Fasting & new to it. Help!

[RawFoodGrl]

I have been on a healing journey and especially after spending several hours last night with a VERY heavy smoker, I feel the need to cleanse my body inside and out (the house too!)

I've never done a planned fast before (outside of simply not eating for various reasons), and this is very spur of the moment, so I haven't done much research. I'm also a little nervous as I'm hypoglycemic.

I am starting my day with a green smoothie of Pure Synergy (contains wheatgrass). plus maca. cacao, cilantro (I understand it helps remove heavy metals) and goji berries as well as agave to help it go down.

I made a Master Cleanse with water. cayenne, lemon juice and maple syrup as one of my raw food book directs, and will be drinking that today.

Any other ideas or suggestions?

What can I expect from this?

How long should I try to do this?

[RawFoodGrl]

Well, I figured I'd post my journey and see if this helps anyone else.

When I first made the Master Cleanse from one of the raw food books I had, I only put in a small amount of maple syrup as it wasn't specific in the amount. I felt good, but very, very spacy.

I spent a lot of time online trying to find information about how to do a fast, and found there's not a lot of specific information out there.

I eventually found a Master Cleanse book as a pdf file (see the end of this Post), and realized I was way off in my maple syrup use. I have not read the whole file, but it also talks about how to get off the cleanse.

I am doing a sort of in-between cleanse, a mixture partway between the raw food book (unclear maple syrup amount and lemons only) and the Master Cleanse pdf file (way more lemons, limes and maple syrup than we have).

That made a HUGE difference, and I continued to feel quite well. I spent the day in quiet meditation, and had the first nightmare free good night sleep in months. So I decided to do it again.


Today is Day 2 and I've decided to only go for 3 days. I wasn't sure I could handle a multi-day fast since I'm hypoglycemic (and most folks say not to fast if you are), but since I was doing well I figured I'd keep going for at least 3 days. I understand 3 days is the smallest amount of time to get to a signficant shift, and, frankly, since I didn't plan on this I have a whole lot of fresh raw food just sitting around going uneaten. I'll do a longer fast later, more planned out, probably next month.

I was having at least some bowl movements (sorry if this offends but people talk about challenges with this when doing a MC) my BF, who had done fasts before, recommended no laxatives or internal cleansers of any kind.

I'm glad I didn't because my body sure moved out a bunch of stuff this morning! Icky sticky and I'm glad it's out!

We did take one of my cats to the vet, and I can certainly say this is NOT something you should do when fasting. Carrying a 15 lb cat to a vet when he doesn't want to go is quite a strain and I really struggled against passing out, between carrying him, his stress & fighting, and the deep scratches I ended up with, not to mention all the standing around waiting for and during the appointment.

Other than that, my big challenge this morning was that I was so spacy from having had nothing while sleeping, so it's taking a bit of MC to get me back feeling balanced again. Taking the cat to the vet within an hour of getting up probably also made this a bit worse, so next time, should I HAVE to have an appointment, at least I will make it for later in the day.

Oh, one final thing I wanted to mention: I am surprised at how successful I have been with this fast and doubt I could have done it at any time before now.

I believe that my transition from eating all kinds of meats but first cutting out sugars and processed foods all the way through to being raw food involved MANY, MANY detoxes. Plus the healing / energy work I've been receiving as part of my healing process I believe also has removed and released a lot of stuck (perhaps also "toxic") energy.

Without doing this pre-work, I think this fast would be very unpleasant and challenging, instead of being a delight and a wonder.

I also find it interesting that a lot of people talk about doing a fast or detox by switching entirely to raw foods!!! And that before doing a fast, one should switch to raw foods for several days, to prepare the body. We're already doing that!!!!

I will keep this updated, in the hopes it helps anyone.


3/12/08 - here is a link to The Master Cleanse pdf:
http://healthandlight.com/TheMasterCleanse.pdf

You might also want to go to The Master Cleanse Support Forum. I found it interesting and helpful:
http://curezone.com/forums/f.asp?f=478

[RawFoodGrl]

The rest of Day 2 went fairly well. It took several hours to come back into balance after the vet - the weight of the cat and the shock to my body with those deep cuts while fasting took some time to recover from. Also it took a while to get my blood sugar back up having not had enough of the MC Lemonade early in the day.

The only other thing I really noticed was that I felt more hungry, particularly when my BF made his vegi burger - it made the whole house smell wonderful. Although I also spent a lot of time on websites dealing with food and reading books about food, so that probably wasn't the best thing to be doing! LOL!!!

Other than that, I felt fairly "normal", as if it was any other day.


Today is Day 3, my final day of the fast. I'm noticing more from a spiritual perspective, which is quite delightful. Again, the day seems much as normal, although so far I do not feel as hungry today as I did yesterday.


