Wobbegong Fasts and Waits for Prey

[Wobbegong]

Time for another challenge already, huh? I'm not sure I'm ready. Last month I had grand ideas about having a "Wobbegong Does All the Things" challenge, but now I have some kind of obnoxious summer cold and even with temperatures hovering in the high 80s, with the humidity our heat index is soaring well into the triple digits. For those of you sensible folk out there who prefer centigrade, it's been around 29.5 - 32°, but feels like 40.5 - 43°. And it's like that from about 8am to 11pm, when it then takes a short break to hover as low as 82° (28°ish) until the cycle starts again. 

 

Anyway, even if it wasn't gross out and I was feeling well, I've been doing so abysmally at sticking with challenges lately that it seems foolish to serve up too much at once. So I'm going easy this time around, with goals as follows: 

 

1. Post to NF five days of seven. Post at least fifteen times a week. 

2. Complete a seven day fast before the end of summer and the return to required lunches (August 28). Spend remainder of challenge on OMAD schedule. 

 

Ok! Hopefully I can handle that. Let's go, team. 

[Tateman]

Hey, I've been all about that meh challenges lately. Time to get ti going again though. seven day fast ehh? I have considered doing an extended fast one of these days. Maybe once I am fat adapted again

 

Good luck!

 

[Wobbegong]

29 minutes ago, Tateman said:

Hey, I've been all about that meh challenges lately. Time to get ti going again though. seven day fast ehh? I have considered doing an extended fast one of these days. Maybe once I am fat adapted again

 

Good luck!

Thanks! I was having a lot of trouble muscling through my longer fasts (48+), but then I started reading The Complete Guide to Fasting. One of the people Dr. Fung quotes says that one of the things they realized was that your experience in fasted and unfasted states are actually incredibly similar. Hunger signals aren't any worse when you skipped your last meal. For some reason, that excerpt was what I needed to read... since then I've been very relaxed in my fasts and make it three days pretty easily, as long as I don't do something stupid like tell myself I've "earned" a meal or such nonsense, and then get caught up in the "well I decided I would so..." of it. 

 

To be honest, my experience with hunger signals while fasted or fed is so similar that the hardest thing for me is just to remember that I am fasting, which means no, I don't get to treat myself with a nice salmon fillet, even if it looks delicious! Honestly, I shouldn't even go to the grocery store at all when I'm fasting, but I keep thinking I'll be able to batch cook for the week while I'm fasting on the weekends... it never works! 

[Tanktimus the Encourager]

I've been hovering in Mehville for a while myself. Following along.

[Wobbegong]

12 minutes ago, Tanktimus the Encourager said:

I've been hovering in Mehville for a while myself. Following along.

I'm trying to look on the bright side. Aside from my crappy cold and the crappy weather, I get to hang out at home this summer vacation instead of going into the school office and sitting around for eight hours a day, so I don't have to take any sick leave to recuperate at home. I didn't miss the start of the new challenge. I've got some Rebel buddies helping me put the Mini together, and they're doing an amazing job even though I keep disappearing for days at a time. And the new Fire Emblem game came out last week and finally arrived, and it's fantastic! There's a lot to be cheerful about. 

[Waanie]

That weather surely sounds horrible... I'm glad you can still see the bright side of it though.

 

The fasting sounds intense. I have tried a bit of intermittent fasting in the past, but I always feel very weak in the morning, barely being able to bike to work if I do that. Do you have any tips to alleviate this weakness, or is fasting just not for me? 

[Wobbegong]

1 minute ago, Waanie said:

That weather surely sounds horrible... I'm glad you can still see the bright side of it though.

It's awful. It was like this last year and I'm pretty sure I blocked it from my memory on purpose. I gotta be honest, the weather is really high on my list of reasons why I will not make Japan my forever home. 

 

1 minute ago, Waanie said:

The fasting sounds intense. I have tried a bit of intermittent fasting in the past, but I always feel very weak in the morning, barely being able to bike to work if I do that. Do you have any tips to alleviate this weakness, or is fasting just not for me? 

