My journey with long-term fasting began when I was eighteen. I experienced for myself what this can do to your body and I’ve never looked back. It’s been 20-plus years that I’ve practiced long-term fasting. Sometimes to regulate my weight, and sometimes for my health.
If you’ve read the post Is long-term fasting beneficial then you know how long-term fasting was introduced into my life. I’ve seen with my own young eyes what it can do to your health, how your body changes, and what impact it has on your life.
In short, my grandfather was diagnosed with brain cancer. The last diagnosis in a long line of illnesses as long as I can remember. It was this one that pushed my grandmother over the edge when he came home from the doctor’s appointment after complaining about headaches.
Three tumors at the back of the head each around half of an inch in diameter. My grandmother decided that this needed to stop or he wouldn’t return from the hospital. Her research lead her to an alternative method to surgery. Long-term fasting. The next day both of them started.
After 42 days the tumors disappeared. And so my journey began.
Is long-term fasting for everyone?
As I wrote I was only eighteen years old and I had a series of failed attempts at losing weight. My experiments ranged from the heavy cream diet to the then-famous popcorn diet. You can read about them here.
Witnessing what my grandfather went through, his body changing, his usually bloated belly almost falling off. His usually round face had fallen but his cheeks were glowing. He lost 18 kilograms (40 lb) in 42 days and the three tumors.
Witnessing my grandparent’s transformation triggered an interest in my young mind that persists to this day. I begged my parents to let me try but they refused. My grandfather put his body through it for health reasons, not for vanity. Besides. I was too young. There were no studies made on what this did to a young healthy body.
A few months later I saw a first failed attempt at fasting. My mother decided to give it a go, finally caving in after constant pressure from my grandmother. This is not the right way to persuade someone to commit to a long-term fast. But in my grandmother’s defense, she was right.
My mother was a heavy smoker. Two packs of cigarettes a day. And not just any kind of cigarettes. They were the unfiltered kind. Two packs meant she smoked 40 cigarettes per day. If we do a quick math. An average person is awake 16 hours per day. The first cigarette was in the morning with black coffee. That’s 3 per hour. One every twenty minutes.
Can we be forced to long-term fast?
I still remember it like it was yesterday. The argument those two women had. My grandmother insisted that fasting must be done correctly. That means no intake of the poisons that are currently ruining your health. My mother agreed to give up coffee, but not cigarettes. So, she started the fast. She did everything my grandparents did a couple of months ago, with one small difference. She kept her cigarette addiction.
For four days she threw up every time she had a drink of vegetable juice and had a cigarette. I couldn’t understand. How can she throw up if she isn’t eating anything? Well, you can. And it exhausted her. Her long-term fast lasted for four days. She finally stopped on day five when my father threatened her he was taking her to the hospital.
She started eating again. Her first attempt was a failure.
But was it?
Well not exactly. My mother failed to fast for 42 days but she succeeded in another area.
She stopped smoking.
After those four days, she never picked up a cigarette again.
The next year she tried again. And this time nobody told her to do it.
The process of long-term fasting is easier once your mind is made up.
Her motivation was greater this time around. She, like her father before her, was diagnosed with cancer. Only in her case, it was breast cancer.
This time my mother did everything by the book. Not only that. Nothing changed for the rest of us. She still prepared all the meals, she just didn’t eat.
Not once did she complain, she was her mother’s daughter. It seemed like she just flew through the 42 days. Her body changed and so did the results. After 42 days of long-term fasting, consuming only vegetable juice, teas, and onion soup the cancer was gone. She tried it for herself. And it worked.
This time she couldn’t refuse when I approached her with the desire to try myself. I think she was skeptical if I could do it and on the other hand, she wanted to prove to me, that it’s not as easy as it looked observing it from the outside.
I decided I would only go through half the therapy so 21 days it was.
My first attempt at 42 days long-term fast
Here is what I know now
It was spring. The vegetables were not as fresh as I’d like them to be since all of them grow in autumn. My mother told me to wait until autumn but I was convinced it would go off without a hitch.
I couldn’t be more wrong.
You see I love fruit. Every kind of fruit. Especially the one growing in our backyard. Not being able to eat fresh strawberries was torture. But my worst problem was the amount of vegetable juice I needed to drink.
As I wrote in the previous post I tried it before and it was disgusting. The smell, the taste, the texture. Everything. I tried different ways to cope with it but this was by far the most challenging part.
My mother never complained about the taste or smell so I presumed it had something to do with illness since there was nothing wrong with me. I found out later that wasn’t the case.
There is a specific amount of vegetable juice you have to drink to get all the vitamins and minerals your body needs to stay healthy. The absolute minimal amount is 0.125 liters.
