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Diaries of a Lodge Owner
In 2009, sheet metal mechanic, Steve Niedzwiecki, turned his passions into reality using steadfast belief in himself and his vision by investing everything in a once-obscure run-down Canadian fishing lodge.
After ten years, the now-former lodge owner and co-host of The Fish'n Canada Show is here to share stories of inspiration, relationships and the many struggles that turned his monumental gamble into one of the most legendary lodges in the country.
From anglers to entrepreneurs, athletes to conservationists; you never know who is going to stop by the lodge.
Diaries of a Lodge Owner
Episode 86: What I Learned from 40 Days of Fasting
In this episode, we dig into my unique experience of completing a 40-day water fast, exploring various health aspects, how to deal with cravings, and the importance of routine. It’s not just about fasting; it’s a deeper story about health, motivation, and the body’s response to nutritional changes.
• Introduction to the concept of a water fast
• The motivation behind the 40-day commitment
• Strategies for hydration: supplements and electrolytes
• The challenges faced during the initial days of fasting
• Documenting health metrics and observations
• Refeeding strategies and introducing food post-fast
• Importance of yoga and routines during fasting
• Maintaining new healthy habits after fasting
• Final reflections and insights for listeners
Your body will tell you that little voice in your head. You'll have cravings for things Salt chips, fast food, sugar, chocolate, all of those things that you are addicted to. This week, on the Outdoor Journal, radio, podcast networks, diaries of a lodge owner, stories of the north yes, it's another Behind the Rod and it's a Behind the Rod with me. And, on a personal note, this is something that people have asked me about and I've alluded to in 40 days and did not eat and you would not be. It's amazing how many people have found out and how much interest there is, with people emailing and asking questions and calling me and wondering what I was doing, and folks, I'm going to say right off the top I'm not a doctor. I'm not giving you advice on what to do. All I am doing right now is I'm talking about my personal experience with something that I've done because I was compelled to do it, and we'll start by saying and all of you folks out there know, I've told some stories about liver cleanses and shitting my pants and if you haven't heard that, that's probably the one that I get the most reaction out of people from. Jump back in the library and give that one a listen. That's somewhere around episode probably 15 or 20. So probably 15 or 20. But there's a hint in the title.
Speaker 1:But anyway, I am no stranger to doing fasts. I believe that for me and again I can only speak for me fasts are something that I find extremely healthy. It gives my body a break, it gives my digestive system a break, and I've learned a lot of things along the way as far as how to start a fast, how to break a fast, how to break a fast. But on January, the 6th, I was messing around on my phone and I saw somebody had done a 40-day fast. I read the words 40-day water fast, a 40-day fast. I read the words 40-day water fast and right away something inside my head said that I'm doing that, I'm going to do that. And at that point I really decided that I was going to do a 40-day fast. And for me, I've had experience doing it. So I kind of did a modified version of what I had researched. Now, a 40-day water fast, it's not just water, folks. You keep your electrolytes up and you supplement with certain supplements, and the first and probably one of the most important things is gray Celtic sea salt. And I'll just explain to you what I did and I was in a position where I have hypertension or high blood pressure, I am insulin resistant or type two, and I'm in a type two diabetic state because type two diabetes or insulin resistance is not type one.
Speaker 1:They are very, very different animals. Type 1 is where your body does not produce insulin at all and you have no choice but to go on insulin. And type 2 diabetes is all you. It's lifestyle is all you. It's lifestyle. It's abuse of food, and junk food in particular, and high fructose corn syrup, and you beat the shit out of your body with foreign sugars to the point where you become insulin resistant. And I believe that in time that can be reversed and that's what I'm working on doing right now. So I have the Freestyle Libre monitor glucose monitor hooked to my phone.
Speaker 1:So I had diagnostics. There were four categories of diagnostics that I kept fairly good track of and we're going to go through some of that. But those diagnostics were blood pressure, blood sugar levels, weight aggregate, weight loss and my notes right. So, right off the bat, I didn't just willy nilly jump into this and um and and uh with without a plan of sorts. Um, um, the plan come from experience in doing it before I've done, uh, at least three or four 10-day fasts, and that was actually the master liver cleanse and I took parts of that and incorporated it into this water fast. So why don't I tell you what I did in some kind of detail when I started, my day began first thing in the morning.
Speaker 1:I would get up. I would pull eight to nine jars, the quart jars, so one liter jars um out of my, um out of my, my cupboard, um, and I love jars, um, I collect jars, old jars, they're utilitarian. I use jars constantly, um I I never use glasses. I always drink out of jars. They have lidsids, they're beautiful, they're wonderful things. Anyway, I pull eight to nine of those out, set them on the countertop. I, for the first week, would put a teaspoon and a half of I'd measure that out in gray Celtic sea salt and then split a teaspoon and a half of that salt in each one of those eight to nine liters of water. So I would eye it, basically just pinch it and drop, split it as evenly as possible. Close is good, because it's all going down the hatch anyway.
Speaker 1:For the most part, drinking nine liters of water a day is a massively tall order, especially in the winter. You know, in the summertime, when you get out and you sweat buckets, it's not that hard to drink that amount of water. But when you're not sweating, and the only way that you're drink that amount of water but when you're not sweating, and the only way that you're getting rid of that water is by peeing it out, you're pissing ridiculous amounts, especially at night, I found. Anyway, I would split that salt up between my nine liters of water. I would split that salt up between my nine liters of water. I'm on a well so I don't have to worry about chlorine, but we do have a filter on it. It does add minerals back into the water. So I would use the filtered water and I would also every day supplement with magnesium and potassium and between the sea salt, magnesium, potassium. You're focusing on your electrolytes. So I started, and I started right away. The day I saw the 40 day. It was the morning of January the 6th and I had not had my breakfast yet and it began January the 6th and I started doing that and for the first week it was just the water, just the salt and just the magnesium and potassium. After the first week I took pieces from the Master Cleanse because one of my focuses.
Speaker 1:I do also have a fatty liver and have had fat in my liver for quite a few years, in my liver for quite a few years and my liver was really the main focus of this fast because the hypertension, the insulin resistance, all of the other issues that I have, all of the other issues that I have I believe the root cause is an unhealthy liver. The liver is one of the most wonderful organs in your body. It's next to the heart and some could say as important as the heart. Your liver is responsible for over 500 processes in the body. It makes hormones, it cleans blood, it removes impurities, it's responsible for so, so much energy production. Like I mean, google your liver and you'll fall in love with what it does for you. Be kind to your liver.
Speaker 1:So what I did after the second week I incorporated into each one of those liters of water I would squeeze half of a lemon. So I would go out, buy fresh lemons, bring them home and I would cut them in half. One lemon does two liters of water. So I went through a lot of lemons and then also I would add about quarter of a teaspoon of cayenne pepper into each one of those liters of water, and cayenne is another miracle spice.
Speaker 1:It is probably the healthiest thing that you can put into your body. It helps with all kinds of inflammatory issues. It's an anti-inflammatory. It won't burn you Like some peppers that you can eat. The oils will actually burn your throat and your stomach. Cayenne won't. Yes, it's hot, it feels a little uncomfortable, but it doesn't cause heartburn. It's one of the healthiest things that you can eat and it is cleansing for the liver. Can eat and it is cleansing for the liver. It both the lemon, um, and the cayenne, uh, in concert with a, a tablespoon of of olive oil, I added in to my regimen every day. Um, it helps detoxify the liver and I was really focused on eliminating, burning, shedding whatever you want to call that the fat out of my liver, because the longer you leave it, the closer you are to cirrhosis.
