In my first day of 7-Day Water Fast - How am I?

My first Water Fast day is going well so far, right now I feel less hungry than before, I noticed that if I drink water I have the emptiness feeling that we always use to associate to the hunger – which is not, it's just the water rolling into my digestive system and finding its way down.

I went downstairs to buy a couple of bottle of vapour distilled water, it's not exactly pure distilled water but I think it's a good compromise while fasting, it also tastes really good.  One of the key component on being diligent during my Water Fast is finding some time to do things instead of having a meal, I have to say that I can always find something to buy instead of eating - but my 23 days Water Fast done in October really made me spent so much money that now I have to be more conscious on what I really need to buy!

The first 2/3 days of a Water Fast are never fun, especially knowing that I'm losing muscle – since I'm not into Ketosis yet. I should have switched to a low carb – low sugar regiment before starting the fast, but who does it? Yesterday I ate whatever I wanted, I didn't feel great with my stomach and my heart palpitations were raised almost the whole day, I have better willpower when avoiding food altogether than sticking with a specific meal plan. I wasn't always so bad, the large amount of Diets made me like this really.

I'm still the idea of doing my planned 10-Day Water Fast on December the 5^th, I like Water Fasting, I don't mind it – it really gives me a break from my obsessions, my fat, my cravings, my mind works better, I have more mental clarity, I feel confident I can manage my weight, I like the idea that my body is healing itself and I'm cleansing it. The reason why I want to do another Water Fast in 2/3 weeks from now is because I believe my body still needs to detox, to heal and I did not complete this process, it will require some time; I cannot achieve this goal without multiple extended Water Fasts. I'll be fasting often in the coming months, not sure yet the length of each fast, most likely a long one like my first, I would do only a couple of times in a year, spaced out with shorter Water Fast like 7/10 – Days total – less than that there's no point on doing it, my body gets into ketosis around 3/4 days into the fast so I need to burn fat or the Water Fast will just make me lose muscles and it's definitely not what I'm looking forward to.

Water Fasting - For the most intense fasting experience

Today I read this article and I wanted to add some extract to my blog, to explain how powerful can be a Water Fast: 

"Water fasting offers the quickest detox and strongest therapeutic effect. It is also the most challenging fast to perform in the first few days.

Some call water fasting the only "true" fast and believe that any food allowed into the bodily system prevents the complete resting state desired, compromising the level of cleansing and detox attained. While it is true that water fasting is the most intense path to detoxification and therapeutic benefit, other types of fasting, and even cleansing diets, detox and heal as well.

The speed at which old conditions can right themselves during a water fast is incredible.

It's amazing the little health "issues" that just go away--the mole that just drops off, the shoulder that's been achy for years suddenly feels well again, that little patch of "weird" skin you've grown accustomed to vanish without a trace...and those are just the little things.

Besides the emotional challenge of going without food, these first days may have the most intense and uncomfortable symptoms of detoxification. After that, the body adjusts to the new fasting state, and most individuals feel little further discomfort, even hunger disappears. After 2-3 days, the body goes into a state called ketosis, where it begins to fuel itself internally by burning fat cells. Ketosis occurs around 48 hours for women and 72 hours for men according to Dr. Joel Fuhrman, author of Fasting and Eating for Health.

The length of time one can safely operate in ketosis varies from person to person. When hunger returns, often called "true hunger", it will be an unmistakable call of the body for nourishment, and is a signal to end the fast.

Fasting is a personal journey--you are not competing with anyone. Your body dictates how long you can safely fast, not your head.

Trust yourself."

My decision of Water Fasting

I need to give some updates regarding my Water Fast, after lots of researches done online and on YouTube I decided to do a 21+ days Water Fast. The reason behind this drastic choice is due to my Binge Eating Disorder. All this time that I had so many issues dealing with my sugar cravings and my BED, I always wondered if I had a Candida Albicans. Of course all the symptoms associated to a Candida are so generic that anyone could say: yes I think I might have it, so I don't have a scientific proof of that. Nevertheless a water fast experience I believe is really what I need at this point of my life.

Apparently after more than 21 days of having just water I can say with confidence that I eliminated the Candida Albicans from my system, or at least put it under control so that the good bacteria can fight the Candida without problems. The Candida survives with sugar, complex carbohydrates and all that junk food loaded with sugar and chemicals, without an extended period of clean eating and drinking the Candida cannot be starved neither killed. I could have had an alternative with juice feasting or following a strict diet regiment, but let's face it: I'm not good in that so far, so I need a more drastic way on how to deal with the Candida and my Binge Eating episodes.

Eliminating this problem is not the only reason why I chosen to water fast for such an extended period of time. Fasting is a physical and mental process, helps the body to detox and purify itself, I can heal my health problems, my addiction to food, I can clean my entire system, it's like pushing a reset button. People have been healed of numerous symptoms, such as: acne, anxiety, arrhythmia, PCOS, diabetes type 2 and I could go on and on. But what mostly sold me on this was the possibility to reconnect with my body, to detox itself and start from a fresh new begin of eating healthy, forgetting this food obsession that is killing my life from many point of view.

HCG diet - VLCD #43 Bad Drink choices and off-protocol breakfast

I registered a small loss this morning, only 200gr but a loss is a loss, if I could stabilize my losses on only 200gr each day, I'll be happy with that till the end of this round! Definitely it's been an extremely slow round for me, wondering if my body is getting used to this very low calories diet regiment after 43 days, hopefully not - because going back to healthy Calories number will be very tough otherwise.

