolve cancer experiences here; even a post focused on that topic would be taking on a lot.  I'd also be careful of trusting what seem to be very well grounded but light information sources online linking fasting with cancer prevention or resolution, of which there are many.  It can seem that if one source might be valid or could be questionable that 10 taken together must be reliable, but many people make videos citing the same studies on mice that may or may not mean a lot related to actual human experience.  They might be generating that content with a slightly different spin mostly to draw viewership, without really turning up any new insights, or in some cases even without reviewing more grounded sources.

Why would I embrace fasting as a means to potentially offset a risk that's not necessarily high for me, when it's hard to clearly determine the linkage that it even works (beyond a lot of claims floating around)?  One partial answer is that I'm discussing potential reduced risk of dying, at a cost of not eating sometimes.  I've spent roughly 20 days fasting over the past year (25, after editing this; I just finished another 5 day fast), and the main cost or impact was increased hunger and reduced clarity and energy level over that time.  All of that was much more moderate in the last fast, and hunger is much more of a non-issue this time too.  People actually claim that fasting improves mental clarity, but what I mean here is that energy level fluctuations have an impact, especially in the first 3 or 4 trials.

Another partial answer is that reduced cancer risk isn't really the main benefit people associate with fasting, beyond weight loss, and it's not necessarily a main reason I'm doing it.  Supposedly--as mentioned--it offsets effects of aging, increases mental clarity (when it's not offsetting it), reduces visceral fat levels and impact, and offsets risks from insulin resistance, lowering risk of diabetes.  Autophagy is another subject I won't really get into here, closely linked to potentially reduced cancer risk, which I've covered more in the past.

Why wouldn't people fast then?  There seems to be a lot of potential benefit, and most people could use to lose a few pounds.  Let's address that separately.  

Why not fast?  Normalizing fasting practice.

In discussing that in a health related thread someone commented "that sounds like complete torture."  There's that; hunger experience is profound over the first few trials.  It's so negative that exposure to a consistent problematic condition like that works as a mindfulness tool, a way of experiencing the present moment differently.

In light of that it would be natural for people not to fast if they aren't sold on any of these benefits, if they have no clear reason to.  I'm only going to mention it to set it aside here but it's hard to be certain any of these claims completely work.  What someone considers good evidence would shift what any individual review would turn up.  If it's only to find documented research of multiple independent findings then maybe that would be possible, but you would still need to interpret what a number of narrow studies really mean in actual practice.

If finding a couple of dozen "health expert" claims and personal experience accounts is enough then that would be an easy bar to clear.  I'm a bit skeptical by nature, so I tend to arrive at probabilities related to what I think is accurate, not necessarily even trying to sort out the final facts of the matter.

Some people might actually regard fasting as posing health risks, although anyone unfamiliar with the subject also couldn't be clear on what those are.  Vitamin deficiency, stomach problems?  The second is mentioned more, when you tell people you practice fasting (per my experience, at least).  

Oddly people who eat continuously throughout the day would actually routinely experience stomach problems, and I never do, because I eat moderate amounts of foods almost entirely as three meals.  That was true before I tried out fasting too though.  I'm unfamiliar with what it's like to regularly experience an upset stomach, constipation, diarrhea, bloating, or any problems with digesting food.  By "regularly" I mean that I might eat something that speeds up my digestion process once a year, or every other year, or that makes me even sicker every half dozen years.  That's not bad for eating a broad mix of local foods in Bangkok.  The rest I essentially never experience.  Some vegetables, legumes and beans, or high protein foods cause gas; that range of experience is familiar, especially as a former long-term vegetarian.

Fasting hasn't caused me any noticeable stomach problems, in those 25 days.  I get hungry, but not like during the first three trials.  That relates more to an empty feeling than other types of discomfort.  Really empty; it's hard to describe.  As of writing an initial draft of this, on day 2 of 5, I could go for most of an hour without being reminded that I am fasting, and the next day maybe even longer, but that's not to say that I felt no negative side effects.  I was hungry, with a low energy level, but I might not notice either for awhile if I'm busy, or even watching a video.

In bodybuilding circles rapid fat loss is very desirable, but muscle tissue loss is a serious concern, so fasting can be applied, but only in limited forms and contexts.  One of the main intros to this subject, that partly led me to explore fasting practices, was from one longevity related "biohacker" bringing it up, and one bodybuilder (Leo and Longevity and "Vigorous Steve," who isn't as far out there as his Youtuber brand name implies, but a little maybe).  

Steve used fasting to rapidly resolve fatty liver disease, even though applying a fasting mimicking diet for weeks cost him plenty of muscle mass loss.  Most of that muscle came back fast, and it seemed the very real health risk caused him to reconsider even trying to be as massive again (the 250 pound or up range, I think).  Leo explored fasting as he did many longevity related pursuits.  Steve feels absolutely certain that fasting does definitely reduce visceral body fat, from experiencing that, and perhaps Leo's direct experiential claims are harder to evaluate.

