Ep. 215 - Tommy’s 7-Day Fast | Extended Fasting Benefits | Should you do a long fast? | Fasting Growth Hormone, Insulin Sensitivity, Autophagy, Mindset, & Immune Cells | Lowering CRP, Increasing BDNF, & Ketones | Hydration & LMNT | Nutrisense CGM
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In today’s episode, Dr. Scott and Tommy explore extended fasting, emphasizing its benefits beyond weight loss. The discussion covers personal experiences, planning, and tracking during a fast, including factors like sodium intake and ketone levels. They stress the strength in choosing to fast and maintaining routine activities.
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Fasting For Life Ep. 215 Transcript
Hello. I'm Dr. Scott Watier.
And I'm Tommy Welling.
And you're
listening to the Fasting for Life podcast.
This podcast is about using fasting
as a tool to regain
your health, achieve ultimate wellness,
and live the life you truly deserve.
Each episode is a short conversation
on a single topic
with immediate, actionable steps.
We cover everything from fat loss
and health and wellness
to the science of lifestyle design.
We started fasting for life because of how
fasting has transformed our lives
and we hope to share the tools
that we have learned along the way.
However, on
Welcome to the Fasting for Life podcast.
My name is Dr.
Scott Water and I'm here as always,
and my good friend and colleague,
Tommy Welling.
Good afternoon to you, sir. HE Scott,
how are you?
Fantastic, my friend.
Excited for today's conversation
because we are going to dive in
to the mind of a mr. Thomas Welling.
Just lucky I didn't use your full name.
All right.
All right.
So we're going to be looking
and talking about a seven day fast.
And why do you do it?
How to do it, what to do,
what time is going to be focusing on
and just kind of
go through some of the highlights,
some of the things, metrics
that he's going to be tracking and I love
because we went back and looked,
when's the last time
that we actually did a longer Fast
and then talked about it, right?
And it was all the way back in 2021
when I did a six and a half day Fast
and Tommy so-called put me on the couch.
So it wasn't my favorite episode
that we did,
but it was back in the seventies,
I think it was episode 74, 75.
I looked yesterday
and now I can't remember where we did
a deep dive into a longer fast
The Who, what, when, where and why.
So that's what we're going to be doing
today.
First and foremost,
I want to welcome everybody
in to the Fasting for Life
podcast is your new welcome.
Thanks for giving us an opportunity
to become part of your fasting regimen,
your fasting lifestyle.
We like to call it the fasting fam
you're part of the family.
Welcome.
Do you want to hear more about our journey
and why we do what we do now?
So one, give it a listen.
For all of you OG listeners,
you've been with us for a while.
You've been coming
in, you've we get a lot of. Yes.
I went back to the beginning
and I've listened to all 200
and however many episodes
where I'm on episode 150 or 185 or so.
Cool.
We really, truly do
appreciate you listening in
and making us part
of your fasting lifestyle.
So if you like
us, could also use a shout out.
Give us a subscribe, write and review.
I know that's the old terminology, right?
I think it's now like a bookmark,
a download we like, we love the reviews,
we love it,
follow whatever, whatever the terminology
these crazy kids are using these days.
Please. We do appreciate that as well.
We love the five star kind
because that tells the podcast world
that we are bringing value to you
each and every week.
So Tommy
So let's get into your seven day fast.
So I'm just going to ask you a couple of
questions here. We're going to list stuff.
We're going to go over
why a seven day fast?
And I'll just mention
leading up to your 40th birthday.
Yes, that's kind of a timely push.
I think about a seven day fast
as kind of a two times
a year tool
that I like to have in my tool belt.
I just I like the mental feeling of it.
I like the physiological benefits.
We can talk about cellular cleansing,
autophagy and and in these kind of things,
but from a mindset perspective,
there's nothing really quite like it
because the mental bandwidth that frees up
when basically there's
just no food making decisions
for an extended period like that.
There are areas of focus
that kind of open up
within your mental processes
that don't come about
when the next food making decision
is, you know, just feels like hours away.
Or maybe it maybe it's even tomorrow.
But still there's like this pool towards
thinking about food just because
it's so important. Right.
And enjoyable but going the opposite way
to kind of abstain
from that for, you know, a multi day
period is just it's really cool.
It's really freeing mentally.
So why did you ultimately
make the decision to do it now
this time of year?
Because it's been since,
I want to say like
spring of last year, late spring,
my last one, right?
Yeah. Yeah.
