Drastic Times

 From my scant blogging over the past year, I’ve managed to talk about my struggles with getting healthy. In the past few months, I hit a major setback with what seems to be the very natural but sometimes devastating signs of perimenopause. The more severe and frequent parts being hot flashes, increased bouts of chronic and localized pain and mood swings. Diet and exercise have been difficult to adjust and I ended up putting back on the weight I struggled to lose over two years plus about ten pounds. Despite circuit training and tracking diet (both calories and macros). I tried fasting for longer intervals, both two weekly 36 hour fasts and the infrequent three day fasts. Fasting helps the chronic issues a lot but I haven’t gotten any weight loss breakthroughs. And really, most fasting blogs and advice are coming from young healthy men (and rarely women) so their advice is rarely reflective of what I, a middle aged obese woman with questionable health obstacles, can actually expect to experience or safely do. 

However, I worked up to my current situation and know how to read my body. Early on in the fast, I consumed tea and black coffee but that seemed to cause more problems that it fixed so the last two days have been water and slowly sipping high sodium broth because I don’t want to have a fragile infant’s digestive system after this. Therefore, supplementing a proper level of electrolytes has been key. I take potassium and magnesium in capsule form in the morning with a lot of water then save a probiotic and high sodium broth for the night. Sometimes I do need to take Pepto Bismol, omeprazole or famotidine at night to ease my stomach for sleep but I have not experienced insomnia (and have slept pretty great throughout). It’s really important that if your prolonged fasts are not supervised to take into consideration how your medications will affect you and to never think fasting will be more beneficial by eliminating medication or electrolytes. These do not make fasting results more effective and can cause chronic health issues or worsen current ones if you buy into ‘clean’ fasting bullshit. The same extreme diet and exercise you could get away with as a healthy 20 year old could kill you later. A safe and intuitive fast beats a ‘clean’ fast any day. Also, be advised that you may benefit more from a fasting-mimicking diet, which is often the ‘extremities’ that diabetics are put on. Personally, I do better cutting out solid foods and calorie worries altogether and just use electrolytes as my safety net.

I might have forgotten to mention I am reaching the last 10% of a five day fast. You may have heard you’ll get mental clarity and focus and energy, which I haven’t gotten outside of the second and third days and never for long. I also have inattentive ADHD so hyperfocus and no focus at all are the only two settings I normally have and wouldn’t know what ‘increased focus’ actually means for someone like me. Since the pandemic and moving, I haven’t been medicated for it but outside of working, I don’t need it and I’d rather reserve going back on stimulants for when I’m able to work again. So I can’t attest to whether focus or clarity is actually a positive of fasting because I didn’t really experience anything like that. Just like taking Adderal tends to give the average person meth-like powers of cleaning and laser focus, it really just slows me down so I can socialize and react a bit more controllably.

The worst part can be the hunger pangs (which also never quite went away for me but only ever dulled) and the almost hallucinogenic obsession with food. I can smell it and nearly taste it with enhanced memory and I get insane inspiration for recipes that just dance in my head with powerful clarity. And despite the fact that food obsession is almost torturous while fasting, I record or plan how I will eat afterwards, which actually reduces the risk of overfeeding or outright bingeing. But since I’m a soul cooker, I don’t actually have set recipes; I season to taste and experience so I can definitely list off what I use but can’t guarantee you will balance it the way I do. 

The other negative for me is that anything I ingest outside of the supplements and water can turn into a nasty shart later. Not in my clothes because the Bucket List movie’s ‘never trust a fart’ is so true but having to run to the bathroom for a weak coffee colored wet fart is annoying so that’s why I end up ditching the coffee and tea beyond the second day. However, the supplements are useless without sodium and plain salt water is awful so the high sodium broth is a necessity. I just have to be mindful to either dilute it a lot or sip it very slowly between lots of water or I’ll be hitting the toilet.

This is where I have to assert; these small spurts aren’t dangerous, but take them as yellow flags to discontinue. Because of the dark coloring, it was an obvious symbol of tea and coffee being the culprit. However if you expel a full bout of loose stool or outright water, start eating a small amount of food and break the fast gently and immediately. Even taking electrolytes, frequent urination or an expulsion of diarrhea are immediate signs you’re losing way too many electrolytes and need proper nutrients now. Don’t wait this out or try to bear through it or you can end up heading to the emergency room.

That shouldn’t scare you but it needs to be a proper warning. Don’t feel guilty if you need to end a fast you haven’t tried before or aren’t prepared for yet. I’ve had setbacks but I give myself proper healing time then try again.