Most people in a Reddit fasting sub-forum I follow practice fasting mainly to lose weight, which makes sense.  It's a somewhat radical approach, but it should work.  Often people either struggle to make it through 24 hours there or else really swing for the fence and go straight to attempting 21 day fasts, which I see as unnecessarily difficult and risky.  With more exposure people seem to settle on alternating fasting and eating, on a 2 or 3 day cycle, which they might refer to as "rolling 72s," the hour duration.  Since the benefit of autophagy is said to "kick in" after 2 days I would think using a 3 day cycle might be better than 2.  Or 4 would work; for me the second day is hardest in terms of hunger and the third is most disruptive for experienced energy level.  

Few people would be familiar with how fasting isn't as unpleasant an experience after repeated exposure.  I can compare it to how running can definitely seem distinctly unpleasant prior to more exposure than most people would ever experience, and then it's kind of pleasant, even addictive.  I think fasting ends up being more neutral, not so difficult, and definitely not pleasant, but just normal over time.  

Maybe level of discomfort can be comparable to when you get 5 or 6 hours sleep instead of 8 (which I don't do; I need my sleep, and I put my time in with sleep deprivation working night shifts when younger and raising young kids after that).  For many people that's a normal trade-off, a way to go through life, so that eventually they wouldn't even notice feeling a bit hazy and off, after their body adjusts to it.  At this point I'd much rather not eat for a day or two than try to function on 5 hours sleep.

My take on fasting benefits

I've really not been clear on how many benefits I buy into here, or which I seem to directly experience.  That only works so well because the largest scale benefits you can't pin down, like reducing cancer or diabetes risk.  Maybe I'm mentally clearer, but that's really hard to track too.  So many things factor into that.  My experience of digestion can't improve because I've never had problems, but it hasn't worsened.  

Resetting my diet to a somewhat healthier form has definitely happened, but oddly I was eating a really healthy diet a year ago, before a first trial.  There were a few snacks to shift to a healthier form, and I could've dialed in generally healthy food intake to a level that may be a bit extreme, and did so.  I think all of that has supported taking my running habit a lot further over the past year, but again inputs and outcomes are complicated.  I know that I've ran between 15 and 20 miles a week for all this year, but I can't trace that directly back to diet improvement; maybe I could've did the same eating worse instead of better.  I feel like it helped my energy level when running, the metabolic flexibility theme, but who knows.  

It's too bad I skipped my annual health check-up last year, due to being out of the country when my company conducts those, and probably will again this year; that would be a good way to track some change, potentially, and undergoing that is a good idea in general.

Fasting has changed how I experience an urge to snack between meals, which was always somewhat limited.  I had switched from eating a bit of chocolate--or potato chips, if they were around--to some mixed nuts between meals around a year ago, and after fasting I tend to snack as a habit even less.  Fasting highlights how much of that practice relates to immediate triggers, like seeing something, or to boredom, and it can become more normal to drop out both cycles.

In conclusion...

Fasting is an option?  But then it always was.  

I've taken up and set aside a lot of atypical practices over the course of my life, and it's interesting considering why others don't do those things, or when maybe more will, or I guess in some cases to what extent I'm making any sense at all.  I was a vegetarian for 17 years, which I ended about a dozen years ago, due to not putting the right effort in to get it to balance, and experiencing immune system problems.  Since then it has become a lot more mainstream.  

I was into rock climbing in the early 90s, and thought this is so cool it will have to "take off," not noticing that it being gear intensive and difficult would probably prevent that (and has).  I explored Buddhism for many years, but then I always knew that was for my own reasons, that there was never going to be broad uptake.  This being a tea blog of course that pattern applies to that beverage choice too.

Fasting will probably never really have its day as a broad trend, at least not in the immediate future.  People only need to skip breakfast and lunch to see why it's not a standard option; you get hungry.  That gets worse on day two, even if it's much diminished on a third or fourth fasting experience.  "Biohacking" is much more approachable; taking a lot of supplements and drugs.  I get it.  I'm not on that page myself but I get it.

I reset to a healthier diet but it's still based on normal food

Adapting to running in heat, related to training in Bangkok

my local running route, a track around the nearby Royal palace

I saw a text content post about how to approach running in heat recently, from a favorite Youtube video channel source, Believe in the Run, with that post here.  

Their advice was all pretty standard stuff, but definitely good advice, about running in clothing that wicks moisture well, wearing light colors, running in the morning or evening to miss the hottest time of day, wetting clothing or a hat (which makes all the difference for desert hiking), and even running in the rain.  Other points were perhaps less practical but still worth considering, like trying to run in the shade.  There's a sidewalk beside the running or biking track where I run and I do switch over sometimes if one part is better shaded, which varies based on direction of the sun.

that sidewalk under repair (left) has been mostly completed since

I've written status updates about my training, last about running longer distances in Honolulu a couple of months ago, bumping my local route from 7 km to 12.  Heat wasn't much of an issue there; it could get up to 88 F or so (31 C), but with generally lower humidity and an ever-present breeze even running in the mid-day sun felt fine.