Speaker 1:And cirrhosis of the liver is where you've beat it up to the point where it starts to scar and your liver again. It is a wonderful, wonderful organ and it has the capability, like your lungs, to regenerate. And it has the capability, like your lungs, to regenerate. But once you hit the point of cirrhosis, you've hit the point of no return. Your liver doesn't regenerate from cirrhosis. Now, the good parts of your liver, they can still regenerate your liver, they can still regenerate. But the cirrhosis if 50% of your liver is scar tissue, then you've only got 50% left. That's the issue and that's the bottom line. So I was really focused on liver health, which, in turn, I was looking at my blood sugar and my blood pressure and all of that stuff to hopefully come back in line. And the other thing that inevitably happens when you don't eat is you lose weight. So we're going to talk about all of that. So we're going to talk about all of that.
Speaker 1:Now I'd like to shift gears and talk about the fast itself, and the fast comes in different stages, and what I mean by that is for me again, because I can only speak to you and I'm sorry if it comes across like I keep on saying this, but I'm only speaking from my experience. I do not suggest that you do this and if you do, I would suggest that you do a lot of research and go slow and steady. I didn't start on a 40-day fast and that is my first fast. I've been familiar with intermittent fasting and five-day fast. So, like I say, this is my experience, but the first. There's really three, maybe four stages in a fast, especially an extended fast. The first stage and in my opinion it is the hardest stage. And in my opinion it is the hardest stage, it is the first four to six days, and this is where your body lies to you, your mind lies to you, lies to you, and this is the phase of the fast where I can see how religious factions look at fasts and it's so much about spirituality as well, because you really fight a lot of demons and they become very, very clear.
Speaker 1:And and what I mean by that is your body will tell you that little voice in your head. You'll have cravings for things salt, chips, fast food, sugar, chocolate, all of those things that you are addicted to, all of those things that industry has put chemists out there, the food industry, have the best chemists in the world to mix salts and sugars and chemicals and MSG and all of these things to create what they call the bliss effect. And that is when you put something in your mouth you think, oh, my God, this is the best tasting stuff I have ever put in my mouth, even though you know those chicken nuggets at McDonald's. They're just sweeping the the, the, the parts of the chicken that fall out of the grinder off the floor and they mix it with a little bit of MSG, which is a neurotoxin that fools your mind into thinking it tastes great and it's addictive. And when you take that away from your body and your mind, you're under attack. For those first, like I say, four to six days, you are constantly under attack. Say four to six days, you are constantly under attack, and not only in your mind, your mind. That voice in there is telling you you have to eat, you're going to starve, you're going to starve, like I mean. But you know, guess what? After three days of not eating, every person on the planet knows that you're not going to starve. You're not, it's a lie. And your body, now your body, starts to go through withdrawal.
Speaker 1:And I had this time headaches. I had this time headaches and it kind of started the day that I started and I think some of it was mental. But, man, this migraine intensified and I made notes of it. It intensified for the first three days and I spent, to be honest with you about, oh, I don't know. Well, on the Wednesday I spent just about all day in bed. It was the migraine, and the strong cravings were just about unmanageable this time, for whatever reason, and when I had the migraine I didn't really feel like drinking, but I forced myself to drink. And you have to drink. You have to because that is number one. What's keeping your stomach full and helping you manage the, the cravings and the headaches, um and and, and ultimately, the detoxification. The detoxification when you start to just drink and you're only on that mixture of electrolytes, you begin to detoxify.
Speaker 1:And that this time, for me, was pretty severe, and I'm just looking at my notes here. So, as I progress through these stages, I'm going to give you my diagnostics. So on day one I didn't even take my blood pressure because I was scared, to be honest with you, and in the morning my blood sugar level was 8.1. Now, keep in mind that somewhere between four and a half and six is really normal. At noon it was 10.2. And in the evening it was 7.2. Now, that actually is a pretty good day for me.
Speaker 1:That was the first day of the fast. I hadn't eaten anything, but when I did eat at that point so back up to, you know, over the holidays and I was pretty good over the holidays. I didn't really gain any weight, um, um, but you know you have some stuff you shouldn't have. I was just portion controlling and and being fairly stringent with that. But my blood sugar after eating. Now, keep in mind, um, you're not really supposed to take your blood sugar test like the old days where you would poke your finger and then have a glucose monitor. That, when you would just test your blood in the moment. They say to take your blood sugar two hours after you eat. So, an average meal, when I would eat bread or any kind of complex carbohydrate or high sugar or whatever, or you know dessert, my blood sugar could spike up to you know 18, you know 18, which is like awful, um, and then in two hours it would be like 13, 12, which is still terrible, um, but anyway. So on day one, um, those were my blood sugar levels I started at 234 pounds, which was not a bad weight for that point in my life or that juncture. Over the last 15 years, my body weight has ranged from my heaviest, which was almost 270 pounds I think it was actually 267, 268 to as low as 220, but never lighter than 220. So 234 in that grand scheme of things over the while, and 220, like I mean, I was 220 in high school, so we can call. I don't even, I don't even want to say how many years that is, but it's a it's. It's a few decades or more. So 234 was kind of in that that range. But I've always wanted to be lighter because I'm um.
Speaker 1:The one thing was that really drove me. Once I saw that that 40 day fast, and knew I was going to do it. The next thing that come into my mind thought the thought that come in, was I'm sick of being sick, like I'm just sick of it. And that was where I was at. So my blood sugar was high. I started at 234.
Speaker 1:The cravings began by the end of the day. It doesn't take long, like I mean, you miss a couple of meals, that's that's when it begins. The next day I I still had the headache and it was bad enough that it intensified. And if I worked on the computer I couldn't. I couldn't focus on anything within 30 minutes, just staring at the computer doing the diaries, intros, doing whatever on the computer. I just couldn't do it.
Speaker 1:And that day, day two of the fast, my blood sugar was 8.6 in the morning, 9.1 at noon and 6.9 in the evening Drank my water, sea salt, and that night I actually in my note I say went to bed at six and Joe and Jimmy put me to sleep. And for those of you who don't know who Joe and Jimmy are, it's Joe Bowen and Jim Ralph and they are the commentators for the. But there is no better commentator out there on the planet for the Toronto Maple Leafs than Joe Bowen. I love you, joe and Jimmy. You're great too. You're the second best color man ever to don the title for the Maple Leafs. But Harry Neal has got you, you know, and I'm sure you're good with that, anyway. So they put me to sleep in bed six o'clock the next day I woke up and did the sea salt, the magnesium, all of my water, uh, but the cravings were still really strong, um, um, and and you know what I, um, I, I read somewhere about, and I'm just reading my note. My note says um, sea salt, magnesium, potassium water. I drank that. Cravings still strong, but becoming more manageable.
Speaker 1:Facilium powder delivered. Now, this was something that I had seen in my research online and somebody had said this facillium powder. It comes from the husk, or actually it's the facillium seed. You can get facillium husk powder and seed powder and it's supposed to be really good to cleanse your digestive tract. And I read somewhere that when you put it in water it turns into like a jello. And in my mind I'm like, oh my God, that sounds really good. Like I could eat some jello right now. You know it's your mind playing these tricks on you, right. Well, listen again from my experience.
Speaker 1:I took a teaspoon of the next day, which was day four for me. My notes are no real cravings now and no head pain, feeling good, took some facillium powder in the morning and one at night. So I took a teaspoon in the morning and a teaspoon at night. Well, I got reading the bag the second time I took it and it said you may expose your. There was a.
Speaker 1:There was a pretty stern warning on this bag about. It said something to the effect of you may expose yourself to lead and something else and it could block your intestinal tract if you don't drink enough water. And, like I mean, it was enough. It scared the shit out of me, to be honest with you, and I didn't take it again. So I don't recommend that. But again, like I say, that scared me. When you're in the wilds of Northwestern Ontario you need gear you can trust and a team that's got your back. That's Lakeside Marine in Red Lake, ontario Family owned since 1988. They're your go-to pro camp dealer, built for the North, from Yamaha boats and motors to everything in between.
