Ok! March is done, how did I do?
Goal: My goal was to lose 8 lbs. this month.
Result: I lost 9, so that was a success. More on how that happened in a bit.
Inches: My goal was simply "better," since losing actual inches is notoriously hard to predict*
Result: -1" from waist, just about the same on the chest.
TOTALS since starting the blog:
-17lbs. I had to check that a couple of times to make sure that was real. All of a sudden the numbers look not horrible!
-5" waist and chest. Nice. The inches are always so darned difficult to lose as opposed to weight, but it's coming along!
HOW and WHY:
So I started this month, as my previous post stated, attempting a low carb protocol. That did work for a bit as it usually does in the short term, but the same old problems of chronic hunger all the time kicked in (despite what you read, while low carb definitely helps with satiety, it isn't a cure all and you can definitely overeat this way).
As the month wound down, I began, inspired by my wife and my "nutritional advisor" to intermittently fast more. This started as a two day fast a couple of weeks ago, in which I had a big, mostly water weight based (but still exciting) weight loss. Far more important than the fickle short term loss, however, was how I felt: Once I decided I wasn't eating, I was sort of totally good with it. I find it utterly bizarre how much easier it is to eat nothing, while it is hard to just eat a little.
The next week I fasted again, Monday through Wednesday morning. This was the longest fast I've ever done (about 56 hours). I had an issue with "jitters" near the end, which I read can happen: when you enter a fasted state, your body goes through incredible hormonal shifts and you can get out of whack. My multivitamin did not have some minerals in it, plus I was probably consuming too much caffeine in this period. I went ahead and broke the fast, but again, I lose even more weight this time than the last. Nice!
However, after a weekend of pretty standard, non-pig out eating, I gained back virtually all the weight. Every last bit (this was just this past Monday!).
Additionally, I fasted Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday again, and lost... nothing.
Yep. I lost like 7 lbs the week before, gained it ALL BACK, and lost NOTHING AFTER THREE DAYS OF FASTING. WHAT. THE. HECK.
My "nutritional advisor" explained it well: basically what happens is that when you refeed after fasting a few days, you probably do not completely fill up the glycogen reserves to the point where you are going to have a huge water weight loss after week one (in my case, week two- week one for me was a very brief, 20 hour fast). Ok, that makes sense, but if you haven't even filled your glycogen reserves up (the fuel your body stores for short term energy use during a fasting period- this lasts about a day or so if you aren't eating, then you switch to fats and a little bit of internal protein**), how could I have regained so much weight, and why am I holding on to it?
Well, a little bit of it is "your body hates you," but the full answer is, look: when refeeding, did you eat carbs at all? In my case, heck yes. Carbs are water sponges, you see, and so if you refeed and even eat the slightest amount of carbs, you are going to soak up all that water you are drinking and hold it.
So, again, TRUST THE PROCESS. I was feeling a little jittery on Wednesday night so I did allow myself a moderate meal, but I was back in fast land on Thursday and Friday (so basically I fasted Monday-Tuesday-Thursday-Friday this week), and finally, on Friday, 5lbs of water weight dropped off. And boy, I could tell: I was PISSING SO MUCH that day. It's amazing how long your body can force you to have a bad result on a scale, when you are actually burning fat internally. Then, this morning, another handful of pounds of water weight off. So now all that weight I regained is gone plus several more.
So for anyone attempting fasting I would tell them: beware these sorts of times when your body is a huge jerk and just holds on to a weight. Of course my nutritional advisor would tell me to just not use the scale at all, or at most once a month or something. I'm still checking regularly until my vacation to Japan (when all bets are off and I'm eating like a drunken pac man), but when I'm back, I may actually take this advice.
The most impressive thing to me was how relatively easy it was, most of the time, to just eat nothing. I went out with my family to a mall food court and I could just easily sit there and have an espresso and water while they ate and totally not care!
Also, while I REALLY DO NOT WANT TO BE A FASTING CULTIST (trust me, they are out there, and make silly claims on the regular), some purely anecdotal, unscientific observations from me:
1. I had a cold on Monday. It was totally and completely gone by Thursday. Shortest cold ever. Some theorize that fasting allows better immune response because your body isn't spending so much energy digesting things. That sounds like more "guys on the internet" talk, but hey, I had this result. So there is that!
2. When I was at the mall with my family, I felt unusually sharp mentally. I was able to corral my kids, quickly solve their minor issues with sharing, and in general be a much better dad, because I wasn't in this "hunger cloud" or a post big meal "food coma" state. I felt better driving: less likely to take a stupid wrong turn, more likely to actually plan ahead in terms of which lane to be, etc. Things I'm sure my wife appreciates!
April Goals:
Er, well, not regain all 17 lbs? Obviously I have a ten day vacation coming up, which in all honesty was a huge reason for this blog. I had personally hit an all time high in weight last year after traveling and didn't want to be at *another* all time high after that. Fortunately that is pretty much impossible to "achieve" now.
So I'll say my main goal is to not do what I usually do after a vacation: not take my eating seriously for weeks afterward, making a small temporary weight gain into a permanent "set point," a mistake I always make. So when that plane lands in America, and the jet lag is gone, I'll be excited to return to a fasting protocol of some sort. While some might suggest forty straight days, I think a regiment of 2 on, 1 off, 2 on, then the weekend of off, repeat, should work pretty well. We'll see. But I'm encouraged overall!
*One of the sucky things about losing weight is your body can and will be stupid about where that fat loss happens; it can be that sliver of fat on your forearm, on some bit that doesn't even seem fat, etc. Just gotta TRUST THE PROCESS as it all gets used eventually.
**Nope, I'm not terribly worried about muscle loss. In what studies exist, the proportion of fat to muscle lost is waaaaaaaay biased in favor of fat, and there is even some debate in some circles over what type of muscle you lose- some even postulate that the body prioritizes non-important "junk" protein you have sort of laying about. Even if that is just "dudes on the internet," the point is- getting the fat off is vastly more important for health, and you can build the muscle later.
