A few months back, I had been listening to a book on CD in which the narrator/author had introduced the concept of a "cleansing fast". Apparently, there is a theory that the body can store a lot of toxins in the fat cells and they will remain there indefinitely unless the body is forced to burn them up. My only prior experience with conscious fasting had been when I was young and my parent's would make me fast for two meals on Sundays. I still remember the ravenous feelings that would accompany this and the mad dash to get dinner as soon as it hit the table.
Despite my bad experiences in the past, I had been intrigued by this cleansing concept ever since I heard about it. There was only one problem; Lori. While the concept seemed interesting to me, I was sure that she would not be so keen on it. If I couldn't explain it to her, and I couldn't hide the fact that I wasn't eating, I was in somewhat of a bind. When Lori decided that she was going to Mississippi, it seemed like there may be an opportunity for me to try this.
As the day of her departure got closer, the spirit of Lori started to creep into my brain and I started to lose my resolve. Did I really want to do this? Why would anyone want to do this? Fortunately, I was able to chase out the Lori-isms and after eating half a burrito on Friday evening, I was determined to see how long I could make it without food. I did set some ground rules: 1) Water was not only allowed, but was a must, 2) Juice in small events would be allowed, and 3) I could not allow this to alter my normal behavior (i.e. I wouldn't just lie around in bed).
On Saturday morning I woke up early to take Lori to the airport. With my better judgment boarding a flight to Memphis, I was free to do whatever I wanted. For some reason, I wanted to eat something, at six in the morning. It had only been twelve hours. I never eat breakfast, so it was particularly weird that I would be craving food. My mind was clearly playing tricks on me. Now I had a new reason to do this. I needed to demonstrate self-control. I needed to prove to me body that I was in charge.
I went home and focused on keeping myself busy. I hung out with Heidi and watched TV. I got caught up on some chapters of my writing. I counted the hours until my next distraction. I had volunteered to help out at the VA at nine in the morning, so it was only a matter of time before I would have my mind occupied. I have been volunteering at the VA since February of this year and I work at the WBRC, or Western Blind Rehabilitation Center. The WBRC works with sight impaired veterans to help them regain their mobility and to show them all the things that they can still do. We have done a number of things such as sport tournaments, attending music recitals, watching wheelchair soccer, going to the Cantor Art Center at Stanford, and playing shuffleboard in the halls. I really enjoy the time that I have to spend with the veterans there. It is definitely an enriching experience. I have consciously chosen not to write too much about it here since it feels self-serving. So suffice it to say that from nine to twelve I would not be thinking about food.
Well, that was good in theory. In reality, I was struggling. When we got done for the morning, my brain really wanted me to go by the Loving Hut Restaurant in Palo Alto. Since I am so close, why not? Shut up brain, you can't beat me that easy! I figured I would do the opposite. Rather than going to eat, I would go home, get changed, and go to the gym. Who knows, maybe my brain will give up and my body will turn on its fat reserves. Fat chance, pun intended.
At the gym, I worked for about an hour on the elliptical machine and then spent some time on the abdominal circuit machines. This did seem to have the effect of shutting my hunger signal off which was welcome. For the whole day day I had felt like I imagine Heidi feels every day. Heidi is food crazed and up until now, I had been walking in her "dog-shoes".
With the hunger impulse turned off, I went back home but I was feeling restless and was worried that I would lose the battle if I sat down and watched TV. For the last several weeks, I had been kicking around the idea of getting a tattoo, so I figured I would go check-out some tattoo parlors. I had scouted some before, but had been pretty intimidated by my lack of knowledge of all things tattoo related. Plus, I had been somewhat taken aback by the fact that even tattooing had Vegan pit-falls. Many of the inks include animal products in the form of glycerin and many of the black inks derive their color from the coal from burnt animal bones. Then, there were the after-care products. These also which required the use of a secret decoder-ring in order to know what was and was not Vegan-approved. Adding to the mix was the fact that, according to various websites, many artists do not like to discuss their inks since they mix their own. I figured I would give it a shot, so I stopped by the place that had seemed most welcoming during my previous foray. After being told that they do use Vegan ink, I decided to make an appointment for the following Tuesday.
