Yogesh Ashok Powar

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    • Fasting: Beginner's experience

    My early experience on long fasts

    Tags: fasting

    Fasting: Beginner’s experience

    Following is my experience with the series of quick fasts that I have done recently. I am just a beginner and do not claim to be an expert(1) in the field; kindly explore at your own risk.

    Recently a few friends from the runners community did a 24 hours fast and can be easily done by most if they follows these steps

    1. Have a healthy diet a couple of days before the fast. Avoid sugary, oily or junk food.
    2. Set a time goal; track the time. There are so many free apps on the Internet; I would recommend zero calories fasting tracking app this works well on firewall
    3. Keep drinking water regularly. Target 3.5 to 4 litres. Add a Cardamom for taste (or green tea), optional.
    4. Avoid physical exercises during the fasts; short walks are fine.
    5. Utilize the time saved by skipping the meals for thought provoking activities like reading, meditation or listing good podcasts.
    6. Break the fast by consuming a bowl of boiled Mug (Green-Gram) and consume regular food after a couple of hours.

    There is a lot happening in the body(2) when we stop eating; idea is not test the limit of our body but at least touch the surface of its power

    Anyway, we did our first 24 hours fast; I did not feel any headache during the fast. But while breaking the fast I ate spicy potatoes and sweet lime. Then after an hour or so I noticed a headache and acidity. Well drank a lot of water an hour after and a light meal resolved it.

    Later I did a couple of intermittent fasts of 16 hours; the eating window was 9 AM to 5 PM. Felt good and light after it; even did running of 5km before breaking it and things were fine.

    Did an Ekadashi fast, 11th day of 14 days lunar cycle, with conventional timing; didn’t eat anything on Ekadashi day (or night). This fast went for 34 hours and consumed nearly 4+ litres of water (with cardamom for taste). During the meal time when the urge was highest, I had warm water. And broke the fast with boiled Green-Gram (Mug); never before enjoyed Mug so much. Felt much lighter, calmer and better after the fast. Utilized the gained time reading books and blogs.

    I feel running and fasting have similar post-event experiences. Runner’s high makes them more open and expressive; some feeling of achievement. I have observed the same behavior with the members after completing the long fasts 18hrs+. I believe this might also be related to endorphins, hormones released by our body in response to pain.It helps positively to destroy anxiety and depression; it is a natural feel good drug. Off Course, google will throw a result for every random search like this endorphins fasting :D. Overall the experience was good and I urge people to try it and share their experience.

    Finally, thanks to ncrunners friends for helping me to get-started with fasting. Awesome people.

    1. Fasting For Survival Lecture by Dr Pradip Jamnadas ↩

    2. Different stages of fasting

      From hrs To hrs Phases
      0 4 Blood sugar rises: As body start digesting the food
      4 9 Still digesting food; blood sugar drops to normal
      9 10 Energy starts coming from glycogen stored in Liver and muscle
      10 12 Body repairing starts by generating growth hormones.
      12 14 Glycogen reserves are going low and fat burning begins.
      14 16 Growth hormones spikes higher
      16 20 Mild Ketosis begins as the main energy source is depleted. Fats are converted to Ketones in the liver and become the main energy source. Body puts itself in energy saving mode; it feels less hungry.
      20 24 Growth hormones are at the peak
      24 28 Cell survival protection starts removing toxic and absolute proteins
      28 onwards Body is fully adapted to deep ketosis

      ↩

    Tags: fasting
    Updated on: 2021-10-19