I’ve done 24-hour fasts off and on for the past three years, and it was always a struggle for me.
I was started on bupropion (generic Wellbutrin) a year ago to treat really bad depression.
A year later, they have just now raised my dosage level, and my appetite damn near vanished altogether.
A 24 hour fast turned into a 36 hour fast turned into a 48 hour fast.
I can very much stand to lose some weight, so I was considering rolling 72s or 96s once a week (for the weight loss but more importantly for the autophagy).
Has anyone else used a similar strategy?
I’m not on anti-depressants but I’ve really suffered this year with depression. I’ve started doing some 48h fasts (once per week) for therapeutic reasons (I’m also now suffering from long covid). While the brain fog is still pretty active, i noticed that one day I simply got my happyness back. It was bizarre, just as I was approaching the 48h, I noticed this odd feeling in my body. I looked outside and the weather was wonderful (I live in England so chances are it wasn’t), I decided that I actually liked my job, and that things weren’t as bad as I thought. I came home and played with my children. I almost had a feeling of euphoria. I’m back to normal person now (as I haven’t been able to keep my routine as well), but I’m still a much happier person than I was before.
This is a personal anecdote, but there loads of evidence for people using extended fasting to treat mental health issues. The book “The oldest cure in the world” by Steve Hendricks has a whole chapter on this. Hope your extended fast can help you.
I suffer from depression but I’m not on medication, I find fasting helps with my depression. I’m doing rolling 36-48s atm with a 1 hour eating window, eating keto based diet.
I normally do as long as I can which ends up being around 100 hours, but everytime I break the fast I binge on junk food, so trying something different now and hopefully it will work as a sustainable plan