Episode 38: Gin and Sheri Answer Some of the Most Common Fasting Questions, and More

Welcome the Fast Feast Repeat Intermittent Fasting for Life. I'm Jen Stevens, author
of the New York Times bestseller Fast Feast Repeat, and I'm Sherry Bullock,
longtime intermittent faster and health and wellness advocate. Please keep in mind that this
podcast is for educational and motivational purposes only and is not intended to provide medical
or diagnostic advice. Jen and I are not doctors, so make sure to
check with your trusted healthcare professionals before making changes, especially when it comes to
any medical treatments or medications. Whether you're new to intermittent fasting or an experienced
intermittent faster, tune in each week to get inspired, to learn, and
to have some fun along the way. Hi, everybody, we are so
glad you're here today. Welcome to this week's episode of the Fast Feast Repeat
Intermittent Fasting for Life Podcast. How are you doing today's Sherry, I'm doing
great. I'm so glad. Feeling better. Yeah, it really is.
I have this weird thing and going on with it. But like a fluid
collection, it happened times next to my incision. Huh. Yesterday it was
a rough day. Lulu decided to jump off the couch right onto my foot.
And she's sixty pounds and Sherry's dog by the way, wondering who baby
sixty pounds. It's not like she stepped on it. It's like she jumped.
She jumped on it. And I thought I was going to curl up
in a ball and die. But it's much better today. It's just sensitive
still, but it's amazing. I was just sitting here at my desk and
I had like my feet up on like the balls on my feet with my
toes kind of bit and I didn't even realize I was doing it, which
that's one of my exercises I'm supposed to do, is to bend that toe.
But I didn't even realize I was doing it. And I kind of
realized I was doing it, and I was like, oh wow, that
doesn't hurt. And do you know how long it's been since up and I'll
have been that toe like that? Oh wow, So you're improved. Yeah,
and I'm three weeks out from surgery today. That's exciting. I'm better
now than you were. Yes, that's exciting. Yes, yes, yes,
very very very pleased. Well, we wanted to take a minute to
talk about ads that might be popped into the podcast, because the ads that
pop into like if we are speaking, if it's me or Sherry reading the
ad, that's a company that we one hundred percent have vetted, and we
have very few of those because you know, a lot of companies will be
like, hey, you know, would you like to read an ad for
us? We're like, no, it's not in line with our value.
So if we're reading the ad, you know, one hundred percent it is
a company that we love. But the hosting platform we're on is called Spreaker.
It's also has an ads marketplace where they just dynamically insert ads and they're
supposed to be tailored to like you and your location things like that, Like,
for example, the first time I listened, I gotta an ad for
like a Myrtle Beach water park, like they knew where I was based on
location, which is freaky, I have to admit. But in the meantime,
there are certain ad categories that we have blocked, for example, weight
loss, wait, los, medications, pharmaceuticals, gambling, politics, right,
anything that might be you know, not on brand for us at all
or offensive to our audience or you know, in conflict of intermittent fasting.
We have those categories blocked, so they should not ever pop in. Now
that being said, we're recording this at the end of February. Was it
last week? So near near the end of February last week? Last week
or the week before, an ad for weight loss medications with injections accidentally popped
in, So we dug in a little bit deeper. After we're hearing from
listeners who are like, we don't feel like this should be on your show.
We're like, well, no, it really shouldn't. We have that
category blocked. Turns out that occasionally new advertisers will be entered in but they're
not categorized at first. So like that commercial was in the system, but
it hadn't been categorized proper. And so anybody who has the category of like
weight loss pharmaceuticals blocked, that wasn't categorized as a weight loss pharmaceutical ad.
So it was just an error, human error in the back end. So
I called and talked to them and they're like, we see what happened,
and it's it had already actually been classified by that point, so it was
a very short period of time. But we wanted to talk about this just
to see. If you ever hear an ad that feels like it's out of
place, it probably is one of those situations where it hasn't been categorized properly
yet, it's a new ad to their system or something like that. So
if it's share in Me doing the ad, you can one hundred percent know
that we are on board with that company. If it's an AD that just
pops in, we don't have control over that other than un blocking the categories,
which we have already done. So it's just one of those things that
is out of our control. But it helps support the podcast to have the
ads. And you know, you may wonder why we have to have ads
to support the podcast, but it's really expensive to put out quality it is
podcast. It costs us a lot of money each week to edit the podcast,
and really what we make on advertising is like pennies per listen. So
our goal is just to be able to keep putting out a quality podcast for
you to listen to. So you know, if you ever hear us advertise
something and it sounds like something you would like, check it out, because
you know, our advertisers do look at that they can tell that Shary is
talking about the ones that we are reading, the ones that Sharry and I
read, like Bioptimizers, for example, we love Bioptimizers. They really support
our podcast and they are a steady supporter. And again they support our podcast,
but we truly love their products. I take their product every single day.
I would never have a product that I didn't love, right, So
those are the ones support those we would love that that really does keep them
advertising. And you know, the more of those types of ads we have,
the fewer random ones will pop in, right, like auto parts or
something I don't know, whatever it might be. I feel strongly that if
we're interrupting the podcast to share about a product, that I want it to
be a product that could be beneficial to you or helpful to you, or
to improve your health or wellness in some way. But if a weird one
pops in and you're like, why in the world would that be on there?
