Kristen Anne Glover

Five in Tow

Fasting for Health–The Update!

Two weeks ago, I challenged myself to do a three-day juice fast.  It was the longest fast I have done in the last ten years, and if I wasn’t convinced it was the best thing I could do for my body, I wouldn’t have done it at all.

Fasting is scary to me, but the more I read about the benefits, the more I had to do it.  I put a date on the calendar and tried to be brave.  I was nervous about it, not just because I don’t like to be hungry, but because I wasn’t sure I actually could fast for three days and still take care of five busy kids, my husband, and all my responsibilities.  Could I really fast for three days and NOT kill someone?

I planned my fast for a time when my husband was going to be away for the weekend.  I thought it would be easier to have him gone because we tend to indulge in special snacks and extra coffee when he’s home on the weekends.  I couldn’t imagine watching a movie with him and not making popcorn!

As it turned out, our area of the country was hit with a significant (for us) snowstorm the week before my fast.  Everything was shut down, and my husband didn’t have work for a week.  His duty weekend at Ft. Lewis was cancelled (he’s an Army chaplain).  I barely made it out of the house to load up on fruit and veggies for my juicing.

The first day of my fast, I had to endure my husband’s coffee-making ritual as I downed a glass of the worst tasting juice I have ever made.  I felt a little sorry for myself.  Did you know there’s such a thing as too much kale?  There is.

But, having my husband home turned out to be much more of a blessing than it was a temptation to eat.  He is extremely supportive and it was nice to have someone to talk to, and to have an extra hand with the kids (always a plus).  I found out that I wasn’t very tempted to cheat.  I had decided to do this fast and I didn’t want to break it.  I wanted to see if I could do it.

The first day was the hardest for me.  I had a sinus headache that made it difficult to function.  And I was hungry.  Some people say they aren’t hungry when they fast but I think they are all liars because I WAS HUNGRY.  Granted, I’d been eating nothing but salad for a week ahead of the fast in an attempt to really, really clean out my system, but still.  The kale-juice-of-awfulness was just not cutting it.  I could barely drink it.  Finally, I gave up and dumped it down the sink.  It was liberating.  Starting afresh with far less kale in my juice, things began to get easier.

That night, my mother-in-law invited us over for pizza and games.  We’d been stuck in our house for a week because of the snow, with no one to entertain us but the neighbor kids zipping down our hill on their sleds, so we jumped at the chance.  Even though I was going to be around food, I didn’t care.  It was nice to think about being around people and doing something fun.  The pizza and the snacks didn’t really bother because I don’t usually eat that kind of stuff anyway.  But the salad looked good.  And then my husband made a pot of coffee and I thought I was going to have to keep kissing him just to get a taste of it.  Ah!  Coffee is my downfall!

Day two and three were much easier for me than the first day, and not just because my hubby was happy from all the smooching.  My headache went away and I felt great.  I had a lot of energy and was even able to work out like normal.  I wasn’t nearly as hungry, either.  I only drank juice at meal times and didn’t feel like I was suffering beyond reason.  I did drink a lot of herbal tea, especially Echinacea because it supports the lymph nodes and helps to detox.  Plus, it was cold outside and I was freezing.   Not eating made me feel colder than usual.  I just wanted to hold a cup of soup!

By the time the last day of the fast came around, I knew I could do it.  I went to bed with the happy thought that I’d be able to get up and make my usual cup of coffee.  It was reassuring to know that I could eat again, but I wanted to make sure that I didn’t overdo it.  I ate a pear for breakfast and it felt indulgent.  I tried to eat the same things I’d juiced and avoided even healthy oils and sprouted nuts for the first couple days.

Before I began the fast, I wondered if I would lose much weight by not eating for three days.  I didn’t need to lose weight, but like most women, I wasn’t going to complain if I did.  The first two days, the scale didn’t move at all.  I was a little annoyed.  Here I was, practically starving myself, and the scale didn’t show it.  I kept telling myself that I was healthy and that is all that matters (lies, all lies).  But still.  Not an ounce?!   I woke up the third day and gave the scale a dirty look.  Why do I even own one of those things?  But I hopped on anyway and was shocked to see that I’d lost five pounds overnight.  I don’t know how a person loses five pounds while they sleep (I guess I toss and turn a lot), but that’s what happened.  And it hasn’t come back.  I feel a sense of redemption in that.