This morning, for breakfast, I ate something off the protocol; I had a boiled egg, a small amount of mozzarella cheese and very small amount of grapes, in addition to 1/4 of an apple. With the cream in my coffees and the rest of food that I planned to eat for lunch, I'm basically already done with my 500 calories daily limit. I will not eat my protein portion tonight, hopefully during the day I can burn most of what I had out of the HCG food list.

Tomorrow I have my first Kung-Fu class and I want to take some supplements that could help me boost my energy without fainting for two minutes run. I feel fine I have to say, never weak as I was on the Dr. Bernstein Diet, however I am aware that my body is still not receiving enough calories to maintain an exercise routine without consequences. I guess I'll see tomorrow how I feel during and after the class, but my hopes are that I will have no issues so I can keep going and burn some extra calories for better results.

Oddly enough but I can't manage to get into Ketosis in these past days, I don't know what else I should do really. I know that the Ketostix might not be accurate, since I'm drinking so many liquids during the day, but this was always the case, even during my first round on HCG. Maybe all this almond milk is affecting my ketosis; yesterday I was reading the label and the sodium content is very high, just wondering if this could be the cause of all my water retention. I also had 3 coffees with cream today, which I usually never do – but my mood is good, I'm excited for my new position at work coming soon so, when I'm excited, I tend to eat more, drink bad stuff too! I should force myself to do a day off from coffees or decaf to get detoxed of all these processed drinks. Will I ever be able to do it? Be strong! You can do it!

HCG Diet- R2P2 VLCD#17 my reflections

Another post for my blog to track all the details of my long dieting journey, it seems endless sometimes. HCG so far helped me a lot, but I have to admit, this Round 2 is definitely not like my first one. I guess this is normal, focusing for too long on something has been always an issue for me, I just regret not having completed my diet with the first round, I was doing so well! My advice is that till you're running with a good pace, keep going because if you stop chances are you won't be back on the wagon with the same enthusiasm and commitment. 

My biggest problem while dieting, is not so much being hungry – definitely with HCG I'm very rarely hungry – but my constant attention on food in general, on what I'm going to eat, when I'm going to…how I will cook, if I need to stop by the grocery store to buy ingredients and so on. I think ONLY about food, all the times, and this is drowning me down so much that it's really hard being focused on Dr. Simeons protocol to the letter. Anything I eat adds up at the end of the day on the amount of calories consumed, and with HCG you have to stay on the 500 Calories plan, even a small increase will reflect on your scale the day after.

This Round#2 I didn't even see any good ketosis so far, I know this is not 100% reliable, since I drink a lot during the day anyway, but last time I had great traces through almost all round. Another thing I skipped on doing this time around is my Wednesday's Detox Bath, I guess being almost in summer doesn't help but, let's face it, it's just me being lazy, nothing temperature or weather related, and I didn't even drink a single Detox tea either!

This morning my scale registered a 0.4Kg increase unfortunately, I knew I will see a gain today, yesterday I was home all day and I had so many cravings that I compensated drinking tons of decaf coffee and almond milk, not to mention the large amount of Jell-O and Snack Packs! Junk food, I should say: shame on me.

I don't care what people say but seeing a weight gain on any amount while dieting, it is extremely frustrating, on this complicated diet is alarming to me, previous to this gain I had 4 days stall, not sure if it was for my TOM or simply for my lack of judgment concerning my food/drinks. 

I've moments in which I feel ok, motivated, strong and others where I feel weak, I don't trust myself and my long term commitments. I've still so much to lose and it seems so difficult even losing half pound.

In the office often people judge my diet, my weight, my approach to food. They don't understand how frustrating is being on diet, being overweight, being obsessed with food. I am alone in this battle; it's between me and my body, my brain, my cravings. 

HCG Diet - on my VLCD #7

So today I am on my VLCD #7 and I'm still astonished about this Diet and HCG. What I believe is absolutely amazing is the fact that I am not hungry at all. Yesterday I had barely 400 Calories and I was ok, yes maybe at night I felt a bit hungry, since I skipped dinner, but it was bearable, plus I did skip dinner by choice, I really didn't want to eat. Without HCG I would be starving every second of the day, but with this hormone I know that my fat has been released in this right moment (without me being hungry) – and that's all I need to know.

Dr. Bernstein Diet puts you in starvation mode and, although being in Ketosis could be a good thing that means you're reducing carbohydrates, being in starvation is extremely deleterious for your metabolism. Every person on a Diet wants to lose weight and fast, but nobody wants to gain it all back and some, and that's pretty much what happens if you are starving yourself. It does suck I know.

I lost pounds every day so far, it's been only few days but I can feel the effects of HCG, it affects my mood making me feel happy, everyone is telling me that they see me different and better, I feel I'm not depressed anymore about my weight, my shape, although I'm still overweight and far from the end of my Diet, but I'm extremely motivated and I believe 100% in this Protocol, I've tons of energy – something amazing for me since I'm having such little Calories per day.

I don't know which Diet are you following but if you find yourself more than often starving, well my suggestion is: quit, whatever you're shedding off with so many sacrifices, it's going to be back on pretty soon.

I've to say I did everything exactly as Protocol …and beyond. I started a pre-Diet phase detoxing with Detox Tea and Detox bath with Himalayan salt (I've one scented with Vanilla that I love). I stopped to eat sugar almost a month before starting my HCG injections, I eliminated all the carbs like bread, pasta, rice, pizza and so on, many days before my Diet. I started to add more fat to my Diet and my loading Days were clean of sugar, carbs or starchy vegetables. I tried to eat healthy fat as much as I could, gorging to capacity. That helped me to get into the Diet smoothly and with no issues whatsoever, I felt a bit hungry on the very first VLCD and after that day my food-life completely changed, my mood changed and now I'm so happy, that just thinking about what is happening to me makes me smile; this is priceless!