Ravenous Fast - Day One

Day one of the fast.

And my word for it so far is… bearable. 

I slept in really late today knowing the impending doom.  I think I woke up some time around noonish and didn’t actually leave my bed until maybe 1 pm.  I had my water bottle by my bed and realized I had actually made this choice to fast for the next three days. 

When I first woke up I knew I had a ton of things to do around the house.  Emptying the dishwasher, cleaning the litter box, there were many routine chores that kept me busy for awhile.  Most of these were done in anticipation for making room to make the fasting broth.  I ran around last night from store to store finding my ingredients.  When I looked at the ingredients and then at my stock pot I realized it wasn’t big enough at all.  I had originally made the plan to head to my mother’s house for her stock pot.  So I gathered up all the trash in my house to bring to her garbage can (she is kind enough to let me add to her trash service). 

I got in my car to head out knowing I looked like absolute crap.  I had bathed, but not showered and tacked my hair up in a barrette.  I threw on jeans and a sweatshirt.  The weather outside was gloomy.  I felt much more in reality today on the streets and much more capable of driving.  I still had people messaging to go partake in the Mardi Gras madness, but there was no way in hell I wanted to feel like this again.  And the temptation was way too strong for drinking.  I’m in the car and one feeling is calling out to me more than any other – bloated.  I look at my face in the rear view mirror and realize how swollen my eyes and face are… my blood pressure medicine has changed and I am no longer on the diuretic version.  I felt like all the liquid in my body had accumulated in my brain.  I remember I forgot my trash and was trying to take the short way out by just stopping by Wal-Mart for the stock pot.  I detest Wal-Mart and have stopped shopping there since the end of last year.  I had to resort to them for the air purifiers or waste too much gas driving to find them.  I am contemplating all of this in my bloated head and scream out in my car “I am not going to justify going to Wal-Mart after the way they treated me!”

So on to Target I drive, the less of the two evils???  I run in and find the stock pot and also take a look at their food scales, something that I have been thinking about purchasing for awhile.  The coolest one was a measuring cup that had a scale on it.  However, it was the same price as the non digital stainless steel scale with the bowl on top – so I went with the stainless.  No battery replacement needed for the old school one.  I got back to the house and all the morning had been sipping the huge bottle of Fiji water I bought last night.  I get home and unpack everything and start my broth.

I have never worked with beets before.  I think maybe I had seen them once in my past out of a can, but the smell and the look was an instant turn off.  Don’t think I have eaten them since.  One thing I learned…. Beets stain.  My hands were a lovely crimson red, as well as various splats throughout the kitchen that beautifully matched the ones on my white tank top I was wearing.  They were an absolute mess. 

The fasting broth recipe can be found in the book Ravenous and it calls for beets, carrots, and potatoes.  But you are only supposed to use the skins.  Basically you peel all of these veggies and keep the actual veggies for later.  I stuck the beets in baggies and froze them.  I have no idea what to do with those.  I shredded the potatoes in the food processor and put them in serving size baggies for hash browns in the future.  I also sliced the carrots in the food processor and froze them in baggies.  Thomas and I love to eat those in butter with dill on top for dinner.

Then I put in the other veggies and water and brought the new pot to a boil.  Then I covered and simmered on medium low for an hour.  I took a taste before it started to boil, but I couldn’t really taste anything at all.  It took me awhile to get the ingredients ready for the broth.  I am talking at least an hour here.  I was getting hungry and had been plagued by the usual stomach growls since I woke up.  Stomach growls are what I usually judge my hunger by and then I eat something.  Other than that I had the really bloated face, and the head ache.  Was that from lack of food, or lack of drink, or lack of smoking?  I figure my body is going through all kinds of withdrawals here and it will be hard to pin point which ones are affecting it most.

The broth is cooking.  Then I went on to clean some more of this disgusting house.  I packaged some more garage sale items in boxes.  I thought of all the other things I need to do and how I should go about doing it.  I started the dishwasher, did some laundry and cleaned up most of the mess from the broth preparations.  The scent of the broth was filling up my house and I was excited to taste it, or to taste something other than water.  Come to think of it, I have hardly drunk that much water today anyways.  I noticed after prepping and waiting on the broth that my face wasn’t as bloated anymore.  I went to the bath room for the first time I think today and took another look.  My eyes look much calmer now, less swollen.  My face is broken out however, another way of my body rebelling from the damage I had done this weekend.