From running in Bangkok I had some ideas to add to that Believe in the Run content I mentioned, commented there as follows:

I've been running in Bangkok, as hot and humid as anywhere, and a couple of extra points come to mind. You need to stay on top of electrolyte replacement, not just after a run, but as a supplement routine based on estimated extra demand. Heat can be treated as another conditioned tolerance, like running at altitude, so adding exposure to the hottest times can help, just in moderation, building up. Easing pace helps, but you condition to an amount of exposure, with distance and time going together. 

There's one unique feel to learn to recognize, the early stage of heat stroke. It's not unlike normal fatigue but not the same. Your energy level might not drop that much, and breathing speed up a little, but beyond those you can feel when it's enough. Running relaxed helps tolerance.

From seeing videos about this topic recently (it's the peak of the Northern latitudes summer) I've been considering the subject, which really hit home moving from Honolulu to Bangkok again a bit over a month ago.  For the first two weeks I was just re-acclimating to the heat, conditioning to be able to run here again, building up tolerance and distance.  To some extent that's ongoing; lots of days I'll quit after 4 miles (6 km), instead of running the usual 6+ miles / 10 km, if I'm out in mid-day and the heat is getting to me.

Of course for people tracking heart rate--which I don't do, even though that makes sense--there's a decent chance that heat stress would spike that, so it would be easy to see when the effect is kicking in.  I still think it would be best to monitor internal feel, since how you react to heat stress as an input seems to vary a good bit outing to outing.  Heart rate monitoring alone might not protect you, and noticing impact in other ways could help.

When I was younger I would hike in the desert in Utah on vacation when it would get up to 115 F (46 C); the rules and effect is different during hiking, when it's much easier to moderate intensity.  You could carry large bottles or jugs of water frozen, to drink cold water, and to carry a cool pack, I just didn't because I was camping on those outings, of course without bringing a freezer.  That Believe in the Run article mentioned that trick, that you can bring ice, and it can cool you through body contact through a pocket.

It's a lot more of a balancing act when running than when hiking.  Intuitively running slower would help, but it only helps so much, and you have to be acclimated for that to work in Bangkok heat and humidity.  It's a relatively cool and cloudy day outside now and it's 90 F, for example, 32 C, and if it happened to be sunny it would've been more like 35 C in mid-afternoon, on towards upper 90s.  Checking the next day it's now 86 F at 9 AM (30 C), with the daytime low above the 25 C (78 F) version of room temperature here, even though it's the rainy season, not hot out by local standards.

it is nice running that route at sunset, when it works out like that

my old Diamondhead loop (Honolulu) route at sunset; a bit nicer

I run when it fits my schedule, versus a cool time of the day, and it's odd how often that's at noon, on a lunch break.  I'm not a morning person so before work is out, and I can't run right after eating, so evening time gets limited by dinner plans.  When you have kids your schedule just isn't your own to dictate, period, and what everyone else is doing factors in.

So what else did I miss in that comment?  It's a bit of a false parallel comparing heat training to altitude conditioning, even though in part that works.  Extra red blood cells aren't going to help you, and there's a limit to your body acclimating to operate at a higher internal temperature.  "Running relaxed" is a funny subject theme, one I was just considering out on my last run.  You can shift how your body reacts to the experience with practice, slowing breathing pace and reducing internal tension, even without cutting pace.  

There wasn't that much "how to" in those comments.  It would help to not run "out and back" routes when time or distance exposure issues aren't clearly determined; it would seem odd to run half of an 8 mile route here and end up taking a taxi back.  I run two versions of local repeating long loops so it doesn't come up, here.

Replacing electrolytes becomes critical when it's hot; there's a lot more about levels and approach to get to.  That's familiar ground from dabbling in fasting over the past year, and something that I've just seen an interesting reference for in a Reddit running group post, here:

...some people have done some research to see what electrolytes the average person loses in sweat.  SaltStick claims:

"The average persons sweats a salt ratio of 220 Sodium to 63 Potassium to 16 Calcium to 8 Magnesium."

That's a ratio of:

Magnesium: 1x; Calcium: 2x; Potassium: 7.875x; Sodium: 27.5x

That goes on to compare a large number of electrolyte supplements, and I suppose many drink versions, based on those forms of replacement being universally accepted in running circles.  A Reddit fasting sub reference takes a different approach, and explains daily requirements and varying approaches for using other mineral replacement forms, for example using potassium based salt substitute mixed with water.  In fasting circles people focus only on replacing sodium, potassium, and magnesium, generally, but a friend once mentioned that calcium level falling out of balance with those others could be a problem.

