question about fasting

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ru442
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Re: question about fasting

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Gritmom... welcome and happy you are beginning your journey. When I started my keto adoption I had to phase it in over several months, eating a light breakfast (hard boiled egg, or nuts/berry's, etc.) and gradually eliminating it over a longer period. Eventually I was able to just eliminate breakfast, and now I go a minimum of 12 hours before my first meal (1-2pm-ish). This includes 3 hours before bedtime. I don't have sleep issues, but follow Stavia's advise, eventually you will get there as your body adapts.
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Re: question about fasting

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GritMom, I noticed your mention of autophagy in a previous post. Are you familiar with the work of Dr. Valter Longo? His research is in anti-aging and he developed a thing called "the fasting-mimicking diet." Very interesting how the body can sense when it it getting enough nutrients of various types, and if it senses a shortage, it may induce autophagy to break up the old cells and reuse/dispose of their parts. Then, when food abundance returns, the body makes a slew of fresh cells. Out with the old, in with the new..
His diet allows you to eat a certain amount so you do not feel starving, but turns on the autophagy, which benefits the immune system, etc. Also may help with multiple sclerosis by regenerating myelin.
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Re: question about fasting

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I'm struggling with the fasting thing, too. I've cut back my sugar intake substantially - not all gone, but much much much reduced. Added lots of fat (nuts, tuna, eggs, olives, & extra dark chocolate). I feel like I eat enough. But some nights my body goes hypoglycemic (doing glucose blood test with meter - and some mornings ok with 83 , while other mornings 68 or 72). Some nights I can't make it 8 hours without having to eat some emergency chocolate. Other nights I go 13 hrs ok. I'm guessing this is going to take some time for my body to adjust. (I had a BMI of 18.25 when I started, so my body doesn't have much stored fat to burn.)
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Re: question about fasting

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gmpicket wrote:I had a BMI of 18.25 when I started, so my body doesn't have much stored fat to burn.)
gmpicket,

With your BMI, fasting can be dangerous. You might want to consult your personal physician about what you're attempting. It's good to try and optimize, but always well within the boundaries of safety. Stay well.
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Re: question about fasting

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gmpicket wrote:I'm struggling with the fasting thing, too. I've cut back my sugar intake substantially - not all gone, but much much much reduced. Added lots of fat (nuts, tuna, eggs, olives, & extra dark chocolate). I feel like I eat enough. But some nights my body goes hypoglycemic (doing glucose blood test with meter - and some mornings ok with 83 , while other mornings 68 or 72). Some nights I can't make it 8 hours without having to eat some emergency chocolate. Other nights I go 13 hrs ok. I'm guessing this is going to take some time for my body to adjust. (I had a BMI of 18.25 when I started, so my body doesn't have much stored fat to burn.)
Possibly you have some hyperinsulinemia. See the reprint of Joseph Kraft's paper Catherine Crofts did her PhD thesis on Kraft's 15,000 data points over his career. She was trying to figure a simpler way to see if someone had hyperinsulinemia without a full five hour glucose tolerance test with insulin assay that Kraft did. She determined that an insulin test two hours after the glucose intake would tell a similar story with <30 being the cutoff for not having hyperinsulinemia. I recently asked her about how much leeway one could have over the 2 hours. She said +/- 15 minutes. " If longer either way, use some good engineering principles to extrapolate whether or not there is a risk of an issue."

My personal experience, with a BMI of 24 and a DXA scan showing my body fat is in the lowest 1st percentile for my age for all limbs and torso, is that being well keto-adapted makes fasting easy. 13 hours is a short time to worry about not having enough fat, in my opinion. My general advice to people who want to fast is to keto-adapt by lowering their total carb intake. I did it in 2009 the traditional Atkins way of 20g carbs/day for a number of weeks till I was adapted. Volek and Phinney's book is a good reference, especially about making sure you have enough electrolytes, especially sodium but also potassium and magnesium.

