This morning I woke up feeling worse than a sack of cats thrown down a cliff face. Body aching, digestive system all over the place, tired, headachy, and bouncing between feeling overheated and shivering.
Searching my symptoms didn’t give me much headway, but I already knew what was wrong. Cold weather, a 24 hour flight, time zone changes, heavy boozing and a far from balanced diet had caught up with me, and I needed to give my body a chance to get back in the game.
Everyone has their own remedies in this situation, although it seems everyone at the very least tries to max out on rest and hydration. For me, I have found that fasting can be helpful.
As I write this, I am almost 24 hours into the process, with only black coffee, water, and a splash of ACV passing through. At this point, I am certainly starting to feel hungry, and I know that sleeping on an empty stomach can sometimes be suboptimal. These downsides have already been well and truly superseded by the benefits I have received so far.
Accord to research, at around the 12 hour mark the digestive system goes to sleep, having processed all food, and the body begins a healing process. At 24 hours, autophagy begins, which translates to “self-eating”. Yep, the body begins to eat itself.
While this can seem unhealthy and even a little creepy, the human body knows EXACTLY what it is doing, thanks to millions of years of experience. When the body begins autophagy, it doesn’t start at the toes and begin working its way up; instead, it begins to recycle the cells that most need to be removed. This could be misfolded proteins, or damaged cells, or even toxins floating around the body.
The most important thing is that I’m already feeling a lot better, and by the time I wake up tomorrow, I should be close to 100%. Now that’s what I call a fast solution!
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