Breaking My Fast
I broke my fast at about 2:30 PM on Day 20 with some miso soup. I had read that when refeeding that you want to go slowly and that you want to introduce probiotics first. Miso soup has probiotics and I went slow. See below for food details.
I may have broken a few hours early, but I also don't know exactly what time I started on Day 0. It was Father's Day on Day 20 and we were going to meet at a restaurant and while I was confident that I could eat keto at the restaurant, I didn't want to sit there and not eat at all with a group of 10.
My taste buds were hypersensitive. Flavors and tastes are definitely intensified.
I felt great. There were no issues with the reintroduction with food.
I could eat a house. I don't feel that my stomach shrunk.
It's very hard to stay under 20 carbs per day, although, I ate close to 40 and didn't get a spike in glucose or drop in ketones. My glucose reading was actually more optimal.
I am going to do keto with intermittent fasting and two meals per day for the next couple weeks and reassess. I have a feeling that I will prefer the slow carb diet. It feels more sustainable. I am going to kick up the daily calorie burn to 4,000+. I may fast on Saturday night to Sunday night or Saturday night to Monday afternoon.
Note: There are a few things above that are hard to "exact". I am using the "MyNetDiary" app and I used one of their restaurant vinaigrette dressings. I don't know if the macros are right and that was one of my biggest sources of calories and carbs for the day.
Same with the lobster artichoke dip. I used a pre-programmed food from the app and that's what they have for a couple of tablespoons of that appetizer. I had it on a piece of celery, which i didn't account for either.
Key Takeaways
I have a few takeaways from the overall experience as well.
Hunger strikes are largely BS. With electrolyte water, unless the striker goes into the strike very skinny to begin with, it doesn't seem like it would be very hard or dangerous, in my opinion. Of course, this depends on the time spent striking as well.
I think that the keto diet is going to turn out to be a diet that is good for sedentary people, but my energy levels are a real concern. And that may be specific to me as well. I am going to shoot for 4,000 calories burned per day and a caloric deficit and I am anxious to see how much energy I have.
All diets are based on a caloric deficit ultimately, even keto. What keto does, as I understand, is keep your glucose low so that your body isn't "primed" for conversion of sugar to fat storage and puts your body into ketosis so that you are "primed" to burn fat as fuel. There is probably more nuance here, but also this is an elegant way to explain it.
I sleep/slept a lot less. I can't say that I was more focused though.
My skin and hair feel softer, but that could be my imagination.
Challenge completed, but I don't think that I would ever do a 20 day fast again. I think that I can run a greater calorie deficit on the keto diet or the slow carb diet. I'm worried about muscle loss as well.
If someone asked me one thing that they should add to their longer-term fast I would suggest a fiber supplement like Kojac root. I just felt better the days that I took it. After the first 10 days I knew that I was pretty much "clear", but stuff still builds up (I don't know from where), but doesn't move out and the Kojac always made me feel better. I think that I took it 3 - 4 times, but 2 - 3 were in the last 5 days of the fast.
I said that I wasn't going to measure weight. I estimate that I lost 15 - 30 pounds. My pants size went down 1 or 1.5 (not yet 2). Shirts feel baggy. This morning (Day 21), I thought that my pant legs felt baggy. My profile looks completely different in the mirror. No stomach, relatively flat. Not that I had pecs before, but my chest looks small and not in a good way.
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