Is it advisable to fast for 24 hours?

A day of fasting, 24 hours, is a slightly longer fast than what we practice daily at night or overnight fasting. The advantage is that 24 hours are enough time to make sure we get into ketosisthat is, to start burning fat as the main fuel.

To do this, two things are required: to be aware and well informed that the 24-hour fast that is going to be carried out is a physiological maneuverand understand its mechanism to put into action.

The easiest thing to do when fasting for 24 hours is skip dinner one day and breakfast and lunch the next. This allows us to enter ketosis, which we can easily verify, since one of the signs that we have started this type of metabolism will be the appearance of acetone in the urine, which is very easy to measure.

You can do this 24 hour fast once a week, every week, as a hygienic custom. So we would be doing a weekly intermittent fasting.

How to fast for a day

The first times think of your 24-hour fast as a long-distance race: go little by little and watch your sensations.

sometimes they are unpleasant sensationssuch as nausea or headache, but in most cases they are temporary.

The ideal is get up at dawn, wake up well and start daily cleaning, with water. Wash teeth, tongue and skin well.

what can be taken

As explained in detail in the video that you have at the beginning of this article, during the 24-hour fast we can drink water, diluted juices and some infusion or vegetable broth, as these liquids will not break the fast and will help us maintain it.

The infusions can be adapted if you have a health problem that you want to influence. But in general, these are some examples of infusions that can be taken during fasting and that will help you in the process:

Rosemary and anise grainLiquorice and anise grainLiquorice and mintThyme and anise grain

These infusions are above all aimed at stimulate blood pressure, which generally decreases during the fast. They are not indicated in hypertensive people.

A infusion alternative for hypertensive people It would be aniseed, lemon balm and orange blossom.

What to do during the day

The rest of the day you can do what you normally do, without missing:

A walk in the natural environment. A while in the sun. A little exercise, with natural movements: walking, running, climbing, crawling, crawling, doing domestic chores like cleaning the room or doing laundry…

He “break-fast”, the first meal after fastingshould be vegetable, with fresh fruit and vegetables, cereal or legumes, without heated fat or refined sugars.

Benefits of fasting 24 hours

The benefits of these “intermittent” fasts have been described in medicine since historical times, but in recent years many papers have been published on their effects. An example: those of the Nobel Prize winner Oshinori Ohsumi on the autophagy, the mechanism that is activated by fasting and high-intensity exercise, and on its therapeutic applications. It has also been shown to be beneficial for the intestine that is inflamed or affected by an infection.

in fasting, energy stored in fat cells is used for cell repair, resistance to stress and rejuvenation, so that fasting day will have upon us a revitalizing effect. This is a benefit of the 24-hour fast that we can all benefit from.

fasting too facilitates weight loss and the elimination of body fat.

fasting It is also used for therapeutic purposes. For example:

In rheumatic diseasesimproving the symptoms, or drug-resistant epilepsy. It has potential to delay brain agingsince it modifies the nutrient sensory pathways in the brain and increases synaptic plasticity, neurogenesis and neuroprotection. During fasting, a reduced insulin and leptin levelsan increase in insulin sensitivity and resistance to diabetes, a reduction in resting heart rate and blood pressure, and an increase in heart rate variability (as a result of increased parasympathetic tone). decreased inflammationan increase in resistance of the brain and heart to stress and improved functional outcome in models of stroke, myocardial infarction, and arteriosclerosis problems. helps fight infections. In fact, the body almost always reacts by losing its appetite until the infection passes. Finally, thanks to the work of Valter Longo, it has been seen that, in cases of tumors, fasting provides additive and possibly synergistic effects when combined with drugs. used in standard cancer treatment.

scientific references

Ohsumi, Y. Historical landmarks of autophagy research. Cell Res 24, 9–23 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/cr.2013.169