My 5–Day Fast: The Aftermath

Here’s what I learned from my first mid-length fast.

Key Observations:

  • My lingering cold disappeared completely after 24 hours of my fast. I had been experiencing gland tenderness, earache, and sinus congestion for over a week and within one day of not eating it was gone.

  • I had zero of my regular physical PMS symptoms; my period started on Day 3 of the fast, but I had no bloating, breast tenderness, or cramps. The same cannot be said for my emotional and mental symptoms, but I’m unsure if my moodiness was due to PMS or detoxing.
  • After refeeding on Friday night, the next morning a touch of sinus congestion and inflammation returned.
  • I hadn’t felt dehydrated at all during my fast, but as soon as the digestion process started, I felt dried up and crusty. All weekend while eating, I couldn’t get enough water.
  • It being my longest fast to date, I was very excited to eat, and indeed everything I ate on Friday night lived up to that excitement. But for the rest of the weekend, nothing else sounded great and nothing tasted remotely wonderful. I believe it was because my body was busy digesting and I honestly wasn’t hungry or wanting food. I still went through the motions of eating and everything was very underwhelming. The whole weekend I was looking forward to getting back to fasting.
  • I wrote that I was going to start another five-day fast this week, but I’m opting for a six-day goal instead. From Sunday night to Saturday night. I like the idea of slowly increasing the lengths of my fasts.
  • Nitty Gritty Alert: I had one bowel movement based on the green smoothie on Saturday morning. No other food from Friday or the rest of the weekend passed as of this writing, 9PM Sunday night.

Details:

I broke my 5-day (115 hour) Sunday to Friday fast on Friday afternoon with a greenberry flavored Shakeology smoothie. I added frozen berries, banana, ground ginger, cinnamon, and coconut milk. It tasted delicious and treated my stomach very well. That evening we ate at a steak house in Winnipeg. It was a wonderful dinner and I enjoyed everything.

We split crab cakes and Caesar salad with focaccia croutons. And I ate a petite filet with blue cheese and a red wine reduction sauce. Mashed potatoes, roasted beets, broccolini and a bread-crumb crusted tomato came on the side. It was a lot of food and I left a little bit of everything on the plate. I drank a virgin strawberry margarita made with real fruit and a glass of water. Despite drinking water all day, I felt quite dehydrated when I woke up the next morning.

Saturday, I ate what was called Mexican Breakfast, two corn tortillas, black beans, two eggs, salsa, guacamole, creme fresh, and breakfast potatoes. I left about 1/3rd of it on the plate. I also had a chocolate coffee drink.

We treated ourselves to a movie, complete with popcorn, peanut M&M’s and a rootbeer.

For dinner, we went to one of Winnipeg’s best restaurants and I ate a half caprese salad, beef wellington, and a small portion of macaroni and cheese with lobster and broccoli. I drank a virgin mint and cucumber bubbly drink. It all tasted just OK to me.

On Sunday, we were anxious to get out of the city and ate fast food on the way home:  Tim Horton’s breakfast croissant sandwich, a hashbrown, plus a maple donut and cafe mocha. It was mediocre at best, though the coffee was yummy.

Once home, we had popcorn with our family movie night and I made a Shakeology smoothie for dinner (because it sounded good and because I hope it will help me poop!!)

Obviously, I denied myself nothing and didn’t eat particularly healthily. I slept poorly, but I’m sure that was due both to my eating choices and being away from home.

Going into this next fast, I will still be allowing myself one cup of caffeinated tea or coffee per day and bone broth as needed. I may play around with taking different supplements just to experiment. We shall see. I also aim to keep up my spiritual, emotional and mental self-care routines in hopes of developing better habits. My intense 80-Day Obsession workouts will continue as well.

Ending weight on Sunday night after an indulgent weekend away: 167.8 (Gained back 6 pounds of the 6.8 I had lost, but not to worry. I have yet to have a bowel movement and my future refeeds will be much more healthy as we have no more special occasion trips planned.)

**

Up next: My 6-Day Fast (Day 1)

Back to the beginning:

My 5-day Fast

My 5-day Fast (Day 2)

My 5-Day Fast (Day 3)

My 5-day Fast (Day 4)

My 5-day Fast (Day 5)

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Author: Angle Full of Grace

A writer, woods-wanderer, and internal peace seeker who raises two free-range children in the wilderness, I escaped the wasteland of corporate America a few years back never to return. I write about love, family, mental health, addiction, parenthood and personal growth all through lens of place and connection to the land. Most entries are my weekly column for our local small-town newspaper, and there's an occasional feature story thrown in the mix as well.

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