You might be wondering, “Why in the heck would you go five days without eating?”
The short answer: it was part of a health kick. Weight loss was only a small part of my reasoning, though it surely became a huge benefit. Years prior, I’d experienced fasting for two days due to an ulcer in my stomach and had a peculiar experience with unexpected benefits I wanted to explore.
Even further, a friend evangelized fasting over and over. I’d read a few studies on the enormous health benefits and how rat lifespans increased when exposed to fasting. I also wanted to test myself in a new and different way, that was unconventional, which didn’t involve some extreme long endurance challenge. The joke was on me: this required a different type of endurance.
And so, after consulting with my doctor, I gave it a shot.
The first three days were rough
I only drank water across the five days. There was zero eating. At my doctor’s guidance, I added a daily vitamin powder to my water just to be safe. It had no calories. Additionally, I dialed down my exercise. For context, I wasn’t emaciated at the start of this. Definitely don’t fast if you are low in body fat or without consulting your doctor. My body fat was around 15% at the start.
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