Firstly, I know that last week was an 8 day week…but I wanted to move to a Sunday to Saturday pattern…and as you know…I will do whatever the hell I like.
The plan for this week is that I am going to continue to re-feed today…and enjoy it (I had 2 hot cross buns with my coffee this morning and they were delightful) and then after this evenings meal commence fasting again. I will have a coffee and cream tonight around 21.00hrs but after that I am going to ditch the coffee and switch to tea (black or green) and drink water and take a sachet or two of electrolyte supplement morning and afternoon until the afternoon of the 12th (48hrs plus) and see how I feel…and if I feel good go another 24hrs to the 13th with a view to ending my fast there and having a gentle re-feed that arvo and then having a high quality/low quantity re-feed on the 14th and 15th.
That will end out the week…even though I will continue this high quality/low quantity feed on the Sunday and go out to dinner and enjoy a nice steak with family on Sunday night…but that is a story for another week.
09.04.23 – 117.7kg and 34.3%
So working nights at the moment and have one more to do tonight.
Came home, slept till 10am…got up and had hot cross buns and shot my mouth off on the interwebs…hence the first post you saw in this series.
Had a dish with fried potato, carrot, cucumber with some cheese on top and then fried and flipped that and added a tin of tuna, a boiled egg with some Japanese dressing. Basically some leftovers from last night fried up with some tuna and egg added.
Had a coffee before work and then have made the transition just to black tea.
Overnight I am consuming a couple of bottles (600ml) of soda water and had a sachet of electrolytes as well last night when I felt a little off…which I think is a combo of tiredness and diet and it picked me straight up…a lesson to the kids out there.
10.04.23 – 118.6kg and 34.2%
So today will ideally be simple…as long as I feel ok…and I do feel quite good right now…I am actually not going to consume anything. My last fluid intake was around 2am last night and I am thinking right now having woken up at 2pm after having got home for work and into bed at 6.30ish that I might see if I can get through till tomorrow morning and get up and have some tea and some electrolytes then to kick off my day. Essentially to ‘dry fast’ for at the least for around 30hours. See how it feels.
So, it doesn’t look like there will be much to log today all going well.
I am actually going to go out for a walk though as well at some stage today. My plan is to make walking a staple exercise…to do 30mins plus every day I can. To start doing some intervals on the Echo bike to really give my heart a good going over and then to do some kettlebell work and calisthenics. That will be the full whack.
I am taking June off from work, so at the moment I am looking to try to bed this lifestyle change down before then and then I am going to MTB everyday up on the farm out in the national park while away and look to start increasing/improving my lean muscle mass as well.
Went for a 35 minute walk with the dog in the early evening. Energy still feels good.
11.04.23 – 116kg and 33.7%
I am up at 4am because switching from nights to living in the normal world is hard. I am wide awake so I figured I’d just get up and get on with the day.
So, I haven’t had anything to eat obviously…but I also haven’t had anything to drink since for lets say 24 hours plus.
4.30am now and had a long tall glass of Metamucil and a large cup of Irish Breakfast. I have to do a course from home today…I am going to get some electrolytes into me just before the course starts and get my brain firing and then got through the day without any other fluid consumption till I felt a bit funky around 4pm so thought I would give myself a break. Had a cup of Irish Breakfast, a glass of electrolytes and a lemon, apple cider vinegar and soda water beverage.
At the moment I have zero hunger…zero compulsion to eat…and this has always been my reason for recommending fasting with discipline to people over calorie restriction.
With fasting you just see an absolute crash in your hunger hormones so the ‘drive’ to cheat on your diet and or to start having some food and then have the desire to over eat…to consume more than required is removed.
When you don’t eat you don’t have to worry about insulin and without insulin your body is free to utilise whatever fat.
I am feeling good. As always discipline is more important than motivation. I have just decided to do this. I just woke up and weighed myself and just decided to fix it and by it I mean me.
Went for a walk with the pooch in my lunch break (35mins). Another good day done.
