No More Mr. Fat Guy!

It’s five minutes past nine on Sunday morning, and I haven’t eaten a thing since 11:30pm Friday night. I’ve had nothing but water for 34 hours. And you wanna know the really weird part?

It’s the end of the world as I’ve known it, and I feel fine!

Hadn’t planned on fasting. It wasn’t intentional at all. On Friday afternoon, I’d been up all night, and I went to bed around 4pm. Got up around 11pm, and I headed into town to get a pack of cigarettes (I know…). While I was there, I swung into Krystal’s drive thru and got two BA burgers and a large coke with no ice. I was up all night writing and reading, and I felt terrible all night-bloated, lethargic, upset stomach, etc. I was really wishing I hadn’t eaten that stuff, even though that’s not bad by my usual standards. Lately, I’m starting to notice how bad I feel after I eat poorly, and how good I feel after I eat a healthy meal.

Well, around 9am Saturday I headed into town for my usual bookstore and restaurant visits. Spent a few hours at Barnes and Noble reading books on health and diet. I decided to buy one of them-Eat To Live, by Dr. Joel Furhman. By around 1:00 I was getting really hungry as I hadn’t eaten in twelve hours, so I decided it was time for lunch. As I sat in my truck, trying to decide which restaurant to go to, it started to dawn on me how much better I was feeling, compared to how bad I was feeling after Krystal’s, and I decided I was in no rush to feel that bad again. I thought about skipping the restaurant, and heading home to make a salad and a baked potato. But I like to make a day of it in Huntsville, so I finally decided that I’d just skip lunch, and hit a restaurant later, before heading home.

So I went to Books A Million for a couple hours, and skimmed some more books on diet and health. I made a mental note to purchase one of them later-The China Study. Then I bought a copy of the Saturday paper to have something to read while I ate. Before heading off to eat, I stopped at Fresh Market, where I picked up my weekly gallon of unpasteurized orange juice. By this time I was really hungry, and I spent about 45 minutes in Fresh Market window shopping. Some of their sandwiches looked really good right about then. But I left with just the orange juice.

By this time it was about 4pm. Which I figured was a good time to eat. It could be my lunch and supper. And 4 is early enough that restaurants shouldn’t be very busy yet. So I made my pilgrimage to Barnhill’s. But the place was packed out, judging by the parking lot. Maybe Barnhill’s is always packed out? I don’t know, but I don’t like crowded restaurants. So I passed on that.

I thought about going somewhere else, but I realized that in about 4 hours I’d be in bed anyway, and I really wasn’t ravenous, so I thought what the heck? Why not give my digestive system a break for 24 hours? Lord knows it could use a vacation. So I headed home. I even stopped at Star Market and bought some bananas, lettuce, and tomatoes, for the coming week. And I wasn’t even tempted at the deli where they’re serving hot ribs, wings, and Terry’s pizza. Well, actually, I was a little tempted, but I didn’t buy anything. Just got my fruit and salad stuff and went home.

And it was all downhill from there. Got home, had some water to drink, surfed the net for a few hours, and then went to bed. And here I am, having fasted for 34 hours, without even planning to. Now I’m wondering if I should try to make it two days in a row. I’m not trying to prove anything, so I may eat, or I may not. We’ll just see how it goes. (By the way, the scale says 285 this morning, but I know that will come back up after I eat again.)

I just can’t believe I went without food for this long. I’ve read about the health benefits of fasting before. And I’ve tried it before, but never had any success going without food for extended periods. Until yesterday, I think the longest I’ve ever fasted was 15 minutes!