Brother Simpleton

I did my first-ever 3 day fast this week. I would’ve preferred to do it later, but that was the only time I could squeeze it in my schedule before the vacation.

I have conflicting impressions about the fast. It was certainly worth doing, but I didn’t feel too great, especially on the third day. I knew very well that it could be the case. On the second-third day of a fast the body switches to a special mode called ketosis, which essentially means that it would be getting all the energy it needs from the body fat, and leave muscles and other important tissues alone. So, it is a known fact that it gets better after the third day. I wonder, though, if it is useful to fast for three days at all, or if one should always go for more to get the cleansing benefits of ketosis.

In any case, I am glad I did it. I know now a little bit more about my body, and I am a little bit more self-confident. The breaking of the fast was an interesting experience too. By the way, I didn’t realize before that “breakfast” is so called because it is used to break a fast. Anyway, I had three wedges of an orange for breakfast, and felt totally, absolutely full. I think it will take me at least three days, maybe more, to go back to my pre-fast eating patterns.

To loose more weight was not my explicit goal for this fast, but it happened nevertheless. In the course of four days (fasting + breaking the fast) I lost 9 pounds! I am impressed. It puts me at exactly 40 pounds less then when I started, after exactly 9 weeks. I weigh now below 160 pounds, which was my original goal. I expected back then that it would take 20 weeks, if not more, to reach that goal. Well, I am not going to officially declare the victory until the red line crosses 160 pounds, but I am definitely very close. Also, my average BMI is well below 25. Nice.

It’s been exactly 8 weeks since I started to track my weight, so I think it’s a good time for a review.

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It’s been exactly 4 weeks since I started tracking my weight. Even though I had a feeling lately that my weight loss has somewhat slowed, in fact this is not so: for the last 3 weeks, I’ve been loosing exactly 4 pounds per week. Overall, I lost 18 pounds in 4 weeks. The red “trend” (moving average) line goes down pretty steadily. I am quite satisfied by the progress.

For some time already, I am feeling rather comfortable with my diet. I don’t feel any of the wonderful things some people report after substantial diet changes (like a boost of energy), but I also don’t have any of the negative effects I’ve expected — no headaches, no tiredness, no hunger. In short, I feel just about “normal”.

This allows me to start trying different experiments. So far I am doing two things: