I am off to Santa Rosa for another water fast tomorrow, ahhh! It seems wild to think that it’s been about 9 months since I was there last, when I did a two week fast and learned all about the SOS-free vegan way of life I have been living ever since then.
That means it’s been 9 months that I have been free of chronic hives and the absolute worst of my Lyme symptoms! After the water fast I started a very rigorous Lyme protocol with my doctor here in LA, but the water fast itself was the first catalyst to my healing. At that time, I wasn’t sure if I would end up doing another fast or not, but my intuition (and my awesome team of healers) has lead me back for round two.
I wanted to write about my decision to water fast again here because I feel like anything related to water fasting needs to be explained in great detail. The process that has gone into me knowing that water fasting is right for me is both complicated and wildly simple. Complicated because it takes a lot to know whether something like this is right for you & your circumstances, and wildly simple because my intuition just KNOWS.
The first time I heard about water fasting I thought it was crazy. I couldn’t imagine how someone could live off of water and only water for any extended period of time. It also sounded miserable!
But as my body deteriorated and my chronic illness symptoms RAGED, in my gut it started to sound more and more like a realistic option with every passing day. And when I say symptoms, I’m talking about: chronic hives (full body for NINE MONTHS), extreme eczema, extremely severe chronic fatigue, brain fog to the point where I would forget my own name, lack of motivation, depression/anxiety, super high inflammation and histamine in my body, the list goes on.
(Otherwise known as… Chronic Lyme disease, mold poisoning, Mast Cell Activation Syndrome, parasites, and more — but at that time I had yet to be diagnosed.)
I believe it was a team of angels who eventually guided me to True North Health Center for my first water fast. It was a combination of my own research, input from my doctors, stories from my readers (you guys!), and honestly some intervention from above (my angels + spirit guides + the universe + God, whatever you most believe in) that landed me there last May.
When I ended up there in May, I felt entirely hopeless. I was just coming off of a monthlong solo trip to Bali where my health was drastically worse than where I began. I had done testing with my Lyme doctor but didn’t have the results back yet, and was struggling with so many severe issues that at that point had zero answers. My parents dropped me off at TN and my dad’s exact words were: “If ANYTHING gets weird here call us and we’ll come pick you up immediately.”
We were all scared and didn’t know what to expect. It ended up being a very healing and eye opening experience, despite the fact that Lyme was slowly killing me at the same time so I had a harder time than some other patients may have because I was so sick. I did a lot of resting and relaxing which at that stage in my journey was EXTREMELY needed. I watched the entire series of “Bates Motel” (will always feel like Norman Bates is one of my dear friends because of how much company he kept me during that time, lol).
You can read all about my first experience at True North here.
What Went Into My Decision to Go Back //
Fast forward to NOW, and I have high hopes again for this second go round. I started feeling like going back to True North would be a good idea for me around December, and their first availability was February. I told myself that whenever they could take me is whenever the universe most wanted me to go back, even though I was initially disappointed because I wanted to go in January to kick off the year. (But think about it… if I had gone in January, I wouldn’t have been able to do Ayahuasca when I did! Everything happens for a reason.)
Plus, now that I have been back to work for the last 3-4 weeks, I know this is the universe planting the water fast in my life now because I need to rest again. I took two months off from all work completely and then absolutely hit the ground running the moment I started to feel some semblance of energy + feeling like a bit of a real human.
Now with the fast it’s time to get back to myself, and really practice what I learned during my time off this winter: putting MYSELF first. I am healing in a real way now for the first time throughout my recovery, but I still feel I have about 70% to go.
I am excited because I feel I am in a much healthier place now than I was last May, so I have a feeling some of what plagued me last time (crampy legs, juicing on a few days because I was so weak, etc.) may be easier this time. But to be real it’s still a water fast, so I am game for whatever crops up.
Where I am With My Lyme Healing //
As far as my Lyme treatment over the last 9 months, I have been getting rigorous treatments every week of IV ozone, Rocephin IVs, Myers Cocktails, B12 shots, Glutathione injections, and not to mention my daily supplement, herbal tinctures, and medications. All of those things have boosted me big time and my doctors & I feel it is time for my body to rest + digest it all now… and really spend the time on the internal healing.
ALSO I had a very encouraging appointment with my Lyme doctor earlier this week where I learned that many of my Lyme markers are going DOWN (!!!!) which is the best news ever. I still have raging Babesia, a co-infection of Lyme, and working on getting everything else balanced out, but compared to where I began — it feels like night and day. I am getting some energy back and feeling like a human again, which is the absolute best feeling.