Everyone is different and coming from a different eating pattern, so there are a lot of things it could be. Physiologically, if you usually eat moderate to high carbs, by the time you wake up in the morning your body will have had to dip into the liver's emergency supply of glycogen and will be screaming at you to replenish. Between that and the circadian ghrelin rush if you usually eat breakfast, plus the potential caffeine withdrawal if you usually drink coffee or tea, can make skipping a morning meal really tough for some people. 

 

Some people try to push through it. Some plan to start fasting on the weekend, when they can sleep in through the toughest morning slump or just generally chill out. Some continue to allow zero calorie caffeinated drinks while they're fasting. Many people who fast regularly maintain low-carb eating habits even in a fed state, to avoid aggravating their insulin response. Many also suggest supplementing electrolytes, as glycogen burning comes with a large initial flush since sugar binds to water in the body. 

 

A lot of people also recommend starting slowly, simply by extending your fasting window an hour or two at a time. If you usually eat several small meals throughout the day, going for many hours without food can be quite a change! You could try to consolidate your meals into three or four larger ones, or cut out between-meal snacking, just to practice going a few extra hours. When you do start IF, you can also do things like delaying your morning meal by an hour or eating dinner an hour earlier, and building off the overnight fast to start. I sometimes used to just skip a meal here and there if I wasn't feeling very hungry, instead of saying "that's it no more dinner ever." You don't have to jump into 16:8 right away. 

[Waanie]

Thank you for your tips! My breakfasts (and other meals) are indeed very carb-heavy, and my meals are every day at the same time (+/- 30 minutes). My first cup of tea is also every day around the same time, but usually after I bike to work. Removing the snacks from my diet sounds like a good plan, so that I eat only at 7:30, 12:00, 16:00 and 18:30, where the 16:00 "meal" consists of fruit and nuts. You're right that my insulin is probably going all over the place, even though it always comes out as normal at the doctor's office. I didn't know about the relation between low-carb diets and IF, but now that you put it out it does make sense. Thanks again, I will see how I can make small changes so that my blood glucose will be more stable than now before trying IF again .

[Wobbegong]

If you did cut out snacking as you say, assuming you don't eat your evening meal for more than an hour, you'd already have a 12 hour fast built into your day right there. That's nothing to sniff at! 

[Wobbegong]

The tea lady at one of my schools is growing sunflowers. She arbitrarily decided that one of them would be mine and it happened to grow a foot taller than the others right away (I suspect because the pot she used for it was slightly larger than the others, so she could differentiate it as mine). She doesn't seem to have made this connection and is very proud of my green thumb. For the record, I haven't lifted a finger for this sunflower. Like, I'm happy to know it exists, but she's done all the work! 

 

Anyway today she sent me a picture of a praying mantis sitting on "my" sunflower. I'm rather fond of praying mantises, so that was a really nice thing to get! 

 

In case anyone is wondering, the Japanese word for praying mantis is kamakiri (cuts with scythe). 

[Countess D'If]

8 hours ago, Wobbegong said:

The tea lady at one of my schools is growing sunflowers. She arbitrarily decided that one of them would be mine and it happened to grow a foot taller than the others right away (I suspect because the pot she used for it was slightly larger than the others, so she could differentiate it as mine). She doesn't seem to have made this connection and is very proud of my green thumb. For the record, I haven't lifted a finger for this sunflower. Like, I'm happy to know it exists, but she's done all the work! 

 

Anyway today she sent me a picture of a praying mantis sitting on "my" sunflower. I'm rather fond of praying mantises, so that was a really nice thing to get! 

 

In case anyone is wondering, the Japanese word for praying mantis is kamakiri (cuts with scythe). 

Love. Plants make me so happy!

[Wobbegong]

4 hours ago, Countess D'If said:

Love. Plants make me so happy!

Me too! But I'm still not very good at plant husbandry. Hopefully my skills will grow with time... 

[Wobbegong]

Yesterday I wasn't feeling well at all so I gave myself a free pass to eat whatever I wanted whenever I wanted. Even though I know I have enough of everything I need to thrive stored away, cognitively there's still a bit of a hiccup around withholding nutrients when I'm trying to feel better. But as it turned out, I wasn't that hungry. I ate one small meal and snacked a little throughout the day, but left off midway through literally everything I ate and ended up coming back to it later. This has been becoming a more common occurrence for me lately, but until I started fasting regularly I never left food unfinished, so it still really throws me off. 