I opened the Ravenous book and went to the fasting chapter to refresh myself with some motivational tools.  I wrote down some lines from the book that made this all make sense again and posted one on the fridge door… “Let whatever arises arise, and do so without snuffing it out with food.  Notice that things pass and maybe you’re not who you think you are.”  To me this has to do a lot with cravings, feeling hungry, the stomach growls.  I can’t just keep busy the whole time to distract myself from not eating.  There are going to be moments when I will just have to sit with the feelings and overcome them without all the busy work.

The one that I decided to put up on the cabinet called out the most to me today.  “I’m not repenting by giving up food for three days; I’m’ honoring myself by letting what I’ve kept hidden under endless mounds of food finally see the light of day.”  I can hear the little voice in my head keep asking myself, "Why does it have to be three days?"  Wouldn’t one day be enough?  And does fasting mean you can have this, does fasting mean you can have that?  Three days.  It’s a small sacrifice to make.  When I start feeling myself leaning toward why I am doing this for three days - this will be the cabinet I turn to.

The one I put on the microwave door is “Three is what you need to wrestle the issues deeper than the physical manifestation of hunger.”  This is where I feel all this is going.  I’ve practiced yoga for awhile now and tried my best to work with meditation and relaxation.  This process seems like one long journey into a meditative type of state where things are going to come up in my head to rebel against what I am doing to my body.  It is going to reach out and grab me by the neck and ask "what the fuck are you doing???" I need food.  I realize how much presence I give my body… my body is going to do this… my body is rebelling from the drinking I did this weekend…. My body feels like this…. My face feels swollen and it feels stuffy and headachy…… However I do not connect my body to myself.  It is one entity and my mind or myself, is another.  This could be one of my issues.  I don’t relate myself and my body together – they are two different things to me right now, not the one solitary unit.  I am realizing and becoming aware of the fact that what one does directly effects the other, but it is not a team effort it is one side rebelling against the other and the consequences of the battle.  I need to figure out how to get the two back together again.  To stop saying my body feels and start saying I feel.  Take ownership of my body and make my body and mind one being again.  One cannot live without the other and they can no longer be separate from each other.

I briefly read through the fasting chapters and write down another yoga exercise that she did on day two of the fast and look forward to hitting that one up tomorrow.  I strain my broth and put it into jars.  I leave a tea cup full on the counter and go in for the big sip.  I have done many diets, the cabbage soup, weight watchers, veggies and fruit only, a nasty tea drinking diet.  I have been to them all and suffered through them as long as possible – keep this thought in mind when I tell you about the broth.  It isn’t bad at all.  Maybe it is the hunger??? But it is good.  I definitely prefer it when it is piping hot.  It pretty much tastes like vegetable soup, without the vegetables in it.  Yes, it is missing salt, pepper and all those things, but all in all, it’s pretty dang good.  I’m now on my second glass.  It cooled off a bit and I popped it in the micro wave and decided hot is the way to go. 

After a day of keeping myself busy I have decided to come over to the computer and sit with the hunger.  It’s not so bad; the author of the book described her hunger as coming and going like the waves lapping the shore.  I can agree with that symbolism a bit.  It is there on day one, a lingering flame in the background.  But the nutrients in the not-so-bad-tasting broth definitely help.  I don’t know if it is from not being around others in two days, but my head does seem a bit lighter too.  I have much more energy than yesterday and I keep thinking of things that still need to be done.  It is almost 7 PM and this day is almost over.