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Speaker 1:Now I'm going to give you some interesting stats. I'm up to January the 10th, which is 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. On the morning of day 5, I had went from 234 pounds in weight and on the morning of day 5, I was at 225. My aggregate loss per day day one 1.8 pounds. Day two 2.2 pounds. Day three 2.6 pounds. Day four 2.2 pounds, and that brought me down to 225. So day five actually was one pound and it brought me to 224.2 and that in five days was 10 pounds. On average I was losing two pounds a day, and that's in water, that's in body weight.
Speaker 1:And everybody thinks that when you do this you lose fat, and that is true. But you don't just lose fat, you lose everything. And I knew that. I know this and it was a calculated decision that I made, that I was good with losing muscle mass, I was a pretty strong guy and I was good with losing the muscle mass. So now I'm kind of getting through the first stage, that five day point where the cravings start to disappear, and it was. This is the next stage. Your first stage is where everything is lying to you, where you're fighting these demons, where your ego, that voice in your head is doing everything it can to convince you to eat, tricking you, and once you get through that, all of a sudden you find yourself in a place where you really don't care too much about eating at all. Like I mean, there were times when I felt like I could do this forever, and for those of you out there who have done this type of fast, you know what I'm talking about. It's a wonderful, wonderful feeling. I had no more headaches, I had no cravings, I felt good. My aches and pains disappeared, the whole thing. Now I'm starting into the lemon juice and the cayenne and the anti-inflammatory properties. My knees didn't hurt. My back, when I got out of bed in the morning, wasn't sore. My feet weren't sore. My ankles weren't sore. That was a pretty regular occurrence when you know I was eating just willy-nilly and weighing, you know, to anywhere from 250 to 234. And, believe me, the heavier I got, the more intense the pain was. I had a lot of joint pain, a lot of stiffness, and it was all gone. It was gone. I wake up in the morning and I felt good. Now the other key thing that I implemented with this system and going through it I realized that it was probably the single most important part of the success of this fast was a daily routine, and over the 40 days the daily routine got broken a couple of times and that's how I realized how important it was. But a daily routine of yoga.
Speaker 1:Now with yoga, I'm not a stranger to yoga because all through the years that I owned the lodge, a good friend of mine his name is Aaron Downey. I'm going to have him on the on the show here shortly. Uh, but Aaron is a uh, a fitness and health uh master. I'm going to put him in the masterclass. Um, he, he played in the national hockey leagueockey League, got his 500 games in. He was basically an enforcer and he really was a pioneer when it came to yoga and stretching and body maintenance through the 90s and into the early 2000s and brought that to a lot of the teams the Montreal Canadiens, the Chicago Blackhawks. But we'll get into all of that his backstory. But long story short, I am no stranger to yoga because Aaron, once he retired, has a gym at his house and he'd have all his buddies over and we would be part of what he would call the breakfast club. So on Mondays and Fridays we do weight training and on Wednesdays we would do yoga every day. Um, and Pat Tryon, another great friend of of the Diaries family, um, he got onto a program online through Beachbody.
Speaker 1:Uh called um a three week yoga retreat and um, I had been doing that for for years too. It's 20 minutes a day, 20 to 30 minutes, and you just do it over and over and over again, and the first week is as good as the third week and you just constantly get better. So I was doing the three-week yoga retreat 20 minutes a day, and what that does is it's a very good way to manage and to keep track of how much strength I'm losing. There's two different categories for me. There's strength, which is muscle mass and tone, and there's energy, which is just energy levels because of the lack of food, or you know what I mean. So I could manage my and keep track of my energy loss and also my strength loss, and it was notable, like I mean it was notable. The strength loss because you hold some of these poses and they're not like, I mean, they're not difficult, but when you hold them for extended periods of time and I mean minutes, not hours you can feel how strong you are. My flexibility, because my thought was leaving and I didn't have a gut to work around, was getting a lot better, but my strength was going down, so that daily yoga was very important to me to keep track of those two key factors strength and energy.
Speaker 1:Then, directly following that, I love Wim Hof, and Wim Hof is the Iceman, and if you don't know Wim, google him. Google the Iceman. He is an extraordinary person and has come up with a breathing technique and I'm not going to get into it because that's a whole nother. That's like I mean you do a podcast series on it. That's like I mean you do a podcast series on it. But it's a breathing technique that helps alkalize your blood, builds energy, it trains your body to be efficient with oxygen. It's a wonderful, wonderful process, and not only that, pat and I really Pat started with it but it helps you become mindful, it helps you to meditate, because the gist of what WIM does is you take a number of deep, full breaths in a regular pace, in through your diaphragm, through your chest, and then out like a wave, like a circle, and you take 45 to 55 to 65 breaths in a row and you charge your body with oxygen and then, once you take your last breath, you do a retention, so you hold your breath for as long as you can and inside that retention it's like a meditation because you're not breathing anymore.
Speaker 1:And I have Wim's app. It's one of those things I'll always have. It's like 50 bucks a year and even if I didn't use it, I love Wim to the point where I just give him the 50 bucks anyway because he's cool. But I use the app and inside that retention he uses his voice and it's a little bit like a meditation, like he explains to you. You know, if your feet and hands are tingling, that's okay and let your body do what it's capable of doing, and he has a way of talking you through these retentions Focus on your heartbeat, feel your body.
Speaker 1:You know all of these different things and and it gives you a real chance to just relax and and not think and um, um, you do your best to let those thoughts go and and um, the the more you let them go, the better the thoughts come. And um, that meditation, um, usually do about a three quarter. I leave my lungs about three quarters full on that retention and I usually do three to four rounds of 45,. I think I got it set at 45 breaths, maybe 50. I'm holding my breath on average three and a half minutes. Usually my third retention is the longest and 70% of the time I'll hit four minutes or more. Four minutes and 10 seconds, four minutes and 15 seconds. So it really gives you an opportunity to let your thoughts go and and I try and let them go and I tell myself thank you for the thought, let it go, and some of them are so good that you really don't want to let them go. But I figure and Pat was again we've done a lot of discussion on this topic and if the thought is good enough, you won't forget it when you come out of the, out of the um, the um retention phase, and and when you're done the, the breathing technique right. So that was really important because it really helped me stay in tune spiritually and with my body as well and how I was feeling mentally.
Speaker 1:And I mentioned there were a few lapses. Well, I made note here on. Let's see, this was january the 12th, so six days after I started my um, my yoga, the, the beach body subscription run out and um, I started doing like a five-minute yoga on my own and then I missed it a few days. Well, my cravings started coming back, my mental toughness was suffering, I was hangry, you know hungry and angry and my family were, were the ones that were getting, were getting the blunt of it. And I, I got, I had to get back to that yoga and and, like a switch, you know three days without it and all of that, all of those symptoms were happening to me. And I went back to the yoga and the day I went back everything was better again. So that part was really really important.
Speaker 1:Um, and yoga and Wim Hof are two of the things that got me through this safely. And I say safely because it can be dangerous if you don't do things right. And yes, I'm going to jump ahead quickly. I'll just mention the dangerous part. The danger is restarting your digestive system after a long fast. That's the danger, and once we get there, I'll explain that in a little more detail. So I haven't told you anything about my blood pressure. We're talking already six, seven, eight days into this.
Speaker 1:The first time I took my blood pressure was on day three and the way that I was doing it, I would take three readings, take the average, because your blood pressure is one of those things where it's all over the place. And to get a good blood pressure reading you should have that cuff on your arm level with your heart and you should take, you know, five minutes of meditation, relaxation, you know, just deep breathing to calm yourself down. Because even just the thought of taking your blood pressure for some people elevates your blood pressure. It's called white coat syndrome and that's where you go to the doctor's office and because you know the doctor's taking your blood pressure, the stress of knowing that, taking your blood pressure, the stress of knowing that, puts your blood pressure up. Well, the stress of knowing that you have high blood pressure and taking your blood pressure and being scared to look at that number puts your blood pressure up too.
