Hi guys, I’ll keep it simple. I have done a few fasts in the last 2 and a half years, I did four of them ranging from 5 days to 10 days, most often a week or eight days. I always used electrolytes, well I mean just Himalayan salt in water and sometimes potassium chloride.
I read a user here on reddit, I don’t know if I can say his name, which seemed to have a certain reputation (he wrote many posts and also a diary with his blood tests values before and after some fasts) and he said that he reached the same value of stem cell regeneration in blood of Valter Longo’s studies only when he fasted WITHOUT electrolytes.
He thought the explaination was that with electrolytes “the system doesn’t need to diminish his complexity”, thereby reducing autophagy.
In his opinion, levels of Acetyl-coA do not drop so much if you take electrolytes, and this diminishes your level of autophagy and subsequent stem cells production. I found scientific references about a high level of Acetyl-coA being detrimental for autophagy (he also posted it) but I did not find any reference to Acetyl-coA being linked to any electrolyte.
On a side note, he said he takes while fasting, beyond water, also a multivitamin with B vitamins and C, and nutritional yeast (which is rich in potassium), so he anyway supplements a bit potassium.
Okay, maybe not so simple. My question is, considered AMPK and MTORC seem to detect things like available energy and free proteins, do you think his thought about electrolytes is correct?
My main aim in fasting is to stimulate autophagy and immune regeneration, which shows up in temporarily lowered WBC count.
I don’t fast to lose weight, so for me it’s important to understand if electrolytes can diminish my autophagy.
Thank you in advance
Uhm. I read somewhere you arent supposed to take vitamins, even water soluble ones, during a fast, maybe Fung said that it diminishes the Big A.
As for no electrolytes, yeah Alan Goldhammers group have done it just on distilled water but they were pretty well supervised.
Then theres Angus Berberi, who did a 382 days fast out of which the first 60 days he didnt receive one supplement - not even electrolytes. But then again, supervised by a doc.
Why not just do a long fast without and with them for comparison ? Like 3 days ?
I must say though, fasting without electrolytes is seen just as dangerous as dry fasting.
Whatever you do, do it with a boatload of proper research.
I think its possible no one knows. Fasting produces ketone bodies which can be converted to Acetyl-coA. There might be some threshold of Acetyl-coA activation which needs to be achieved but I would think the electrolytes have little impact.
A possible explaination that maybe makes more sense popped in my mind, and it is that in the first fasts he could not reach same values as Longo’s studies because they were his firsts and he was also very overweight, maybe obese. I don’t know his height but I remember his weight, well above 110 kg and maybe much more without fasting, and he once wrote about 190 kg but maybe he was just being hyperbolic, because he was saying “I can be 100 or 190 kg and no matter what I eat, my HDL stays the same” so don’t take it necessarily in a literal way).
So maybe he would have reached the same values anyway because it was the third, fourth time and this improves effectiveness “per se”, and not because he removed electrolytes (actually just reduced, because nutritional yeast is potassium rich and took a multivitamin anyway, and probably mineral water ).
Electrolytes may just be a coincidence in his case.
I can’t speak from a scientific standpoint, here, but what I can tell you is that electrolytes have made all the difference I my fasting.
Specifically salt.
However, I can go a step beyond that and say that in my two most recent fasts (four day fast, three day break, and I’m on the third day of fast #2), I’ve been taking supplements, plenty of electrolytes, collagen & gelatin, and averaging about 300-400 calories a day.
I still go through ketosis symptoms, but I don’t get keto flu and the aches and pains are severely reduced.
From this round of fasting, I noticed a big change in a “floater” I had in my eye, and in my overall eye and skin health.
The floater was oblong and pretty dark before the 4 day fast. Now on day 3 of this fast, it’s a little spec that is semi-transparent.
It would be my guess that autophagy is responsible for this, because when I researched these floaters, there seemed to be no “official cure”.
So to conclude this thought - it could be the my vitamin/mineral/electrolyte use helped with reducing the floater.
I think it’s somewhat safe to suggest, though, that it probably did not impair my autophagy, because I doubt that the supplements & electrolytes, themselves, would have fixed this problem. So it must have been the fasting. In which case, it would be the autophagy, I believe.
Electrolytes (salt, especially) made a big difference in my ability to function well early in a fast, which I think helped my fast progress. Sugar does not appear to be necessary.
Potassium, however, is very necessary for me. I found that out on a 10 day fast attempt wherein on day 7 I was almost completely incapacitated by keto flu, coupled by heart symptoms. This happened on a camping trip, though, and I’d gotten lost in the woods and ended up hiking far more than anticipated. (Dumb of me, I know). Had to call the trip quits & grab some fries and chicken nuggets at McDonald’s (which was closest), and the symptoms went away within hours.
I’m a fan of the “listen to your body” approach. If you feel like crap - figure out how to fix that problem. It’s been my experience that feeling like crap is rarely helpful for your body. Its not a “no pain no gain” paradigm, except in terms of food cravings. Seems to me that my body does best when things are easier.
Electrolytes are vital. Both for building and breaking down but also the fundamental singling we need to function. While you picked up on electroytes and vitamin your also not thinking about amino acids.
We know BCAA inhibit autophagy but they are only 3 of the 9 essential amino acids our bodys cant make. Atophagy could diminish once the bodys supply of methionine or tryptophan or any of the other 6 run out.