 

Well, either I got everything I needed or I proved to myself I didn't need much, because I woke up this morning feeling significantly less stuffy and not hungry at all. Lately with fasting I've been kind of considering myself either fed or fasting, so every time I finish a meal I start fasting again. I snacked yesterday, but I usually don't, and don't have any urge to. I usually then fast either until a scheduled meal (lunch at school, work party, etc) or until I forget I'm fasting while I'm at the grocery store and stupidly buy something and then tell myself since I've bought it I'll eat it. 

 

But right now my fridge is absolutely bursting with food, so I have no reason to visit the grocery store, and my meal schedule is completely clear, so I currently have no plans to break my fast at a certain time. The challenge hasn't officially started yet, but I might as well try to get through my seven day fast goal ASAP: both because I'm more likely to have meals scheduled as friends try to plan to hang out later in the summer, and because I might fail and need to start over, and don't have much time before school starts again. 

 

It's 9am August 4th here. I'm currently approximately 12 hours fasted and 89.4kg. Let's do this. 

[Wobbegong]

9pm marks 24 hours down! Felt really headachey around three and wasn't sure if it was an electrolyte issue or the cold, so I drank some salt water and took a nap. Now I'm feeling better but still have no idea which it was lol! I felt a little hungry around 1:30 and again at 8pm, both about an hour after I usually would eat if I was eating lunch or dinner. Neither instance felt particularly persuasive. Hopefully tomorrow will go just as smoothly!  

 

I'm also significantly less phlegmy today, thank goodness. Still keeping fingers crossed about my usual post-cold cough (I tend to get a post-nasal drip on the tail end of a sinus infection that leaves me feeling normal but coughing like I'm dying for a month after every cold). I'm hoping to avoid that this time. It's been literal years since the last time I got sick, and I can't remember the last time I had a summer cold -- usually it only happens in response to the Christmas tree. So I have no idea what to expect. 

[Waanie]

Good job on the first 24 hours! 

 

It's nice of the coffee lady to think of you when caring for her sunflowers . They are happy and bright, hopefully "yours" will bloom for a long time .

[Wobbegong]

9 minutes ago, Waanie said:

Good job on the first 24 hours! 

Thanks! I've done 24 many times, but this is the first time I'm trying on the mindset of "a series of 24 hour fasts one after another" instead of "a seven day fast." One hundred and sixty-eight hours just sounds too long! 

 

9 minutes ago, Waanie said:

It's nice of the coffee lady to think of you when caring for her sunflowers . They are happy and bright, hopefully "yours" will bloom for a long time .

She is really nice. I do love sunflowers, they're so cheerful and cute! In a lot of Japanese media such as anime and video games, characters who like sunflowers often have personalities that inspire me to be a better, more friendly, caring, and outgoing version of myself. 

[Wobbegong]

9am August 5th, 36 hours fasted, 88.8kg, waist: 94cm

 

It occurred to me that I should also be tracking my waist circumference, something I haven't been doing for ages because I wasn't seeing any progress. This measurement is taken about 1" above my belly button, despite my physical waist -- the smallest circumference on my torso and the place a tailor would measure -- occurring rather higher up. I'm taking the measurement here because it's a more accurate measure of health and because that's where I'll be measured at the upcoming health check. I'd like to get it below 88cm before the health check, but that's probably not possible, as it's coming up next month. I'm not too worried about it, since last year my 97.4cm pulled a "C" grade, which is passing. As long as it's lower than that I'll be fine. 

 

It is a little frustrating that I've been doing keto for a year and haven't made significant progress in shrinking, either in waist or weight. It's probably a reflection on my lack of strict adherence to the diet. Because of the timing, I kind of feel like I look like I'm using fasting as a get-slim-quick yoyo/fad diet, but I swear it's really just because it's summer break, and I have to eat at school during term. I actually like fasting a lot better than keto and have seen better results with it in a much shorter time -- unlike keto, I really can see myself continuing to fast regularly for the rest of my life. I'm still grateful to my year of keto, because it's helped me recalibrate what a "normal" amount of carbs is and become open to not eating so much processed shit (I include white rice, bread, and pasta, and other things based in refined grains, in this category). I still like the processed shit, though, and want to be able to eat it sometimes without feeling like I'm breaking the rules. Since I've started fasting, even when I do eat those foods I'm more likely to stop eating when I'm approaching fullness, instead of notice that I'm getting full and keep eating anyway because it tastes good or is convenient. That one little change is worth a lot to me. 

