I started immediately on a water-only fasting regimen. I used mostly three- to five-day fasts because I wanted quick results that I couldn’t undo by eating something wrong. I wasn’t focused on weight loss but on beating diabetes—still, I lost twelve pounds the first month and then six pounds a month thereafter, for thirty pounds in four months—I went from 256 pounds to 226. Although alternate-day fasting doesn’t slow your metabolism, multiple-day fasts do seem to slow it a little. But the improvement in insulin sensitivity is well worth a long fast over a short one.
