Re: Can you plateau while you fast?

Dana, I read your post in the weight loss forum and know you are discouraged. Try not to be, your body is acting normally. It is virtually impossible for the vast majority of people to lose 30-40 pounds of body fat in a single fast. Even that amount of overall weight loss is unlikely, it goes against our natural physiology. Remember your basic biology? It takes the expenditure of about 3500 calories to lose a pound of body fat. Find one of those calories burned per activity charts and see how it would be almost impossible for an average person to burn enough calories (15,000+) to lose five pounds of fat in a single day. What happens in the first few days of a fast is that we lose a lot of excess water weight plus the weight of the material in our digestive system. This is probably why you were able to see such rapid weight loss on your shorter fasts. When our body fluids become balanced (a wonderful benefit of short fasts for those of us who retain excess water) and our digestive systems are empty then the weight loss we see is generally that of body fat loss and that is a lot slower process. However, with the gradual reduction of body fat, you are becoming cleaner in terms of toxins stored in the body, leaner and healthier. You will need to be extremely careful when you return to eating because by now your metabolic rate will have slowed considerably. You must stay on a very low calorie diet and slowly work you way up as you metabolism gradually increases. Still,after 10 days I would say you have done a great deal of inner cleansing and have gained discipline that you might never suspected you had. Just because you have not lost all the weight you expected to does not mean your fast was a waste of time and effort. In reality you may be experiencing the real benefits of water fasting, renewed health and healing. The weight loss is more of a bonus, health is far more important whether you can see that now or not, you have done something good for your body.

I know that many of the fasting for weight loss crowd think we are a mean spirited bunch over here. We really aren't, but we have discovered, the hard way, that extended fasts are not the best way to lose weight and keep it off. When I first started fasting it was to lose weight. I could drop 10-12 pounds in two days, but it would always come back within a week. I too, lived the fantasy that one day I would quit eating for a month, lose a ton of weight and everything would be OK. It never worked that way. I did find other wonderful benefits from fasting though and am a strong supporter of it. My feeling is for weight loss issues that Water Fasting one or two days a week plus following a healthy Diet is the best way to lose weight and keep it off. Once you discover the trigger foods that either can make you gain weight or slow down your diet, you can eliminate them and lose 5 pounds a week when you throw in a fasting day or two. By the way-my trigger food is wheat, with corn and white potatoes also a problem. After you have lost most of the weight you need to, then you can do a fast for a week to ten days to cleanse your body of both self-produced and environmental toxins, equalize blood pressure and insulin levels and generally "reboot" your system.
The only real advice I can give you is to allow fasting to do what is is meant to do, accept weight loss as a bonus, not the primary goal, and above all else, listen to your body and follow its natural wisdom both during and after your fast. When your health is restored you can continue to fast for both cleansing and healing of the body, mind and spirit.
By the way-ten days of fasting is awesome!
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Dana, I read you post in the weight loss forum and know you are discouraged. Try not to be, your body is acting normally. It is virtually impossible for the vast majority of people to lose 30-40 pounds of body fat in a single fast. Even that amount of overall weight loss is unlikely, it goes against our natural physiology. Remember your basic biology? It takes the expenditure of about 3500 calories to lose a pound of body fat. Find one of those calories burned per activity charts and see how it would be almost impossible for an average person to burn enough calories (15,000+) to lose five pounds of fat in a single day. What happens in the first few days of a fast is that we lose a lot of excess water weight plus the weight of the material in our digestive system. When our body fluids become balanced (a wonderful benefit of short fasts for those of us who retain excess water) and our digestive systems are empty then the weight loss we see is generally that of body fat loss and that is a lot slower process. However, with the gradual reduction of body fat, you are becoming cleaner in terms of toxins stored in the body, leaner and healthier. You will need to be extremely careful when you return to eating because by now your metabolic rate will have slowed considerably. You must stay on a very low calorie diet and slowly work you way up as you metabolism gradually increases. Still,after 10 days I would say you have done a great deal of inner cleansing and have gained discipline that you might never suspected you had. Just because you have not lost all the weight you expected to does not mean your fast was a waste of time and effort. In reality you may be experiencing the real benefits of water fasting, renewed health and healing. The weight loss is more of a bonus, health is far more important whether you can see that now or not, you have done something good for your body.

I know that many of the fasting for weight loss crowd think we are a mean spirited bunch over here. We really aren't, but we have discovered, the hard way, that extended fasts are not the best way to lose weight and keep it off. When I first started fasting it was to lose weight. I could drop 10-12 pounds in two days, but it would always come back within a week. I too, lived the fantasy that one day I would quit eating for a month, lose a ton of weight and everything would be OK. It never worked that way. I did find other wonderful benefits from fasting though and am a strong supporter of it. My feeling is for weight loss issues that Water Fasting one or two days a week plus following a healthy Diet is the best way to lose weight and keep it off. Once you discover the trigger foods that either can make you gain weight or slow down your diet, you can eliminate them and lose 5 pounds a week when you throw in a fasting day or two. By the way-my trigger food is wheat, with corn and white potatoes also a problem. After you have lost most of the weight you need to, then you can do a fast for a week to ten days to cleanse your body of both self-produced and environmental toxins, equalize blood pressure and insulin levels and generally "reboot" your system.
The only real advice I can give you is to allow fasting to do what is is meant to do, accept weight loss as a bonus, not the primary goal, and above all else, listen to your body and follow its natural wisdom both during and after your fast. When your health is restored you can continue to fast for both cleansing and healing of the body, mind and spirit.
By the way-ten days of fasting is awesome!