Fasting Chronicles Day 7

Fasting Chronicles Day 7:

I thought I would have a hard time getting out of bed, as my stomach wanted to be funny. As I got out and completed my morning routine (face washing, brushing - I skipped the shower today), I felt much better but during brushing my upper back started acting up. Muscle pain seemed to come out of nowhere and it persisted for the rest of the day. I worked around it by making a mental to do list.

Laundry needed to be done and I knew if I did not tackle it today, my week would be a wreck. I went downstairs and had water instead of my usual vinegar water. It was what my body was telling me it wanted.

I proceeded to take the rest of the turkey that had been thawing in the fridge and shred it of it's meat and remove any stuffing left in it. I am making turkey broth soup for the husband, but I want to make sure there is as little meat on the bone as possible when I put it in the slow cooker. I don't want his body having to deal with trying to digest protein. This is counter-intuitive as we are fasting to remove the body of toxins, this means that the body is feeding off our fats, (that is where it is getting its nutrients from), also where most of our toxins are stored. To provide the body with additional protein does not aid the body in this detoxification process.

 I put hot water on to make coffee and I started to shred the meat. I am starting to accept the coffee - not for flavour - but for the change from tea it provides. The taste of tea was beginning to resemble plain hot water, and believe me, at some point, after drinking hot water for 6 days straight, multiple times a day, it starts to grate at you.

We started to fast as a result of my husband. After a diagnosis and months spent trying to recover from his hospital procedure and the multiple drugs they had put him on, he got to a point where he could not eat and ironically, the only things he could stomach was McD's french fries, coke and bottled water. I watched this man eat like this for a month and more. One morning, he said to me that something had spoken to him to look up fasting.

We read up on it, studied it, compared different sites and the information on them, watched videos, read about the benefits, the pros and cons, who it is recommended for and who should avoid it. In the end, we dove in and said this is definitely something that we are willing to try. We started off with intermittent fasting for about 2 months, and then stretched to a full day (24 hours) and then 3 days every month. We had read that approximately twice a year, there are two big fasts, one usually in the spring approaching summer and the other one in fall/winter. With that, we did a long fast, I was able to do 10 days and my husband, 14. The really interesting and positive thing about that particular fast was that I experienced a lot of healing. I always argued with the husband about doing push-ups and could not do many of them nor could I do them effectively. That 10 day fast changed everything. I had a sore wrist which healed and my push-ups were on point. After that fast, we continued with our IF (intermittent fasting), weekly and monthly fasts. One of the things we had realized we were doing wrong with our fasts was putting honey in our teas. Once again, this is counter-intuitive as a true water or drastically reduced caloric intake fast increases ketones in the body and puts the body into ketosis. This is what the body fuels off of while detoxing. Honey or any type of sugar will kick the body out of ketosis.

Making dinner and laundry throughout the day has really tired me out. Not feeling dizzy or light-headed or anything like that, just my stomach feeling funny. Time to sit. Kids are now eating dinner and all is good.

The thought of having some of the turkey broth has crossed the mind many times today. I'm not going to contemplate it too much longer. If I do, I won't lie, I will be a little disappointed as I was hoping to have gone longer without having broth. I am going to have some balsamic vinegar and water to see if that does anything to help.

My upper back still hurts and my husband has said that his lower back is killing him. I welcome these symptoms as they are a sign of healing.

I did not end up having the broth and had tea instead. The pain in my back is easing. 

Tomorrow is another day.

Share your fasting experiences and thank you for reading.

MA.