Speaker 1:But on January the 9th I did the three average blood. I did it twice because I missed on quite a few on the days before. In the morning my blood pressure was 177 over 109, with a beats per minute of 71. There's a little white coat going on in there, I was sure. So I come back at noon and after I did the yoga and the Wim Hof, and the Wim Hof exercise is a great way to breathe deep and relax and meditate. After the Wim Hof, I also just lie down on my yoga mat and I took about five minutes of just relaxation. I got back up and I took my blood pressure at that point and I averaged out 154 over 97, with the beats per minute of 65, which is still high. It's still high. So, but at the end of the day I told myself, and I still do they're numbers. I need to really watch the numbers and need to know the numbers to diagnose what's going on and to see what's going on right.
Speaker 1:So this whole time I have not had a bowel movement, not one. Uh, the first day I did, but that was, you know, that was from everything from before. So the first time that I had a bowel movement I made note of it, obviously because it's important, and I was watching my weight and I didn't realize what was going on. I had my first bowel movement. My first shit was on January the 15th, at night. Okay, my aggregate weight loss for that day was 1.4, but I took that weight loss in the morning, um and um. The day before that I went to see my buddy, gary, and we'll get into that right after this. But the following day I had another bowel movement, and you know Another bowel movement, and you know this was the day that I took another spoonful of the Fasilium seed powder and then I noticed that there was all this scary shit written on the bag and that was the last time I used it. But I was looking at my aggregate weight loss and on the 15th I lost 1.4 pounds. Well, on the 16th. So three pounds in one day.
Speaker 1:And one of the things that I told myself was I cannot let my ego get in the way during phase two of the fast with putting the brakes on and saying, okay, enough is enough, because let me just explain. Well, first I'll finish my thought. So, 2.8 pounds, and I was a little concerned. I thought, oh my God, that's a lot of weight for one day, and I hadn't put my notes in the Excel spreadsheet yet. So later on that day I was writing my notes in and I realized on that day I had the shit the night before, and a big one that day, and the difference was my bowel movement, and the following day I only lost 0.6 pounds, right? So that was the thing, and taking these notes and journaling is another hugely important part of this process, just for these reasons. So you can look and correlate things and see, okay, well, that makes sense. I know why I lost three pounds that day. You know what I mean. So because what was once concern and thinking, oh, you know, I can't really lose that kind of weight, although I like it to be honest with you kind of weight, although I like it to be honest with you, but anyway. So journaling and taking those notes and that correlation between my bowel movement and that huge weight loss in one day, that was the revelation on how important it is to take these notes.
Speaker 1:Now, I didn't get the notes taken every single day. I got my blood sugar and my weight loss and my my aggregate weight loss per day all filled out every day, but the notes not so much, just kind of cause a lot of it once you get rolling, is the same, the same, the same, the same, like I mean my blood sugar by this time, so by the, by the 15th, my blood sugar is like am on the 15th, 4.1. Noon, 4.6. Pm, 4.9. Like, perfect. And it stayed within those boundaries high being 5.9, low being, you know, 4.3, which is perfect, like I mean it is like if I went to the doctor at that point. They took my blood sugar. They would say you don't have diabetes, and they also do. They measure an AC1, which is just your three month average. And by the time I was done this, even though I did 40 days, the perfect blood sugar levels for 95% of the 40 days changed my three-month number, my AC1, down to six. And that is normal. They would like, I mean they would say I'm cured, right, but that's beside the point, we can talk about that later. And on the 16th my blood pressure was still being stubborn Like. It was 162 over 106, with a beats per minute of 67. So you know that that that's that that was was 215.8 and 215 was one of my recent, my adult life lows Like I I had never I hadn't seen below 220 in 20 years. Um, so 215, that that was. That was quite an achievement at that point.
Speaker 1:But the second stage of this is where you feel like you can do it forever. And at this point I was talking about my ego and I wanted to make sure, and that was the whole. You know the three pound in a day loss and worrying a little bit about that. But I said to myself okay, in stage two, your body does not lie to you, right? It doesn't lie when, if your body is telling you you're hungry, or your energy levels drop extremely low, or your blood sugar bottoms out or you begin to lose too much weight, just because I saw 40 days and I got that in my mind, I wanted to be sure that I wasn't going to let my ego say I'm going to do 40 days, no matter what I'm going to get there, because I know I can. Well, I know Like that egotistical drive in there could cloud your judgment and push you through into dangerous waters, and I didn't. I did not want to do that, so I was very mindful of that, and that's where the Wim Hof, the yoga and the mindfulness really, really helped. The other thing that I want to mention and I mentioned it right before the whole my big shit thing Um, I went to see my buddy, gary Tebow, and I'm going to have Gary on as well.
Speaker 1:He's he's an absolutely interesting um guy, um and um, um. I really look forward to having him on again. I had him on a short stay last year at the Sportsman Show and we did those three or four shows live from the Sportsman Show. I had Frank from Ugly Pike and Gary on at the same time and we talked a little about health and wellness. But Gary is what he does is he looks at, he analyzes your blood under a very powerful microscope and he is really good. And I've been going to homeopathic doctors and over the years. I'm not a big fan of big pharma, I don't like the fact that there is so much money involved and money corrupts everything, and I believe that the best way to heal your body is through natural means and through food as medicine. And Gary is that guy. But he analyzes your blood and I'm going to read you the notes that I wrote from that Went to see Gary.
Speaker 1:He noted that I was releasing toxins from the top of my head and called the headaches Like I didn't I, I, I was very guarded with the information that I give to these people. Um, I the. Whenever they ask me questions about how I'm feeling and everything else, I tell them I feel good, I feel all right, I feel good. What do you see? And I let them tell me. Well, he called those migraine headaches right off the bat when he was looking at my blood, so I've written in here he called the headaches I also. He also called my eyesight degradation. Now I'm just turned 49. So I'm at that point in my life where you know your eyes. I'm now in glasses. Probably should have been a couple of years ago, but the degradation of my eyesight has been noticeable in the last year. And I'll go back to my notes.
Speaker 1:He called my eyesight degradation and explained it is due to poor liver function. Now what he told me is your liver cleans your blood. It's one of the main functions and when it gets overtaxed, right, your liver's like Spider-Man. It'll throw out these webs into your blood and these webs act like gillnets for shit floating around in your blood, whether it's sugar for shit floating around in your blood, whether it's sugar. And when you look at your blood you can see sugar in there and it's like crystals and they're jagged and they're sharp. And that's why a diabetic, when you have high blood sugar, that's why you're and I thought the eyesight thing was because of the sugar, which for all intents and purposes it probably is look like quartz rock, but sharp and jagged.
Speaker 1:And in the smallest capillaries in your body, in your eyes, for instance, in your lungs, those capillaries in some cases could be one to two molecules or blood cells wide and when that sugar gets pumped through there it cuts and it damages those tiny, those tiny blood vessels right. And then your body tries to repair them with cholesterol and it sticks cholesterol to the blood vessel walls, trying to fix up all this damage, walls, trying to fix up all this damage but to go and see so these, your liver throws out these nets to try and catch all of this shit to help it. And he said I can tell your eyesight is changed. Has your eyesight changed in the last little while? And I said, oh my God, yes, it has. It's been a concern actually. And he explained it was poor liver function. And he also noted that my blood was thick and I needed to drink more water. And I said, holy shit, more water. Now, mind you, I was having a hard time getting nine liters of water into me. There were some days where I could only get six. So I took heed and took that to heart and I left Gary and Gary mixed me up some tea, um, and he's um, um, that's how he um, he helps with uh, with um, herbal medicine is uh, teas and he uses all kinds of natural things that, um, he collects from a couple of properties that he owns. He collects from a couple of properties that he owns, whether it's slippery elm bark, wormwood, cedar, you know all kinds of different natural things, dandelion root, you name it. He's got it figured out. So he mixed me up my tea and then I progressed and over the next three weeks really it was pretty smooth sailing. To be quite honest with you, I'm just looking at my notes here.
