How To Survive A 48 Hour Fast

I’ve always wondered.

What would happen to your body if you don’t eat for two days? (SPOILER ALERT: I didn’t die)

If you’ve been following my YouTube channel, you know I’m a big fan of intermittent fasting and all the benefits that comes with it.

The benefits of intermittent fasting

• It improves mental clarity and concentration.
• It induces fat loss, obviously. And you’re gonna see how much weight I lost in a second here from doing this 48 hour fast.
• It lowers blood sugar levels.
• It improves insulin sensitivity. And if you’ve been watching my videos, you’ll know how important insulin sensitivity is when it comes to controlling your weight.
• It increases energy.
• It lowers blood cholesterol, particularly your small LDL particles. The stuff that actually causes heart disease.
• It reduces inflammation.
• Fasting helps prevent Alzheimer’s disease and even reverses the aging process because of the growth hormone response in your body.

Pretty impressive, right? And it’s free! I always say that weight loss might be the least impressive benefit of fasting when you consider all the improvements in your bio markers from simply taking a break from eating.

Why I did a 48 hour water fast

But more than anything, I wanted a bit of a reset.

I went on a couple of vacations recently and I also dealt with some personal stuff. Both my grandparents passed away recently, and I gotta be real with you here. I put on a couple of pounds in the process.

I always say that you gotta balance feast with fasting, right? And I definitely feasted a little bit more than I should’ve.

But hey, that’s okay. Life happens. But what better way to reset your diet and get a head start with your weight loss than doing an extended fast? So I recorded everything and I’m gonna show you what happened in a second here. I also worked out both days of fasting because, why not? Here’s what happened.

48 hour fast weight loss

Boom. I lost almost 3 pounds from my 48 hour fast. I dare you to find a  diet that produces better results.

Doing a 48 hour fast goes against about 99% of conventional wisdom about nutrition out there. It goes against everything we’re told not to do.

Never skip a meal. You need to eat 6 small meals a day. Like, no. There is no scientific data that eating 6 small meals a day is somehow more beneficial for you.

Let me ask you this if you’re still somewhat skeptical about intermittent fasting. What do you think will happen if you take a break from eating? What do you think will happen if you do a 48 hour fast? That’s right. You’re going to lose weight. A lot of weight. And as you just saw, I felt great the entire time.

This whole notion that fasting will put you into starvation mode and that it’s gonna slow down your metabolism is just a big fat lie.

The longest recorded fast by the way is 382 days. Over a year!

A 27 year old male did it under doctor supervision and he lost a mind blowing 276 lbs. So you’re not gonna die if you skip a day or two of eating. In fact, a lot of good things happen when you take a break from eating like I mentioned earlier. Weight loss is almost just icing on the cake.

Did I get hungry during my 48 hour fast? Sure. But that’s perfectly normal. Most of the time, we really just eat out of habit. Once I drank black coffee or soda water, it eventually went away.

The best workout when doing intermittent fasting

In case you’re wondering, I do a type of training called CrossFit. It’s a high intensity interval training style of workout and it is in my humble opinion, one of the best types of workouts you can do.

Some of the benefits include improvements in:

• Physical performance and overall body composition
• Cardiovascular health
• Insulin sensitivity
• Blood pressure
• Lipid profile
• Bone development
• Improved sleeping patterns
• It combats specific aging factors in skeletal muscle
• Type 2 diabetes
• Improved cognitive abilities, and self-esteem
• And so much more!

Most of my workouts last no longer than 15 to 20 minutes. My workouts are always constantly varied. Most of them require compound, full body, full range of motion movements involving multiple muscle groups working all at once.

It’s literally the best bang for your buck when it comes to time invested and improvement in your overall health and fitness.

I’ve been doing this type of training since 2012 and it’s what I get all my private coaching clients to do, they spend maybe a grand total of 3 hours in total working out every week and they’ve all gotten some amazing results.

So, no. The notion that you need to spend countless hours at the gym to get results is pretty outdated.

And this type of training isn’t easy by the way. It’s pretty intense. And that’s a good thing. Short and intense workouts with a couple of strength sessions every week are way better for you than long drawn out repetitive cardio workouts. And during my 48 hour fast, my workouts felt great.

I mentioned this earlier but that should debunk the myth that you need to eat or drink before or during your workout and then you need to consume a post workout protein shake or your muscles will start withering away.

Like, no. You have about 20,000 calories worth of energy in the form of stored fat in your body. It’s not just there for looks. It’s stored energy that’s waiting to be used.

And if you’re trying to lose weight, you wanna tap into those fat stores as much as you can. And that’s why intermittent fasting and an extended fast like this is so effective when it comes to weight loss.

It allows your insulin levels to become really low and when your insulin levels are low, that’s when your body starts using some of that stored energy in your body. Your body literally becomes a fat burning machine. And if you’re trying to lose weight, that’s exactly what you want.

That’s why insulin is such an important hormone in your body. It’s one of the main hormones that controls your body weight. And you can use it to your advantage by fasting intermittently.

How to survive a 48 hour fast

Now if you’re thinking about doing a 48 hour fast, then I just have one more tip for you. I already mentioned earlier that you should stay busy but my other tip is start slow.

If you’re used to eating three meals or even six meals a day, then all of a sudden you don’t eat for two days, then it might come as a complete shock to your system and your fasting experience is gonna suck.

Honestly, a daily intermittent fasting routine of 16 to 24 hours is more than good enough to get you results if you’re trying to lose weight. It’s just way more practical and it’s easy to integrate with every day life. But hey, if you’re really committed and you wanna try an extended fast, then do it. It’s unbelievably rewarding when you can break away from the habit of eating all the time.

This is where voluntary hardship comes in. It’s good for you. I actually have a separate video where I did a 3 day water fast. You can check it out here.

But if you’re completely brand new to fasting, I would just start by skipping breakfast for a few days. And that’s also the other thing. I’ve seen people lose a ton of weight just by skipping breakfast and just eating two big meals. I’ve also seen people lose even more weight by just eating once a day.

Again, this goes against conventional diet wisdom but conventional diet wisdom has also led us to an obesity epidemic. So you gotta go against the grain here if you’re not getting results with whatever diet you’re following.

And again, there is no scientific data out there that proves that breakfast is the most important meal of the day. It’s all marketing by food companies getting you to eat breakfast cereal which has tons of sugar,  and meal replacement bars. Again, more sugar.

Should you do intermittent fasting?

Now, who should and shouldn’t do intermittent fasting? Intermittent fasting  is generally safe for everyone if you’re in good health. Just consult with your doctor before you try it if you’re not sure.

If you’re pregnant, or you’re underweight, or if you’re taking blood sugar medication, or you’re chronically stressed, if you have a history of eating disorder, or if you’re a teenager then you shouldn’t do it. Otherwise, if you’re in perfectly good health, you should be good to go and you can reap all the benefits that comes with fasting.

To answer my question earlier, what happens to your body if you don’t eat for two days? You lose weight. A lot of weight. And you get a boat load of other benefits. So take a break from eating every once in a while. It’s good for you.

As always, if this was helpful, share it with a friend who could benefit from it as well!

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