[Wobbegong]

Feeling inspired by @Diadhuit I did the dishes, started cleaning my bathroom, and put away all the clothes I've been meticulously cleaning and dumping in a pile in my room. 

 

A city announcement came on at 11:45 that said -mumble mumble- be careful -mumble- weather -mumble mumble mumble mumble- power outage -mumble-

I'm not sure if that means they're scheduling brown outs or they want us to prevent power outages during the heat wave by doing ~something~. If the latter, I'm not at all sure what it could be. Cycle my AC? I've heard that's less energy efficient, because it's easier for a thermostat regulated AC unit to maintain a moderate temperature than to "fix" a high temperature over and over again. But I didn't grow up with AC so I have no idea really. Advice? 

[Tateman]

On 8/3/2019 at 3:20 AM, Wobbegong said:

The tea lady at one of my schools is growing sunflowers. She arbitrarily decided that one of them would be mine and it happened to grow a foot taller than the others right away (I suspect because the pot she used for it was slightly larger than the others, so she could differentiate it as mine). She doesn't seem to have made this connection and is very proud of my green thumb. For the record, I haven't lifted a finger for this sunflower. Like, I'm happy to know it exists, but she's done all the work! 

 

Anyway today she sent me a picture of a praying mantis sitting on "my" sunflower. I'm rather fond of praying mantises, so that was a really nice thing to get! 

 

In case anyone is wondering, the Japanese word for praying mantis is kamakiri (cuts with scythe). 

Yup, this is what I thought of as I read that haha

 

I had also ready that people should intake a bit of salt and some electrolytes while fasting. Dr. Berg has some info on it too I believe.

[Wobbegong]

3 minutes ago, Tateman said:

Yup, this is what I thought of as I read that haha

 

I had also ready that people should intake a bit of salt and some electrolytes while fasting. Dr. Berg has some info on it too I believe.

As soon as I realized kama was scythe I was like "Oh... Scyther... that makes sense." 100% on the same page with you there! 

 

I love salt water so drinking it while fasting is no problem for me. There are a few different schools of thought regarding whether electrolytes are truly "needed" while fasting, but generally I toe the middle line the same as with anything: "if doing it makes you feel better and brings you closer to your goals, do it. If it's off-putting or getting in the way of your goals, don't." Salt water makes me feel better and makes fasting easier without negatively impacting my results (as far as I know), so I'll keep drinking it as desired. I also drink regular water. Whichever is more appetizing in the moment. 

[Diadhuit]

Feeling inspired by [mention=63447]Diadhuit[/mention] I did the dishes, started cleaning my bathroom, and put away all the clothes I've been meticulously cleaning and dumping in a pile in my room. 
 
A city announcement came on at 11:45 that said -mumble mumble- be careful -mumble- weather -mumble mumble mumble mumble- power outage -mumble-
I'm not sure if that means they're scheduling brown outs or they want us to prevent power outages during the heat wave by doing ~something~. If the latter, I'm not at all sure what it could be. Cycle my AC? I've heard that's less energy efficient, because it's easier for a thermostat regulated AC unit to maintain a moderate temperature than to "fix" a high temperature over and over again. But I didn't grow up with AC so I have no idea really. Advice? 

Wow! You were more productive than me [emoji28]
My dry clothes are still all on my bed.

I was lurking here, not daring to ask about your fast... 7 days seems a lot on only water? Am I missing something here?

For the city announcement, can you ask your neighbours / people in the shop? You are a foreigner, it's ok if you don't understand things!!

[Waanie]

I'd say that 3.4cm is a significant change, even if it's not as much as you'd like it to be. Do you do any form of strength training? Having big muscles makes that  you use more energy, and hence might lose weight faster. Muscles are also very cool .

[Wobbegong]

1 hour ago, Diadhuit said:

Wow! You were more productive than me
My dry clothes are still all on my bed.

