Hi Adam,
Congratulations on completing a 23 day fast, hopefully you can get back to feeling happy, healthy, and hippy soon!
I'd like to ask what your fasting history is?
"I am assuming that my body is still in detox mode and cannot clear enough of the residues out of the lymphatic system so has therefore created this healing crisis for me to deal with... the question is how!"
It is best to break your fast when you are on an 'up' cycle, meaning that if you are not feeling well you should continue fasting until your body deals with the current toxins it is dealing with. How were you feeling when you broke your fast? If you weren't feeling well when first taking food again, this would greatly diminish your bodies ability to handle nourishment, as it's energies would be diverted away from the digestive process and directed towards cleansing and healing. Eating at this time would interrupt this process. What you are feeling likely isn't a healing crisis, though yes your body will not completely switch from detoxing so soon...
"I also noticed that my digestive system did seem to be taking issue with the new influx of food, but with the high quantity of juice and soluable fibre I did think it would be good to have the tract swept clean after the fast."
I think this is the cause of your problems. Too much food too soon. 23 days is quite a long time, and your digestive system will have gone into a deep 'slumber' and need to be gently nurtured back to it's regular functioning. I note you say "high quantinty of juice", while it's important to have have quality nourishment after a fast, a high quantinty of even healthy food is contradictory. Which is a good reason that juice is your best bet for breaking a fast, since even if you over due it a little, it will be received much better by the body than whole foods. Sometimes just a little juice is enough to stimulate the bowels after a fast. No need to rush in to eating fiber to sweep the tract clean, there was nothing doing this for the last 23 days...
"Broke the fast with a day of vegetable and fruit juices, along with a few leaves of raw spinach later in the day and a couple of small items of sweet fresh fruit."
How much of these you took will make a big difference, and where you would have been safest waiting a few days before taking even whole fruit. For your first 'meal' for example, as little as 1/8-1/4 of a cup of fresh juice would have been a recommended amount. Sipped slowly, and taking the time to 'chew' it and letting your saliva start the digestive process. Repeating this process every 1-2 hours. You may find, if you look at some older posts here, that people have had problems from breaking much shorter fast than yours with whole fruit. A common advised rule of thumb is to stay with juice 1 day for every 4-5 days that you fasted. So for your 23 day fast, having nothing but juice for around 5 days. After which you could move into whole fruits, again taking care to not eat too much at once. The best fruits during this time are ones of high water content, melons, apples, grapes, oranges, etc. After this you could start with small salads. Be prepared for the next few weeks that your digestive system will still not be at it's full working capacity, even if you think you are ready for more, mind yourself. We should allow for a period of time equal to the fast in returning to our normal digestive capacity, and sometimes more.
What kind of fruits have you consumed? Bananas would be a poor choice for instance, and dried fruit would be worse. The spinach would have best been taken much later after breaking your fast. What amounts of juice, fruit, and salad have you taken?
"However, my glands in my throat have now swollen up and I now have a sore throat. Also my tongue became very sensitive and felt like it had been exposed to too much acid or something.
"Do I continue with the juicing and reduce the quantity of food to a minimum, or try to just drink as much water as possible and refuse all solids again?"
There is no need to drink as much water as possible... are you having excessive thirst? Only drink if your body requires it, any excess water is just more that your body has to deal with. I think you should refuse all solids. Try to relax and rest, drink if thirsty, but otherwise it is for your best to allow your body to recover from overtaxing it with too much food. This may take a day or so. Start back with the juice when you're ready and stay with that for a few days, then start with very small fruit only meals of high water content.
Don't worry, you don't sound like you've done anything overly wrong, just a little hiccup. It sounds like you've let the psychological aspect of the need for food govern your strong appetite emerging from this fast...
"Went from 155-130lbs on the fast and I'm a 6ft male in my 30s, so I'm pretty keen to start rebuilding as that's not a lot of weight for my frame..."
This is a normal amount of weight to lose in a fast of this duration. I understand your eagerness to gain your weight back, but you must be patient with your body and it will take care of itself. While 130lbs. is thin, you're in no danger. Most of your weight loss has been temporary water loss, that will quickly return. After a fast, less is more to an extent. Please remember your digestive system has been resting, your metabolism has lowered (it will return), small amounts of food will still result in a quick return of your weight. Overeating at this time will not result in gaining your weight back any quicker, and will more likely cause you to gain less back.
You may feel like you need a lot of food to make up for the days you went without, but just reason it out. You were fine during those days, there is no need to jump back in to eating large quantities so soon.
I hope this information is what you are needing. It looks like it was, based on how I interrupted your post. Please ask if there was something else, or if I missed something. I don't know how much of this you knew or what your experience is with fasting. Keep us updated on how you are, and I'm sure someone more knowledgable/experienced than I will be able to help you (if I haven't).