So I definitely wanted to, you know,
hitting a decade mark I guess for,
for my birthday was, was kind of like,
you know what, I'd really like to sharpen
all of the tools
that I use going into, into that.
Like, I don't like New Year's resolutions.
I sat them for years and years, decades
actually.
So like, right, Yeah.
With very, very low success rate.
Not that I didn't put in the effort,
but just, just to look back
Significa into the year
like how many of them stuck.
And it was, it's a very low percentage
but things have been very different
since living consistent
fasting lifestyle over the last few years.
So it's, it's very different.
I have a different framework
to bring in new positive habits.
And then if I find something
that's just not serving me
or there's a better way
that I want to do it, that I can,
I can swap those out much more easily
than I used to be able to.
So I wanted to take all the tools
in my tool belt
and kind of sharpen them up
leading up to the to my 40th birthday.
Cool. So I love that perspective.
My wife always says, you know, the thing
you do on New Year's Eve and New Year's
Day is, is is the energy you're going to
bring with you is like that.
The things you do, you set the intention
for the rest of the year.
So I love talking in decades for weight
loss as well.
So just for perspective,
if you're new or if you've forgotten
or you get confused, whose voice is who?
Tommy's lost,
I believe 75 to £80 over the last.
Now the majority of that weight loss
was over the first, what, 12 to 18 months?
Yeah, the majority of it. Right.
And then able to keep it off and slowly
tick down the decades.
Right now, it's not a weight loss goal.
We'll talk a lot about
what are the goals for when you get closer
to maintenance or living a fasting
lifestyle, body composition, etc..
We'll get into a bunch
of those different things.
But the fact that this longer fast,
I want to juxtapose it
in terms of a long term
sustainable strategy, right?
So yeah, we hear this a lot
and I'll briefly mention
my most recent attempt
at a seven day fast.
Okay.
And why
I joined you a day late on this one.
Right.
That's a great little process
to kind of dive into.
Yeah.
Just to talk briefly about
because it's like, why do it?
Like, what's the intention behind this?
You just explained your intention.
A lot of people
we hear this often
inside of our Facebook community,
inside of our coaching group,
inside of emails and texts,
and all the message we get is, Man,
I've done a lot of longer fasts, right?
Or I've attempt to do longer fast.
Now, we could do the Angus Barbieri method
and you could fast for 380 something days.
Now there's 270 longest record of fast
medically supervised and lose £272,
which mathematically makes sense
based on the information
that we have of that fast.
And he then was able to extend his life
because he was clinically ill,
like really, really ill, right?
So he did it
and he was able to maintain it.
We don't have a lot of data on
how many years and what his post fast
life looked like, but we know that he was
able to sustain it, which for most people
that rock bottom of, Hey, you're dying,
you need to do something.
Isn't the motivating factor
to do a seven day fast, right?
Or an unending long, fast. Yeah right.
Yeah, for sure. Open ended fast.
Right. Hate those. Yeah. Yeah.
That's not sustainable, right?
It's just not part of the equation.
So when we look at the concept of
I'll do rolling forty-eighths,
I'll do 70 twos until the cows come home,
until I reach my goal eight off.
Yeah.
That really especially if you're thinking
about doing a longer fast.
Right.
If you're new to fasting in the beginning
or it's your first or second time
attempting it,
it may not be the right time
or you may not have the right mindset
to start.
And for me, alluding
to the most recent failed seven day,
it's easier to stop earlier than planned
because of external life stuff.
Sure.
So if it wasn't for the group of guys
that I was doing the fast with last time,
I would have quit my seven day fast,
probably in the first 36 hours.
Wow. And it was not great
and it wasn't an enjoyable experience.
So the juice has to be worth the squeeze,
but you have to have the right intention.
So when I asked you, Hey,
why are you doing this?
It's not for the scale.
yeah, 100%.
It's not for weight loss. Right.
But making sure that you're really clear
on the intention is why I love
that you were just like,
Hey, I'm doing a seven day fast
for my fourth decade of life.
I'm like, That's freakin cool. Yeah.
Yeah.
And, you know, if if you think back at ADD
something like, okay, so you called it
a failed seven day fast,
but it was a six and a half day test.
Right.
Which is a successful six and a half.
I mean, that's that's a huge success.
Like let's, let's start there first.
It didn't feel that way.
Sure.
Well, I'm sure it probably didn't,
especially if you if you felt like
you would have hit the ripcord, you know,
at our number 36 or so, you know,
because there's a lot of things that are
that are happening physiologically.