To me it makes more sense to try to guess about extra demand and add that back into your diet gradually, day to day, than to try to immediately replace an estimate of exactly what a long run just expended.  I take magnesium and calcium as supplement pills, and use a potassium based salt replacement, at times drinking that and salt mixed into water, after longer outings.  Using that approach your electrolyte levels can stay a bit high, beyond that periodic dip, but as long as you drink plenty of water overshooting intake wouldn't be a problem, because your kidneys could keep removing the excess.  Staying very hydrated is critical anyway; I try to gradually restore water balance over each day as well, versus drinking a lot just before or during a run.  I do try to consider when I'm going to run and drink half a liter or so of extra water a half an hour before an outing, just to be on the safe side.  

Even though I'm often running 10 km (6 miles) in extreme heat and humidity I don't drink water while out; I hydrate before going out and drink immediately after.  That's about as far as I think that approach would work, under those conditions; for quite long runs drinking water while running would be necessary, and adding electrolyte supplements.  Per following running social media content, like that Youtube channel, lots of runners tend to love adding extra products and gear to their routines, varying drinks and energy gels, or more recently a "legionnaire's hat" for extra shade around your neck.  I'm definitely in the other group, not buying or collecting any extra stuff or using much for supplements.  I've developed a running shoe habit; that's about it.

another favorite running channel, Kofuzi's

missing my new addition and favorite pair; this includes my son and daughter's shoes

my favorite shoes, ACIS Novablast 3, but I really like the New Balance 1080 too

One important part of adapting to running in the heat is liking it.  If you absolutely hate the experience it would be natural to avoid it, and it all would never click.  Relaxing would be harder.  In discussing heat acclimation, in travel or expat threads, I often mention that a big part of adapting to heat, in general, is to keep experiencing it.  Living out all of your daily routine in cold air conditioning will then relate to struggling with the change when you go outside.  Going for a walk is perfect light contact, or working outside, or just being exposed to indoor natural temperatures.  It's crazy to me how so many of the aspects of daily life that we've dropped out seem relatively ideal for maintaining good body mobility, activities like hanging out laundry to dry.

It can help to reset AC temps higher, which would also save on a utility bill, setting that to 26 to 28 C here instead of 22 (closer to 80 than 70 F).  For many that would defeat the purpose; my wife (who is Thai) would much rather sleep at 22 C than 26 (closer to 70 than 80 F), and for her limiting cooling to 25 already is a compromise.

How would someone develop a love for being really hot, which is almost objectively a negative state of being?  I don't see it as so different than adjusting to the experience of running, which doesn't come naturally to most people.  You can walk first, then run slowly, and later even higher levels of exertion become pleasant, on some level, and then you crave it (in general, or maybe even when it's hot).  No one craves running in the mid 30s C / mid 90s F, in high humidity, when the early phase of heat stroke experience enters in before long, but it can normalize as an internal experience, more than it might seem possible.  

Just as that higher degree of exertion, just the running, feels unpleasant without acclimation if you never experience heat exposure in any positive context of course it's going to seem bad.  Outdoor childhood play can lead to acclimation early on, but it would be harder to identify with later on.  For the longest time my Thai family was happy that I didn't die on runs out on hot afternoons; it's also a cultural convention here in Bangkok that you should avoid the heat.  Only in a few cases did I experience hitting a wall on runs, experiencing part of what they were concerned about, significant physical distress.

where we live in Honolulu, from Diamondhead; lots of nice running routes

What fasting is like when it doesn't work out

 

Day one:

This is my fourth trial of fasting, moving on to a habit or accepted regular practice.  It made perfect sense to try it out as an experiment, but I could be clearer on what I expect from this.

It's not losing weight; I didn't weigh myself before or after the last five days, less than a month ago, but at a recent health check I'm 1 kg over my normal weight last year, up to 75 (165 pounds).  My blood pressure was up too, so general health isn't looking better, instead worse.  I've been running a lot lately and wonder if I'm not stressing my body a bit much, if recovery isn't a burden for it.  Of course I ran today, on the first day of the fast too, so it's not as if I'm acting on that as a concern.  

The theory behind that was from online discussion input that if you can burn up some available glycogen reserves on the first day that can speed up switching to ketosis, use of stored fat as energy (mostly that, at least; your body can use your own protein based tissue too, muscle, per my very limited understanding).  Supposedly even hunger might seem less an issue.  It is strange how I keep forgetting I'm fasting today, when in the past days 1 through 3 have always been rough.

There are a list of supposed, somewhat mysterious health benefits attributed to fasting (especially autophagy), and maybe it really is all that, the appeal of something wonderful being possible, just not clearly defined.  I'm also curious if the experience keeps changing, if it gets easier and easier, and some degree of benefit emerges with more exposure.  I may be slightly clearer mentally; something like that.  

I've been eating a continually healthier diet since I've started fasting some months ago, but it seems like the "diet reset" function is largely finished, that I'm as "switched over" in terms of clean diet as I'm probably going to get.  Most sugar and processed food is already out, and I eat a bit like those people who go on and on about it on social media, the streams of ultra healthy meal photos, I just don't mention it.