12.04.23 – 116.3kg and 32.8%
Interesting to see the body fat reading incrementally. Back drinking as much water as I like. Restricting my fluid intake just doesn’t feel very good. Doing it I didn’t feel ‘bad’ but not doing it I feel ‘better’. Have managed to ween myself off the coffee…which was easier than I thought. I say that because usually if I haven’t had a coffee by 9ish I am homicidal and have a headache that can only be soothed by my favourite bean and hot water. Going to keep drinking tea as needs be which has in fact only been 2 cups a day which I suppose must be the equivalent of a maintenance dose of caffeine (I usually start the day with 2 cups of 4 shots). I’ll continue to drink soda water as I please as well and will have some electrolytes mid morning just to make sure I am firing on all cylinders.
One of the things that you realise when you are fasting is that there is sooooo much extra time in the day. It comes immediately to your attention exactly how much time I spend thinking about food, preparing, cooking, eating and cleaning up and what a cycle that is.
What I am doing is not something that I am going to do forever. It is being done for a very specific purpose.
My current plan (and this is evolving) will be to continue fasting as I have been this week until Sunday. I will break my fast with some avocado and egg in the morning when I get to work…i.e some healthy fat, fibre and protein. Then mid afternoon I will have some white rice, chicken and vegetable…just a small portion. Then Sunday night I am going out to dinner with family and I’ll have a steak and whatever else takes my fancy. I won’t eat a lot..just a normal meal and then will essentially repeat this week again (tea, water, electrolytes). At the end of next week I will either have another re-feeding day like I plan to this week or if I am still feeling good I will push on through the following week to the end of the month. I will just play it by feel.
I got in 2 walks today of about 30 mins each. Felt good.
Time + Discipline = Results.
13.04.23 – 115.1kg and 32.4%
Still feeling good. I really thought ditching the coffee was going to be more difficult than I thought. But no real issue. I just weened off it and switched to tea (of which I have only been having 2 cups a day). I am going to have a good think and rejig of my plan today as I have got where I wanted to get a bit faster than I thought. Going to have a tin of tuna and 4 boiled eggs today and then go out and take a ride on the Echo Bike while watching a podcast. I want to keep feeling good.
Next week I am thinking I am going to ride my super low ‘hunger hormones’ levels and start introduce some really small amounts of healthy fats, protein and carbs and start introducing a structured exercise routine around it. At the moment I am thinking I might actually just do a week of one meal a day and use that meal to fuel an exercise session. I have Monday and Tuesday off and then Wednesday, Thursday and Friday I have later than normal starts and I am thinking now what I might do is get up, weigh in, drink my tea and make something simple to eat. Next week simple may be a half a cup of rice, a protein source .i.e a tin of tuna or some chicken, an avocado and some pickled vegetables. Just enough to put some essential nutrients into my system. Then as soon as I am done and cleaned up go out and walk 30mins plus (I am going to find a course around home to walk with purpose) which will flatten the post food intake insulin response and then do some calisthenics, a simple full body routine. I will develop 2 routines to do on alternate days.
Fasting is not sustainable long term. I can do it because I am fat. I can also do it because I understand the physiology and biochemistry of what I am doing…as I said…it used to be my job. I certainly am not recommending it to anyone. I am simply logging what I am doing for my own sake and because I thought there may be people interested in what is happening and what I am doing as a curiosity.
This phase of my re-build is very much a phase. It has a starting point and a finishing point. The next phase will be different and so will the phase after that.
The goal of this phases is really just to reset myself…primarily hormonally. I keep having to explain to people with fasting the first 48-72 hours are the hardest….after your body crushes your hunger hormones it just becomes a game because you are as hungry on Day 3 as you are on Day 13. It honestly doesn’t ‘feel’ any different. So yes, the goal of this phase is to reset hormonally, give my entire system a chance to reboot and repair itself and to promote all the conditions and to trigger all the physiological response the body is capable of given the opportunity to do that.
