fasting and skinniness

[rawnpawgirl]

Hey everyone, all you rad raw fasters out in cyberspace!!

I would love some advice from all you experienced fasters-- especially from those of you who are slim.

My body, mind, and spirit are very strongly communicating to me that I need to do an extended fast (like 25 days or so).

I did a fast a year ago for 22 days (10 days MC, 2 days water, 10 days juice). It was a wonderful experience (my longest fast before that was 10 days of MC). After that 22 day fast, I went mostly all raw (90-100% depending on the week) from vegetarian, fish once in a blue moon, lots of coffee and junk.

I am so glad I did it but I lost lots of weight and I was already thin. I went from 118 to 102. I was so skinny, my skin was hanging, my ass hanging (sorry but true), I looked yuck and gosh, all the comments from well meaning friends and family...ugh. I felt like Nichole Ritchie!! Now, being mostly 100% raw (except for the occasional slip) I am down to 110. I really don't like being this thin. I want to fast because I believe I need to face some emotional/spiritual/food addiction issues head-on and I know a fast will help SO much and bring me to a new and higher level of health with cleansing and mental/emotional clarity. There is nothing better than fasting for bringing things to the forefront that must be faced! Ya know?

Anyway, can anyone give me some advice??? I think that if I am 110 now, I would get down to 95 lbs or so. Can you imagine??? I know fasting is good and right and healthy, but I can't help but be concerned with the weight issue. It is the ONLY thing holding me back.

What do you think? Thanks in advance for your comments/suggestions.

Kirsten

[sport]

Maybe fasting is good as you say but does it have to be for as long as that.

[eatyourbroccoli]

how tall areyoU?

[star1919]

Hi... I can't answer your question. Hopefully someone will be able to offer some good information for you.

I was wondering if you could do smoothies for more calories. Or higher calorie in juices you make. Perhaps that would give you the renewal and simplicity of a fast... without too much weight loss.

Also, drinking LOTS of water... will help with your skin when you're fasting.

Wishing you the very best in your journey... :D

[rawnpawgirl]

sport- I wanted it to be long, to get the deeper benefits of fasting--to the brain level at day 21 as Miss Linda has talked about.

eatyourbroccoli- I am 5"5'

star1919-yeh, I don't know about the smoothies, definitely would consider it, but really want deep detox. Wonder what some higher cal juices would be????

Would love some additional advice/suggestions!!!!

[Brianna]

I also want to do a fast (a longer one) to help me with my emotional/food addiction issues. The only thing is that I need to lose weight! I don't know what to tell you. I work at Hippocrates Health Institute and we don't advise underweight people to fast, but you know your body best.

[Sharon in Colorado]

I am considered slim at 143 lbs 6 ft tall and when I fast or liquid diet, I usually don't lose more than 10 lbs. or so.

I also read in Miracle of Fasting by Paul Bragg that his underweight sister who all her life had been fed all kind of meats and rich foods in order to get her to gain, stabilized her weight through the ritual of fasting. Paul Bragg advocated strict fasting though - water only.

Oh I see you are looking for advice. Well, if you are spiritually led to a lengthy fast, no man could advise you otherwise. But if you are feeling like you intuitively need a fast, you might want to consider several short fasts, or an all liquid fast with a few days water in the middle of the fast.

I try to fast weekly for 24 hours each time. You could try that, a weekly fast, then a monthly 3 day fast, then a seasonal 7-10 day fast as the Braggs did. Or you may be interested in finding out about a supervised fast, which might make you more comfortable about your weight.

[star1919]

Hey Rawnpawgirl... There may be someone else with some good ideas for higher calorie juices... Mostly, I would stay with fruit juice combinations. Also, perhaps you could drink them more often... kind of like some people eat 6 small meals a day instead of the typical 3.

If you pay attention to how your body is responding... and what you're feeling... you can make adjustments as you go along.

Brightest best with your fasting... :D

[Biff]

If you are planning on doing the Master Cleanse again, you can always use a little more maple syrup than just the two Tablespoons that Stanley Burroughs recommends. I forget if this was in Stanley Burroughs book or Peter Glickmans book regarding people concerned with losing too much weight during the MC.