Or that doesn't seem right, like like the weight loss medication, know
that that was in some kind of a probably just because it's miscategorized, and
they'll get that. Yeah, And right now, you know, we're in
an election year, so we've got politics. But if for some reason something
slips through. Please know like it wasn't us. We didn't say that.
No, I'm getting weird text messages from politicians and I'm like, I've filled
out my thing where people aren't supposed to get my cell phone number. Yeah,
they have magical powers. I don't know how they do any maybe they're
authorized to have that, But I keep getting these weird text messages and I'm
like, I don't know this person. Yeah, and then we will never
make political here on this podcast anyway. And we will also never try to
sell you weight loss pharmaceutical injections or anything like that. No, So if
it seems weird, just to know that it's it's not supposed to be there.
And they had already taken care of it before I reached out to them,
like I said, But before I had even reached out to them,
it was already fixed. So we don't really even need to worry about it.
It just they get it fixed eventually. All right, Ready for our
celebration, I am. So today's celebration comes from Bess and Boise, Jenna
and I love alliteration, so we did that just made me happy when I
typed it. So Yes, we're geeks, Beth and Boise. She says,
I'm fifty three years old and started the IF life October twenty twenty two
out of sheer desperation with how absolutely miserable I was with my weight. I
joined weight watchers in twenty eighteen and hit my goal of one hundred and fifty
five pounds and made lifetime that for eighteen months. And in twenty twenty I
started feeling poorly and I was found to have Graves disease, which is a
disease of hyper thyroidism that sounds like a fabulous disease to have, but I
felt terrible all the time, and they explained that it was as if my
body was running a marathon. I had a lot of hunger and exhaustion.
I was regulated by medication which suppresses the thyroid, and then over twenty twenty
one and twenty twenty two, I gained thirty pounds while still following the weight
watcher's plan, and I was not able to get off that weight no matter
how much I watched points, earn fitness points, et cetera. I had
seen some posts on the weight Watcher's connect about intermittent fasting, and I bought
Fast Feast Repeat, and I started with a sixteen eight and very shortly moved
to a nineteen five, and that is what I followed to date. The
secret is the clean fast, and I am so thankful that Jin's book was
my starting point. I began to lose very slowly, and when I'm feeling
sorry for myself that everyone else is eating lunch, I just get out my
book and I read some of the testimonials, and that motivates me to keep
going. I am now back down to one hundred and fifty eight pounds,
down twenty five pounds in ten months. She sent this in a little while
ago. She says, I am elated. I can wear size eight to
ten pants and shorts and it is nothing short of miraculous. I do still
track my food in my weight Watcher's app, as I want to get back
to lifetime and weigh in so that I can stop paying for the app.
I feel that tracking keeps me from wandering off and binging, and I can
see myself doing this indefinitely. I would like to get down to one hundred
and forty one to one hundred and forty eight, but I know the scale
matters less than the honesty genes every day when I get dressed in my closet
and don't have to try to hide myself with layers or scarves or long shirts.
I am so thankful that my former self was brave enough to say I
can do this, and I'm trying to incorporate that mindset into other areas of
my life. My advice for others be sure it is a clean fast,
otherwise don't bother meal prep helps and taking some times to mentally decide what I'm
going to open my window with is crucial or I end up standing in the
pantry in a free for all, Consistency is key to if if that isn't
the truth, if you're gonna know what you're gonna have, you can wander
around the kitchen just eating random things. I've been caught in thats, just
randomly, and then you're never satisfied and you just have eaten so much and
you were not satisfied by the end of it. That happens. And at
Beth, I love your post, And you know, I think you probably
know most people know. I came from a lifetime of White Watchers. I
used to be a Wite Watchers leader. I know what it's like to want
to hit that goal and make lifetime and you know, get your app for
free and all that. But I hope that once you get there, and
that maybe you even start on this mindset before then, that you can let
that go and just trust that IF is going to help you stay at your
maintenance. Wait, and I believe that you have learned through the years what
a healthy diet looks like for you. But really listening to your body is
going to be key. You know. That's where the ultimate freedom of IF
comes from, is just really learning to trust your body and not being tied
to an app or points or exercise points or any of that. So I'm
not telling you you're wrong, I'm not telling you not to do that,
but I do hope that at some point you'll just kind of lean into trusting
your body and listening to it a little bit more. Just let it go.
Yes, And it is storming really bad here, So if y'all hear
a rumble in the background, I did not hear it. We had hail
the other night. We hadn't had hail in ages. That was coming down
really hard. Well, we've got all this warm weather and cold weather all
behind it well, yeah, all right, So now we have a question
from a listener. This question is from Gizzeppe from Saint Andrews, Scotland.
Hello, Jin and Sherry. Thank you for your podcast. I love listening
to it every week. I've not missed an episode since it started, although
I discovered it late and had to catch up on the first few episodes.
Thankfully, my long work commute of one and a half hours each way allows
me to listen to plenty of podcasts. I discovered intermittent fasting mid July of
this year and started doing it consistently and cleanly from mid August, when I
also bought the Full Fast Feast Repeat book. Thank you so much. Jin.