The next phase will be one of consolidation and ongoing repair. I have had a huge number of injuries over my life and athletic career and I want to use the next phase, the month of May to improve my ‘general fitness’ and to do what will essentially be rehabilitation as a training program. I will continue this next phase in a calorie deficit with a view to continuing to decrease my body fat but to maintain that deficit with enough essential nutrients and fuel to minimise any loss of lean muscle mass. To take in some protein to have a protein sparing effect and enough fuel to facilitate the training stimulus required to improve the quality of that lean muscle mass.
The phase after that will be the month up at the farm and I am hoping that my fitness levels will be such that I will be able to up my calorie intake and progress to 2 training sessions a day…fuel and then walk and calisthenics in the AM and then fuel and MTB in the National Park in the PM and see if I can stick to a routine where I can do that everyday that I am up there.
The phase after that…and this is a long time off may depending on the million variables that may happen in between now and then might see me return to the gym and meaningful resistance training for the first time since I stopped fighting.
Got some good exercise in today…a solid 45 minute walk and then another 30 minute walk with the dogs.
Had 50g of almonds in the evening…just for sport and because I had been reading about the benefits of nuts and seeds all day.
I also signed op for Cronometer today which is a nutrition and training logging site. I asked around and got more than one recommendation for it…and that is good enough for me, It has a lot of great features and I am looking forward to playing around with it over the next while. Like logging my training and nutrition here I am all for anything I can do for a little bit of extra accountability. As I said, previously…April is all about getting myself dialled in.
14.04.23 – 114.6kg and 32.2%
Started the day with a cup of black tea and drank 840ml of soda water between waking and work. I am actually going to start logging everything…it is not something that I necessarily think I will be doing forever but I will do it for now for no other reason than to be able to accurately gauge exactly where I am at. To be able to look at the calories going in and out and see what effect changing different elements have.
12 hour shift at work..felt good. Came home and had 50 grams of almonds. Today I just drank tea and water during the day and had 1 cup of bone broth.
That’s it. Weigh in again tomorrow and see where I am at after my second week.
15.04.23 – 113.5kg and 32.4%
The end pf week 2. Having coffee, milk and cream to start the day. It was good to give it away for a week for no other reason that just to prove to myself I can do anything…for those that know me…you all know how much I enjoy my coffee. Any way ditched it for a week and am enjoying my cup this morning.
Another 12 hour day today and tomorrow. I will continue fasting today and then ease out of my fast tomorrow and then dinner tomorrow night.
So after 2 weeks I am down 11kg’s and 3.2% body fat. We will be able see Monday how much fat I have actually lost after my re-feed tomorrow because as I have said before a lot of the weight in water and glycogen associated with my carb depleted state. It will be interesting to see how the re-feed also effects the body fat measurement via the bioelectrical impedance. I actually can’t even guess where that will settle once I have reconstituted myself.
Also, I have to tell you (this isn’t an ad) that I am really geeking out on cronometer which is the food and training logging app I settled on. Super easy to use and a lot of cool functionality. I am very much looking forward to using it to track and detail everything I am doing nutrition and training wise just to see the effects and to tweak and modify my intakes and outputs and to monitor the effects it has on my mind and body.
Speaking of effects, I am 25-30 mins post my double shot espresso and milk and I can REALLY feel the effects of the coffee.
I have a feeling you will see this same pattern in the next couple of weeks. That I will re-feed and then return to fasting and see a ‘drop, peak and drop’. It will be super interesting to see where another 2 weeks gets me…I think the fat loss will slow but be more consistent and due to the fact that I will re-feed more regularly I will exercise more and more exercise will minimise any lean muscle mass loss. Well, that is the plan.
So, end of week 2, 12 hour day done and a couple of cups of black tea, a couple of bottles of soda water and a sachet of electrolytes later I am home.
Have cooked my food for tomorrow. Breaking my fast and re-feeding…but that’ll have to wait till next weeks post.
Will Heffernan 