Day 2

Done already; I woke up in the night and couldn't go back to sleep, and felt an odd and disturbing sensation in my chest, and eventually called it.  I woke to drink water, with some extra electrolytes, but then over an hour later it wasn't resolving, so I ate a snack.

Maybe an electrolyte imbalance?  Seems most likely.  I was very careful about measuring out recommended amounts of sodium and potassium, and took a mid-level supplement range of magnesium, in pill form, in a multi-vitamin, and in a dissolving tablet, about 500 mg worth in total, but it still may have been that.

Two variable conditions came into play, which could've worked together.  I ran yesterday, thinking that it might help switch me over to ketosis to clear glycogen stores.  Since it was a short run (2.1 miles) I bumped intensity, to see how that would go, running that as 4 fast half-mile (800-900 meter) sections.  Of course that went badly; I don't train exactly like that, even though adding a fast 800 meter section at the end is normal for me.  Making a change in form might've been a bad idea.  I hadn't eaten for 15 hours or so at that point but I was expecting reserve energy level to hold over from the day before.  It kind of did, just not completely.

That step definitely seemed to help to smooth transition; I wasn't hungry at all yesterday, and an hour could go by without me thinking of being on a fast.  When I did walk by a snack food I'd often not notice, or the inclination to eat seemed muted.

A second variable was going to a health check-up a week or so ago and registering higher blood pressure than I've ever experienced (150 / 85).  I don't know why that happened.  My mother said that high blood pressure runs in our family, that she switched to experiencing it quite suddenly in middle age, in "spells," and there is probably a trigger I'm not clear on causing it.  

I've been increasing running distance, frequency, and intensity over the past 3 weeks, and that breaks a golden rule of running training, exceeding something like 10% weekly increase in any one or set of those.  That alone could be it, that my body is shocked by the change, experiencing higher recovery demands causing stress.  Or I suppose it's easy to see how working with a standard electrolyte supplementation input may not apply at all coupled with increasing running training.  

I checked total weekly running distance while editing this and I covered about 27 miles in a week, 43 km, when my past total never amounted to half that, at the same time I've been dropping pace down to around or under 6 min / km, around 9 1/2 minute miles, across run distances up to 10k.  Stopping eating without stopping running was foolish, even if it was the plan to take a couple days off for the fast.  It was surely too much recovery demand to put on my body even if all the running occurred just prior to the fast, with the last run in the first half day.

I'll move to Hawaii in two weeks so there's a lot that I wanted to get in (running, fasting, and of course packing), and compressing it together is probably not a good idea.  My kids are there now, and have been there, and I spent last Sept. and October there, so it's an odd staged move.  

I've "trained up" to a point where a lot of new running options are open to me, I'll just have to not rush to try too many at once.  I really should start tracking my heart rate, and just eating a good diet may not be enough, I may need to check into a few extra key supplements.  I switched over to running 6+ miles in distance back in Honolulu last year, including hills there, so it's not really sudden, but checking timing and pace recently probably caused me to increase that.

my longer running route there goes around this, Diamondhead

we live in that background shown there, with my heart and soul in the foreground

I want to distill this to what I take to be a lesson, to advice, but to be clear I'm no authority on any of it, and the main thing I would recommend is caution (so don't do what I do).  Fasting seems like it can be quite safe, interesting to experience, and probably healthy, but dialing in electrolyte supplementation, drinking enough water, and eliminating other variables seems helpful.  Going into it with concern over a health condition is probably always going to raise level of doubts, and with or without that activating a significant risk it could be quite uncomfortable.  Stepping up to longer time-frames seems much better, which I didn't do earlier, but then I pulled the plug on my first fasting trial after three days as a result.

Then there is an odd balance theme that comes up, how keeping busy enough to not focus on not eating seems critical, but being over-taxed by physical and mental demands won't work either.  Something like watching a movie can provide enough distraction, or cleaning the house.  I packed for the move yesterday, or started to, and I suppose it's conceivable that embracing the stress of wondering what I'm going to need, and what's going to happen, could've added mental burden.  During fasting would be a fantastic time to get out and experience a bit of nature, which luckily is all around me where I live now, even though I'm in Bangkok.

papaya in the yard; that squirrel just ate another one, long before it was ready

I don't feel bad about this test not working out.  Of course I'm more concerned about my general health; I keep saying that I'm going to moderate running intensity but I'm addicted.  Maybe I'll test how slowly I can run this evening, or taking a day off would make more sense.  [later edit:  of course I ran, and tried to keep it slow, but did drop below that 6 min / km pace on a light 4 mile run, which seems moderate because it's normal now].

More on electrolytes

It sounds like it should be simple to dial this part in, right?  There's an RDA for minerals like potassium and magnesium, and surely some normal range for sodium, and ingesting that should keep you in the clear.  One problem is that people claim you go through more of those in ketosis, and if you end up drinking a lot of water (which is recommended, to support different body function using different internal energy source), and add in exercise, then who knows what the actual suitable input level is.  