Tomorrow is my transition day - after a 10 day fast the MC book reccomends 2 days of orange juice, then a third day with a combination of OJ, fruits and vegetables. I decided to just go right to the third day since my fasting has gone very well, and my normal diet is raw foods.

I'm a little nervous about the fruit, as I've been hypoglycemic and have not had good results eating fruit, making my blood sugar skyrocket and crash, resulting in all kinds of crazy emotions and mood swings. I had planned to do a yeast / candida cleanse, and have been working toward that. So, I have chosen fruits that are lower on the glycemic index scale for the transition. (And wouldn't it be nice if through this cleanse I can go back to eating fruits???)

Breakfast will be fresh squeezed orange juice.

Lunch will be various fruits but focused in this order: berries, stone fruit (cherries, peaches, plums, nectarines), and grapes. (These are rather lower on the GI scale, with berries being very low. This list will also depend on what organic produce is available today.)

Dinner will be raw veggies, most likely one of my favorite arugula + spinach salads.

[Double Helix]

You are doing great, RawFoodGrl.

There's no doubt that a fast is healthy, as rest is important for the digestive system and can only benefit you.

Longer fasts are more effective for cleansing, and the best fasts are water only fasts with constant rest and supervision.

However with somebody starting out, mono dieting or juicing only would be the second best to a fast.

I've embarked on several fasts, and had to really ease into fasting, by first skipping breakfast 3 times a week, then breakfast & lunch the next week. Then breakfast, lunch & dinner and so on until I could get by just 1 day as I would get all out dizzy and nauseas abstaining from food.

After 1 day, I eased into a 3 day fast, then a 2 week fast and finally I was able to do a month long fast.

I have definately seen better results when water only fasting to banana dieting or juice dieting myself. If you ever get to the point in your journey where you can fast on water even for 3 days, you'll see a remarkable difference in your sugar imbalance.

[RawFoodGrl]

Thanks, DH!

Actually, I WANTED to do a water-only fast, but it freaked my BF out too much, so I found this Master Cleanse as a compromise.

********
Just for fun I calculated the calories on the Master Cleanse.

If you do it as described (2T lemon or lime juice, 2T maple syrup, 1/10 tsp cayenne pepper to 8 oz water), for 6 cups of water (the minimum recommended) that's about 800 calories.

He recommends a max of 12 cups (well, the book said "6-12"), then that's about 1200 calories, right at the range recommended for most people to lose weight.

For 16 cups, that's 1,600 calories - so it would be no wonder that you could do this fast and not feel crazy hungry.

*********
The way I'm doing it is different (2T lemon or lime juice, 1/4c maple syrup, 1 tsp cayenne to 64 oz water (8 cups)), and works out to around 200 calories.

I drink 2 of those (1 gallon, 16 cups) in a day, so it actually works out to 447 calories.

[RawFoodGrl]

Yesterday was the last day of my fast. I felt fairly normal, which surprised me, yet, I can now recognize starting yesterday and into today has begun a subtle yet solid shift. It is hard to describe.

I am again rejoicing that doing a fast (which up to now I believed impossible for me) was actually possible, and I actually felt a little bit sad that I was stopping. I look forward to an opportunity to take it out 10 days!

The biggest struggle I've had through this entire process is when my boyfriend cooks food. The aroma (even when what he's making isn't particularly appealing to me) really brought out the hunger pangs and made my stomach growl.

Physically, my gums started bleeding some yesterday. I understand this is a possible outcome from the detox process. One of my teeth really started to hurt - it's the one I have that feels like I have a deep, painful cavity in it but generally when it hurts really something is going on with my sinuses. It was very painful and quite distracting, but it stopped after a couple hours.

The other thing I'm noticing is without all the cayenne pepper I'm feeling cold!


Today I am transitioning. I started with 8 oz of fresh squeezed OJ and am pleased that my body is fine with it, no sugar high then crash, with all the resulting chaos of emotions to go along with it.

I'm feeling low blood sugary, though, as I'm having difficulty focusing, these words are all blending in together, I cannot see well. I'm looking forward to lunch, which is about an hour away.

One thing I found interesting today is the water I was drinking. Typically I put in the shelf variety lemon juice (for cost & convenience - with the chronic pain state I've been healing sometimes convenience trumps freshness), and did so today, but when I drank the water - blech!!!!!!

Not liking the water from the filter as-is, I wasn't sure what to do. I'm out of lemons and limes so I couldn't use fresh juice, and suddenly it dawned on me to send energy into the water and prayers to the water. I did this for a couple minutes and the water is SO amazingly delicious!!!!


Oh, yes, one other thing I wanted to mention - while I was doing a food fast, I also decided to do a TV fast, so I had no TV on at all Sunday and Monday, and just watched two hours yesterday, to watch 2 specific shows. That's been an interesting experience too!