In the four months since, I lost nearly twenty pounds nine kilograms exactly
to be precise, and I look forward to the rest into enjoying the other
health benefits that come. I started at one hundred and four kilograms and I
am now at ninety five kilograms. I hope to shed at least another ten
to fifteen kilograms. I am a forty nine year old male. My intermittent
fasting routine for the last month or so has been Monday and Friday or down
days with one meal around six hundred calories, so that is the down day
meal, followed by up days of around twelve hour windows. The remaining three
days I have variable windows of five to seven hours, mostly six, sometimes
five, rarely seven. I started with fourteen ten in August, then moved
to sixteen eight in September and eighteen six in October because I had finished reading
Fast Feast Repeat since November. I started the new routine with two down days
as explained above. On the six hour window days, I always work out
at what time the evening family meal will be and try to open the window
accordingly with a very light meal to achieve five to six hour window. Seven
is usually due to delays with a family meal. I don't count calories except
on the single meal of the down day, which I boosted from five hundred
to six hundred based on another intermittent fasting book I saw, which had a
recommendation for five hundred for women and six hundred for men, and I thought,
as a mail it would make it easier for me to do the down
day. By the way, side note that yeah, that's close enough five
hundred and six hundred if you're a man, estimates those are close enough,
so he says, I'm happy with the results so far. My wife can
see the difference, and I certainly see it by how my trousers and sweaters
fit. Since August I reduced by two inches and my hips in my chest
and by three inches in my waist, although the chest seems to have plateaued
in the last six weeks. Do you think that my routine is valid?
Do you have any tweaks you would suggest for quicker weight loss, or indeed,
do you think the weight loss is fast enough? It is an average
of a pound a week since I started, including a three day break in
late September as I was not sure yet how to manage a conference. I
had a week long holiday in October and December and managed to stick to a
fasting regime during those times eight hours during the October holiday and seven hours during
the December trip. Now I feel confident that I can manage a fasting regime
for the foreseeable future. Thanks again for your company every Wednesday. The podcas
cast is always interesting and helps as a motivation booster if I need it.
Best wishes to you both, Gizzeppe well number one. I love that you
just jumped right in and you're adapting to life. I get like when you
had first started you didn't know how to navigate a conference. That can be
tricky. That's something that we help our community members with a lot in the
DDD community. And then I love how in October you gave yourself an eight
hour window and then by December you had whittled that vacation window down to seven
hours. So you know, you are just really adapting to fasting and making
it part of your life, and I love to see that. I also
love what you said about when you have your daily eating window days that you
look at what time the evening meal will be and then open your window accordingly.
That is a great strategy. That's something that I do and I really
recommend. So is your routine ballad. It looks great to me. You're
doing Monday down to stay up, Friday down, Saturday up, and then
on the other three days a week you're doing a five to seven hour window.
You're losing a pound a week. I think that's great if you feel
good, if you like this protocol, if it's working around your family life
and your work life. I don't think you could asked for more. I
think you're doing great. Yeah, I think so too. I will say,
since you only have about ten to fifteen pounds to go, now is
the time to really rely on your measurements, like your waste measurement, your
goal size that you would like to be. And you know, as you
get down to those last ten pounds or so, you're not going to probably
see a pound a week, So just keep that in mind. Expect it
to slow. That's what happens. So eventually weight loss stops for all of
us. That the ultimate plateau, which is maintenance. So your body's going
to settle in. You may see that the scale completely comes to a halt,
but your body continues to shed fat and you get a leaner over time.
So just keep that in mind. Your body's going to change. Yeah,
And I noticed he had said that like his chest measurements had plateaued,
but that everything else seems to still be going down. And yeah, I
think that's completely normal. Yes, when we put on fat weight, it
tends to go everywhere, but men especially tend to carry most of their weight
in their abdomen with visceral fat, and so it seems like you know,
you have reduced probably as much as you're really going to see in your chest
measurements. You know, you might continue to see some changes, but I
don't think they're going to be as drastic as continuing to measure your waist and
watching that waste measurement change. You know. Women might be a little bit
different, but for men, you don't have as much tissue up there to
lose. So yeah, I'm losing right now, a little bit sheery.
I think it must be from plates my shoulders, Like for whatever reason,
my shoulders are like my metric now, like they they're feeling like like nice,
And I don't know, bony might be well, you might just be
developing some muscles there, That's what I think. Just yeah, I can
my bones a little bit better too, Like I can feel, you know,
in my little shoulder bone here. But I think it's from pilates,
do you know. I was just looking at some pictures of us from like
either twenty eighteen or twenty nineteen, and it is amazing to me, Like
I see you every week via face, video chat, recording whatever we see
each other when we record, Like there's a video feature on our recording program,
and I don't ever look at you and be like, jin, you
look thinner, Like I don't see that, but when I was looking at
the pictures from then, like your face is thinner, your netflix thinner?
Yes, well it's it's menopause, and well I think a lot of it
maybe too given up alcohol. Uh inflammation, Yeah, which you know,
hormones help with inflammation as well. Around like from like twenty eighteen when when
I retired from teaching, that might have been like my very leanest period,
but then I went through menopause, and so as I went through menopause twenty
nineteen, twenty twenty, and I wasn't doing any kind of hormones, I
got puffier. But you're right, I was drinking more. My face has
changed a lot. Really, Yeah, I showed Eric, that's funny.