Let's take a look at what I'm working around, that Reddit fasting sub reference, cited in high level of detail here to talk around (but there is more to check out; the rest is worth a look):

So potassium deficiency can cause irregular heartbeat and low magnesium levels insomnia; sounds about right.  Fasting is no joke; I get it why people often recommend consulting a doctor before trying it, which of course I didn't do.  Then you would have the problem that if you talked to 10 different doctors you would probably hear a range of advice, from some seeing it as a great idea with low risk and others saying not to do it, with advice in the middle varying.

Checking RDA is pretty easy, since you just need to look at the back of a multivitamin bottle and multiply out the percentage value (in the US; the same approach could give slightly varying results elsewhere, but it would be similar).  Magnesium (on mine) lists 50 mg as 12%, so that's just over 400 mg per day.  Then it's a bit complicated sorting out bio-availability concerns and amount of a compound in a salt form.

I had read through all this, made simpler for taking a 300 mg magnesium supplement capsule that first morning.  As best I could I sorted out using a variation of what they referred to as "Lite Salt," filling a container of water full of the sodium and potassium mixture for a day (the "chloride" version of both; I had tried mixing baking soda as an input before, as they recommended in one place, but it's disgusting).  It should've been fine.  Maybe especially the magnesium input, since I ended up taking around 500 mg, versus that 300 - 400.  Mixing a day's worth in advance like seems best because you can not worry about tracking amounts, and can mix that solution with water or an herb tea as you like.

Adding running is a variable though; it has been cool out, for us, so level of demand seems to be not as much an input as when I'm running in the mid 90s F (mid 30s C), but I should've tried out a slow, easy run.  I was still undergoing muscle recovery from a run the day before too; it's hard to factor that in, but I guess that process may or may not also utilize electrolytes (why wouldn't it?).

Related to taking it easy, or not, I ran another "short" 4 mile / 6 km outing the evening after bailing the night before, and 10k the next day, and as I finish final editing I'm forcing myself to take a day off.

I discussed in a recent post how getting new running shoes is part of wanting to get out more

I think if people had to wait until conditions were perfect to try out fasting, or extend duration of trials, that they never would get to it.  Work is always going to enter in, or exercise, family demands, or other external stresses.  Some degree of moderation must be required though, which of course I didn't factor in.  Naps are perfect for adjusting energy level imbalances, more of an issue in early fasting trials, but that's not a standard practice most people could include, outside of during weekends.  Days 1 through 3 seem the hardest, so starting on a Saturday could include the first two then.

I was awake in the night some last night, not related to fasting, and it's obvious then that if I had been fasting I might see that as a potentially significant side effect, when really it just varies how long it takes to fall back to sleep.  A lot of it is psychological, that if you expect it all to go well and see minor issues as minor then it's not so bad, but with the opposite negative expectations little issues could add up.  I think that I really did screw it all up for not moderating exercise, as described, that it wasn't mostly about expectations this time.

5 days of fasting including exercise and tea drinking

 

I'm starting this post on day 2 to include some general context and current perspective, but I won't finish and post it until it's over.  That made citing a length of time in the working title strange; I included 6 days as a guess, but really I'll fast for at least 5 and maybe go as long as 7 if it seems comfortable.  Odd that I'd expect not eating for 5 days to a week to be agreeable and pleasant, right?  In retrospect, added in later, it was fine for the most part, light duty compared to two earlier trials, but I still stopped it after 5 days.

But it is much more moderate to experience this time; I'm hungry, and was on day 1 too, but it's nothing like those first two trials.  I think that's mostly because my expectation related to not eating has changed, not because my body is dealing with it better, although that could factor in.  I drank some tisane yesterday, blue pea / butterfly herb with stevia, but didn't notice it making any difference.  I was still hungry, and my stomach still rumbled a bit, especially related to drinking the salt mixture.  In a Reddit sub on fasting they recommend supplementing sodium (salt, or mixing that with baking soda), potassium (salt substitute works), and magnesium, which I ingest as a dissolvable tablet supplement.  Food grade epsom salt can be used for magnesium, but they say it has laxative properties, and I didn't see that handy at a local grocery store or pharmacy.

these are from a vine growing at the house, so all very fresh

That brings up the theme of conventional wisdom of drinking only water, versus supplementing minerals, versus taking that next step, including tea and tisanes, or coffee, lemon or lime along with water, or whatever else.  It's commonly expressed that you can drink only water for a day or two, no problem, but that it adds potential impact, or even risk, if you go longer without electrolyte input, of course with individual experiences varying a lot.  

On my first trial I didn't supplement those minerals (salts, really), beyond taking a multivitamin, then part-way through sorted out that levels included weren't even close to sufficient.  I could've kept on with a trial anyway, but felt what I perceived to be an irregular heartbeat at about 3 days in, and stopped the fast.  Maybe it was just something I imagined; it's easy to let concerns about that kind of thing get to you, and minor sleep disruption when changing diet so drastically is probably normal, so it's easy to be up in the night wondering how ok you feel.  

