Hello, hello!! How are you all doing now that we are mid-way through January? Are you working on resolutions? Changing habits, or maintaining? I would love to hear how your month is going.
I think some of you know I needed to take a step back, primarily from social media, this month to clear my head after the holiday stress. I am taking January to work on me which included the 3-Day Water Fast with Dr. Mindy Pelz that I completed last week. It was a great week and a great experience. I prepared for this fast in the days leading up to it by reducing carbs, and increasing fat and protein. Plus, I have been working on longer fasts for some time which helped. I had a small group of women who joined me and as a group we cheered each other on, it was really nice to have the support.
Day 1 & 2 were not bad, especially once I started building ketones at a level that kept me from feeling hungry. It took about 26 hours for me to be in a low level of ketosis. By Day 3, when I woke, my blood sugar had dropped to 65, so I thought by drinking my black coffee it would come up, but that did not happen. I started to get shaky, checking it again and it was 58, so I decided I better do something - so I had 2 tablespoons of almond butter with a teaspoon of raw honey. This worked to bring my glucose to 72 and it did not affect my ketones which remained over 2.1. I am not sure if this pulled me out of my fasted state or not, but I kept going with the fast until 72 hours was up. I broke my fast using the 4 steps, waiting about an hour between each step:
bone broth
sauerkraut, kimchi, 1/2 avocado with hemp seeds, blueberries
steamed broccoli
grilled chicken with green salad
I noticed that night my face was feeling unusually dry around the mouth, and when I woke up on Friday morning, it was very red and burned, and I had dark circles around my eyes. Of course, researching what these symptoms are - I think I was having a histamine reaction to the food. And I don't think I drank enough water, so I guzzled about 30 ounces at one sitting. This was helpful for the dark circles. But the rash persisted so I took a Zyrtec because I needed relief on my face. This helped, but then I realized I have Quercetin, so that's what I took for the next two days and it went away.
Something else I noted during this week - I slept horribly! I was very tired every night and was able to fall asleep fast, but then I would wake througout the night, several times - I was wired! I am wondering if it was the ketones? Plus, by Day 3 I needed to talk, talk, talk...and this was the hardest part because at work, I am working remotely and not talking to anyone most of the day! Thankfully, I called a friend who gave me the time to just talk, talk, talk...thank you to my friend, you know who you are!! So much energy on Day 3! I did not take any supplements during this week, nor did I take my thyroid meds. I wanted my body to just do what it needed to do. Thursday night when it was done, I still slept horribly, so Friday night I took some magnesium and it worked like a charm. I slept well!
I am so happy to have completed this long fast. I have hypothyroid and Hashimoto's and it's generally not advised to do these long fasts, but I needed to try. It's a week later and I feel really good. I'll continue with the intermittent fasts and work in 24 or 36 hour fasts when needed.
I would love to hear if you have tried a long fast, or are intermittent fasting and how that is going? And if you have not tried fasting and want to learn more about the fasting lifestyle for healing your body, please let me know, I would love to work with you!
Thank you for your ongoing support! I hope you have an amazing rest of the month!
In good health,
Bobbi
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