I was drinking more because I was retired. I didn't have to go to
work the next day, so you had your farmed wine and you sit drinking
dinner every Yeah. But yeah, so now, but I also started hormone
replacing with therapy in twenty twenty two, and I think that helped as well.
Like I was just showing Chad last night, I was like, look,
I think I look younger now than I did, like a year ago.
I don't know. So I mean, like even when you're in maintenance,
like your body is going to continue to change, and like Jin's body
has continued to change. I've seen it over the years, and so it's
it's just funny to look back old pictures and it really is. I mean,
you've been fasting for like what nine years now? What was ten?
In August, it'll be ten. But I will say my waist measurement is
a little bigger than it was back in twenty eighteen. But the very smallest
my waist ever got was right before we went on one of the cruises and
I measured it and it was like that was the lowest number I ever saw.
So over menopause, my waist did get a little bigger, and it's
still a little bigger, but that's I think biological in nature, right,
So like my waist measurement is a little bit bigger. Like I'm still sitting
here and I'm wearing my smallest sized zero genes today. Yeah, they're a
little tighter in the waist than they were in twenty eighteen, but that's the
biological changes of menopause. Even with BHRT, the bioidentical harm and replacement therapy.
So I'm not like upset about it or mad. As long as I
can put them on and wear them, that's what matters. So so now
it's time for our segment called What's Your Why? And you know, most
of us begin intermittent fasting with weight loss in mind. It is totally a
valid reason to begin in intermittent fasting lifestyle, but we always want to remember
that there is so much more than intermittent fasting can do for us beyond weight
loss. And in twenty eight day fast Start Day by Day, I asked
readers to craft their why statement before beginning. When your why statement is deeper
than weight loss alone, I genuinely believe you are more likely to find long
term success and view intermittent fasting as a lifestyle. So Monica shared her why,
and she said, I started clean fasting several years ago for weight loss
after reading Delay Don't Deny. I lost thirty pounds and then slowly stopped the
eye of lifestyle. I gained back about five pounds, and I knew in
the back of my mind that I wanted to live an intermint fasting lifestyle again.
We relocated in January and I developed planter faesciitis in my left foot.
Both of my tonsils were swollen and the right one had a huge polyp.
I was having tonsilstones all the time. I knew it was time to get
serious again. I read fast, Feast, Repeat, and then I'm again
if for life. I have lost fourteen pounds since I began fasting in twenty
twenty three. The weight loss is great, and I weigh less than I
have in over twenty years. But the real winds are that my plantar fasciitis
has resolved and my tonsils have shrunk with no more polyps or tonsilstones. I
have no pain in my body and I have such a reduction in inflammation.
I look thinner than the scale says, and I would like to give away
another twenty pounds. But this is about so much more than weight loss.
I often say that I want health span and not just life span. I
want to feel young and healthy and strong. I don't want to just live.
I want better than that for myself. I see and know so many
people with chronic health issues, and we all know that IF could change their
lives in many positive weights. I love this lifestyle with the side effect of
weight loss that and have you heard me talk about tonsilstones sherry from childhood?
Like I had to for anybody who doesn't know what tonsilstones are. It's like,
if you open your mouth and look way back in your throat, your
tonsils have those craters on them. I had giant craters on my tonsils and
they would have this yellowish gunk in there in those craters. Have you ever
seen them? Well, yes I have and it smell. Unfortunately, has
awful tonsils and they refused to take him out and his are really allergies.
But yeah, a friend of mine used to get tonsilstones and she would have
to like press pick them out out. I would do it. It's like
you're like picking them out and getting them out, and they stunk so bad
they were disgusting. I don't have them anymore. That's awesome, like gone.
Like I like I said all that from when I was a child and
I didn't even know if they were. I was like, what is wrong
with me? Why don't I have this weird thing? But yeah, tonsilstones
are gross. I'm so glad not to have them, and I'm so glad
Monica doesn't either. Plus all the other victories that she's celebrating. That's amazing.
Well, so this week, rather than just picking out specific questions from
individuals who submitted them, I was going through our submission forms and we have
lots of the same type of questions with the same topic. So I've kind
of just pooled them and we're just gonna kind of go through some of these
questions and answer them so that we can help you know, all these people
who had written in with these questions. So, first one, does mushroom
coffee or some of these alternative coffees such as fig brew? I didn't even
know what fig brew was. I've never heard of that. It sounds delicious.
