What I Learned From Fasting
By Tony Bianchino, Founder, Out Run Your Fork Personal Training and Nutritionists in Westfield, NJ
Fasting has a lot of benefits if done correctly. However, there are some warnings that I’ll pass along from my own experience with fasting.
Weight Loss
There’s no secret here. If you fast you’ll lose weight. If you fast long-term fast (ie: starve yourself), then you’ll lose even more.
Too much fasting, or starving, will cause a severe deficiency in essential nutrients necessary for proper organ function, including your brain. If kept up for too long you’ll eventually die (duh)!
While fasting can help promote weight loss there’s also the risk of killing your metabolism so that when you do start to eat again, your body will hold on to everything you give it and store it away in fat reserves.
Why does this happen? simply put, your body is a survival mechanism. It will do everything it can in order to keep you alive. This includes preventing you from starving to death.
In order to prevent starvation, your body will reduce the amount of calories it burns each day in order to preserve itself. It does this by getting rid of excess baggage.
Goodbye Muscle Tone
Muscle is an example of excess baggage. Muscle is very biologically active and requires more calories to function than any other part of your body (except your brain).
Since muscle is more of a luxury than your vital organs such as your liver and kidneys, your body will look to use your muscle as fuel to help keep you alive and also reduce the amount of calories you burn each day.
This phenomenon is evident in that person you know who looks fairly skinny, but they’re all mushy. Their bodies lack muscle tone because they have starved themselves enough times that they no longer have any.
Intestinal Health – The Big One
Here’s where I screwed up. I did a combination of 24 hour fasts, 36 hour fasts and intermittent fasting.
I wanted to experiment with different types of fasting to see what the result of each one were. Unfortunately, I went ahead and tried each approach randomly and to excess. Many times I did a true fast and excluded water during the fasting phase.
Well, I succeeded at giving my digestive tract a break and clearing out some intestinal toxins that had built up, but I also succeeded in starving out all of the good bacteria in my gut.
The result: Bad Things.
First thing I noticed was that, for the first time in my life, my historically greasy T-Zone (nose and forehead area) were clear of grease and blackheads. As a matter of fact the area was downright normal!
My initial inclination was that I had changed my guy biome in a favorable way, which was probably true considering my increased energy, better sleep and better bowel movements.
I went on with random fasting styles for about a month.
I was pretty happy with the way things were developing…
Until…
I Got The Itch For Something New
My face started to itch.
And I mean ITCH!
I wanted to scratch my eyes out, my ears off and my face apart. It felt like 10 million tiny worms squirming below my skin.
At first I thought my face was dry, which, of course, it was. But not so dry that it was flaky or scaly. Just normal.
So I lathered my face with lotion. Special lotion the pharmacist recommended.
It didn’t help.
I took Benadryl. No help, either,
Cortisone cream. Nope.
Changed my detergent, pillow case and facial cleanser. Nothing.
This went on for four weeks and I was going bonkers!
And Then It Struck Me
By the fifth week I decided to go with my initial inclination about a change in gut health. But this time I feared it had swung too far the other way.
So I loaded up on certain vitamins, minerals and a TON of probiotics.
The first two days my bowels were NOT happy. But the itching slowed down a lot.
Day three my gut settled down and I continued to load up on probiotics, good food and supplements.
By day 7 the itch was all but gone.
What happened?
Throughout the entire experiment I shared my progress with two of my clients both of whom are scientists specializing in intestinal health,
On day two of the probiotic restore I shared that the itch was subsiding and his answer was “Maybe you just starved out all the good stuff?”
Boom!
Maybe indeed!
I couldn’t believe I had done something so stupid.
I know this stuff.
Anyone outside of me could have looked and asked, “What the hell are you doing? You can’t predict the outcome of that. Of course you screwed the whole thing up!”
Well, live and learn.
Ironically, I’ve learned most of what I know from making mistakes. Needless to say I’ve learned a lot.
But, at least I’ve learned. And I don’t make the same mistake twice.
I don;’t know that I’ll ever experiment with fasting again (you could imagine I’m a little gun-shy).
But I might allow someone else to take the lessons I’ve learned and carry it forward.
Tony Bianchino, owner, Out Run Your Fork Personal Training and Nutrition near me in Westfield, NJ
Yours In Health,
Tony, Owner Out Run Your Fork Personal Training
Out Run Your Fork Personal Training and Nutrition
web: www.outrunyourfork.com
As a personal trainer and nutritionist near me in Westfield, NJ, we create better health for people over 40 who are looking to lose weight, build strength, increase energy without sacrificing time or risking injury.
Like this article? Consider leaving a comment, liking this post or sharing with a friend. The more likes and shares we get, the more people who will get to benefit from articles just like this.
PS, whenever you’re ready here are two ways to work with us:
- Talk to Us on the Phone to help get you through the holidays without the holiday weight gain. Just reply back with the words NUTRITION CHALLENGE and we’ll call you right away.
- Schedule your Free Session for Personal Training to help you get Stronger, Lose Weight, Boost your energy without wasting a lot of time or risking injury. Just CLICK HERE to schedule that out.