[rawnpawgirl]

Thank you all so much for the thoughtful suggestions. I will take all of what you said into account as I make this important decision.

Love and gratitude sent your way,
Kirsten

[J Raw]

Hi rawnpaw girl. I just read Bragg's Miracle of Fasting book and there was a section on how to gain weight by fasting. Quite interesting, you may want to check it out.

[SiennaInLondon]

Ok this is my first post here as someone helpfully directed me here from thefashionspot.com. The first thing I want to clarify is that I don't have eating disorders etc etc but I am concerned with body aesthetics. The second is, weightloss is one of the most important motivators for me. It just happens to tie in with healthiness as I believe longevity is down to not having too much of the things we crave... food, money, property, sex, heat, oxygen etc etc (ok the last one is hard to limit but oxygen will be the thing that kills you... I forget the reasoning but it was once explained to me by some Natural Scientists at university!).

To start with, I am 5ft8.5" and I am fighting to stay at 53KG (116.6lbs). Before university I was skinny skinny and by the end of school I was not too skinny but not bad -52 (114.4) KG easy. But then the boredom of academia led to lots of chocolate brownies day in day out and I ballooned to 58KG (127.6lbs). Grotesque and uncomfortable to boot.

My target is somewhere in the range of 48-50KGS. In my ideal range? No. But aesthetics and health is something I believe can be balanced as I am 20 years old and a decade of being underweight is in my opinion worth it. I do NOT believe in starvation diets so I have been excercising like crazy and want to do this via diet and exercise. Problem is, my body is stuck at 53KG/54KG at this point. I have been on a year out from university since May 06 and have been pretty much excercising and trying to be healthy since.

My diet has been varying a lot in the period. Sometimes I believe in meat, other times I believe in vegetarianism. I have recently replaced sugar with fruit (mostly because I was addicted to sugar and it was messing up my skin but also because my dentist scared me with a filling) but apparently fruit sugar is as bad for my teeth and my body doesn't need the sugar. Thing is, I need a lot more fruit than I needed chocolate to get rid of the cravings... oh and dates too. The thing I liked about it was I could eat fruit and nuts every time I felt hungry without feeling guilty. And the weight still came off.

Here are a few questions (I know I am probably going to be frustrated with silly 'be happy in your own skin' comments, but that is really not what I am asking here so I would ask you to leave those aside)

1) Some people (like the last poster) have said that fasting puts on weight. This is obviously NOT what I want. I have tried about three, three day water fasts in the last year and a half and the weight never stays off for more than two months or so. How come the thread starter has managed to keep the weight off? Is it because I skip back to eating meat and cakes etc? It still shouldn't come back on so fast and all of a sudden?

2) Why do all the doctors say fasting is NOT the way to keep weight off and will cause all the weight to come back rapidly?

3) Is having a week long raw thing, and then one day a week where I can eat baguettes and steak inadvisable. I used to be a HUGE meat eater so giving up the taste of blood is turing out to be more difficult than my beloved refined sugar.

4) Oh and I tried a week of fruit/nut and I went back down to 53KG after having gone up to 55KG inexplicably (I thought it was my period but the weight didn't come off after my period was over) but the fruit/nut thing gave me a runny tummy.

5) Am I being too haphazard about this?

6) Oh and what is MC... Master Cleanse?

[Nectarine]

I did a fast a year ago for 22 days (10 days MC, 2 days water, 10 days juice)


With all the energy I expend during the course of my week, combined with my quick metabolism, fasting for 22 days would be one of the hardest things I've ever done I think. I applaud you on being able to achieve that!

[SwishTN]

I hadn't read this thread, just the title, and,, when I was reading about fasting elsewhere and for other reasons, I came across this:

73. Thin persons might not realize that they need to fast, in some cases even more than a heavy person. The reason is very simple. The thin individual has so many times overworked his organs by overeating, that he is incapable of putting on weight. I have seen many an underweight person fast from two to three weeks and weigh more after breaking the fast properly than he weighed before fasting. A heavy person usually is in good enough health so that his organs put on weight. However, one should not in any case be a glutton.

It's listed in some article #80 reasons to fast...

Anyway, just thought I would throw it out there! Seems as if Paul Bragg has some agreement as well!

Blessings!
Lauri