It is made with figs, I guessed, yeah. Or Creo brew,
which is made with cacale. Yes, chocolate, it's chocolate. Do
these alternative coffees break the fast? Can they be used in place of regular
coffee? If they taste bit or like regular coffee? So I would not
risk any of those. They're all food, They're made from food. They're
you know, figs and chocolate and mushrooms or food. So no, I
would not have any of those during the clean fast. And I just don't
really even know why you would risk it if you want to get the benefits
of those. You know, if you if you feel like mushroom coffee has
health benefits, or fig brew, which actually, like I said, does
sound delicious, or the Creo boo the made from cacal. If you think
they have benefits and you'd like to experience those, have it in your eating
window. But I would never want to risk the clean fast. Now these
are all new products, right, we don't have studies on you know,
how that do they affect autophogy and how do they affect you know, all
these things that are going on in our bodies. So taste is one component,
right. The reason we know that the bitter flavor profile has to do
with insulin response. But there's a lot more to fasting clean than just what
your insulin is doing. Right. I could chug some MCT oil and wouldn't
have much of an insulin response, but that still breaks the fast. So
it's not just the taste. It's more than that, right, So right,
Yeah, And I can't a fig brew. I mean, I don't
know. I can't imagine. Figs are fruit and they have natural sugar in
them, and I just can't imagine that that would not be awful in the
fast. I don't even think you would feel well if you tried to drink
that while fastest, I would not. So I mean to me no,
like I just I'm not going to risk my fast. Remember why we're fast
and clean. We're fast and clean because, yes, we want to keep
insulin low. We want to tap into our stord fat for fuel. We
want to have increased autophagy. Do you want to risk any of those three
things to have some of these alternative coffees? You don't save that for your
eating window. If it's mouth entertainment, you know, had some some more
regular coffee, or you know, some some regular tea or hot water in
a mug. You can have all those delicious alternative flavors in your eating window.
Just save them. And I want to just throw out there real quick
while we're talking about coffees. A lot of people recently, I think it
might be because we have a bunch of new Fasters in the community. They're
just finding they don't love black coffee. And that's fine, you don't have
to love black coffee. But then they talk about trying like a cup of
hot tea rather than coffee like they thought, Okay, well, I've never
drunk tea before, but I'm a switch to tea. And then they complain
about not feeling well and being nauseous, and their tea could be one hundred
percent fast safe, but there are a lot of tannins in tea, and
some people are really sensitive to tannins and it can make you nauseous. And
it makes me I can't drink I can't drink hot tea, actually green tea.
Oh, it makes me so sick me as well. I actually get
like shaky, like I'll feel like I have to drill. Yeah, yeah,
Now I can drink iced tea that I make at home, but I
think it's just because it's dilute, so you're not getting all those tannins in
one little small cup. It's one of those things you're kind of sipping on
over time. So you know, you could play around and try to make
your own iced tea. But if you're getting sick with tea, no,
it's not breaking your fast, it's the tannin's. Yeah, all right,
here's another one. We hear a lot constipation. Help, why am I
suddenly struggling? Or we could just fill that in with diarrhea. Help we
get them both? Sorry, yes we did, but digestive adjustment help.
Yeah. So the constipation, this one we often hear from new fasters.
Now here's what's important. Like, our bodies run on a on a rhythm,
a biological clock, and your digestion, your bowel movements, that's on
a clock. And now we're not digesting at the same times that we have
been in the fast right, So it can just take your body, your
coalon and everything time to kind of reset and basically develop a new pooping pattern.
So give it time because it usually sorts itself out. Now, there
are a few things to remember. Less volume in means less volume out.
If you were three times a day girl before every time you ate and you're
only eating once a day now, you may not be a three times you
know, less in less ways out you're more efficient. Okay, So there's
that. Keep that in mind. Number two. As your body adapts to
katosis, it does pull fluids from your body, from your colon, your
kidneys start to pull that out. It acts like a kind of a natural
diabetic and so that can make you constipated early on in you're fasting, especially
as you get used to katosis. So my suggestion this works really well.
This actually works well for both problems. Open your window with some silium husk.
Silium husk in water. It's not going to kill you. Does it
taste delicious? No? If you let it sit longer in your water,
it actually kind of gets thick and like a light jelly like it kind of
goes down smoother because it's not gritty tasting. If you don't like the grittiness
anyway, that can help because it absorbs water. So as you drink it
and it goes into your colon, it's absorbing water and it's going to make
things move better. I wonder if like some chia pudding would also do that
well. Kind of a thing some people have success with chia. But like
one of the things about chia too, like chia absorbs water, right,
But if you've already made it as a chia pudding, it's already got the
water in there, it's already hydrated. Yeah, so it's kind of it
might be as effective for you it didn't work, okay, Or maybe you
could just put a stir of the chia in the water and drink it before
it's all puffed up. That's true. In your window sounds yucky, but
yeah, these are all for your eating window fiber chia like, yeah,
if you couldn't do cilium for whatever reason, then you know you could try
the chia. And then as for the diarrhea, people are like, help,
after I break my fast, I have diarrhea. A couple things can
be happening. Some people just don't process a lot of fat. Well,
their body just dumps out too much bile if they eat too much fat,
like all at one time, especially when you're waking up digestion, and that
can lead to bile acid diarrhea. And you'll know because it's like you eat
and you've got to run to the bathroom. Okay. The other thing is
is some people's digestive systems just wake up really super fast. And if that's
you, try to break your fast really gently, have something light, give
it time, give your body time to wake up digestion before you eat a
bigger meal. And again, the cilium can help because if your body is
prone to have too much liquid, it's gonna absorb it and it's gonna give
you more of a solid piwel movement. Sorry, guys, well I don't
book everybody, We'll pay everybody poops and pooping problems are never good no matter
what they form their ends. Either way is not your favorite way to spend
your afternoon. So me, either one's comfortable, so there's ways to manage
it. And you know, for me, I've been fasting since twenty fifteen
and if I fast over twenty three twenty four hours, I'm gonna be one
of those people that has diarrhea. And I break my fast and the cilium
has worked wonders and it's good for your cholesterol, and it's eight Doctor B
in Fiberfield. It's a prebiotic, and Doctor B actually says you should have
a prebiotic every single day, and he recommends cilium husk as a prebiotic.