You're metabolically transitioning,
but you're also in the earlier stages,
like the first couple of days,
you have a lot more recency bias towards
food as well, depending on what
your recent food
making decisions have been
and things like that.
And so I feel like your food choices
leading up to a longer fast are vital
because they're definitely going
to affect the outcome.
The probability of a successful
outcome for sure.
Absolutely.
So when we look at the starting point,
right, and this longer fasting strategy,
we are leaving out
the most important part of fasting,
not the most important part,
but the thing that drives results in
either making a fast, more doable,
less doable
in terms of sticking to it
cravings, hunger, etc.
like because you mentioned the thing
leading up to the thing,
like we're going to do a fast
so our food decisions matter
and make it easier or harder on us.
Yeah, alcohol, carbohydrate, sweets, late
night eating, all of those life things.
Right?
So when you do these longer fast,
the Angus Barbieri method removes
all of the food decisions.
So you're literally avoiding
if you got £50 to lose, you're avoiding
the thing that got you into this place
in the first place.
Yeah.
You didn't just happen to gain £50.
It's the decisions you make.
Yeah. Takes time, right?
In terms of the food relationships,
the type of food, the failed
or successful weight loss attempts
or dieting mindset that you have.
So we don't want to be going
into a longer fast, you know, feeling
deprived or that I'm just avoiding
the thing that I know I need to handle.
Right?
So I know in the beginning
when I was doing longer fasting,
it was like, my goodness,
like I cannot wait to eat.
Yeah, like,
I just can't wait to break my fast.
And that was not
that didn't happen many times.
But doing 24, 48, 72 hour fast,
that decision
making process is incredibly important
when you break your longer fast as well.
Yeah, and I still haven't
put a lot of thought into
how I'm going to break this fast.
I know one day it's going to be on.
It'll be the day before my birthday.
So the thing about it is
you're not going to break it with
with a beer and a piece of cake. Right.
I'll do that 1,000%.
I'm not not that
I haven't done something close to that
at some point
but regretted the heck out of.
Yeah.
So I think my first longer fast
like a five or seven days
I actually broke it at a mexican
restaurant here like for date night.
And I was miserable and I didn't,
I didn't go crazy with it or anything else
like that. But yeah,
learn from learn from my mistake.
Don't do that for sure.
So I'll, I'll put some thought into it,
but I'm really not worried
about thinking about
it's not going to take me very long
to kind of put,
you know, to kind of put a plan together.
So I don't need to be thinking about it
right now.
Right now it's about what's opening up,
what feels different,
not what do I need to plan for
only afterwards.
I'm in the middle of the doing right now.
So as we're recording this,
I'm about 40 hours
into this fast
and, you know, so I didn't start it off.
Ideally,
it was coming off of a date night.
We had some sushi, I had one drink
and then dinner ended a little later
than I would have typically liked, but
there just wasn't really any controlling
some of those variables.
And I didn't feel great going in
like waking up the next day
a bit more lethargic.
My workout suffered.
I had some nausea
because I just didn't have enough time
to process through all of that food
from from earlier.
And I didn't make
a whole lot of different choices.
I just I just stuck mostly to,
you know, fish and rice pretty much.
And like I said, just had one drink.
It was a relatively small one.
And then but I cut that off
pretty early into the day night
so that I could have plenty of water.
And I had some extra salt that night too.
So I did a couple of things
to try to mitigate some of the frustration
that I thought might be around the corner
coming into the next day.
But then most of the rest of the day
I focused on good hydration.
I had a couple of element packets.
I had some decaf coffee,
a little bit of extra Himalayan salt,
and I didn't really feel too much,
you know, kind of frustrated.
I didn't have to go through too much
of like a metabolic like keto flu.
I didn't feel too much of the
the kind of Kido flu symptoms
that you might hear about sometimes.
So let's talk about benefits
and then we'll talk about
some of the things that you're tracking
and some of the things and metrics
that you're going to be looking at.
Because one of the things for my decision,
because we had spoken,
you were already into your
first full day of fasting and you're like,
So you're doing this for me or not?
Because I originally raised my hand
being like, Yeah, I'm going to do it.
But then I had some recency bias
to the most recent Fast
and the Life's going to life stuff.
The stressor stuff on the outside
has not changed.
It's increased.
So I was like, No,
I don't think I'm into it.
And then I was like,
Wait a minute, what can I control?
Like, I can't control all
the external stuff, so what can I control?