By now it was about nine-thirty in the evening and I had crossed the twenty-four hour barrier. When I got to my car, I was feeling a little light-headed, but the feeling passed and I felt safe driving home. My mind was set on getting home, going to bed, and putting this day of hunger behind me. I didn't have any more light-headedness on the way home, so I figured it was definitely not hunger related. Walking through the door at home, my eyes were drawn to the box of licorice on the counter that I had bought the night before. It was calling to me, teasing me even, and daring me to eat it. If I couldn't show this licorice who was the boss, what kind of man would I be? I decided to take the high road and let the licorice live to see another day. Besides, sleep cures all.
I didn't really have a fast duration in mind, per se, so I was kind of winging it as Sunday dawned. I wasn't feeling too bad, but I wanted to stay ahead of my body so I headed to the gym first thing. During my work-out, I can't deny that I was a bit more tired than normal. Not exhausted tired or on the brink of passing out tired, just fatigued. When my workout was done, I headed back home for a shower. I wondered t o myself how long it would take for my body to start fat burning.
By the end of the day on Sunday, I felt like I was in pretty good shape. The feeling of hunger had all but subsided, and I didn’t really have to find any distractions in order to continue. As a whole, I was feeling significantly lighter and better. I was convinced that my body had switched over to fat burning mode and that my cleansing was underway. I still allowed myself some juice, but I found myself needing less than I did on Saturday.
Monday morning was a different story. When I woke up in the morning, I felt distinctly light headed and had a bit of a headache. I struggled to get out of bed and wondered if my little experiment had run its course. As it turned out, it was nothing that a shower couldn’t cure. When I got out, I was still not feeling as good as I had on Sunday, but I was certainly in a better place than I was earlier in the morning. As I drove to work, I wondered whether I would have the presence to make it through a day of wor,k or whether it would prove to be too taxing for me.
While I had some doldrums during the day, I think I pulled it off. I don’t think that anyone would have thought by the end of the day that I was not seventy-two hours without food. I began to fantasize, not about food, but rather about how much longer I would go before I had to eat. I wondered if I could make it until Lori came back on Sunday night. That would be the absolute limit of my experiment since I am sure she would expect me to resume a normal life; after some severe chastising that is. I made a point to stop by the gym on the way home and push myself aggressively in my work out since it would probably be the last one of the week. I had made an appointment to get my tattoo on Tuesday and, while I had never gotten one before, I was savvy enough to know that I probably wouldn’t want to be flexing my skin too much afterwards. It felt good to break a heavy sweat and I didn’t feel like I was at the limit of my endurance.
I had a truly peaceful night sleep and woke on Tuesday morning feeling great. My physical state from Sunday seemed to have returned and I was feeling like I could take on the world again. When I arrived at work, I felt more productive and alert and I had to wonder if the need for food may just be some vast conspiracy to make money by selling us things that we don’t really need. Call me cynical, but in today’s world, it is easy to find oneself wondering if every part of their life is some grand manipulation created to extract from them what someone else desires. It seemed more and more likely that I would make it through to Sunday night.
By two in the afternoon, suddenly everything changed. My whole physical being seemed off-kilter. As I caught a glimpse of my arms when I was typing, I could see that my skin looked incredibly dry and was flaking. Not peeling, but just flaking off. While I had received a major sunburn a couple of weeks before, it had stopped peeling a week ago. This seemed to be something new. I lifted up the cuff of my jeans and saw similar peeling on my legs. It suddenly became apparent that this fasting may be doing something to my body. I shrugged this off largely as the price of admission into the club of no food and resumed my work.
Within an hour and a half, it was clear to me that I was not going to make it to Sunday. As a matter of fact, I knew I wasn’t going to make it another hour. In a sudden wave, a hunger based anxiety attack overcame me, and I felt like I needed to eat immediately or I would die. And so it was that, at the ninety-fourth hour of my self-imposed fast, I found myself hurrying across the street to Subway for my old go-to favorite, the Veggie Delite on Italian bread.
I wish I could say that eating it made me feel immediately better, but it didn’t. I am sure my physical body was relieved, but my sense of self-control was tarnished. I had thought that I could be stronger. I had often pondered what I would do if I had no options for sustenance other than animal based food sources. I had been so sure that I would sooner die than revert to my old ways and that I would have the strength to let the life seep out of me rather than compromise. Now I recognize that this was not an exact approximation of that scenario, but the fact that my physical body effectively ordered me to eat, makes me wonder if I am indeed strong enough to hold to my convictions in the most extreme of scenarios. Would I fight to the end or would I fail? I hope that I will never have to know, but it is clear to me that I need to continue to toughen myself and strengthen my resolve. It is not enough to live if I can’t live with myself.
