Claire's 21 Day Fast!

[claire02]

Hey everyone!

I’m excited to start my 3 week fast and I wanted to start this water fasting journal to keep myself accountable and measure my progress. Some background about me, I am a 24 year old who used to be very thin and athletic, but developed some bad eating habits in college. Long story short, I began to binge eat to cope with my emotional/mental health issues, which lead to me going from 110lbs to 140lbs in four years. I’ve since learned how to stop binge eating through recovery and therapy, but I still have the extra weight that I’d like to lose. I don’t really believe in restricting certain kinds of food personally, so fasting has been working for me in that it allows me to eat freely while still losing weight.

I would ideally like to get to 120 by the end of the fast, but I’m not going to stress out too much if I don’t reach that goal. Although weight loss is an appealing goal, I am mainly doing this fast to separate myself emotionally and mentally from food and heal some of the recent health problems I’ve been dealing with (inflammation, skin issues and constant congestion).

I think my main struggle is going to be not breaking my fast when the rest of my family is having dinner and spending time with friends without eating. I’m also not going to beat myself up if I don’t get to 21 days. I’m trying to make this process as sustainable as possible, so progress is progress even if I don’t hit my goal.

[isabellaalves]

Good luck with your fast! I’m sure you’ll do great, just try to stay positive and listen to your body.

[Fastingkat]

Good luck! Try getting to day 3 then day 5, then 7, etc. listen to your body if you have to stop it’s okay. I set out for 21 and made it to 7 losing 15.1lbs. Now 3 days post fast I’m still losing. It’s a journey but I really believe just 7 days has reset me mentally towards food. I’m able to say no and refrain. I’m doing a 20:4 IF schedule where I eat from 11:30 to 2:30. This way it’s at least 4 hours from when I wake up and I have all day to burn what I’ve eaten. It’s been good for me.

[claire02]

Day 1 - 140 lbs

I’m pretty excited! I know that this post is a bit late, but I gave myself a few days before this fast to prepare myself mentally and buy all the electrolytes and stuff. I started off the day by cleaning my entire room (Marie Kondo style) and throwing away everything that isn’t adding to my life anymore. I also separated half of my clothes that make me feel worse about myself. Over the past year, I haven’t really been able to wear the clothes I like anymore, because they don’t fit me anymore. I basically kept all the clothes that don’t fit me anymore as a reminder of my goals. I also think that only having my smaller clothes will give me the incentive to keep going with this water fast.

I also made this water fasting calendar on Canva to measure my progress! (Lmk if you want a copy of the pdf too)

[claire02]

Day 2

I didn’t weigh myself today, because I don’t want to get too obsessed with the scale. Instead, I really want to focus on my physical and emotional health, so I’m going to limit myself to weighing myself 1-2 per week. Last night was pretty tough hunger wise, but today hasn’t been too bad. I’ve been reading a lot of books on intuitive eating and one thing that I’ve learned that has helped me to separate myself from food has been reminding myself that I can eat whatever I want after this fast (in moderation of course). I am a strong believer that often times people binge when they are under a dieting/deprivation mindset and feel like certain foods are “forbidden.” Reminding myself that I have complete freedom with food ironically gives me the mental strength to do this fast.