As I write this, I have been fasting for over 24 hours (my last meal was dinner yesterday) and by the time I ‘break my fast’ tomorrow around 10 am with a yummy bacon, steak and egg brunch, it will be about 40 hours.
Fasting has been around for thousands of years but more recently it is becoming a mainstream way to get health conditions from obesity to cancer under control.I don’t recall hearing about fasting at all in my childhood. I do vaguely remember a group of students deciding to go on a ‘hunger strike’ to protest against starving children in Ethiopia when I was in high school but the concept of intentionally abstaining from food to improve one’s health was a foreign concept to me until well into adulthood.
While working at a school in the GTA I was introduced to fasting for Ramadhan. I had difficulty understanding at the time how school aged children could go all day without eating, but now that I’ve had my own experiences, I have a greater understanding and appreciation.
Reverse Disease and Aging
Fasting as a health benefit was first introduced to me through Keto support groups that I joined online. Having studied to be a Medical Laboratory Technologist back in my 20’s, I was quickly intrigued with the concepts that fasting influences biological processes such as autophagy (a cellular mechanism where the body detoxifies itself).
Interestingly, I had a lump on my thumb for years. I don’t know what it was, calcification or a cyst, it’s not something that I ever had the doctor look at because it seemed insignificant and wasn’t painful or obvious to anyone but myself or my daughter who use to rub it when she held my hand. Funny thing is, after doing a couple of 24 hour fasts, it disappeared! I really don’t think this is a coincidence. That darn lump had been there over ten years. It was enough to convince me that fasting really does give our bodies the opportunity to cleanse itself.
I was also diagnosed with fibrocystic breast disease a few years ago and had to have ultrasounds and mammograms to check out any cysts that arose. Since being Keto and doing intermittent fasting, I haven’t felt one cyst!
From the reading that I’ve done, the online groups that I am a part of, and through my own experimentation, I am convinced that fasting can help reverse disease and aging, in addition to help lose stubborn fat. Jimmy Moore and Dr. Jason Fung have written a book The Complete Guide to Fasting that I highly recommend for more information.
During an interview on Bulletproof Radio, Dr. Fung actually says “If you want to lose weight, you must fast.”
Now, fasting doesn’t need to be long. Typically, we all fast while we sleep each night. That is when the body does its best repairing (autophagy) and this includes weight loss. By stopping eating right after dinner and delaying breakfast, we can increase our fasting window to about 16 hours which will give the body a chance to burn some fat stores that otherwise may never get tapped into!
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