Well, I can control what I do
on a daily basis,
especially when it comes to food.
And I've been doing mostly a T matter
and man strategy recently.
Right?
And I'm like, Wait a minute,
this is the simple solution.
Let me simplify life right now
by adding this in.
So I'm like, No, duh. The first night
I was like, Nope, not doing it.
And then I was like, Wait a minute,
I think I should do it.
And then here are
all the additional benefits
you can get,
and we'll dive in specifically
to what you're going to be looking at
and some things that you've made, choices
you've made this time around
that you've done differently at this point
in your fasting journey, weight loss
journey, health journey, etc.
So can I please you for one please.
Food as a comforting thought.
It's always going to be there.
And that that doesn't necessarily
mean it's the end of that thought process.
Go ahead.
You ask me the question, right?
Yeah. Was food going to be helpful?
Was food, were meals going to help
with those outside stressors
over the next seven days? Right.
That was basically the question now.
And they're not because the entire
downstairs of our home is covered in dust
and it's being voluntarily remodeled
due to a water issue.
So, no, it's
not it's not going to make it better.
Yeah, it's
absolutely going to make it worse.
And it's not like I'm eating junk, right.
I'm eating meat in Carnivore
most day stuff.
So it's like.
But cooking right now is difficult.
So like last night for the kids,
it was canned chicken on a plate
with some fruit and some, you know,
avocado, oil, satay chips.
And they loved it.
Nice.
Mom made a smoothie that didn't
need to take out the pan, defrost to me,
get, you know, like we're not cooking
fajitas at home right now in the kitchen.
Everything is covered in dust.
Yeah. So?
So this simplification
is actually a good thing,
even though it didn't strike you
in the moment as just like, You know what?
Yeah, this seems like the perfect time
for a seven day fast.
That definitely wasn't
the thought that that I saw in your face.
Right, Right.
It was a great question. Cheeky as it was.
So here's the benefits as we go through.
So at 12 hours, blood sugar
glycogen stores are going to be coming
down, possibly
entering into that state of ketosis where
we're going to transition into fat
burning 13 to 15 hours.
Your growth hormone is increasing,
which is protecting
your lean muscle tissue
and growing the muscle tissue,
but it's protecting it.
You've got some autophagy starting,
which is some cellular growth
and detoxification.
Once you get to this magic hour of 17
or 18 hours, that growth hormone
really, really elevates
and the autophagy really ramps up.
And at this point, for most people,
depending on your food choices in last
that glycogen depletion
because we store about 24 hours of short
term energy, either in our smooth muscle,
our blood or our liver.
So we want to get through that glycogen.
And then at that 24 hour mark,
now we're starting to really see
some cool things about breaking down
proteins, misfolded proteins
that are linked to Alzheimer's,
which is type three diabetes.
It's a metabolic issue.
It's not a plaque issue.
We've got intestinal stem cells that are
starting to regenerated that 24 hour mark.
We've got DNF,
which is brain derived nootropic factor,
which is like a brain growth factor
which is increasing, serotonin
is increasing, inflammation is decreasing,
or C-reactive protein at this point.
And this is at the point where, you know,
so you had date night,
woke up the next morning being like,
okay, I knew this is going to happen,
but use the hydration and stuff
to push through it.
Not your first rodeo. Right.
But this morning. Right.
So now you're between the 24 and 32
hour mark.
I mean, that second morning, like that's
where that like you've got your shield
on the energy, the euphoria, the brain
fog, like all of that stuff goes away.
You know what?
And I'm glad you just brought that up,
because what I didn't mention yet,
I kind of forgotten I hit a wall at let's
see what what our mark.
I mean, it was
it was around the 24 hour mark.
It was
it was probably right around 23, 24 hours.
And it was like it wasn't very late
into the evening just yet.
So, yeah, it was a little shy of 24 hours.
And I mean, I was like, Man, I'm
hitting a wall like that, feeling like I'm
feeling that, that kind of,
that kito fluky just for the energy wise.
Like I didn't really want to get up
and do anything for about probably
where it was like, okay, it's
not that late into the evening right now,
but man, I got I feel zapped right now.
But you did not go to coffee, correct?
No, no, no, no, no, I didn't.
I chilled out.
I just kind of propped myself up.
I lay down for about yeah, about 30,
And it wasn't that easy to kind of
get out of that position, you know?
But after a little while, it was like,
okay, all right, I'm feeling a little bit
better now for sure, but
I hadn't really felt that way in a while.
