As you guys can see in the picture, I started losing barely half a kg every day, but suddenly started lowering 1-1.5kg every day.
I drink 2L of water every day, and a bit of electrolytes (not much).
Also, I feel really tired.
Medical Professional here, it’s been a while since I brushed up on Biochemistry.
My assumption is that you’ve used up quite a bit of your glycogen stores which explains losing a lot of water weight and that feeling of fatigue is probably from losing glycogen and a lack of electrolytes. Having drinking lots of water causes you to lose a lot of that Sodium through urination thus you have less retained water which could also explain the weight loss.
ELECTROLYTES! Drink water with elecreolytes!
I am @105 hours of a planned 7 day fast. I had a rough morning yesterday, but reading the electrolyte post from the mod, a liter of water with some sodium really helped. Within an hour or two the “stressed out, dragging a**” feeling went away.
I bought some NOsalt at walmart yesterday, so today the water will be a bit more electrolytic than yesterday, not just sodium mixed in but also potassium; fancy-shmancy man.
There’s no shame in doing a 5 or 7 day fast, and refeeding before jumping into a 30 day. Wish you the best though.
I am thinking of extending to 10 days, but I’ll wait until Monday and play it by ear.
I have been drinking black coffee and black tea during the fast - so I suppose that’s cheeting.
Probably much mich better than drinking caffeine .
It’s a good idea to watch the ingredients on the packet as some herbal teas have licorice and sugar that can throw you off a fast.
When you’re several days in, I find any flavor is soooooo welcome that even a super diluted herbal tea is a relief. I don’t think there’s any shame in it.
This morning I had tea with a squeeze of lemon in it. Let’s be honest, Lemon juice definitely has some sugar in it, not much but it does. Just trying to make it to day 7 lol.
I’ve done two 5 days previously so this 7 day will be a milestone, then I’ll think about making it more strict and just water.
Hard to imagine right now, must wrap my head around it first.
I suppose preparing the electrolyte solution prior to embarking on that journey would be a good motivator and more likely keep you on the strict path.
You are losing extra water retained in the body.
Take rlectroltyes as per recommended ranges I e. Sodium 4g per day, potassium citrate 200 -400 mg, megnisium citrate 400 mg in water. Space it outover the day. 2L water is pk.
Drinking more water is not required unless you are still thirsty.
Average weight loss would be one pound a day on an extended fast This will be primarily fat loss.
> a bit of electrolytes (not much).
One; fix your electrolyte game. If you’re going for a 30 day’er, do it right. Make it the least dangerous as possible.
Second; don’t worry too much about the day to day variability of weight loss. It’ll be all over the place. It depends on water, activity, weather, phases of the moon, etc.
Remember TDEE is an educated guess based on averages.
Basically you are not taking in any calories so you are feeling really tired because your body is trying to use as little energy as possible. Its telling you to slow down and do as little as possible because your body does not want to burn through its fat stores even if thats what your brain wants to do.
Insulin also causes sodium/water retention in the kidneys. For the first four days or so insulin levels drop to their resting levels but the body maintains them there. After four days they truly begin to drop which is associated with the release of this excess salt and water but without affecting other electrolytes.
A kidney is not that big so I don’t know how much water it can hold. A pound of water is roughly the volume of a 3” x 3” x 3” square.
half a kilogram a day is quite a bit. You lose water weight from glycogen being eaten up for 1 to 4 days depending on how much carbohydrates you consume prior to starting the fast. It ramped up after the first couple days because you went through the main glycogen reserves in your liver and then your body started going after it in your muscles and you’re probably tired because you are not keeping up enough with electrolytes. Also depends how much previous fasting you’ve done before this to train your body to regularly depend on burning fat and not carbohydrates. You may notice that you increased urination at the start of fast and then it goes down quite a bit after the second to fourth day. Unless you increased drinking water and that might also account for extra loss of electrolytes.
The main glycogen reserves are gone though after about the first day so after that you lose half a pound or .227 kg of just fat per day. Also from my experience once you get to about day 6 to 11 you’re probably going to see a stall in the weight loss. I think this is because of inflammation from your body dealing with absorbing excess blood vessels. For every pound or .454 kg you have 5 miles or 8 km of blood vessels. After losing just a few pounds that’s going to cause some stress to the vascular system having to reabsorb all that tissue. I’ve only ever gone to 12 days because I stalled so much I figured I was probably causing some issues so I know that eventually you start losing weight again but I didn’t want to put my body through that much stress yet without training up to it.