I wonder if tomorrow will be harder, being at work and around other people that will probably be eating.  I will look forward to work as a bit of a distraction from wondering about food.  I have noticed that I am not an absolute binge eater.  I don’t eat everything until it is gone.  The traits that I am aware of that my body self seems to enjoy when it comes to eating…. Eating when my stomach grumbles or my head starts to ache.  I have never eaten breakfast before last year and have slowly tried to implement it into my diet.  Sometimes I still slack and go for the starbucks iced mocha instead of an actual meal.  However, I have grown to like oatmeal again.  I know I like grits and have done that for awhile, but the oatmeal is much sweeter and I can do it without added butter or salt.  Let’s not forget to mention I have been doing cinnamon roll oatmeal and maple and brown sugar – so most of that stuff is already in the package, but it is all accounted for in my calorie volumes.

I usually don’t eat my breakfast until late when I’m at work and not at all when it’s the weekend.  I have resorted lately to eating some special k chocolate delight with skim milk when I have eaten most of my calories at lunch or if I know I need to eat breakfast on the weekends but don’t feel like preparing anything.  I think it is a good thing that I have started to turn to it – it is easy to prep and it fills me up when I don’t really want to eat anything or don’t really need more calories.

However, during the week I eat my oatmeal breakfast somewhere between 9 and 10 am, sometimes later.  I usually wake up at 6 AM so you can see what I mean about eating it late.  But lunch, lunch is my enemy.  We sit and talk about lunch for hours at work – what are you doing for lunch?  Where are you guys going for lunch?  And I so often give in to my favorite Thai restaurant or Greek restaurant at least once a week.  And then we have catered lunches on Thursdays.  From logging in my nutrition on spark people I have realized that most of my daily calorie intake happens at lunch.  I can put down about a thousand calories at lunch very easily.  I was awakened this week that my subway tuna sub, cheetos, and I had a cookie topped the calories at a thousand calories.  I had no idea!  I get about 1500 calories a day with sparkpeople and with a 400 calorie breakfast and using a thousand at lunch, you can see not much is left over for dinner.  This is a problem I have been running into more and more lately - another awareness that has come from this remarkable web site. 

I don’t know what sparks it at work, maybe the talk of food – or the waiting for food – or maybe just not a big enough breakfast, or maybe a too late breakfast.  However, I find if I keep it easy on the lunch calories I get that huge hunger in the afternoon and usually break down with a snack.  And here is another one of my greatest evils… I have a really filling lunch and then decide I need something sweet to top it off with – a menchies, or a cookie – no meal is complete without that sweetness.  Maybe I could try a cup of hot tea to help with this sweet need??? Another thing to experiment with in the future.

I am now finished my second cup of broth and figure I will do one more later in the evening.  I am going to continue with my chamomile tea routine before bed. 

How do I feel about the fast right now?  I feel I need to realize why it is significant for me.  I want to use it as a way to promote detoxification from all the drinking and smoking I did this weekend.  A sort of cleansing of the pallet to bring me back to normalcy.   I want to use this fast as a tool to help my stomach issues get back to normal again too.  I hope this will completely clear out my stomach of any nonsense so that I can get back to feeling normal again.  I want to see how my body self is going to react to the various levels of hunger.  I know the surface levels, I never let myself get past them – there is an ache in my belly and it usually rises in a rumble.  I am feeling those the most today.  Out of habit I always suppress the grumble with food.  I wonder how long it is going to lay silent in the pit of my stomach.  I want to use this fast as a tool to get to know myself better.  I have never fasted before other than before midnight for blood work or surgery.  And that is easy enough.  You go to bed and wake up for an early doctor’s appointment – you don’t even notice the fast. 

The timing is right – I am noticing all kind of things that my body self is trying to tell me about the way I have treated it.  My son is not in town so I don’t have him to distract me from any realizations that may be going on inside me.  My parents are not in town so I don’t have a three course meal waiting for me at the end of the day when I go to pick up my son. 

What have I learned so far?   I separate my body and my mind into two different beings.  I refer to them as different beings; they don’t seem to communicate with each other openly in my head.  It is just my body feels this way, not what are you going to do about it?  I am going to try to incorporate the two views into one by calling it my body self.  I have had to do that throughout this entry just to realize how much I separate them.  Every time I have written body self so far I was going to refer to one and not the other, but brought them back together by using the word body self.  I will start to realize when I am separating the two and mentally bring them back together.  I live in my body self all day and all night, they are never separated.  Where one goes the other one follows, what one experiences the other one must experience too.