"Anyway, I decided to do more juicing and minimise all fruit consumption, still eating a bit of fruit though, mainly out of a mentally perceived need to rebuild... I know this isn't necessary but I thought as long as I take it fairly easy for a few days I should feel a bit better... and I am... though still feel a bit down emotionally, which is hard to take after feeling especially upbeat during my fast. I guess I will have to just give me and my body more time to adapt to the changes that have taken place inside me... and try not to be so impatient for the improvement in overall vitality that led me to this process... "
You sound like you're back on track now.
"I know rebuilding will take a while, and I was aware of that before I started this journey, but I seem to remember that when I did a 25 day water fast before that my transition back to foods was more straight forward.. although I guess I was a bit younger then (8 years ago - 27)..."
I was a bit younger 8 years ago too ;) But I don't think your age has anything to do with it. You're still fairly young now, and I don't advise anyone of any age to think that they don't need to be cautious of breaking their fast. Even babies vomit back up their food when they've had enough baby food force fed to them. And little kids with stomach aches after eating too much candy! You're never too young that your digestive system can be treated with little regard, especially so after a fast. I believe there are 2 possiblities as to why you had an easier time with it several years ago. And I'd like to hear your thoughts on these theories.
Firstly, it could have been that you were less experienced at the time. I don't know what you knew of the process at that time, but I do know that you say you read a lot before this fast, so I'm lead to believe you were thinking about it a lot less 8 years ago, therefore just didn't pay the discomforts that you may have felt as much mind as you have this time around.
An example comes to me now from one of the first times I consciously chose to abstain from food. I was about 18 years old and didn't know much of anything in the grand scheme of things. I finished a fast of 36 hours or so and broke it with a huge fruit smoothy. I didn't quite finish it but started to feel very ill and had to lay down in the lazy boy chair in the living room. Of course after resting for a short amount of time I felt better, and basically forgot about the whole experience until now. If I'd known and realized that this was because I should have been more moderate at the time I'd have been thinking about it a lot more and for several days to come. As you can see even at the age of 18 and coming off a fast of 36 hours it wasn't in my best interest to gulp down a huge smoothy.
The other likely possibility is that you were in more of an up cycle when you broke your last fast. As you may know, and as I mentioned in my last post, the body will go through cycles of cleansing on a fast. If your body is dealing with heavy detox/cleansing/repair it's energies are therfore committed to those tasks. The process of digestion is one that takes a lot of energy. If you try to start this process up while your body is heavily focused on dealing with something else, it's sure to make refeeding more difficult for you. For instance, did you not have days on this fast where you felt very vibrant and alive, for only days later to be feeling tired, ill, or a bit down? How were you feeling when you first broke the fast? And maybe compare this to your fast of 8 years ago.
Of course the third possibility is that it wasn't any different and you just forgot. ;)
"I guess my mental turmoil isn't made any easier when I start to question the fast itself, for instance, I feel like I did get pretty dehydrated on the fast, my skin became pretty wrinkled. I am just hoping that I did get benefit from everything I did and did not cause any damage in the process. I felt comfortable with my understanding of the process - I did A LOT of research, reading virtually every old naturopathic text available on the matter, but I know that doesn't ensure success... However, with my digestion taking time to re-adjust, my emotional state of mind taking a bit of a hit, and my body not gaining much weight back and continuing to feel week, I have some doubts as to how much benefit I have gained from the process..."
Again, I think your digestion re-adjustment is more than normal and should have been expected. I understand your emotional state, and where an overtaxing of the digestive system can naturally lead to feeling this way. I would also say it should be expected to still be feeling weak, your body is still detoxing heavily. It needs time to readjust fully, as is normal. In fact you should still be gaining from the process and will continue to do so if you continue breaking the fast properly and living wholesomelly afterwards.
"What are your thoughts on that... do you think the fasting process will have been beneficial"
From what you have said I do believe your fasting process will be beneficial. But you must continue to ease into eating. Once your body has completely readjusted you will continue to benefit from the fast. It will better utilize the nutrition that you give it and be freed of the burden of excess toxins so that it may strengthen. Hopefully, if you weren't already, you will begin to eat a nutritionally dense diet and get appropriate amounts of fresh air, sunshine, and exercise. You will really be able to utilize the benefits of all of these things now.
"or do you think there is always the potential to be left in a more compromised state of health than before the fast?"
If you mean your health being compromised from the fast itself, this is highly doubtful in my opinion unless there was a special reason that fasting was contraidicated for you in the first place. The most important thing is refeeding properly, and I don't think you've done any real harm there from what you've said. You were just being a little overzealous and trying to move the body along quicker than it wanted to go.
"Your support and advice is much appreciated...
Many thanks,
Adam"
Take care, Adam. :)