So you're doing your gut good. It's gonna make you more comfortable, your
windows are going to be more enjoyable. So give it a try. Great
steps so sleep, So several fasters, usually within their first three months,
they want to know why sleep feels elusive these days and what can they do
about it. Well, that can be very common as your body is adjusting
to keytnes early on key tones or fuel for your brain and you're eating less,
you're getting into katosis, and so it might keep you awake, but
most of the time we find that our bodies adjust to that, so it's
one of those things that passes. That's one reason why if you're an alternate
daily faster and you choose the full fast version of the down day and you're
doing like maybe a thirty six hour fast, you might have trouble sleeping the
night of your down day. That's why the five hundred calorie down day can
be so much better for a lot of people, because that having that five
hundred calorie down day meal close enough to bedtime so that you're able to sleep,
it just helps you sleep better. So there was a book I read
years ago, Sherry Potatoes Not Prozac, and the author wanted to for mood
and also sleep. She recommended that every night you have a potato before you
go a bit. Of course, you know, I liked it because I
just like potato. I read something about potatoes before bed and something else too,
But there's also electrolytes and potatoes, I really and they're saying that can
help. So I wanted to add two. As far as sleep. You
know, when we are fasting all day. We're not eating and drinking all
day long, and we're you know, eating in a shorter period of time,
and you know, we get a lot of minerals from the food we
eat. And like I've said, katosis does have a di retic effect on
the body. And that's kind of ongoing. It's not just when you're new.
You notice it more when you're new, and some people are just more
sensitive and they need more electrolytes others. And you know, if your body
is if you're not eating as much or not getting as much minerals throughout the
day. You know, mineral support is good for sleep too. That's why
most fasters you'll find end up starting taking magnesium agin and I talk about magnesium
all the time. It can really help your sleep. It calms your brain,
calms your body, keeps your blood sugar regulated so you're not having ups
and downs while you're sleeping. So you might consider taking a fast safe magnesium
like optimizers magnesium breakthrough when you go to bed, and that can help as
well. All right, here's a question. I've just started fasting, but
I have no idea what or how I am supposed to be eating in my
window should I be following a diet like keto or paleo to get the best
results. No, there's no diet you should be following. That's my The
word that sucked out to me is should. There is no should, no
other than focus on real foods that are satisfying to your body. And yeah,
exactly, eat real food. I mean I really love the eat real
food, mostly plant Yeah, Michael Pollen, eat food, not too much,
mostly planted. Michael Pollen. He wrote that a long long time ago,
and it's really good. Fine, it is really a good advice.
You know, some people feel great on keto and some people lose weight on
keto. I am not one of those people. Me neither. Some people
feel great and love paleo. If you are a person who loves those things
and that's the way you want to eat, and you think that's gonna give
you great health, and you want to do that, knock yourself out.
But there's no should. You should eat to satiety in every window, and
you should eat delicious food that fuels your body, and that leaves you feeling
like emotionally fulfilled with the food you're eating. Because I do believe there's an
emotional psychological component to eating, and I think we should be eating delicious food
we enjoy. YEP, I agree one hundred percent. All right, what
is the best option for taking meds that must be taken with food during the
fest? So here's the question about that. If you get a prescription,
Like we'll hear this in the community. Someone will say I've been to my
doctor. I have I'm just gonna say strip throat, for example, and
my doctor wants me to take this antibiotic that must be taken twice a day
twelve hours apart required to have it with food. I would actually talk to
my doctor and say, hey, I'm an intermittent faster or what could I
take that would not require me to have it twice a day? There are
so many options out there that would not require you to have that multiple ones
a day or with food. So like, for example, there are certain
antibiotics. I mean, I haven't needed an antibiotic. I haven't been to
the doctor for a sick visit since what was it twenty fifteen or something.
I mean, I haven't had a sick visit. But I used to take
antibiotics all the time. But I always like, for example, a ze
pack because it was convenient, whatever reason. I like just being able to
take it and it's done. So when the doctor would try to give me
something crazy, I'd be like, could a Z pack work for this?
And they would say sure. They would just you know, if if the
answer was no, they would tell me that depending on what was wrong with
me. But doctors, you know, they might just be in the habit
of prescribing one thing. But if you ask for something else, say hey,
I really don't want to have to have one that it needs to be
taken with food, or I would rather have something that I could take once
a day because I like to do intermittent fasting. They'll say, oh,
here's one that'll work great for that. Just and also really look at what
that sticker says. Because I hadn't been on antibotics in years, and when
I had my foot surgery, I had to take Clenda Mason for ten days,
I think, just to prevent infection. And I first looked at it
and thought it said take with food, And then I looked at it again
and it said may be taken with food. I say must, so really
look at you at the label on it too. And you can also ask
your pharmacist, like, you know, do I have to take with this
food? Is it going to impact how it works or like damage your stomach?