More importantly, I feel a great sense of accomplishment because I did something I didn’t think I could do.  And it wasn’t awful and I didn’t kill anyone and I was (mostly) my usual delightful self.  But, I did feel like three days wasn’t quite long enough.  I have read several doctors who say that a three day fast removes the toxic build-up in the body, but it takes five days (or longer) to really begin to undo any past damage.  Five days lets the body really accomplish something.  So, my next challenge is to complete a five day fast.  I haven’t set the date yet, but I think it will be sometime this month.  Stay tuned, and please consider joining me!

Fasting for Health, Part 1

Fasting.  It’s a scary word for me.  Like most people, I find comfort in food and refuge in eating.  I don’t like to be hungry.  As a matter of fact, I rarely allow myself to feel hunger because I eat like a bird (in other words, constantly).  When I think about going without food for a day or two, or, dare I say three, my palms get sweaty and my heart beats a little faster.   I feel a little panicky.

Still, I’ve done a few fasts in the past, always for spiritual reasons.  It is difficult for me every time, but yet rewarding and even nourishing.   I rarely fast longer than a day or two.  Once, and only once, my husband and I did a complete fast for five days.   It was both one of the most amazing and most excruciating five days of my life.  Because it was so challenging, I have never had a desire to repeat that experience!

Recently, however, I’ve become open to the idea of lengthy fasting for health reasons.  Fasting stimulates your body’s natural healing abilities and prompts the production of beneficial growth hormones.  It draws on your fat reserves, which are a holding tank for toxins and a storage place for any viruses or diseases you have been exposed to over your lifetime.  Any prescription drugs or antibiotics you’ve ever taken, or any vaccines you’ve ever been given, also leave a trace in your body.

Fasting cleanses your body of this buildup, stripping down fat cells and releasing toxins.  It gives your digestive tract a chance to rest from the daily work of digesting your food so it can focus on healing itself and dealing with the glut of unaddressed issues your body has been ignoring.

It might be helpful to think of your body like an e-mail in-box.  Every day, it receives more messages than it can respond to, so every day, the inbox gets more and more backed up.  Your body prioritizes by responding to the most important e-mails, but every day, it gets more and more sluggish because it can’t keep up.   By stopping the flow of new messages coming in, your body can deal with, and purge, the backlog of SPAM, forwards, and advertisements that clog up and slow down the server.

However, most of us never give our bodies this opportunity for rest.   Instead, we treat everything from illnesses to aging by sending more messages into our bodies.  We add supplements, exercise, meditation, super foods, lotions and potions in an effort to get our bodies to work (and look) the way we think they should.  And while these things may be beneficial, they don’t address the real problem.  If you have a back-up in your e-mail, adding more memory to your computer is not going to fix it.

What our bodies need is a break.  A rest.  A chance to catch up, recoup, and restore.  If given the opportunity to do this, our bodies will amaze us with their ability to heal themselves.

But when it comes to fasting, few of us are willing to take the plunge.  Self-denial is not something we Westerners value.  Giving something up feels a little too much like sacrifice, too much like a hardship.  We think it requires more self-control than we have, and we worry that it might hurt.

Even when we know that a temporary denial will bring long-term gain, we resist.   We are willing to add things in, but please, let’s not talk about taking them away.

As I began to read and think about fasting, I realized that  I was not willing to suffer any kind of real discomfort for the sake of my health.  After all, I don’t need to lose weight and I’m not suffering from any dread diseases (that I know of).  So if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, right?

Of course this isn’t true.   Periodic resting and cleansing is good for everyone, even those of us who don’t think we “need” it.

With that in mind, I decided to take on a three-day fast.  My husband, who is a chaplain in the Army Reserves, will be gone next weekend for duty.   This provides the perfect opportunity for me to fast.   In fact, he’s gone one weekend a month, so I’m considering making this fast a routine thing.  But we’ll see how this one goes first!

I have decided to do a juice fast since I don’t need to lose weight and because I need to keep up my energy for chasing after all these kids!   In order to maximize the effectiveness of the fast, I’m preparing my body now.  I know I drink more coffee than I should, and I don’t want to suffer withdrawals during the fast, so I’m cutting back now.   This is something I should have done a long time ago.

Secondly, I’m eating a raw food diet until the fast, and for a few days afterward.  This will help to cleanse my digestive tract and provide my body with lots of nutrients, including necessary enzymes, which my body will need to heal itself during the fast.   I will be posting blog updates during the fast so you can see how it goes!  Perhaps you will even consider joining me.  If you do, please be sure to let me know so we can encourage each other in the journey.