Then there were my mood swings. Some days were excellent. I felt like I could run a marathon, and climb Mount Everest, all in one day. The amount of energy I had was unbelievable.
And then there were other days when I couldn’t get out of bed. On those days it helped if I was outside as much as possible. So I went on long walks. These long walks were life-changing.
Plus being outside helped because so I didn’t look at the cupboards and refrigerator filled with food. However, I still had to use the fridge since my vegetable juice was in there.
The end of my first attempt to long-term fast?
My initial goal was to fast for 21 days. I didn’t last that long. My first attempt at long-term fasting lasted exactly 18 days. By that time I was fed up with everything. The juice, the teas, the soup, my mood swings, everything.
I couldn’t wait to be finished with it.
But…
On day 19 when I started eating again I regretted it. Firstly because I was so sick I didn’t know what to do to make it better. After not eating for 18 days I started my morning with fresh bread, coffee, butter, and jam. No wonder I was sick. My stomach couldn’t handle the weight of that much food at one time.
But after my stomach calmed itself I was sorry for another reason. I suddenly understood what my grandfather was talking about when he missed the lightness.
The food that I ate acted as a block of cement, weighing me down. It never felt like that before. I missed the lightness in my body.
Also, the energy was gone. Before nothing used up my energy but my daily walks, now most of my energy was used for the digestion of food. I felt sluggish and drained.
Was long-term fasting worth it?
In a word, yes. Most definitely.
On day 19 I did what I looked forward to the most. I measured myself. I did this at the beginning of the fast and every week that passed. I was astounded even after the first week. I never got such results with any of my diets.
I lost 8 centimeters (3.15 in) from my hips, 2 centimeters (0.8 in) from the top of my arms, and another 3 centimeters (1.2 in) around each leg. It was crazy. When weighing for the last time, I was 10 kilograms (22 lb) lighter than when I started.
Was this possible?
What was most shocking was the skin on my behind and the back of my legs. The cellulite was dramatically decreased. And for a woman in her twenties that meant only one thing.
Confidence.
The skin on my face also had a massive transformation. The pimples were gone, and so was my dry skin. My face was shining without any facial cremes.
The only other time when I saw such skin on my face was when I was pregnant. But that was the working of the hormones.
I looked back over my notes, my diary that I was keeping, writing in everything each day. The feelings of hardship didn’t seem so hard anymore. All I could think about was what an incredible transformation my body went through all on its own. And all I did was not eat for 18 days.
I was hooked. I poured over the literature that I could find but there weren’t many books on the topic. The ones I did find were vague as to what I could expect.
So I decided to make my observations and conclusions. Here are some of them:
My conclusions on the long-term fasting
I divided my lists into two categories. The first was the difficulties of the long-term fast.
Here are the ones I faced with:
- I hated the smell and taste of the juice
- The will it takes to make it to the end
- The amount of teas you have to prepare each morning
- The monotones of the days and it’s ‘food’
But besides the difficulties, there were so many more benefits to it looking only through the eyes of my weight loss goals.
- the lightness during the fast
- the cellulite was almost gone
- the skin on my face was smooth and glowing
- the energy I had was unbelievable
- the weight I lost
- the centimeters that just melted off
- my sugar and salt addiction was gone
- I had unbelievable concentration during the fast
- I listened to my body more – when I needed to rest I did
- The excess amount of time I had because I wasn’t spending it on preparing and eating food
I’m sure there were more but these are just from the top of my head. But what changed, in the long run, was my outlook on life. And my body. And what capabilities we all have to feel better.
The mind shift that I went through was intense.
Is long-term fasting for everybody?
I’ve found a secret recipe to a better life. Sadly I also found out that this wasn’t for everybody. In the years that followed I’ve met so many people who could benefit from long-term fast but none would listen. I couldn’t understand why.
They were sick, overweight, so many problems that a small amount of time spent not eating would fix but no one listened to me.
I bought books for everybody who I thought would need them, they thanked me for it but I’m certain none of them ever even read it.
Why?
Because it takes a lot to go through a long-term fast.
The most obvious one is people like to eat. Even at the expense of our health. We love our food. Also, the amount of will and persistence it takes to pull it off is not something to overlook.
When I met my husband I was reluctant to bring up the subject but when I was faced with my health problems I had no choice.
This is a whole new story on its own, so I’ll leave it for next week.
But for now, think about it. What problems do you have? Are they health-related? When reading through the post, did you think you could benefit from the long-term fast?
Let me know. I’m more than willing to help.
Until next week, stay healthy.
Ann