And that's one of the things
about going into a fast
or trying to like rip the Band-Aid off,
if you will, and like,
look for the next burn day,
the next day where I'm
just going to abstain from eating.
But the problem is,
if my choices aren't so great
before I do that, it's just
it makes it that much harder.
And then when you're up against that
tough decision point or temptation
or I'm just not feeling great
if you're not mentally prepared for it,
if you're not really committed to what you
you said you were going to do
on the front end,
it would have been pretty easy
to kind of break that at that point.
Like, well,
let me just go grab a little something.
I know the salt is going to help.
I'll probably feel a little bit better
bringing in a few carbs
or maybe even if it was like a keto snack,
something would have help pick
me up in that moment.
So what took me 45 minutes of of lying
down, or at least sitting down for a while
may have only taken 5 minutes
if I had brought in some food
like for a short term hit.
And that may have been tempting
if I wasn't really strongly
mentally committed to this.
And that's not 24 to 36
hour kind of magic.
And that's different for everybody.
Depends on when you start food
choices, etc..
But then at the 36 hour mark, Gabi's
increased, resulting in a calm right.
Insulin resistance is reversing,
Your body is now into ketosis.
Right.
We'll talk about some of the metrics
you're going to be looking at
and some of the variability
and things that you've seen and in terms
of blood sugar and ketones,
because you are wearing a CGM.
Right. And nutrients
throughout this process as well.
And this is the first time you've done
a longer fasting with one. Yes.
Okay.
So want to give a shout out to sense here
before we continue on with the benefits
and kind of going through the our chart,
we partnered with nutrition,
you know, in the spring of 2023
as it was really a needle mover
for me personally on my health,
weight loss and fasting journey.
And it's been incredible.
And then I'll have you just kind of share.
Tell me what you know, what you're going
to be looking for in terms of it.
Okay.
But if you're unfamiliar, nutrition is
a cutting edge tech plus human expertise.
So it allows you to see your responses
to different foods, exercise
stress, and sleep in real time.
It's one of those CGM
So it's a continuous glucose monitor
that you put on the back of your arm,
completely painless.
And then it combines with their incredible
app, which this go round for me.
I've been like, Whoa,
look at all these like additional benefits
and you can choose your glucose range
and what you're working on, never mind,
you get expert dietitian guidance as well,
so it can really help reach
your health goals.
So it's a program and a biosensor
and a visual and expert
dietitian guidance,
and it really allows you to see,
you know, your response to certain things.
And in this case, for this week, Tommy,
you're not going to be looking
at your response to food. Right.
But you may have been looking at
in the past your response to coffee.
Right.
So application, again, super simple.
You scan it, boom,
your data comes right up in front of you.
You've got someone to rely on there
in that expert dietician guidance
in seeing the data in real time
makes it super easy
to identify what you're doing well
and where there's room for improvement.
So weight loss, stable energy,
better sleep, which foods or things
like health related things like working
out and plunging and all of that stuff,
what they're doing to your blood sugar
and then ultimately how you're feeling in
the moment is really key.
So what are a couple of things
you're going to be looking for this week
in kind of going through your fast?
Yeah, I'm very familiar
with what my blood sugar
has been doing the last couple of weeks
that I've been wearing it.
And so I kind of know
what that range looks like.
So I want to see how the range
is kind of affected
and what my average changes to
and what it kind of shows me over
the seven days
without having the ingestion of
of food and calories
and a required insulin response
because, you know,
if you're eating very low carb
or you're eating Quito,
you're still going to have a change
in your blood
sugar, blood
sugar fluctuations are normal.
So I want to see how wide or narrow
that range kind of gets.
And then also,
I've just recently like very intentionally
kind of like just cut down
almost all the way on caffeine.
I did have one day last week
where I had substantial caffeine.
I was in a coffee shop for a few hours
and we had some, you know,
a couple of cups of coffee.
But other than that, it's been, you know,
basically zero for most of the other day.
So I did that to kind of clean up the data
a little bit so that those like cortisol
spikes and potential blood sugar
rebound effect wouldn't be like muddying
the waters.
So I'm interested to see because
I'll probably bring in a cup of coffee
or two during this seven day fast
after blood sugar is like, you know,
it should be tighter, it should be within
a tighter range, cleaned up.
Yeah, yeah.
See if it gives me a response
with like a black coffee.
So what I'm hearing,
they're getting a baseline, removing
some of the metrics and actually seeing
how your body responds
on a cellular physiological, circadian
based kind of thing.