I should note that because I’ve had so many weight loss setbacks that this 5 day fast has no weight loss goals attached in the least. I’m not even going to weigh for that reason. This is because I’ve experienced autophagy (pronounced aw-TAW-fuh-jee) benefits for pain and inflammation on previous three day fasts and I’ve since read about extending autophagy and am really hoping it can balance my hormones and reduce pain to make my diet and exercise routines (which are more than sufficient otherwise) more effective.

Which brings me to the benefits that make me fight the worst and keep going. Hot flashes, gone. You actually get cold easier while fasting (that much is actually true) so I’ve done something I haven’t been able to do all summer: turn the AC off for hours at a time. I would love to be able to enjoy this along with energy in the future but this is huge for now. Secondly, HUGE reduction in chronic and localized pain. I have both fibromyalgia and touch and go issues with hips, ankle and toes and all of those have been significantly dulled over the course of fasting. Although lethargy and brain fog have not been so magically affected, I’ll take those two things alone and embrace them as evidence enough.

I do advise you research autophagy. There have been proven studies for its effectiveness in slowing and even reversing some aspects of aging, preventing and even treating cancer (again, if you have cancer, this is something you’ll want to okay with your doctor still), cell regeneration and renewal as well as disposal of old and ineffective cells, and even healing old aches and wounds that therapy and medication haven’t quite helped. Even the revised version of how it works can be quite lengthy, so I’ll pique your curiosity to begin with that. It starts with what to expect in fasting stages (anabolic, catabolic, fat burning, ketosis and deep ketosis) and those will often coincide with how to activate autophagy and what the results can be with extended fasting. What I have read on autophagy during five day fasting has intrigued me. I initially intended to do at least four days but since I am still feeling okay decided to go for five. 3 days can go a really long way with digestion and immunity but you’ll start to involve increased stem cell production and musculoskeletal repair if you keep it going. It’s really interesting how your body starts to assign different jobs when digestion isn’t demanding so much energy and your body becomes more efficient at using what is left. And at the same time, your hunger hormones will still keep screaming at you about attaining food so you don’t just give up and starve. This is largely why I don’t seek to ignore or suppress the desire for food. That is not something you ever want to lose. Instead, rein in on how you can use food thoughts efficiently later. If it’s really becoming too much on your willpower, you may want to do something a little physically exhausting (but not to the point of dizziness or fainting) to sleep off some of the fasting period. 

I absolutely intend on sleeping off the last eight hours. Ten o’clock tonight is bedtime and by 6 AM I’ll have conquered this five day journey. I truly hope I’ve achieved the level of autophagy I need to knock through some health issues but if nothing else, I never lose hope and I never stop trying.

I would love to reach more people on the reality of obesity and personal struggle, to stop people from assuming obesity means a lack of effort or laziness or pretending it’s concern to shame or belittle people or even shower them with good intentions and unsolicited advice without knowing anything about the many medical hurdles and conditions that can make all of the CICO/hot yoga/etc banter just die. It’s lazy ‘advice’ and there’s nothing kind or eye-opening about it. I was healthy, athletic, full of energy and a normal weight up until I very suddenly wasn’t. Circuit training and strict dieting worked to get me close to a normal BMI until it didn’t. I wish I could say what will work next but I don’t know. I’ve never imagined there would be a place where P90X3 and a managed diet wouldn’t work. And more terrifying, that I’d watch the weight pile on plus a little more WHILE I was so carefully dieting and exercising. But when something doesn’t make sense, there are complex levels that only working with a doctor MAY help me breakthrough.

I couldn’t get a doctor appointment for blood tests until late August. I didn’t want a long fast to mask any levels or concerns that might help me get accurate treatment which is why I’m doing it now. By the time I go, I will have literally tried every healthy path I could. I’m actually hoping there is some pesky food intolerance I can eliminate or some hormonal therapy that can correct whatever is happening because… let me tell you, it’s taking every ounce of optimism and determination and self-love to face this. I can never have a model slim body but I sure as hell want to build a strong healthy one. The sort that will have me firing off my creative energy without physical limitations again! I can’t tell you how much I’m obsessed with being that person again.

And I blog this nitty gritty BECAUSE I didn’t see much representing the experience of people in a similar demographic. Ffs, we don’t just get here and give up and we need to hear there’s hope! Keep finding your health and peace, ladies! To the rest of you, I’m rooting for you too but biologically, my experiences probably aren’t going to do you much good and that’s okay too. I’m hoping the foray into autophagy might be enlightening though!