Speaker 1:January the 20th Okay, so this is. I'm in the teens somewhere, 15, 16 days. I'm 5'1", 4'8", 4'8" and my blood pressure, you know, it's 159 over 98. So I'm on the bottom number. I'm breaking into the 90s. And the one the day before, well, two days before my blood pressure was 142 over 89 at 65 beats per minute. So now I'm seeing that low number creep into the 80s, which is really good. But on January 20th in particular I see my note felt really tired. 20th in particular, I see my note felt really tired.
Speaker 1:Found that if I don't keep up on the water intake I lose energy fast. Went to bed at 10 pm yesterday and slept till 10 am. Woke up and had a good day. Also, I have found that making food for the family or to preserve makes me feel better, even though I am not eating. Now that was a real revelation to me, because that just the smells of the food that I was making was decadent, delicious. I could taste the food just by smelling it.
Speaker 1:And I made stews, I made chili, I made cabbage rolls, I made all kinds of healthy food options, and my cabbage rolls, by the way, I made with cauliflower rice. So I just put the cauliflower, a whole cauliflower, through the food processor, made rice out of it and use that for the rice. And I made my own spaghetti sauce. And I kind of did it out of my memory of watching my dad's sister, my Aunt Regina. She married an Italian fella and become like Aunt Regina is Polish Nidziewski, but by marrying an Italian and growing up with my grandmother and her mother-in-law man, she is one of the most outstanding Italian cooks and Polish cooks there are out there. And from when she looked after my grandma, I remember I would go there and she'd be making her tomato sauce and I watched because, oh my God, she ruined me forever for any kind of store-bought and tomato sauce, because it's just shit compared to hers.
Speaker 1:So I made my own tomato sauce for the, for the cabbage rolls and just that helped my mental stability and I think maybe it was just knowing that when I come off of eating or start come off of the fast and started eating again, I would have healthy options. I made kapusta, which is um um sauerkraut soup, polish sauerkraut soup, and I got my dad's recipe. Like I mean, it was really an opportunity for me to think back when I was a kid and and my grandmother, grandma Nitzwicky, she they grew, they had, they had a hundred acre farm and like I mean, they ate from the farm, they grew their own vegetables. She made all of this stuff out of their own animals and their own milk and their own everything. And just to get some of those recipes and to make it and to seal it in jars and have it so that I can, you know, I know I'm going to have good food later. That made me feel better and was very important. And again, the water thing was a revelation. I needed to drink water. I knew that if I missed drinking a liter of water my energy would quickly wane and it was really really important that I kept up with that water. And then you know again that whole middle section, the was pretty darn easy.
Speaker 1:On the 29th of January now, my blood pressure starting to look decent, it was 133 over 89, with beats per minute of 59. My blood sugar 4.8, 4.4, 4.6. And my weight was 200.8 pounds. The 29th and, interestingly enough, the day before, I lost no weight. The 29th I and this, okay, the 29th. So from the 6th to the 29th you folks do the math I had another shit After not eating for I don't know 23 days. There's still stuff in there that's coming out of me.
Speaker 1:The other thing that I did that was key, and this was a Gary Thibault tip that he gave me before I did this that I've kind of held on to and solidly incorporated into my routine. And still now I have a kombucha bottle, rise or whatever, but it's a one liter bottle and it's like it's got a lid that you can, a screw top lid on it. It's not like a glass. I use it as my water bottle because Gary explained to me that if you put a liter of water beside your bed and in the morning before you get out of bed, while you're lying flat, you've got a valve in your gut called the duodenum and that valve, while you lay flat, opens. It falls open and it allows your digestive system to your stomach to drain into your digestive system.
Speaker 1:Well, when you drink a liter of water which sounds like a lot all in one sitting while you're lying down, that runs directly. Not all of it, I would assume, but some of it goes directly into your digestive tract and it's a wonderful way to hydrate yourself and not feel bloated Like I mean. You can drink that at least I can drink that one liter and I'll lie in bed for I don't know five minutes after just to let it settle. And when you're on a fast especially day 23 or 24, you can feel that water moving through the pipes. It's kind of a cool sensation. But I always would start my day and that was a way that I got a liter of water into me quick.
Speaker 1:Now, that was straight water. There was no salt, no magnesium, no, nothing. In that first liter of water that was filtered fresh water and that helped. But that was Gary. And then on the 31st I had another bowel movement, um, uh. And then on the 31st I had another bowel movement Um, I, I, I, and. And the note was it's ridiculous Uh, my note said had another shit like the size of a hot dog Can't be lemon pulp and cayenne can it? Well, I don't know Like. I mean, I'm, I'm down to 200 pounds and I haven't eaten in 24 days and there's still stuff coming out of me, right?
Speaker 4:Hi everybody. I'm Angelo Viola and I'm Pete Bowman. Now you might know us as the hosts of Canada's Favorite Fishing Show, but now we're hosting a podcast. That's right Every Thursday, ange and I will be right here in your ears bringing you a brand new episode of Outdoor Journal Radio.
Speaker 1:Now, what are we going to talk about for two hours every week?
Speaker 4:Well, you know there's going to be a lot of fishing.
Speaker 2:I knew exactly where those fish were going to be and how to catch them, and they were easy to catch.
Speaker 3:Yeah, but it's not just a fishing show. We're going to be talking to people from all facets of the outdoors, from athletes.
Speaker 2:All the other guys would go golfing Me and Garton Turk and all the Russians would go fishing To scientists. But now that we're reforesting and letting things breathe. It's the perfect transmission environment for line to be.
Speaker 3:To chefs If any game isn't cooked properly, marinated, you will taste it.
Speaker 4:And whoever else will pick up the phone Wherever you are. Outdoor Journal.
Speaker 3:Radio seeks to answer the questions and tell the stories of all those who enjoy being outside.
Speaker 4:Find us on Spotify, apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Find us on Spotify, apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 5:As the world gets louder and louder, the lessons of our natural world become harder and harder to hear, but they are still available to those who know where to listen. I'm Jerry Ouellette and I wasoured to serve as Ontario's Minister of Natural Resources. However, my journey into the woods didn't come from politics. Rather, it came from my time in the bush and a mushroom. In 2015, I was introduced to the birch-hungry fungus known as chaga, a tree conch with centuries of medicinal use by Indigenous peoples all over the globe.
Speaker 5:After nearly a decade of harvest use, testimonials and research, my skepticism has faded to obsession and I now spend my life dedicated to improving the lives of others through natural means. But that's not what the show is about. My pursuit of the strange mushroom and my passion for the outdoors has brought me to the places and around the people that are shaped by our natural world. On Outdoor Journal Radio's, under the Canopy podcast, I'm going to take you along with me to see the places, meet the people. That will help you find your outdoor passion and help you live a life close to nature and under the canopy. Find Under the Canopy now on Spotify, apple Podcasts or wherever else you get your podcasts.