The mineral supplement step serves two purposes then:  offsetting risk of muscle function disruption (and your heart is a muscle), and adding peace of mind.  Dialing in supplementation takes some doing, and I think everyone would experience laxative effect from rushing ingestion at some point in trials, or maybe even sporadically later.  It helps having an empty digestive system, but not as completely as one would expect.

I'm not sure that any perspective on pros and cons of adding coffee, tea, tisanes, and whatever else emerges from checking out that sub's discussions, or watching popular content Youtube videos about fasting (many of which are not so great, clearly just content producers passing on bits they've heard, as this writing also conveys).  

As I see it a main concern is if autophagy is offset or decreased by ingesting anything.  That's a body process of recycling damaged or atypical cells in your body when you don't eat, one supposed benefit and goal of fasting over a couple of days worth of time, which supposedly extends to reducing cancer risk (more on that here).  I didn't mean if you eat anything with caloric value; you just aren't fasting if you consume calories.  Exercise is also said to initiate autophagy, but beyond that inputs and related conditions aren't clear.  Supposedly it occurs after a couple of days of not eating, and I have no idea how ingesting coffee, tea, or tisanes factors in.  

Then there is concern people bring up that even artificial sweeteners, or stevia, can trigger digestive or energy processing internal processes that aren't ideal (insulin release, I guess), tricking your body into thinking you just ate sugar, when you didn't.  This trial is about passing on experiential account related to that, but of course I can't track my digestive system changes, or insulin production, and I am not measuring blood glucose levels.

I drank blue pea tisane yesterday (day 1), and both Shui Xian roasted oolong and Jing Mai sheng pu'er today, more inclined to crave any beverage input since I'm not eating.  I felt the usual caffeine withdrawal headache yesterday, and energy loss, but I feel pretty normal today (at time of writing the initial draft, on day 2).  Compared to the first two trials hunger is a non-issue, but again my guess is that's from acclimation to the idea of not eating.  There are still snacks on the table I'm sitting at, tons of them, cashew butter cookies, digestive biscuits, dried strawberries and mango, and strange snacks my mother-in-law eats that I don't, odd crackers and dried pork snacks, but I'm not fixated on eating it.  As you walk around and see things it might be normal to think a snack sounds good, and of course I'm more prone to that now, but beyond an odd emptiness and baseline of moderate, limited hunger I feel normal.

I plan to run tomorrow; that'll be new.  I felt like doing it today but I just ran the most I have yet in a week, four 8 km intermediate pace runs, and my legs are too blasted, on a second rest day after all that.  I ran the last 3 of those outings slightly sore, which is why it sounds good to me anyway, because it's normal now.  But there's no rush, so I should acclimate to the fast and take an extra rest day to be on the safe side.  Maybe because it's crazy cold out now for Bangkok, down to 20 C / 68 F at night, I'll try to run in the morning tomorrow, but I'm not a morning person, so I tend to not feel like that at 7 AM.

Day 3

Sleep could've went better but otherwise all goes well, and even for that I just woke up and slept again a few times.  Drinking water helped me sleep again; I may not be drinking enough.  I'm still hungry today but nothing like the first three days both other times.  Today I tried exercise for the first time, a 4 km / 2 1/2 mile run, and that felt pretty normal, not unusual.

For tea I drank shu pu'er as a breakfast, of sorts, and am trying out a Thai sheng in the afternoon.  Shu really settled my stomach, and the sheng isn't as smooth, but writing about Thai teas had me craving it.  Sticking mostly to shu and Wuyi Yancha (roasted oolongs) might make sense.  I thought chrysanthemum would be ideal for fasting but haven't tried it out yet.  A sheng version yesterday didn't bother my empty stomach at all, and that one today did, a little, maybe for being younger, not softening in character with as much age (bitterness and astringency).

that Chawang Shop Jinggu pu'er reviewed here; much better after a year of settling

what that looks like brewed (comparison tasting)

Day 4

Mixed results today; again sleep wasn't so great, but my energy level was good today, and right on cue hunger almost dropped out.  That's relatively speaking; the idea of eating is there in the background, but the feeling of hunger and repetition of thinking of food wasn't.  I walked about 3 km / 2 miles doing an errand today, and felt fine.  Later on, around 7 PM, I really crashed, not just feeling low energy, but feeling not ok, and slept if off for 45 minutes.  I don't know why; maybe related to drinking electrolyte mix too fast, or a stevia sweetened chrysanthemum and rosemary blend.  On day 1 I drank a tisane with stevia and nothing negative came of that, but I was probably still settling into ketosis.