But I also have days like today where even getting out of bed feels impossible… and I am hoping the additional bacteria the fast kills + the additional rest & healing time my body will get will put me in a much better position with that.
Just having the ability to rest and HEAL is what I am most excited about. Doing that in our daily life becomes pretty much impossible, because the duties of life call! Not to mention, our bodies spend about 70% of their daily energy on breaking down and digesting food, so that leaves only a small percentage to focus on healing + restoring from the inside. Our bodies have the innate capability to heal themselves, but we don’t often put ourselves in the right situations for that to happen.
More About Water Fasting //
What I want people to know if they are learning about water fasting for the first time is that fasting is not some new and trendy fad. It has been around for CENTURIES and has been used for deep and therapeutic healing on many levels. A huge misconception is that people water fast for weight loss or outer appearance, when that is not the case for those of us who are hard at work healing our bodies from chronic disease.
In fact, it has nothing to do with anything “trendy” for those of us who are practicing it for the deep healing benefits. People turn to water fasting when they need deep healing. Deep sickness calls for deep healing — a wake up call of the deepest kind.
I don’t take offense to those out there who misunderstand because we are all at a different place in our journeys and our understanding of others. That doesn’t mean it’s not hurtful to have an onslaught of anti-diet campaigners attack my Instagram (that’s what happened during my first fast), but I am used to the judgment and criticism of others when doing something wildly alternative when it comes to health. I feel comfortable taking one for the team and being the guinea pig in a sense for our community — because I have seen the healing benefits for myself and that’s what I want for everyone.
As far as the history of water fasting, the ancient Greeks spoke of fasting for healing and theirs are some of the original quotes and texts on the subject. I think anyone who decides to do a water fast should look into what they had to say about it to learn more and to gain inspiration from some of the great healers of our human history.
The famous physician of Ancient Greece, Hippocrates, said: “Instead of using medicine, rather, fast a day.” When an animal, such as a dog or cat, is sick, its natural instinct is to refuse food — so why not humans? Plato and Socrates frequently fasted for 7–10 days to gain physical and mental efficiency. Pythagoras fasted 40 days before his examination at Alexandria and required his students to fast before entering his classes. It was normalized in their culture but for some reason (for so many reasons) in our culture it can be frowned upon simply because it is misunderstood.
I believe anything that scares people is quick to be judged + looked down upon. I really hope that our culture will shift away from this about alternative healing treatments and EVERYTHING for that matter, but to make that happen some of us have to be change makers. We are all change makers in our own way. And if this is part of my path, I am into it!
Speaking of Pythagorus’s 40 days… the fabulous doctor of our time Joel Fuhrman has a great book called Fasting & Eating for Health (where I first learned about fasting), where he chronicles his 40 day water fasting experience healed from a traumatic foot injury, and then began leading people through fasting for healing. Once I read that book I was hooked on the idea and was officially convinced that for many cases, it works.
My Goals This Time Around //
To drastically simplify it, here are my goals this time around:
1. To reduce inflammation in my body. I still get huge itchy patches of eczema & the occasional flare up of hives. Also the acne on my face is a sign of the inflammation inside of my body. I can’t wait for those inflammatory & histamine markers to go down. Last time my histamine levels jumped from a 1300 to a 600!
2. To allow my body the time & space to rest and use my body’s energy to heal rather than digest/run around.
3. To kill Lyme bacteria & parasites by starving them out.
4. To kill any existing fibroids or small tumors in my body by starving them out. Last time I was unable to do this because I had a fibroid in my body the size of a grapefruit! But now that it has been surgically removed my body can focus on smaller tissue masses if there are any left.
5. To put my body into the healing state that fasting induces, and get the deep rest & healing benefits it deserves after the roughest year of my life.
6. Spiritual reasons — meditation, intention setting, time with myself, tapping into my inner strength, and healing from the inside out.
So, there you have it! There is my water fasting update. I envision this time around to be a more spiritual journey than the last… i.e. more self reflection and less Netflix – LOL! But no rules. Whatever I have energy for, I will do.
I will keep you guys very updated here on the blog and on social media. Subscribe to the blog to stay very up to date & get these updates straight to your inbox.
Love you guys! Thank you for your support as always. Would love any & all thoughts below!