Speaker 1:The target day, the day 40, was February the 14th. And now, once February rolled around, I started thinking about how to begin my refeeding program and doing a lot of research on that subject. And this is the third stage, really, of your fast, and a very, very important one even 20 days. Your digestive system is built out of billions of microbes, of bacteria good bacteria in most cases and they have all gone dormant or died Like. Your digestive system at this point is shut down. There is, there is no, um, there's nothing in there to help digest your food, your all of the, the bile secretions and um, all of that digestive system is closed. She's closed for business. So if, at that point, you decide, yep, today is the day I'm going to eat, and you head down to Mickey D's and smash two Big Macs, three hamburgers dressed like Macs and a filet of fish, you're going to jam your digestive tract. Three hamburgers dressed like Mac's and a filet of fish, you're going to jam your digestive tract. Or if you decide to go, I'm going to eat healthy, I'm going to have a 12-ounce steak, four potatoes and a half a block of cheese, well, you're going to jam, you're going to block your digestive tract and blocking your digestive tract could be life-threatening, like I mean, it's serious shit. And I was a little bit nervous about doing this, like on my first fast, the first one I ever did. This is the one I did with Philly, phil head chef Phil at Chaudière and it consisted of the master cleanse recipe and it's basically your cayenne, your lemon juice, your water, but this also uses pure maple syrup in that drink and that gives you some energy. I was using no maple syrup for energy I didn't want to use anything like that because I didn't want my blood sugar to spike and this water fast. People are doing it and have done it for thousands of years since the times of Jesus. Jesus did a 40-day fast in the Bible. So I knew I didn't need that and I didn't want it. But now I'm at a point where I really need to start to think about a refeeding program and I had thought about it a little bit and that first fast it was 10 days and I made it the 10 days but, my God, it was.
Speaker 1:It was difficult and I did it because, being at the lodge, um, I never really ate um meals at a regular time. Right I would. I always had access to the walk-in fridge and the chefs would always have, you know, they would plate up a couple of extra dinners because, you know, we, we would offer two, two plates every, every dinner, right, there'd be, say, duck, confit, or you can choose, you know, a strip loin with the fixings. So they would make, you know, one, two plates extra, just in case one of the girls trips and a plate goes down or whatever. So there was always food in the walk-in fridge, food in the walk-in fridge, and not only that, like I mean, there was always desserts and and and cold meat and, like I mean, you walk into that walk-in fridge and it was a fat kid's dream and I was the fat kid, right. So at any time of the day, typically when I was right before bed, you know, I'd forget to eat dinner because I was working the dining room. I'd forget to eat, you know, lunch, and then I'd be ripping through and anyway.
Speaker 1:So I did this first fast to lose weight. That's the bottom line. There was no other thought about anything else, it was just shedding weight and I did. I lost, you know, 25 pounds in 10 days. But there was no thought about refeeding.
Speaker 1:There was a refeeding and, as a matter of fact, that fast ended on Thanksgiving and at the lodge we did a massive Thanksgiving dinner and it was it was served family style and all of our guests and Thanksgiving did end up getting and all of our guests and Thanksgiving did end up getting becoming busy. But that year I think we had maybe 20 guests and for Thanksgiving what we did was it was a family service, family style. So we pushed all the tables together, everybody sat together. My mom and dad were already up, my gram was up, my aunt and uncle, aunt Heather and Uncle Chuck, aunt Beth and Uncle Barry, like I had my siblings, whoever, scotty, all of these people that were coming up to help me close, they were all there. All of these people that were coming up to help me close, they were all there and you know, the guests were there and all of the staff. I had all of the staff come and we all sat together as a big family. And mother, mother, mother, mother, did I ever lace into that meal? After 10 days, my mom come up to me. She said you're gonna, you're, you're gonna plug your guts up Like you need to, you need to slow down. And um, uh, I, I made it through. Uh, it was, it was fine, um but um.
Speaker 1:This 40 day fast was way different than that. So my refeeding program began at about day 34. So day 30 on, let's see here. I went out on February the 3rd, so that's 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 days before day 40, and bought and this was from Harmony Foods, it's just a health food store I bought organic and this was from Harmony Foods, it's just a health food store.
Speaker 1:I bought organic plain yogurt, organic kefir, and kefir is fermented milk, which is supposed to be one of the best probiotics for your large intestines on the planet. In preparation for this and what I started to do, let's see here. On February the 9th, so that is T minus 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 days before day 40. Day 40. I started with a fork and I would dip the fork into the yogurt and I would take I took one fork full, so it wasn't even like a scoop, just a straight. I would dip the fork in and then I would eat one forkful of the yogurt, one of the kefir, and I would take a tablespoon of the fermented coconut water to start to repopulate the gut flora that I was lacking to help in the digestive system, and I slowly started to increase that. So the next day I would take two or three forkfuls of each.
Speaker 1:And I got to tell you, if you have never had plain organic yogurt and kefir before, after not eating for 35 days, it is exquisite. The sour like I mean to start to bring back tastes and flavors, even tastes and flavors that you didn't like before, even tastes and flavors that you didn't like before. They're intense and they're just like. I mean. It was delicious Just dipping a fork into plain raw yogurt and trying it and tasting the flavor profile of organic plain yogurt. Sour, oh sour you want to talk sour, I'll tell you what but delicious at the same time. And then follow that up with the plain kefir. And the kefir is like a fermented milk. The yogurt, the consistency, is a little more stiff, right, it's like yogurt. The kefir is a little more runny, more like a thick buttermilk kind of, and the kefir is so much sweeter I'll say I'm not sure if sweet is the right, less sour is probably the best way to describe it and I really enjoyed the flavor profile of organic kefir and even before this fast, I would periodically use organic kefir in salad dressings for me my grandmother used to make.
Speaker 1:She called it cucumbers and cream, but it was really cucumbers and onions with a tiny little bit of fresh garlic cut up, put in a big bowl and she would put salt, pepper, vinegar and whole unpasteurized cream from the farm right, she had access to the cream all together in a bowl and oh, from my childhood it was delightful, it was. One of my favorite things was cucumbers and cream and the longer the cucumbers stayed in it they would become a little bit flaccid kind of, and that's when it was the best. But anyway, the kefir is a very, very close match to that and for me, just eating that kefir and tasting that flavor profile was just amazing, like all of these flavors, especially when you're introducing them back individually. You're introducing them back individually. I read the jar on the fermented coconut milk and it said that it's got a pungent. The description on it was it's got a sulfuric smell and a pungent taste. And when I'm reading it in the health food store I'm like, ooh, health food store. I'm like, ooh, that's kind of, that's a, that's a. That's a hell of a description for flavor profile. But anyway.
Speaker 1:So I remember the first time I took the tablespoon which was on on the, the, the 10th or whatever day it was, and I opened up. I shook it real good, because that's what you're supposed to do. I opened it up and I was waiting for this sulfur smell. Like I mean, I grow chickens and have fresh eggs here at the house and I know what sulfur smells like. I didn't really smell the sulfur. Well, I took a tablespoon of this, expecting it to be pungent. You know what it was. It was delicious too, like I mean I know I haven't eaten in in in 35 days, so just about everything. A skunk's ass would taste delicious, I'm sure, just about everything. A skunk's ass would taste delicious, I'm sure, but I really it was. I'm still. I still take it, but there was nothing wrong with it at all. It was a little bit sour, but other than that it was good.
Speaker 1:So now what I'm doing is I'm slowly introducing probiotic into my gut. I also started taking Melissa's gut. My wife's got a. She takes a probiotic supplement, so I saw that in the fridge. So I popped a few of those down too along the way. And then on the 12th of February so T minus two I started with vegetable broth, homemade vegetable broth and all I did.
Speaker 1:Now I'm getting all of this information and these ideas from a couple of sources. Um, number one, um I I use chat, gpt, and I asked, I ask, um, I ask it for uh, advice and um, um, it's pretty good, it's pretty good. And also, um, uh, the interweb. Um, there's a couple of people that do extended fasts and have built these refeeding programs. So I just, and the one thing I'm going to stress, if you decide to do something like this and again, I am not suggesting that anybody should try this, but if it's right for you the one thing that I can't stress enough is don't use just one source of information. Use as many sources of information as you can find. Use meditation, and let I'm gonna call them them God guide you, um, but you can call, call it source, you can call it where my ideas come from, whatever, but take as many sources of information and choose the things that are right for you.
