The Accidental Fast

For the last few months, Lisa and I have been coaching and encouraging some friends who had seen the results of her weight loss journey and mine.

We have a few separate text message threads going with different friends. This enables us to support and advise them, while also creating a shared diary of our experience together.

One couple started about three months ago by cutting sugar, limiting carbs and also adding alternate-day fasting.

The core #BodyBabySteps stuff.

They’re doing really well: he’s lost 26.2 pounds and she’s lost 14.4, or 8.8 and 4.8 pounds per month respectively.

It hasn’t always been easy, but she had a pretty amazing and encouraging breakthrough a little over a week ago which showed just how much progress she has made.

Not only or even mainly in weight loss, but in her reorientation toward food.

After hitting something of a plateau, she decided to try going for a longer fast than what has become her customary 24 hours. By waiting to break her fast until the next morning, she could stretch to 36 hours.

But as it turned out, she was busy in the morning and didn’t get to eat until about 2:30 p.m. So her fast ended up being…

47 hours!

Then just a couple of days later, she forgot she had meetings until 8 p.m., and so added an “accidental” 36-hour fast closely following her nearly two-day fast.

Three months ago she would not have believed this was possible.

She also was amazed that at the end of a 36-hour fast she would have such “great clarity and energy.”

The alternate-day fasting, eating dinner to satiety every evening but skipping breakfast and lunch on alternate days, helped her to overcome a habit of unthinking late-night eating.

As she has become fat-adapted and also more mindful of the importance of a narrower eating window, she stumbled into two fasts that were both longer than what she had planned.

At some point, when he and she have reached their goals, we’ll have an online “coming out” party for them, complete with before and after photos and their whole story.

They’ll join John Bishop and Rebecca Williams among those sharing their stories here.

And because we will have their in-the-moment observations from our coaching text thread, they’ll be really encouraging for others who are considering committing to the health journey.

But for now, I’ll just refer to them by their personal pronouns.

If you have questions about keto or fasting, feel free to ask in the comments below or in my social feeds on TwitterFacebook or LinkedIn.

If you have a story you’re willing to share to help inspire others, send me an email.

Author: Lee Aase

Husband of one, father of six, grandfather of 15. Chancellor Emeritus, SMUG. Emeritus staff of Mayo Clinic. Founder of HELPcare and Administrator for HELPcare Clinic.

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