I'll end this fast in the evening tomorrow, at 5 days, because two papaya grown at the house and a bunch of bananas are ripe, and it's enough, it'll be good to eat again.  I may run tomorrow, to finish testing out that input.

my nemesis; he figured out plastic bags were covering some because they were almost ripe

Day 5

I think I'm getting something slightly wrong with electrolytes; my energy level isn't great, or clarity, and my calf muscles feel a little odd.  Probably that's too little intake instead of too much, so bumping it just a little could resolve it.  All the same I'll probably drop the running idea, and leave that at one trial for this fast.

Later, after ending the fast

Looking back on that calf muscle thing I think I was just sore, that I had ran one day and walked some the next and I wasn't recovering as I normally do, probably because I was days into not eating.  Fasting is like that though, at least early on, you have to wonder if every minor sign isn't related to it, and wonder if it's not more serious than it seems.  My wife's last advice was to just not cause myself to have a heart attack, and that's it, probably not eating for a week (on some appropriate electrolytes) isn't very dangerous, but it makes you wonder, because you can't be sure.

On the other side of that not eating for a few days seems like something any animal or person could be built to deal with.  It's a little rough psychologically, but physically it should be ok.  For people with health problems of course doctor input would be required, and it wouldn't be good to find out about health problems you don't know about while not eating.

This time was by far the easiest of three attempts, the last two of which both lasted 5 days (minus a couple hours; I went dinner on Saturday to dinner on Thursday, and drank some milk after dinner on Saturday, so that it wouldn't spoil over the fast).  But then I did experience an unusual crash on day 4, and day 5 wasn't as easy as the first half of day 4.  On the last day I went out to run an errand and went grocery shopping; that's not so easy.  I smelled prepared foods, and walked by stalls selling plenty of it.  It was still just normal but it brought me back to the earlier days' experience of hunger.

What about lessons learned?

-it gets easier every time:  that's been covered here.  Mental clarity and energy level were much better this time, and by day 5 I stopped thinking about food, until I went grocery shopping, and that didn't help.  I just saw someone mentioning how the difficulty, overcoming that bit of adversity (hunger) is something they see as a benefit, so I guess for some it's as well that's it's not too easy.

-running can be fine:  it's no problem, but it's at least possible that recovery time is slowed.  My guess is that at least the running experience you could keep extending as you acclimate, but I am concerned about recovery.  To be clear on context I'm 54, and I run a bit harder than really makes sense, pushing pace to close to my limit at the end of a lot of runs, which may or may not be a good practice.  Conventional wisdom in running circles is that you shouldn't do that, that running slowly 80% of the time builds a base and speeds recovery time, and works better.  I couldn't run every day given that context, but I'm not trying to log 50 mile weeks to work up to a marathon, it's just limited exercise.

[Final edit]:  I did feel very minor leg cramping, even after eating in the evening of the last fast day, leading me to think it was an electrolyte issue, but then I'm also sore, and have recovered a lot from that throughout that one day.  I think the issue was that I didn't recover well from a light run and walking two days after, so for me every other day runs while fasting would probably go badly, no matter how short or light.  I like the idea of running on stored fat energy too; maybe I could try it early, even on day 1, to move on to ketosis, and then be ready to run again by day 4.

-tea doesn't seem to change a lot, one way or the other.  It's nice drinking something familiar, retaining part of an eating experience, and still necessary to consider drinking it on an empty stomach.  The second time I drank sheng I felt that, in a bad way.  I had one mug of roasted oolong this last day but got caught up in trying to down a good bit of salt water, the electrolytes, and extra water, to avoid dehydration risk, so I'm cold brewing the second potential infusion from those leaves in the refrigerator to drink again tomorrow.  Shu pu'er felt the most comfortable; no surprise there.

-tisanes might not have any effect, and stevia seemed not to.  But then I don't know; once I drank a tisane, stevia, and electrolytes in a relatively short period and felt that crash then.  One part I didn't mention is that mixing the blue pea tisane with the salt (electrolyte) water made it quite palatable; it might be possible to experiment with a best-results saltwater cover tisane flavor.  If some of that disgusting salt water tasted more like a Gatorade that would be great, and there's no reason why fruit range couldn't help with that, even without calories.  It would work to peel the outside of an entire orange (the zest) using a fruit peeler, dry that, and then brew a whole orange's worth of outer peel later while fasting to make up an orange flavored Gatorade version.

The odd part is that I don't know if any health benefits are being realized.  I didn't weigh myself before, during, or after, but I doubt I've changed weight at all, or if I did feeling more like eating for a few days will restore it.  I see it as a chance to reset diet, but my normal diet is fine, unusually healthy.  It's just one more thing to experiment with for me, I guess, and somehow it does seem to help with energy level while running, maybe because my body can switch over to an alternate energy source easier with that extra acclimation.

Another odd part is that I like the idea of an exercise in willpower, living with somewhat significant and constant discomfort for some days.  It's only terrible if you think it is, but still there's an underlying and constant pressure.  It makes it easier to notice what you are eating continually afterwards, to see it as an energy source and health input in addition to an urge response.  It might pair well with some kind of intuitive eating approach, something I took up decades ago, but that's another long story for another day.