Hey guys so can someone help me,
I want to do fasting but I keep thinking like if I go 6+ hours without sugar in my blood then will my brain slow down in function??? because I need to study and have a sharp mind
I’m just scared. that’s why I haven’t been able to fast yet because at 6 hours when my stomach starts growling I just panic that my brain is about to slow down so I eat
Your body won’t let your blood sugar dip. You have stores of glycogen that your body will draw from for at least two days. After you’ve used up stored glycogen during an extended fast, your brain is powered by 25% glucose and 75% ketones which many fasters will attest give you more alertness and focus.
If you get brain fog, have a glass of snake juice.
https://www.reddit.com/r/fasting/comments/9gcaz3/snake_juice_recipe/
My personal recipe is a teaspoon of pink salt, half a teaspoon of nosalt, half a teaspoon of baking soda, 3 splashes of apple cider vinegar, and 6 splashes of RealLemon in a 24oz glass of water.
You can do it
Build up your fast timeline. Push through the 6 and get to 12, 16, 18 and so on. Sugar is as (or more) addictive than many hard street drugs. It is going to take time to build your resistance. But you CAN do it.
You will find that as your fasts get longer, and you get into ketosis, your mind will find a new store of clarity and energy
I had the exact same fear. I used to eat “for my brain” more than for being hungry. Once I started fasting - once I got used to it that is - that totally changed. That brain fog is actually sugar addiction. Fasting changed that for me. Now I eat when I want to. I can go long periods without eating with a totally clear head. Fasting turned that condition off for me.
Ease into it with a few days of low-ish carb, avoiding sugar and processed grains. Then ease into intermittent fasting with a 16:8 routine. For me, delaying ‘breakfast’ as long as possible works best, but my mom had great success by not eating after lunch. After that, try for one meal a day (OMAD) - then you’ll have a pretty good idea on how well you function while fasting.
Learning not be be scared of hunger was one of the biggest lessons I had to learn. Hunger is just a hormone message our body puts out and is an imperfect indicator of whether we really need to eat or not, at least in the short run. IOW it’s perfectly fine to feel hunger and not eat. It won’t hurt you and the sensation will go away. One way to practice being okay with hunger is to go to bed hungry. Your brain doesn’t need to be sharp then.
It’s important to avoid sugary and heavily processed food because they are made to be hyper palatable so you want to eat more and they swing your blood sugar around which falsely drives a hunger signal.
You might want to look into “slow carb” ( r/4hourbodyslowcarb is pretty helpful).