There's no food to be ingesting,
so you're not looking
at the food response,
but you're looking at the lifestyle
response,
the sleep, the stress, the workouts,
the sauna, the coal plans, the walks,
the know, all of those types of things.
So that's really cool.
So I'd say
that's more of an advanced application,
but the cool thing is, is in the beginning
this will literally open your eyes to
so many cool things that you didn't know
good or bad, that you were doing
for your weight loss and health journey.
So head to the show notes.
Put the link Nutrition stat forward slash
fasting for life.
You get 30 bucks off
and one month of free dietitian support.
So as we keep going
up, this timeline of benefits of why
or what you do
when you get into these longer
fasting periods you had mentioned earlier,
that's a couple,
you know,
twice a year thing for you, right?
You know, when we're looking at, you know,
autophagy, cellular regeneration.
PALTROW Longo mentions things
like really clearing out
the system
and allowing your body to prevent
future issues of blood, sugar,
metabolism, etc., etc., down the line.
So when we're looking at this
and we're looking at this timeline chart,
when we get past
that 48 hours, mark your growth hormone
level has really peaked, right?
It's up to five times as high
as when you started your fast.
You're really working
now in that 48 to 50 6 to 72 hour
mark where you're going to be increasing
your insulin sensitivity,
which is the effectiveness
of your current insulin
and the efficiency
of your insulin production.
Yeah.
And this is really like cleaning up,
like going to get
an oil change,
like you're cleaning out the pipes.
You are you are really allowing your body
to function in an ideal state.
And then at that 72 hour
mark is where we start
to see some of the Valter Longo stuff
taking effect from that 3 to 5 day mark.
Where are you going to be getting
your immune cells and generating new
immune function in immune cells
through your body's regenerative property
and also white blood cell repair
and your IGF
one will decrease,
which is something that we love to see.
Wow. One of my favorite parts
about all of that and kind of like leaning
into that timeline of the benefits is just
the fact that I like to think about it.
Like we don't think about food
affecting every cell in the body.
You know, we bring in food several times
a day for most of us, most most days.
If you're living a fasting lifestyle,
hey, maybe it's just once during a day.
And maybe if you've
if you've done some longer fast,
then you may have gone a full day
without bringing in something.
But the important thing to remember
is that when we ingest
food, calories have an insulin response.
We're affecting every cell in the body.
So that means every cell
has something to do.
It might not be directly related
to food digestion or food processing,
but they're all sitting in
the same environment, the same ecosystem
that is affected by the blood sugar change
and the insulin response as well.
So they have new jobs to do.
So there's a lot of cool
things that happen under the surface
that can only happen
when we are not changing insulin levels.
When insulin gets very low
and when we're not bringing
in new energy to actually process
and figure out where it needs to go
and then actively energizing the cells
with new external sources of energy.
So this can only happen
when we take a pause from this.
And there are some benefits
that don't happen
until that pause gets longer
and into the multi day period.
And so, again, that's why this is
really not optimal for weight loss.
I expect some changes on the scale,
but I also expect most of those changes
to revert back fairly quickly,
whether by conscious design or not,
it doesn't really matter.
But most of what's happening
physiologically, especially after two
or three days, is really suboptimal
as far as the fat burning is concerned.
There are a lot of other benefits
that I can only get there
once I hit a few days.
So that's a really good point.
And I want to go into some of the things
you're going to be doing and looking at,
and then we'll report back in a part
to follow up.
But we've talked about the benefits
of talking to you, etc..
So when we talk about weight loss, right,
the longer fasts are not ideal.
You just said that and I think it was
kind of buried in there.
I want to make sure
it's really clear. Okay.
So in my own experience
and there's something, you know, glycogen
stores and regain
that take place, 40 to 60% on average.
So let's say you lose £10
during a seven day fast.
You would expect 4 to 6 of that to come
right back. Right.
So the other thing you'll notice
is that if you're tracking your weight
throughout the fasts on for me
personally on day
four and five
and then once on day three, the scale.
Now if you have £100 to lose
and that's the first time
you're doing a longer fast,
then you're most likely going to see
the scale decrease every single day.
Good point.
Yeah, but as you get into more closer
to maintenance, more ideal body
composition,
you're going to see where the body says,
okay, I'm
going to go into deeper levels of ketosis,
but I'm no longer going to be moving
the needle with the scale.
For me, I'm typically on day four or five,
the scale stops moving.
It actually went up
on the last day of a seven day fast
and people are like, Well, wait a minute.
