New Intermittent Fasters: Pushing through a Tough Spot
If you hit a rough spot a few weeks into fasting, stick with it. If you can push through that adjustment phase, everything good is on the other side.
Here’s a common pattern I see in beginner fasters. Many people who start slow with something like 16:8 find the first week of fasting relatively easy. However, as they near the end of their first month and they are increasing their fasting a little more, they often hit a rough patch.
There’s a biological reason for this. I’ve mentioned before that the liver can store between 12-24 hours worth (depending on factors such as how active you are) of temporary, easy-access glucose in the form of glycogen. As you transition to eating two large meals instead of three and focus on high protein instead of high carb, your liver glycogen will slowly decrease and you will eventually run out.
So let’s suppose that in week one you start out with your liver glycogen at 100% and each day you fast for 16 hours, you’re burning through about 60% of what’s available during the fast. Then when you eat on day one, you only have enough carbs to go back to about 90% capacity. By the end of week one, your liver glycogen right before you eat is now dropping to 30% and you’re refilling to only 75%.
If this trend continues and you keep eating fewer carbs (fat and protein do not contribute to liver glycogen), you’ll eventually run out of liver glycogen during your fasts. When happens, you will feel it and usually fasting will get a harder for a time.
I want to assure you that if it stayed as hard as it feels during that transition, then nobody would do it long-term. But after you conquer this adjustment phase, everything begins to get easier.
Think about a butler at a large estate who is walking slowly down to the basement to where the deep freezers are kept, and he’s taking his time because it’s been so long since he last took anything out of that freezer. The people in charge of shopping have been stuffing food down their daily for years and kept buying more and more freezers to store it all. But now there’s no food in the kitchen, so he has to begin a new habit: pulling food out of deep storage.
The more weight you need to lose around your middle, the more painful this transition process will be. Abdominal obesity indicates insulin resistance (there’s that insulin word again) and high insulin is the enemy of fat burning. A transition period is needed. Two people could both need to lose 20 lbs, but the person who needs to lose a little everywhere will likely have an easier time than the person who carries all their weight in the waist.
But if that’s you, never fear; just know that your battle will feel a bit fierce for awhile. Support yourself by drinking plenty of water with some added salt since the body locks toxins away in fat stores. Part of this initial discomfort is also the toxins released as you burn through fat stores, so make sure to flush them out constantly.
The worst advice that anyone can give you as you transition to being a fat burner for the first time since—well, a very long time—is to listen to your intuition. Being an intuitive eater is something that most experienced fasters eventually do achieve, but only after a lot of hard work.
Some of us may never be able to be intuitive eaters when it comes to highly palatable foods. I’m to the point where I’m definitely intuitive about meat and cheese—my appetite tells me how much to eat. I will probably never be able to rely on my intuition when it comes to ice cream. That doesn’t mean I’ll never eat it again, but if I do add it back in, it won’t work to “follow my heart” on the appropriate amount.
In a similar way, if your body is really ramping up the hunger signals and throwing a little fit, caving only encourages the tantrum. Give it some water and tell it to go rummage around in the deep freeze. It’ll eventually figure it out.
I’ll use weightlifting as an example. Suppose you go to your doc and find out that you have sarcopenia (muscle wasting) as well as osteoporosis (loss of bone density). He will prescribe lifting weights and dramatically increasing protein. So you get a coach because you’ve never lifted before and you want someone to show you the ropes. After a couple of weeks of giving you low weights and few reps so you can work on form, the lifting starts getting harder.
Your coach tells you to do 10 reps. Do you say, “No, I’m going to follow my intuition here on how many I want to do?” If you have a good coach, she is not going to ask you to do more reps than is safe. If you stop at 7 instead of 10 because you feel like that’s all you want to do for now, you’re defeating the whole reason you got on your workout clothes, drove to the gym, and did the first 7 reps.
All the results come in you pushing yourself beyond what you feel like doing. If following your intuition resulted in muscle loss and weak bones, it’s time to submit yourself to something hard.
Fasting is the same way. We may have to push ourselves a little beyond what’s comfortable. And if you’re feeling a bit uncomfortable that’s a really good sign that something positive is happening.
Being a little hungry is not a feeling that most Americans ever experience. It takes time to learn how to be productive in spite of some stomach rumblings. Part of the trick lies in learning to ignore it. Drink some water or black coffee and wait 20 minutes. I’ve personally found that true hunger is much easier to overcome than the munchies. I define the munchies as that feeling you have when you’ve eaten just one warm chocolate chip cookie. Once you’ve had one, you really want another.
But that’s not how I feel fasted. As I type this, it’s been 22 hours since I last ate. My stomach has a slightly hollow sort of feeling but I don’t mind that because it keeps me alert. There’s plenty of stored fuel on the system, my body knows how to utilize it, so there’s no feeling of panic or emergency. I could continue like this for days, but I’m looking forward to eating tomorrow.
You will know you’ve crossed to the other side when:
You find yourself reading twice as fast as you used to and no longer needing to reread sentences.
When you start listening to everything on 1.25 or 1.5 speed but are still able to follow no matter how complicated the material is.
When you have tons of energy to do things like clean, and no longer suffer from decision fatigue.
That, my friend, is the magic of ketones: upgrading the mitochondria in your cells, and giving your brain a boost. If it can bring someone out of a catatonic state, it can surely do something for you. But you’ll never know unless you try.
Final Note:
If you have started fasting and then quit and then keep saying you’ll start again tomorrow, don’t give up. It takes a long time to relearn a lifetime of input telling you to eat processed junk around the clock. Not only is your body learning a new trick, to burn its own fat, but your mind is also still figuring out if you believe this stuff or not. It’s a long process, and that’s okay. Tomorrow is a new day so keep trying and upgrading yourself to the new 2.0.
Until Next Week, Fast Well and then Feast Well,
Leslie Taylor