Hey there!
Although it has been several years since I’ve had excellent results from five-day water-only fasts. I’m now going for a ten-day. Never used electrolyte supplements before
How important are they for longer fasts? Which do you recommend? Why?
Seeing a lot of talk and no sources.
https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/153188#_noHeaderPrefixedContent
https://health.clevelandclinic.org/electrolyte-drinks-beneficial-or-not/
https://www.rush.edu/news/essential-electrolytes
Yes, you need electrolytes. There is a reason it’s very difficult for life to thrive where there aren’t any.
It’s necessary for biochemistry and electrochemistry. In nature, ponds and streams will contain dissolved calcium and sodium at the very least. Even spring water will contain trace levels of electrolytes.
They are essential minerals. If you consume pure water and nothing else, you can give yourself seizures or cardiac arrest. You sweat and pee electrolytes. Your body isn’t doing nuclear chemistry and creating new electrolytes. They have to be replenished eventually.
Most people get 100% of their electrolytes through food. If you’re fasting, you will lose them faster than you consume them.
All I know is that without them fasting is a totally different experience for me.
These 4 I get every time without electrolytes on a prolonged fast. But I gone none of them when taking them.
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For those folks that are against electrolytes taken during human fasting. Would you be willing to link to any studies that support the claims that taking electrolytes (sodium,potassium, magnesium etc) are detrimental to fasting benefits?
You’ll get varying answers. Reddiors will say yes, it’s necessary whereas the sciences would say no, si it falls down to what you consider necessary.
I looked into this a lot and the conclusion I came to after reading what the most famous and respected names in fasting have to say (Peter Attia, Jason Fung) is that technically we don’t need the electrolytes as our body has a way of maintaining electrolyte levels, but anecdotal reports on Reddit day you may start to feel s bit lethargic, weak, lacking motivation etc. if you don’t take them. So while technically you don’t need them, they may help improve the way you feel when you do the fast.
Petter Attia, who’s opinion I respect a lot with regards to exercise and fasting, adds a bit of salt to his water a few times a day and takes a bit of magnesium at night to sleep better, nothing more.
If you have easy access to electrolytes, just go and buy them and take them. They do no harm and likely have some benefit to the way you feel. If you have no access to them then don’t worry about it, you will be fin without.
Because most all people living in the modern age have no real sense or direct experience of their body regarding its remarkable abilities, let alone practice at fully utilizing or developing our physical potentials, we find doing things like fasting uncomfortable.
This is similar to going to a gym and lifting weights – it’s neither natural for us or much fun to do well as beginners or posers because it’s uncomfortable. Until we get used to it and find the beauty and rewards within the practice itself.
The same is true for fasting – it’s uncomfortable at the beginning, until the body fully develops its latent potential by repeated practice.
In the same way, taking electrolytes, minerals, supplements or any other bullshit you put into your mouth other than pure water will retard your body’s ability to make progress in fasting, in exactly the same way that having somebody at the gym to spot you on a final rep of a heavy lift instead ends up lifting most of the weight for you for the entire set:
We’d likely all agree a much better approach is to simply lift only the weight you can manage.
Similarly, but less likely to be discussed because of all the “body hackers” and other professional bullshitters out there, one should fast for only the duration one can manage at the time – without putting added crap into your system.
ANY TIME YOU PUT ANYTHING INTO YOUR MOUTH OTHER THAN PURE WATER (or nothing at all by dry fasting) you distort and delay your body’s abilities to create the environment it needs to thrive in a fast.
And maybe that’s ok for many people, but at least understand what one is doing by being a hack is suboptimal to the outcomes one is seeking by fasting in the first place…
Silly at best.