Like a what is it? Advil? What is that? Yeah?
Ibuproven And said, not good for an empty stomach. You need food just
to protect your stomach. Yeah, so don't hesitate to ask if you absolutely
have to have food. It is going to break your fast. But you
know there's some options. You could have it with something that is going to
kind of coat your something like a little butter, something that'll keep it from
from being so harsh on your stomach, or a handful of greens something like
that, like leafy greenable spin of cream, some greens. I think it
was actually maybe doctor Funga said, like some greens like a little handful of
spinach dipped in some olive oil because the fat will help kind of coat your
stomach. And that is absolutely breaking your fast. So if you're someone who
has a medication that you're going to take all the time, like it's not
just like a temporary you know, you're gonna want to figure something out.
And that was when would be when you would want to talk to your doctor
because you have to do what you have to do for your health, right,
But if you would like to fast, you want to try to work
around anything that needs to be taken with food. But you have to take
what you're prescribed no matter what. My suggestion to say, you take a
prescription twice a day, So the first one in the morning, let's say
you have to break your fast to take something with it, but then time
it so that you're taking the other one, like at the end of your
window in the evening. And even if you had to take it an hour
after your window closed, you're still going to have stomach and your food and
your stomach. That's it. You don't just eat and it doesn't leave your
stomach immediately. It takes a couple of hours to get out of there.
That's a good point. But also don't think that just because you had to
open your window at seven am to take an antibiotic, that it's just a
waste of a day. Like right, take that little whatever you have to
take and then just keep fasting until it's time for your window to open.
The day is not a waste. You don't have to take seven or ten
days off from fasting exactly because you have to take a medication. You don't
have to have a full meal, pretend like it didn't happen, and keep
fasting exactly all right, So here's one. Does toothpaste trigger an insulin response?
And what about oil pulling? Okay, could it trigger an insulin response?
Absolutely? It's mintye. Most toothpastes have some sort of artificial sweetener in
them. Are we worried about it? No? I mean, don't brush
your teeth all day, like get up on stunning, brush your teeth.
And I personally, I don't brush my teeth. So I drink my coffee
because I don't want to brush them twice, and so I brush them when
I'm done with my coffee for the morning, and I brush once and I'm
done and I go about my day and I don't think another thing about it.
And I talk about this in fast feast repeat. Any cephalic phase insulin
response like that is going to be brief and be over with. So you
brush your teeth. If you have a brief insulin response, it goes right
back down. The problem would be, like Sherry said, if you're just
brushing, brushing, brushing, And that's also why we don't drink like artificially
flavored sodas, because that's not brief and you're doing that for a long period
of time. Like my grandmother used to get a diet coke when we would
drive through. She'd get her hair done and a large McDonald's diet coat and
she sipped on that thing all day long. She was constantly having the cephalic
phase infulunner slade right all the time. That's real different. And then oil
pulling. Okay, if you don't know what oil pulling is, you basically
put oil in your mouth like coconut oil swisher. It's unflavored. I know
some people like to put like essential oil in it. Don't do that unflavored
cocon oil. You swish it around for half her long and it's supposed to
detox to your mouth, clean your mouth whatever. You would never swallow that.
You're spitting it out in the trash can anyway. So because you're not
ingesting it, no, it's not going to break your fast. And yes
you can oil poll Okay, do Canadian bitters, tombs or milk of magnesia
break a fast? What can I take for upset stomach or heartburn that will
not break the fast? I have no idea about bitters. I don't know.
Well, I looked them up, okay, because I did not know
what they were. And it is a medicinal of herbs, oh okay,
like beinger, and I don't know what all is in it. A bunch
of herbs in a liquid form. So I would say all of those then
would break a fast. Here's the thing, though, if you were sick,
like if I had an upset stomach and like I was going to throw
up kind of a thing like that, kind of queasy I'm gonna throw up
if I don't have something sickness, you know, it always makes me feel
better real coke. If I was sick like that, I mean I haven't
I can't think of the last time I've had that problem where I needed a
coke because I was sick. But I mean that would break my fast,
but I would have it because I needed relief. So if you absolutely are
sick and need something, you set fasting aside and take what you need.
That's not going to happen all the time. It's not going to happen every
day. If I get a little motion sick like in a car during my
fast, I might drink some like sparkling water, just plain sparkling water helps
me with that. As far as heartburn, baking soda and water, yeah,
and I should be discussing art burn. And sometimes it can help with
a little nausea as well, because I have used it for that and it's
nauseous. Yeah, yeah, because sometimes people perceive a little acid stomach as
nausea, Like if your stomach is really sensitive to that acid, you might
feel a little nauseous. Yeah. And I actually have a little thing save
because I share this all the time. You mix a half a teaspoon of
baking soda in four ounce glass of water and you can drink it every four
hours as needed. Awesome, all right, And the last question in this
lightning round of questions was do electrolytes break the fast? Okay, do electrolytes
themselves break the fast? Sir, No, they do not. What can
break the fast is the delivery method, right, all the junk that's in
there with the electrolyte, right, or the source of the electrolytes. Like,
for example, there are some capsules out there that have like sea kelp
in them, and that's where they are pulling these minerals from. But sea
kelp is not something you want in your fast, your body is going to
perceive that as food. So that's what we would call a food like supplement,
and that's one I would take. And then the other thing that you
need to really look out for, and a lot of the liquid electrolytes is
going to be citric acid, boric acid, those sort of things that they
use as preservatives, a lot of them out there. If you're just going
to have to read, read, read the ingredients. They'll say that their
minerals come from dead sea salt or seawater or that sort of thing. If
that's what it is, that's fine. Just really really look at your ingredients.