So the intention again is not to do
a seven day fast to lose weight. It's
and if we would have pushed through
and gone from ten days to 14 days. Yes.
Like Angus Barbieri,
the scale would continue to move. Sure.
But there's a point
where ketosis moves from ideal weight loss
into deeper levels of therapy, to ketosis
where you're no longer
the body's no longer
just going to be gone.
All right, let's just burn all those fat
cells, right?
Yeah. It's pretty crazy.
It's pretty crazy
how that how that happens.
And it can be counterintuitive, too,
especially because we know
a lot of people who kind of stumbled
into fasting
sometimes for religious purposes
or sometimes,
you know,
with some sort of medical supervision,
but not a whole lot of guidance
as far as the ins and outs and the
the specifics
of how the fast was going to go.
And then it's kind of like, yeah, well,
I did that
and I saw the scale move,
but then it just went way back.
So I don't think this is for me,
I don't think fasting is for me,
you know, things like that where it's like
even people that have done that right,
they're like, I'm doing Nomad,
but I broke my ass last night.
The it's went up £2. Well, yeah,
because you just ate.
Sure, of course
it's going to go up like that.
Fluctuation is normal.
So I just want to make sure that's clear
in terms of the weight loss and the scale
and just, you know, keep an eye on
if that's something you're doing.
But I know it's me
that's not your main focus here.
So what are the things that you
what are the things
you're going to be doing
and what are the things you're going
to be tracking during these seven days?
Yeah, I'm looking at a couple of things.
I'm doing like a brief 5
to 10 minute journal each day,
and I'm not a big journal, as I've said,
you know before journal this.
Yeah, but, but just taking a couple
of like checkpoints
that I can look back at
and kind of see them each day of the fast.
So like, were there
any kind of external issues
that I had to deal with or like food
reminders or cravings or opportunities?
Because these are things that can be
that can make it tough or can make it
seem easier to to shorten
the fast that I plan to do.
Like, all this outside life stuff kind of
came up and it kind of derailed me.
So it must not be the right time.
So I kind of wanted to just track that
because I'm 1,000% committed to this fast.
So I'm not worried about the temptation
of of dropping off early.
I have to say that I've never had a false
start on a longer fast before.
I definitely have,
but I just kind of want to track that
tracking
how much sodium I'm actually bringing in.
So writing that down
because that's an important factor.
Taking a look at my actual recovery
from my will to see how my sleep was
and what my percentage of recovery
was each day,
see how I felt during my workouts
and if I went up or weight went down,
taking a look at my sauna and cold
plunging just to see if there's any
any trends there
that I feel any different than normal.
I'm also using my keto mojo as well.
Excuse me, Ketone mojo
to track ketones and get a blood
sugar response usually like a midday.
I'm going to take a look at my ketones,
see if I love a midday ketone reading.
Yeah, so frustrating.
The first longer fast
couple of five day fast that I did
because my body would kick out.
I'd be out of ketosis mid-afternoon.
yeah.
And I'm like why in the world
like back in the day
before I knew like it was like,
what is happening?
So I love your application of,
you know,
kind of what you're going to be tracking
and looking at
and what are the things
you're going to be doing.
So as far as doing is concerned,
I'm doing I have a daily kind of workout
called Plunge Sauna routine.
Yeah,
I hit that most days during the week.
I'm also looking to I don't want to like
overengineered everything,
but like I said, over the last few weeks,
I've been working on sharpening up
some of the tools that I use.
So tightening up my sleep a little bit.
So those things, I didn't want everything
to just be because of the seven day fast.
I wanted to make some priming,
good choices and tweaks before
I got into the seven day fast
because I didn't want it
to feel like New Year's resolution.
Okay, All of a sudden
everything just changed all at once.
And because the seven day fast
is going to come and go
like a few days from now,
I'm not going to be on this fast.
I'll be back to making more food
related decisions.
And I didn't want everything to feel like,
okay,
now that the fast is over,
those new habits are also done as well.
I wanted to completely avoid that
mental black and white on off transition.
So if that makes sense, it does.
I love that perspective too,
because at this point
in the conversation,
some people were going, okay, so 7/8. Yup.
Not not for me.
Like and some people are going,
okay, I kind of,
I kind of like I kind of like, wear this.
Is that right?
No matter where you fall on that scale,
I love the intentionality of it.
And so I'm going to be getting indexes
again here coming up.
And it had been on the docket
to do for a while.
Right.
