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Weekly 24 Hour Water Fasts
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I would be interested in folks' opinion on this. I read the book "Clean" and buy in to the idea that your body uses a lot of energy processing food and then rids the body of toxins when it is not processing food. The idea of the 24 hours fast is to provide your body with an extended time period to focus on removing toxins. I tried the 3 week cleanse that was described in the book, I lasted 3 days. :-) In reality I only lasted 4 hours; I had a cup of black coffee to fight off being brain dead and a caffeine headache.

The reality is that I don't want to sacrifice 3 weeks of quality training to do a cleanse, so I am looking for a reader's digest version.

I did a 24 hour water fast (with the required cup of black coffee) this past Wednesday and it was pretty easy. I was able to workout in the morning and did not feel like I was going to die all day. I am thinking about doing every Wednesday for a month to see if I notice anything different. I do eat a relatively clean diet, but will occasionally stray for something that looks yummy.

Thoughts?
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Re: Weekly 24 Hour Water Fasts [DirtGirl] [ In reply to ]
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This says it better than any explanation I can type:

http://www.webmd.com/diet/detox-diets


"But the idea that your body needs help getting rid of toxins has "no basis in human biology," says Frank Sacks, MD, of the Harvard School of Public Health. Your organs and immune system handle those duties, no matter what you eat."

Plus, drinking only water (and no electrolytes) might end up hurting you more anyway, especially if you're working out during your fast. I know people fast for religious reasons and I'm perfectly fine with that, but when the reasoning is to get rid of toxins, it's not scientifically sound reasoning. You'd be better off just eating a clean diet (and splurging on sweets or unhealthy foods is ok now and then!).
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Re: Weekly 24 Hour Water Fasts [jl2732] [ In reply to ]
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What she said - the whole 'toxins' thing isn't what you think.

While a fast won't hurt you, it's not helping you, either.

Drink a lot of water and eat healthy and your body will take care of 'toxins' on its own.


http://aclockworkmango.com
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Re: Weekly 24 Hour Water Fasts [DirtGirl] [ In reply to ]
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I agree with the other posters. There is no such thing as cleansing. However, there is such a thing as autophagy, which is activated by either exercise (yay!) or by fasting. Autophagy is helpful for increasing longevity.
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Re: Weekly 24 Hour Water Fasts [DirtGirl] [ In reply to ]
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I've read Clean and I've done the 3 week cleanse twice. I'm not sure I really believe we need to rid ourselves of toxins. I did the cleanse for other reasons. However, one of the things that I think is really good that it suggests is that you eat dinner by 7pm and don't eat again for 12 hours. Give your body a full 12 hours to fully digest. This was also suggested by a nutritionist that I've been to. I think it might help with your metabolism.

I don't believe that you should be fasting on a regular basis. It just isn't supported by facts and science. Many of us could eat less than we do, but to not eat entirely for a full 24 hours doesn't make sense to me.

In the end, you have to decide what you are trying to achieve and figure out the best approach to get there. I just don't think a 24 hour fast will do anything other than make you hungry and make your workouts harder than they need to be.
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Re: Weekly 24 Hour Water Fasts [DirtGirl] [ In reply to ]
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I tried the weekly 24 hour fasts for three months straight last year, but could not find any difference in anything - weight, performance, mood, etc.

There's a lot of evidence for calorie restriction being useful:
http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/86/1/7.full
"Calorie restriction (CR), defined as a reduction in energy intake without malnutrition, has been shown to increase life span, improve numerous functional indexes, and reduce metabolic risk factors for chronic disease in several mammalian species."

Alternate-day fasting or intermittent fasting have been proposed as an alternate way to achieve calorie restriction.
From my experiments it seems once a week is not enough ;-(
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Re: Weekly 24 Hour Water Fasts [doug in co] [ In reply to ]
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That is an interesting article. My primary interest in doing the weekly 24 fasts were the benefits that the article cited and attributed to calorie restriction:

"increase life span, improve numerous functional indexes, and reduce metabolic risk factors for chronic disease",

not necessarily weight loss. Like anything, you can do a google search and find as many articles saying it is good as say it is bad. Just like doing an Ironman. :-)

Your experience after 3 months is a very relevant data point. I am on week 3 and don't have any improvements that I would be confident in directly correlating to the 24 hour fasting. I am 50 and have had intermittent bouts of night sweats with the associated lack of sleep. This latest round, I have been very warm (my husband says it is like sleeping with a hot water bottle) but no sleep depriving anxiety that normally accompanies them. I also have less stress in my life, so that could also be a factor in the improvement.

I wonder if you had had blood work/physical done before and after the 3 months period, if that would have showed any improvement.
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Re: Weekly 24 Hour Water Fasts [DirtGirl] [ In reply to ]
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Your body rids itself of "toxins" every day. The process is known as "digestion" and is accomplished by the kidneys, liver, intestines and associated organs/glands/etc.

While a 24h fast won't kill you, it won't make any long term difference in your body's ability to do its job.
This whole detox thing is, hopefully, nearing the end of its 15 minutes of fame…….On to the next useless fad.
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