My Cure is in Sight!

My Intermittent Fasting is Definitely Working

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I just finished fixing my husband a brunch of bacon, eggs and toast.  And all the time I did not crave food.  I’ve been fasting now for over 42 hours and I did not get hungry while cooking his meal.  Overall, this is the easiest “diet” I haven undertaken to date (and I’ve tried many).

I’m on Day 19 of my journey with Intermittent Fasting (IF) to cure my diabetes and lose weight.  I began this journey on December 11th after reading Dr. Jason Fung’s book “The Complete Guide to Fasting: Heal Your Body Through Intermittent, Alternate-Day, and Extended Fasting”.

I managed to make it through the holidays well and its working.  I started out weighing 260 pounds and this morning I weighed 246.8 pounds.  13 pounds in 19 days.  I’ve averaged a loss of .6842 a day (a little more than a half a pound per day).

How Can I Do This?

I must say that without some support, I’m not sure I could have done it.  But fortunately for me, about 4 days in, a doc in one of the Facebook Intermittent Fasting Groups took me under his wing and began helping me.  Doc Manny (Dr. Manuel Lam) has been wonderful and invaluable in this journey.

I’ve done several fasts of varying lengths:  As follows they are:

20.8 hours
23 hour
42 hours
44 hours
46 hours
22.5 hours
49.5 hours
42 hours
72 hours (which I am in the middle of now.

That’s almost 362 hours of intentional fasting.

Since I’m a Type 2 diabetic, I had lots of questions about how to reduce my insulins during this time.  I was previously taking about 182 units of insulins per day (including both my short and long term insulins).  I did not want to experience any lows and have to eat something during my fasting periods and thankfully Doc Manny (Dr. Manuel Lam)  has been giving me awesome advice about how much to take.  I had one low of 65 before he started helping me, but since then I’ve had no lows at all.  Yesterday, my total insulin used was only 10 units of my long acting Lantus last night.

I haven’t had to deal a lot with hunger during my fasting times.  Whenever I start to crave eating, I drink some no carb organic broth or eat a spoonful of coconut oil.  That seems to work well in keeping me going on my fasting period. Otherwisde, during my fasting periods, I drink coffee, tea and water only.

My fasting schedule right now is fast on Monday-Tuesday-Thursday-Friday and eat on Saturday-Sunday and Wednesday.  On my eating periods, I’m usually only eating one meal (dinner) but occasionally two meals.  I’m trying to keep my calories during my eating times to <1000.   That’s a pretty low number but I’m treating this like Dr. Fung said, basically its like I’m undergoing bariatric surgery without the surgery. Once I’ve lost the weight and am off all my diabetic meds, I hope to maintain with only 2 fasts of 20 hours each week, eating Paleo style when I’m not fasting.  Of course, I’ll have to see if that works when the time comes.

Right now, during my eating periods, I’m sticking to a paleo/whole food eating style.  Low on carbs, high good fats and medium proteins.  I think that helps with my hunger during my fasting periods.  I’ve found that if I eat a normal diet with too much sugar I don’t’ feel well at all that night and I experience more hunger during the next fast.

Exercise?

For 18 days, I did not exercise at all and I’m pretty sedentary, in my wheelchair all day.  Yesterday, I began doing some water exercise,and I plan on doing that at least 3 days a week from now on.  My BGL (blood glucose level) was 193 before I went to the pool and after my exercise of two hours, it dropped 40 points.

I have always had high morning levels (the dawn phenomena).  You can read about that here.  I’m finding that so far, my morning BGL readings are still higher, but overall they are coming down, even in the morning testing.  My meter is showing an average of 164.  Before I began IF, the average was well over 200 (my diabetes was not very well controlled).

Continuing

I’m so happy with the results I’ve had so far, that I intend to keep on until I reach my three goals:

1. Getting off all my diabetic meds
2. Losing 125 pounds (I would weigh 145 at that point)
3. Getting out of this wheelchair if possible

I’m already achieving significant loss of pain (from my fibromyalgia and hip).  Time will tell and I’m praying my will-power and determination will stay the course.

Comments

Thanks for looking at my site and coming to this page. I would love for you to leave any questions or comments below.  In addition, I’m open to new topics to research and comment on as they pertain to my own health and experience living with diabetes.  Please share your interests and questions in your comments.  I also love to hear others stories about how they handle their own diabetes issues.  I will be sending out a monthly newsletter staring in January 2017.  If you would like to receive that email newsletter, you can sign up here.

– Shirley