For those of you not familiar with it, I highly recommend fasting from time to time for anywhere from a few days to a few weeks.
Why? Because there's nothing else like it.
A good friend who lives across country was having severe problems with his liver and kidneys. Among other symptoms, he blew up like a balloon and turned quite grey. According to those on the scene, he was in the process of dying.
He went to a very prestigious medical research facility and they did various tests. They confirmed that his kidneys and liver were failing, but that they didn't know what was causing it. They suggested 1) a kidney transplant, or 2) going on a dialysis machine for the rest of his life, which was likely to be relatively short.
Those alternatives didn't appeal to him, so he tried really good diets and supplements. They didn't work; he got worse. (Not to say that good diets and supplements are bad, just that they didn't work in this instance.)
He had a friend who suggested fasting. He was quite resistant at first. What good was fasting do, when nobody even knew what was wrong?
That's the beautiful thing about fasting. You don't need to know what's wrong, because your body knows. And fasting gives your body the chance to work on the problem itself.
Why can't it do so otherwise? Because it's too busy processing the food we're shoveling down each day. It's a fact that the digestion and assimilation of food takes far more energy than any other process in the body.
When we don't eat, the body breaks down its own cells to live, but in doing so displays its supreme wisdom—because it breaks down first those cells that are least needed (and which are most likely causing the problem, namely dead cells, diseased cells, fat cells, aged cells, etc.
Thus the curious fact that the first 30 days or so of not eating tend to be tremendously beneficial for us, because the body is ridding itself of cells and toxins that we're better off without. After that, of course, the body must consume vital tissues to live, and then the stage of starvation begins. (If you're of average weight, you'll die somewhere around the 90th to the 100th day.)
What happened to my friend? After some skepticism, he decided to try a four-day fast, from Thursday to Sunday, after which he'd have to return to work. Because he was so toxic, he did a fresh juice fast rather than a water fast, so that the rate of toxic elimination would be slowed down somewhat.
So he laid in bed for four days and drank fresh carrot juice, fresh beet juice, and all sorts of combinations like carrot, apple, celery and so forth. He read a great novel that he'd been wanting to read, and rested.
Lo and behold. His swelling went down. His color came back. His energy came back. He went to work on Monday a changed man.
In my humble opinion, fasting is the most powerful thing I've seen in 30 years or so of studying nutrition and health. The body seems to have deep wisdoms that our minds can scarcely dream of.
A few caveats:
1) A few people (such as diabetics) need to be very careful about fasting. Seek experienced advice.
2) Don't fast more than a few days without supervision from a health professional experienced in fasting, because occasionally things can go wrong.
3) If you're very toxic (you can feel it if you are), you may want to go on a fresh fruit diet first to detoxify a bit before you go on a fast. Seek professional, experienced advice.
More information about fasting can be found on this website. Do a Search (one of the buttons on the left) on the word "fasting" and it will bring up related articles. Or click on Topics (button at left) and then Body.
—jim sloman, 11/26/01
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