Is fasting a good way to lose weight?
Historically, there were two reasons to fast: physical purification before a ritual or rite of passage, and self-discipline or asceticism. Among some Native American tribes, fasting is the primary means to stimulate ecstatic experiences on a vision quest. In other indigenous groups, shamans, who conduct healing ceremonies, prepare themselves by fasting. But fasting as a way to lose weight is a North American phenomenon, and while many people fast to help clean toxins from the system, it's not a good way to lose weight. Here's why.
When we go without food, the body's survival mechanism kicks in - the body thinks it's starving, and begins to hoard fat. While the scale may say we've lost fat, what's actually happening is we are losing water and, more importantly, we are losing precious muscle.
Muscle burns fat, so the more muscles on our body, the greater our ability to burn fat. When we go without food, the body begins to cannibalize itself; rather, it starts to eat up its own muscles. So while the scale is going down, so is the amount of muscle on our body. Remember, muscle burns fat, so when we lose muscle, our ability to burn fat, and our metabolism, is also lowered. The consequences of this are three-fold: not only have we lowered our metabolism, we are becoming a 'skinny fat person', one that looks smaller but has less tone. Finally, when we resume eating, our body remembers when you starved it and it now holds onto its stored fat more than ever, making future weight loss attempts futile.
The best course of action is to use a fast for shorter periods of time and more frequently (2 to 3 days, every other month or so). This way, the body will let go of its toxins, not its precious muscle, the very thing that keeps us healthy and toned, and keeps our metabolism revved up.