My last two posts were on the physical and mental aspects of my 4 day fast. Today I am going to discuss my insights around “Family”!

I grew up with a poor relationship to food and I still struggle with a scarcity mentality occasionally. This is how I became a morbidly obese teenager and struggled with my weight for nearly my entire life. Food was a reward, food was happiness. Celebrations and achievements always centered around buffets and other family food gatherings while my adolescent brain was developing.

Everyone is individual, there is no one size fits all nutrition plan for everyone. I have a different gender, ethnicity, genetics, epigenetic expression, activity levels, age and the list goes on…from my wife and kids. So while how and what we eat has much in common, we do have individualization.

Why did I choose to do this fast when my family was away? No distractions and no temptations from whatever the kids were going to be eating.

I have no problem preparing meals at home where my meal is aligned to my biology and goals, and my kid’s meals are slightly different to be aligned to theirs. But I know myself well enough, that if they were home eating whatever, I wouldn’t be able to make it through a 4 day fast.

Constantly battling temptations by willpower alone is a fools game. While I have made great strides in correcting my biological hardware, there are still bugs in my software. Food temptations will always be a struggle for me. I can do 16, 18, even 24 hours very easily, but that is why I had to be alone to even attempt this 4 day experiment.

While I can have influence on the foods in our house, I certainly can’t control what family members have in theirs or what they choose to serve during family gatherings. I appreciate the substitutions and accommodations that others sometimes make for me, realistically it comes down to my own willpower, my own desire to follow my purpose and how I choose to mitigate kryptonite foods for me.

During this experiment, I explored further than I had before on how ones friend and family situations effect how, what and why we eat what we eat. Actually, regardless of the reason clients first approach me, this is an area that is common to all. Our food choices and interactions with food effect all aspects of our life, physical, mental, business, relationships, emotions etc.

I think even in the back of my mind there was a desire to prove to some family that I could do a fast of this duration.

Everyone is on their own journey, which is completely normal, however through trial and error I have developed tools and strategies to integrate myself with family and others that don’t align with my health habits. This may be off-putting to others, and in fact I know it is with some of my family, but I am ok with that, as my purpose and resolve is strong.

These strategies include everything from pre-meal mitigation techniques, to in-meal choice and substitutions to post-meal supplements and biological hacks.

Most of one’s culture and family time surrounds food, but it can be optimized if you have certain goals and the resolve to see your goals through. A longer fast or even intermittent fasting can be a part of that. If you would like to learn how to incorporate fasting into your life for overall health, weight-loss or managing family gathering, lets connect.