If it's minerals only, it's fine. If they have added flavors or
sweeteners or citric acid, it is not. I struggle to keep my potassium
levels up and this is something I work on with my doctor. And I
was using a liquid potassium and I was doing fine with it. It was
just straight like ionic potassium. Well, all of a sudden, I started
taking it. I got a new bottle, did not read the ingredients,
and I was getting really really nauseous in my fast, and I looked at
the bottle and they have added I think it was citric and boric acid.
No fulvic and boric acid. Wow, So that is no longer a fast
safe alternative for me. Now I will use it at the end of my
eating window and I can take it then, but not on an empty stomach.
That I'm not going to take on an empty stomach. So they change
the formulation and your body let you know before your y my body let me
know. So avoid anything flavored has to be unflavored. Really look at the
ingredients. And other than that, electrolytes do not break the past. All
right, Before we get to our tweek of the week, I want to
take a minute to talk about my books and which ones you need. If
you are brand new to intermittent fasting, or if you are restarting after a
break, or if you feel like you're fasting has gotten sloppy and you're in
need of a refresh, you're going to want twenty eight day Fast Start,
Day by Day, the ultimate guide to starting or restarting your intermittent fasting lifestyle.
So it sticks. This is a companion book for Fast Feast Repeat,
so you're going to want to have that one as well. Fast Feast Repeat
is the comprehensive guide for delayed on tonight intermittent fasting. So it really does
have everything you need when you have a question or if you need a refresher
into a topic. You want to have it as a resource to go back
to as needed. Also, if you are a settled intermittent faster and you
want to clean up what you're eating, clean up your personal care products,
the cleaning products you use in your home, then I think you'll enjoy cleanish.
I wrote it so that the process of cleaning up would feel less daunting
with a step by step approach that you control every step of the way.
I'm not going to make you throw away your regular de owner until you're ready.
I just finally switched to one myself, a natural dealner that finally,
you know, it's just a very natural stuff in the process for a lot
of us. You know, we're feeling so much better. We want to
just do everything we can, but we don't want to be you know,
we can't give up everything. There's the ish clean ish. So now it's
time for our tweak of the week. And you know I always say tweak
it till it's easy. But the tweak that works for me might not be
the one that works for you, and that's why it is super helpful to
hear how other intermittent fasters are making intermittent fasting work for them. This tweak
was submitted by Anne in Sacramento. She says, when I am getting close
to opening my window but don't want to open until later, and I'm experiencing
hunger pangs, I have a large glass of water and then get busy doing
something moastically it's sweeping or vacuuming, or organizing a clause that are spending some
time in the garden. After a short time, I forget about food and
I get to finish some task that needs doing. Unless I am having real
hunger pangs with a headache or I'm lightheaded, this works really well for me.
Yeah, and I think too Sometimes we think, oh, really hungry,
maybe I need to open my window today early, and we tell you
to listen to your body. But I would encourage you to take Anne's advice.
Set a timer for an hour and just be like, I'm gonna get
busy and I'm going to do some work for an hour, and when this
hour is up, I am still really hungry. Then that's probably when you
know you need to open your window, because if it's just that your body's
trying to flip the switch or whatever, sometimes that hour is all you need.
And then after that hour's up, you suddenly are like, oh,
I don't need to eat. So we love to leave you with inspirational or
motivational quotes. And this week we have a favorite poem that was shared by
Celeste. And this poem was published in a book called The Good Woman Poems
and a Memoir. It says from nineteen sixty nine to nineteen eighty. I'm
not really sure what that is. Maybe it was a collection of her poems
from a lot of time. Yeah. The author is Lucille Clifton, and
the poem is called I Am Running into a New Year. I'm running into
a new year, and the old years blow back like a wind that I
catch in my hair, like strong fingers, like all my old promises.
And it will be hard to let go what I said to myself about myself
when I was sixteen and twenty six and thirty six, even thirty six.
But I'm running into a new year, and I beg what I love and
I leave to forgive me, and I just think that's really fitting for those
of us living in an intermittent fasting lifestyle. I think so too. Thanks
so much for listening today. We would love to have you join us in
the Delay Don't Deny community, where you can interact with both me and Sherry,
plus the most supportive bunch of intermittent fasters you'll find anywhere. Go to
Jenstevens dot com slash community to join us. Don't forget to subscribe to this
podcast to your favorite podcast app, and if you haven't already, please leave
us a five star review that helps me listeners find the show and we really
appreciate it. We are a community driven podcast, so to submit your success
stories, your questions, your favorite tweak it till It's Easy moments, or
anything else you want us to share on the podcast, go to Fast Feast
Repeat dot com slash submit and then listen each week to see if we share
your submission or answer your question Until next week. Thanks for listening.