Hey, I spent the last ten days at a fasting clinic where you fast for 6 days then have very gradual refeeding days. Even though I'd fully mentally prepped myself that day 3 and even 4 would be the hardest I broke my fast on day 4. It sounds stupid saying it now but I felt like I was going nuts or dying on the final night of fasting. It wasn't even hunger, it was more like....I couldn't lie still enough to sleep but I also didn't have the energy to go exercise or focus on reading or watching anything. After I ate a banana I had a day of feeling euphoric then the regret that I didn't get to day 6 set in.
Anyway since refeeding my appetite is way down, cheese and milk taste like puke to me and bread sits really heavily in my stomach. I'm taking this to be a good thing as previously I ate too much of these foods. I came to the clinic because before this I'd occasionally do intermittent fasting and once did a 48 hour fast but knew I needed more support to do a longer one.
My question is this: what should I take away from this experience? I still feel incredible just from doing 4 days so I'm hoping to go home now and do one 36 hour fast per week then 16:8 on other days. Does it take practice to get 'good' at fasting?
Oh also I took electrolytes and drank tons of water so that's not an issue, think the struggle I had was just the usual thing of the body switching over from burning carbs and I had a healthy but carb heavy diet prior to this.
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I’ve eaten OMAD every day for last 4 years and love it. My longest EF was 3 days and I didn’t find it so pleasant. Like you, I got stressed and didn’t sleep well.
I lost 50 lbs and love my omad lifestyle. My diet is healthy, I exercise a good amount, heath is good - no plan to ever go back to frequent eating.
Although I have nothing against EFs, and know a lot of people here do them and incorporate into a healthy lifestyle, I don’t think it’s a lifestyle for everyone.
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I think its interesting your taste changed about bread and milk. Dont beat yourself up, it was obviously worth it for that. Also I was just listening to a Dr. Fung lecture, and someone asked about things that break a fast, like coffee/cream, bone broth, etc. He said its not all or nothing, like a lot of us think. One slip up doesn’t exactly ruin the whole thing. If you have cream, your insulin response will rise a little but will go back down in maybe 15 min. Its not a total reset because of a slip up. Just go back to the fast.