I've moved my bed to the living room (where the AC is) for the summer, so my bedroom has so much nice, clean floor space... so tempting... so perfect for laundry. But it literally piled up for days. At least with your bed you have to move it somewhere before you can sleep! Just make sure when that happens you move it to where it belongs!

 

1 hour ago, Diadhuit said:

I was lurking here, not daring to ask about your fast... 7 days seems a lot on only water? Am I missing something here?

It's a long time! But not outrageous. I'm overweight and generally healthy (aside from some biomarkers tied into disordered over-eating), so I have plenty of stored energy to burn and am unlikely to face any ill effects from fasting. But I've also done a lot of research, spent time doing shorter-term practice fasts to build up to this, and am coming from a state of nutritional ketosis, all of which make fasting either safer or easier for me. I wouldn't recommend fasts longer than 48 hours for anyone who's never fasted before, and I should probably have said something about that previously! 

 

Extended fasts are generally safe if you're a) overweight b) not taking medication c) not pregnant or breastfeeding d) an adult e) have a plan to safely end your fast AND f) prepared to stop if you feel ill. People who are underweight, are growing or responsible for the growth of another human, taking certain medication, or suffering from a mental issue that is causing them to under eat or punish themselves by withholding food all SHOULD NOT FAST. There are potential dangers and complications from undertaking extended fasts, especially for people in high risk categories listed above. 

 

Aside from that, though, fasting really isn't a horrible thing. Humans didn't evolve with a constant, steady food supply: the reason we store fat at all is to protect us from starvation in times of famine. Organized religions such as Christianity, Buddhism, Islam, and Hindu have all included holy fasting periods in their annual calendars for thousands of years, usually as a time of cleansing and prayer. One of the evolutionary side effects of fasting is increased mental focus (to help you find food and not die), and this altered state can make religious people feel closer to God. Back in the realm of science, until insulin was discovered in 1921, management of conditions like Type 1 Diabetes and epilepsy were based entirely on restricted eating under doctor supervision. (Type 1 Diabetes was still a death sentence, though.) 

 

Anyway, I'm really interested in the history and science of fasting, and therefore study it and know a lot about it and feel very confident in my choice. But seven days is still a long time! Good question. 

 

1 hour ago, Diadhuit said:

For the city announcement, can you ask your neighbours / people in the shop? You are a foreigner, it's ok if you don't understand things!!

I really ought to text my coworkers who live in town. People are really friendly about answering questions I have. The issue is asking. 

[Wobbegong]

8 minutes ago, Waanie said:

I'd say that 3.4cm is a significant change, even if it's not as much as you'd like it to be. Do you do any form of strength training? Having big muscles makes that  you use more energy, and hence might lose weight faster. Muscles are also very cool .

I'm trying to be proud of what I've accomplished. I consider "stalls" in weight loss to be "successful maintenance at new weight." But slow progress is still frustrating, whether it's on the scale or in the measuring tape. 

 

I would absolutely love to do strength training but I have nothing really to lift. Maybe my coffee table? I could get under it and try to bench it.... I do do bodyweight exercises, but I've been very haphazard about pursuing them lately. I should really get back to it!

 

Maybe I'll add bodyweight training to my challenge this round? I'm nervous about adding anything because I'm currently in the "Things are going WELL I have this challenge DOWN" phase but it's literally DAY ONE. That said, I might actually complete my second goal before the end of the week, so maybe I should have something else going on. The other trouble is that whenever I include an exercise goal, as soon as I stop doing it I feel like a challenge failure and am too embarrassed to show my face at the forums, and then I disappear for way too long lol. 

[Waanie]

Bodyweight exercises are great for getting stronger, if you can do proper push-ups and one-legged squats at your weight, then you're stronger than most people. I found the thing that you really do need for strength training is something to do pulling, although a bed-sheet over the door is also said to work for rows. When I started all those years ago, I used the dinner-table to do rows with . Something heavy for one-armed rows is also a good alternative. I got all my coworkers impressed with my strength by just bodyweight training, 5 years ago .

 

To ease into it, you can do a 15-20 minute circuit twice a week? Or do another programme with just 4-6 compound exercises, starting at an easy difficulty? I find I have more motivation to continue if I start relatively light and very slowly increase the number of reps and difficulty of the exercises.