Speaker 1:Well, the one thing that I chose that I felt was right for me was starting with a vegetable broth. I started with the probiotic five days before and used all natural sources you know which ones they are and then I started with the vegetable broth on the 12th, and the vegetable broth was simply two whole organic carrots. I cut the top and the tip off, I didn't even peel it, I washed it and I put two whole organic carrots into about I don't know. I think I ended up with probably about a liter of broth from it and four no, it was four organic carrots and two pieces of celery. The celery stalks were average to large and the carrots were average size, four and two and probably a liter and a half of water, with my pinch of gray Celtic sea salt in the water to help her boil.
Speaker 1:And I boiled those for I don't know, probably three, three and a half hours, four hours, brought it to a boil quick, on high, and then set it right back to simmer and just let it simmer for four hours and then dumped the broth into a bowl and I grabbed a spoon and I ate a bowl of broth and the act of actually having a utensil to eat was wonderful and it and it, um, it fools your psyche into feeling like I'm. I I'm not drinking, even though, like I mean, I could have put that broth in a mug. All it was was carrot celery water and I could have drank it, but the fact that I was able to use a utensil to eat was awesome. It was one of those things where I um, it was a puree day. So I took those four medium-sized carrots, the two celery stalks, the little bit of broth that was left in the bottom celery stalks, the little bit of broth that was left in the bottom.
Speaker 1:I added cinnamon, which is another spice that I forgot to mention, that I was using on a semi-regular basis through the 40 days in my teas, because cinnamon, again, is an amazing, amazing spice for a raft of different things, but namely balancing your blood sugar. Cinnamon is wonderful for that. So I was using cinnamon. So, with the carrots and the celery and the little bit of broth that was left, I brought that back up to a boil. I threw in a full teaspoon of real cinnamon.
Speaker 1:Now, this isn't the kind of cinnamon that you buy from Zare's, that comes in the little jar. It's a different type of cinnamon, a whole cinnamon that I bought at the health food store and I bought a fairly large. But the taste and the flavor profile and the smell of this real cinnamon is outstanding. It almost reminded me when I open the bag and I smell it and these things are terrible for you. But you remember when you were a kid, you used to get the little gummies that were shaped in like a Coca-Cola bottle and they were like a Coca-Cola gummy. Well, I'm sure they must have used some synthetic cinnamon, because this cinnamon reminds me of those little stupid candies. So anyway, in the carrot water and celery water, with the carrots and celery, I put a full teaspoon of cinnamon in there.
Speaker 1:I also threw a teaspoon of curry powder, which is something that I enjoy in certain foods, and then took my wand blender and I puree the shit right out of that stuff. Man, it was like pablum, and I put that in a bowl and I got to tell you. Well, first of all, I kind of felt a little bit like I was cheating because it was on the 13th, so I had the carrots and whatever on day 39. But, having said that, I'm, I'm good. I'm, I'm good with it because I'm, I'm there and um, it was, um, it was the nourishment that I needed.
Speaker 1:And that soup. The moment that I finished it, I stood up, I walked right over to my recipe box and I wrote down that recipe, and since then I've tried to make it again, but it doesn't taste the same. I don't know whether it was the fact that it was so delicious and the flavor profile. With the cinnamon and a little bit of curry, it was like a, and with the carrots, the natural sweetness of the carrots. It was such a delicious soup. Delicious soup, but I'm struggling to figure out if I'm not getting the recipe right, if I hit it out of the park on the first one, or if it was just the fact that it's the first actual, not even solid, like puree pablum food that I had in 40 days. And it was, it was delicious. Anyway, I've made it since and it's not bad, it's good.
Speaker 1:But um, uh, I'll never forget eating that soup on on day 39. And then on day 40, um, I had, um, um, uh, another another bowl of soup and like folks, I'm just like I'm talking one bowl of soup for the day, including all of my water. That water regimen is still in full force on the refeeding program. Like I'm not backing off on the water because I'm eating the soup, I'm still solidly locked into that regimen. And on day 40, I had a vegetable soup, but this time I didn't puree it, I cut the veggies up small and it was actually something that I could chew on and that again it wasn't as good as the soup from the day before. But that was the beginning of the refeeding program and the following day it was again day 41. Now I'm on to um, um, a couple of bowls of that vegetable soup and I added in some spinach, which is your, your, um, your uh, your leafy greens and um and then um. You know, you slowly start to get back in.
Speaker 1:It was three days of soft vegetables, steamed zucchini with no skin. Peel the skin, steam the zucchini and add a little bit of it wasn't butter, I put ghee, the ghee which is like milk fat. I'm a believer in butter, I'm a believer in milk fat, I'm a believer in natural fats like that. I wouldn't eat margarine. I'll tell you a quick story about margarine.
Speaker 1:I left a jar of margarine, like a margarine container of margarine, out in the barn. I don't even remember when I was a kid, why I had it or when or whatever, or even if it was me who put it out there, but this margarine stayed uncovered out in the barn at Graham's place, graham and his wickies. It had to have been there for a month. The flies didn't even go on it. Nothing ate it. And even as a younger kid I looked at that margarine and I thought to myself if the bugs don't eat it, it can't be good. Right, you leave, you take fresh butter from the, from the cream separator that Graham would make. The flies would be all over the place. They couldn't wait to get to it, right? But anyway, so I, um, I steamed uh, the, the, the vegetables, and a little bit of, uh, of um ghee and a little salt, little pepper, and oh, again, those three, those, those.
Speaker 1:I've never had vegetables that were so flavorful and wonderful, and then into my stews with a little bit of meat. And the meat in the soup is a great way that, I felt, for me to start back onto protein, onto meat, because when I would make the soup the meat typically was left over from dinner, so it had been cooked already once. Then you put it in the soup and it, and it boils in the soup as well. So it was, it was very soft and and um, and already broken down a little bit, and a lot of the, the fat and protein has has has left the, the actual meat, some of it anyway, and gone into your bone broth and into the soup and I was using in these soups, like from day 40 on, wasn't vegetable broth, it was my bone broth that I make with the chickens.
Speaker 1:I usually grow anywhere from 30 to 50 roosters every year and when we butcher them we do that ourselves and I process them. So what I mean by that is I take the breasts, I take the thighs, I take the, the drumsticks and, and I part out the birds, which leaves me with a carcass of of the, the, the body carcass right and and the neck. One year I took the necks off because when I was a kid, at Graminid's Wikis, we always used to do this at the farm, but in higher numbers and the necks were always. We always fought over the neck and and the feet believe it or not, that was one of our treats was a big bowl of chicken feet and there's basically nothing on them except for a tiny little piece of meat and then a little bit of cartilage, and really all it was was a vehicle to get the salt and vinegar into you. But that's another story. But after day 40, so with the carcasses that I get from these 50 birds, or 40 birds or 30 birds.
Speaker 1:I've got one big pot that's so big. I just keep it out in the garden, I flip it over, I use it once a year to make bone broth and I clean it out. It's stainless, it's like I don't know 38 gallons or something. It's massive. I bring it in the house and as I'm processing the birds, the carcasses all go right into that pot raw, into that pot raw, and uh, I, uh, I use a turkey um um, a turkey um um propane burner, like for the turkey boilers. I throw this big pot on top of it and, um, I use, I let it, I bring it up to a slow rolling boil, a simmer, and I add water. Over the period of this last batch man, I let her go, for it was six days. It was six days that I boiled the bone broth, the other very important thing that you need to do and with this broth I always take a run through the yard. I got gardens in multiple spots and I'll pull dandelion roots and burdock roots and whatever. You know, lamb's quarter leaves.