And it was important but not urgent.
So I can't be I got to get it done right.
I got to get it done.
So my wife just scheduled
the dang thing for me.
And it was like,
because she's getting one done too.
That's cool.
And I was like, thank you for doing that.
Because what I'm not going to do
is do anything differently to change
the result of what I've been working on
in terms of my visceral fat.
Right. In the next week.
Yeah. You're not,
it's like optimize the results. Right.
It's like when you go to the dentist
you start flossing week before.
Yeah. No. Right.
Until they know right when they ask you
they already know the answer.
Okay.
So I love that this fast is not
you're going to be looking at the data
and you're not going to be doing things
to try to alter right?
It's like, this is my routine.
This is the stuff I'm doing now
and I'm 1,000% in like I am in.
No matter what life looks like
on the outside, I'm committed.
Yeah.
As you guys know, if you start a fast,
I'll do a 72 hour fast.
Is your heart really in that decision?
Yeah. Or was it
did you take a moment? Right.
Did you take a moment to think through it
and be like, okay,
what do my next three days look like?
Is this the right time?
So if you're in the camp of yup,
it's the right time,
but I'm going to do
less of the advanced tracking. Great.
Or if you're in the camp
of what I really like
some of this advanced tracking
and you want some help, let us know.
Yeah, right.
But any fast should have
some intentionality and some planning in.
Why am I doing it?
Am I really in it to win it?
And what's it look like when the juice
may not be worth the squeeze or when I'm.
When I'm breaking my fast?
So if you're looking for some
more guidance in between the 1 to 7 days,
you can head to the show notes,
you can click the link.
We have a blueprint
to fasting for fat loss.
Now, this has been an incredible
thousands, almost 10,000 people
have downloaded this over the past year
and the feedback's been incredible.
It's a 20 page PDF.
It has different fasting schedules,
the who, what, when, where and why.
Some of the science behind it,
some of the reasons why we feel fasting
is so such a powerful tool,
but it also gives you some different
fasting schedules
that you can use to ramp up
if you're like seven days.
Yeah. No, not yet. Not me.
Totally get it? Totally fine. Okay.
So how do the show notes cook
to like blueprint to fasting for fat loss
Totally free
will send it over to your inbox
And Tommy as we wrap up today,
one final thought for everybody listening,
because we're going to do a part
two on this, right?
We're going to check in
to see how it went,
have some
some look back and some perspective
on how it went and the things you did
and what you would do differently
next time.
So we're going to do that
in a future episode.
Yeah, but as you're doing a seven day fast
to honor your fourth decade of life,
what's a final,
final action set for final thought?
You want to leave the people with today?
I think it's it's
just you're not now muscle.
I think being able to say,
you know what, I'm fasting right now
or I would rather be fasting right now
than to ingest more food right now.
Whether you have weight to lose or not,
there is a decision that then brings
about a compartmentalization of the
am I eating or am I not eating right now
in this moment that I feel like when you
do something like a more extended fast,
one of the big benefits
is coming off of that.
Your muscle or you're not.
Now muscle is is like at a high
at a high peak
tone at that point because it's
kind of like I've been deflecting things
or, you know, invitations, opportunities
or just
smells, food, truck, Fridays,
whatever it might be.
They're kind of everywhere.
I'm not isolating myself
during these seven days.
I'm not going to a mountaintop.
I'm not alone,
you know, in a basement somewhere just
watching the clock or something like that.
So I'm going to go about things as usual.
But that means I come off of that
with with kind of a different perspective,
a different, like less urgency,
I think, and less
maybe less fear of FOMO
of like fear of the fear of missing out.
When I kind of come off of the fast.
I'm really looking forward to that.
And I definitely want to talk more about
that when we get into this next time.
Absolutely. I'm excited, man.
Thank you for pushing me.
So on your birthday I will be fasting
to make up
for the first 24 hours of wishy washy.
Not sure if my right now. No, not now.
Muscle is strong enough. Yeah. Yeah.
So I appreciate, sir.
It's been too long
since you've done one of these.
It's going to be a lot of fun.
Head to the show notes,
grab the blueprint.
Got questions about nutrition.
So let us know.
Been an incredible partner for us
and so many people
since we partnered with them
earlier in 2023.
As always, set
those times, set those timers.
Tommy, that was a mouthful.
A tongue twister. Mine. I did. And right.
You don't even have to write.
It's just the so many days from now.
We'll talk to you soon.
Have a good day. Cool. Thanks. Bye.
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