I have maintained this keto-adaptation since 2009, even though my carb intake is generally much higher. On multi-day fasts, I have dropped my blood sugar as low as 31 mg/dL (1.7 mmol/L) however ketones were at 6.0 mmol/L. As per the research, I had no cognition issues whatsoever. On p 2760 of this paper they show the results of fasting subjects for 50 days, THEN giving them insulin and dropping their serum glucose to as low as 0.5 mmol/L (9 mg/dL). The subjects had no cognitive issues at all. Note their average serum betahydroxybuterate was around 8 mmol/L (though even levels around 0.5 mmol/L will stave off hypoglycemic issues. See graph here:
Screen Shot 2018-03-24 at 8.17.37 AM.png
From May 1 2017 to Jan 31 of 2018, I did 19, 120-hour fasts. I maintained weight stability when looking at the first day of a fasting cycle to first day of the next. I also have fasted 22 hours/day on eating days since June 2015.

I'm not suggesting you should do what I do, only that I'd look to an insulin profile that is not a Type I as shown in Kraft's paper as a possible cause.
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Re: question about fasting

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gmpicket wrote:I'm struggling with the fasting thing, too. I've cut back my sugar intake substantially - not all gone, but much much much reduced. Added lots of fat (nuts, tuna, eggs, olives, & extra dark chocolate). I feel like I eat enough. But some nights my body goes hypoglycemic (doing glucose blood test with meter - and some mornings ok with 83 , while other mornings 68 or 72). Some nights I can't make it 8 hours without having to eat some emergency chocolate. Other nights I go 13 hrs ok. I'm guessing this is going to take some time for my body to adjust. (I had a BMI of 18.25 when I started, so my body doesn't have much stored fat to burn.)
Hi gmpicket;
I too have a similar BMI. I'm able to tolerate an overnight fast of about 13 hours, but struggle to go longer. I am not keto-adapted yet, losing too much weight without whole food carbs. I'd like to be keto adapted, but right now putting some weight back on is a higher priority goal for me. One step at a time...

I'm thinking it was TheBrain who was having trouble sleeping due to hunger. It might be hard to find the thread where this was discussed, so you could PM her to see if she was able to solve this problem.

I wouldn't call a fasting blood sugar of 68-72 hypoglycemic, but it can definitely still make one "hangry". I experience less of that sensation during the day after adding more fats to my diet. You may want to play with the Cronometer online app to check your fat/protein/carb percentages, and start checking ketone levels with a meter that allows you to do so. You can find more information on both in our website.
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Re: question about fasting

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My first wife has a BMI of around 19. She always needed to eat frequently, or she'd have many side effects. Two or three years ago, she adopted a lower carb diet as per Dr. Gundry (not keto) Plant Paradox book. Now she easily skips breakfast and has an eating window of around 8-10 hours. She is not E4. Another female friend had severe hypoglycemia from puberty. She also adopted a lower carb, but not keto diet and likewise has been able to go 14-16 hours without eating for the first time in her life. She's an E3/4.

A male E3/3 friend who is a thin, observant muslim (he's ethnically Berber from Morocco) observes Ramadan fasting as well as the optional Monday and Thursday fasts throughout the year. Muslim fasting is dry (without water) during the hours the sun is up. We have talked fasting quite a bit. He observes, that contrary to the Quran, most Muslims he knows will pig out when they do eat and the diet is very high in carbs during Ramadan. He says this actually leads to "hangry" fights in the streets at 4 PM. He noted that fasting is much easier for him when he eats modestly at night when he does eat on a fast day and especially if it is lower carb. He's 35 and told me that his 85 year old grandmother has observed both Ramadan and the 2 days/week fasting since she was a girl. His family has many T2 diabetics. He says she has no metabolic issues at all and is very healthy except for a few wear and tear issues.
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Re: question about fasting

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Thanks for the helpful replies. I will do more reading up, and be patient while my body has time to adjust to the lower sugar/higher fat diet.

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