That's all I have for now, but I will post more of my journey as it unfolds.

[Double Helix]

when it hurts really something is going on with my sinuses.

I have that same problem, when my sinuses act up my teeth hurt!

You did great. If you keep doing it regularly and follow along the raw path, I'll bet one day you'll be able to do a water fast. Rest is super-important though. I know of some people who do spiritual water fasts while working, which is fine if it's led by the Holy Spirit, but any other water fast while working is a recipe for disaster!

I really love the Master Cleanser using lime juice. Of course the maple syrup isn't raw, but it is so much better than raw agave nectar, you just can't substitute the flavor of Grade B maple syrup. I cannot even use Grade A for it.

[RawFoodGrl]

Thanks, DH! I may try this again in a month or two, but more planned out. I'm not sure I can go COMPLETELY with water for several days just yet, but maybe one day.

I didn't think I could even do ONE day of the MC, let alone three, so I'm open to the idea of water only. I keep saying that because it just blows my mind.

Fortunately, I'm not working right now, so it's easy to just rest, read and get some sun.



For my fasting update, as I mentioned, yesterday was the transition day. I had 8 oz of OJ for breakfast, which I think was not quite enough. I was pleased it sat well with me, but I was REALLY hungry and it was challenging to wait until lunchtime to eat.

I wasn't sure about the fruit, what to eat, how much to eat, and how it would sit with me, so I started with low glycemic fruits and worked my way up to mid-range.

I started with blueberries. I ate them slowly, chewing thoroughly, and waited to see how they would sit with me. I did the same with strawberries next, and then went on to a peach. The peach wasn't ripe and hard, so as I chewed slowly and sat with it, I felt very strongly I didn't want to keep eating it so I set the rest aside. I then ate some red seedless grapes, and I had a slight problem with that, I noticed it made me a bit sugar-woozily.

I didn't exactly have "lunch", it was more like I "grazed" as it took over 2 hours to complete the process of eating those fruits. I then stopped, because I wanted to be ready for dinner (a vegi salad) and know it's important to completely digest fruit before adding veg.

So, 2 hours later I had one of my favorite spinach & arugula salads. After doing the MC and eating fruit, I was surprised how fibrous the spinach and arugula was!!! It seemed to take an inordinate amount of chewing!!!!! LOL!!!!

After eating the salad, I was still hungry. As the MC said to just eat OJ for breakfast, fruit salad for lunch, and fruit or veg salad for dinner, I thought perhaps I should not eat anything else. (At that point I had had about 750 calories).

But the hunger really got to me and I struggled to figure out what to eat. Since I was starting to feel out of balance, my body's first cry was for an ounce of cheese, as my bodymind knows that will restore me. But especially after the fasting, I did NOT want to put that in my body!!! I ate 1/4 cup of guacamole, which was good, but not enough, then a couple macadamia nuts which really didn't suit. Then I decided to have a hemp shake with all my superfoods. That really hit the spot!

Later that night I read that fasting can remove essential nutrients from the body, so it makes sense that my body was craving those superfoods to bring my nutrition back into balance.

From a spiritual perspective, things are expanding exponentially. It has been a joyous, marvelous, and remarkable experience.

I have found it also interesting that as I've been fasting and coming out of it, I've been giving a lot of thought to foods I liked in the past: bacon cheeseburgers, stuffed baked potatoes, seitan BBQ, bean burritos, tofu scrambles - be it animal, vegi or vegan, I found myself thinking of all the cooked foods I've enjoyed through the years.

I found that odd, but then talking it out with my BF (as he was making a bean burrito while I was hungry and he offered to make me one), I realized that each food was pleasurable in some way to my mouth, mind or body. That there were things about each that I really enjoyed, and to some extent, draw me still.

Looking at each one in turn (and physically looking at the bean burrito, which I think made me really "get it") I realized that while they all appealed to me in the past, while I still feel a pull and draw to them now, the truth is I really do NOT want to put those foods in my body.

I especially found that interesting as I'd completely forgotten we're going out of town for several days, and I had an "Oh my god!" moment thinking about how to do raw food, if I can, etc., but through all this pre-work, pre-thought, I am extremely strong in my stand, in my body, about eating only raw foods.

In fact, I quickly established a plan for how to eat raw, no matter WHAT restaurant we go to, and as we discuss our travel plans, it seems now part of our adventure may well be to try every raw restaurant in the area we can find!!

Outside of that, I find my body appears to be cleansing, as, well, let's just say when I went to the bathroom today it was not as "usual" and smelly.


So, that's the last I plan to post about my journey, unless something comes up that I feel is really important to share.

DH, I appreciate having your comments and support, and I hope this journey helps others in theirs.