Speaker 1:A few years ago, from having the lodge and not being able to look after my garden, the weeds took they just take over and I got so pissed off. I googled edible weeds in Ontario and found that there are so many things that you can eat, and so, you know, I incorporate some of that stuff into my bone broth, along with carrots and onions and garlic and all of the other good stuff, boil it for the six days, add water as I'm going along and then strain everything out. You don't stir it. That's the mistake I made.
Speaker 1:The other key ingredient that you need to put into your bone broth is apple cider vinegar, and I use the glug method because it's such a big pot. I just, you know, take a bottle of apple cider vinegar and I go, let's give her four glugs, dump her over and she goes glug, glug, glug, glug. That's good, and then you know, but what that does is the vinegar. The acidity in that vinegar pulls out all of the minerals from the bones, from the cartilage and from those carcasses. And then, once it's done, I let it cool a bit and then I strain it through just the strainers, you know, like a mesh strainer, and then I put it through a cheesecloth for a second time just to clean it up and take all of the sediment and debris out of the actual bone broth and then all of the bones and the boiled, everything that gets discarded. It goes and makes wonderful, uh, wonderful dirt, uh.
Speaker 1:But the key thing with that too is I've got dogs so I gotta dig a. I usually dig a um a hole. I got the invisible fence that keeps them out of my garden too, because I got a lab and she eats everything, like I mean she eats my carrots, digs the carrots out, the peppers, the like. I mean the dog eats anything. So you got to be careful if you're getting rid of those bones. I bury them real deep, usually about three feet deeper than what the rototiller will turn up.
Speaker 1:Anyway. So back to this fast. We got off on a tangent. So back to this fast. We got off on a tangent, the last. So that refeeding program is your third stage, which I thought was the most important. But I realized that once you finish and you achieve something like this, you take a breath and you're like I did it, I'm done. And I forgot about the diagnostics. I forgot about the journaling. I forgot about the daily yoga. Forgot about the daily yoga. I forgot about all of the habits that I had built over the 40 days and the old ones started to creep back in the old habits of snacking and you know I knew I was going to gain weight back quick.
Speaker 1:Today is the 25th of February and since I finished my fast and my weight when I finished my my fast was 191 pounds I had not weighed 191 pounds since grade eight. I was 190 pounds in grade eight and I know this because I was in the wrestling competition and I was about 25 pounds heavier than everybody else in the whole district and I wasn't overly fat. I was probably, you know, 5'9", 190 pounds and I ended at 191. And I ended at 191. Now my weight loss really slowed down. For the last week, on the 7th, I was 194.4. So over 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 days, two, three, four, five, six, seven days. So over the course of seven days I lost 3.4 pounds.
Speaker 1:I had been used to losing up until that point and it was pretty much a well, it kind of slowed down. I was hitting plateaus where, you know, for three days I would lose 0.6, one pound zero pounds, and then I'd hit on a 2.6 and then, you know, 0.06. I actually, on the January 31st, gained 0.2 pounds, but then on February 1st the next day I lost 2.2. Those last seven days. I lost 3.4 pounds over the whole course of seven days, so it really slowed down. But the most important phase for me is the phase that I'm in right now and I didn't realize until I had gained back about eight pounds that I was like, oh shit, and that was in a week.
Speaker 1:And I knew and I think part of it was my mental state, and throughout this whole thing there were a couple of people that I talked to a lot about what I was experiencing and my experience and doing this stuff, because both of them have had experience doing the 10-day cleanses, and one it was Patrick Tryon and the other is is Ange Viola, and you know I was telling Ange in the last week and and he's just a wonderful, wonderful person, oh, and there to support, never, you know, just just the, the, he, he. About halfway through he reminded me that you know, know, everything is good in moderation. I think he was a little worried about me. To be honest with you. My mother was like, oh my god, you gotta eat. When are you gonna start eating? Like to the point where she was like it would, it would piss me off. I'd have to tell her. I'd have to tell her to, to, in a nice way, piss off and leave me alone, right? But with Ang, you know he's been there, he's done. I'm pretty sure Ang has done 15 days, which is a great achievement. And he said, you know, everything in moderation is good. And that's all he said to that. But boy, oh boy, once I got close to hitting that 40 days, he was like brother, you are doing awesome, Just make sure you're safe. And you know, I'm real proud of your achievement. And you know, it wasn't so much that, but it was.
Speaker 1:The key part of this is phase four and I'm going to call it the hangover, and it's the part where you forget the habits that you were in. And it wasn't until about a week after and I had stopped yoga, I had stopped doing the Wim Hof just because, you know, I don't even know, I don't know why. I think I might have got one day in. And then I got back to it and during one of those Wim Hof sessions it came to me in the meditation or right after it was. Like you know, you've worked so hard at doing this and the cravings like once you start eating again, the cravings are. So they come back full force they do. But I was hoping that the 40 days would break those cravings. And, by the way, folks this water fast, I'm just going to remind you.
Speaker 1:It didn't include things like caffeine. I still haven't went back to coffee at all no caffeine. No caffeine, no alcohol. I did. I had a couple of beers on the weekend.
Speaker 1:On Saturday I curled in a bond spiel, a memorial bond spiel for Tommy Little. A good buddy of mine passed a few years ago and I curled with him for quite a few years. And another fella, gordie Brown and Matt O'Brien, chaudiere, guide extraordinaire, and I and Gordie and his son curled in the second annual Tommy Little Memorial and we kicked the shit out of everybody. We won it all. So I had to have a beer or two, and they were cream or on draft and they were delicious. Man, I'll tell you what, and I'm not a beer guy Like I mean. And since then I've had no alcohol at all. No, no, no, nothing. I shut her all down. No nicotine.
Speaker 1:And I, through the 40 days I had, I did decide that I was going to have two cigars, two Colts with my good buddy, mark Plante. And Mark was he didn't want to do it kicking and screaming, but it was. He hadn't been to my house to visit in two and a half years and I was bound and determined to have a cigar. And yeah, I'm pretty sure that I've kicked that habit and I don't want to ever take it for granted because I've been there. My mama didn't raise a quitter and I've tried many, many times to quit and it's always creeped back, but I'm pretty sure I've got that one kicked. I have no want for that at all to continue.
Speaker 1:The diagnostics was part of that key revelation. To continue to do the yoga and the Wim Hof was a key part of that revelation. And it is the most important part of this hangover because your routines are changing again and I had my blood pressure down to 84. On February 6th, 139 over 88. Those are outstanding, outstanding numbers. And after the fast and after I began to eat, I didn't take my blood pressure up until let's see here.
Speaker 1:I took my blood pressure on February 24th. Yesterday was the first day. I'm pretty sure I took it once before, but what day was it? I know I did. Anyway, I took it once before. I didn't write it down because I didn't like it. It was high again and that would have been maybe four days ago. I took it yesterday and I didn't take an average, but I'm going to give you the lowest was 148 over 101. So it has come back and it's got higher. That bottom number is still and the top number it's not where it was, but it's a concern. So that journaling is key to keeping you motivated to diagnose what's going on. So now I'm convinced that the blood pressure has something to do with the food sensitivity, because something that I've started to eat has caused me my blood pressure to start to rise again.
Speaker 1:And this is all unmedicated. I'm supposed to be taking medication, but again I'm. I'm very. I don't like that whatsoever. Um, I was doing it before, but now I'm, I'm not. I want to figure it out. So I've got another appointment with Gary and I actually had an appointment. Before I sign off.
Speaker 1:I had a second appointment with Gary and it was on let's see here. It was on January, so the first one was January 14th. I had another one with Gary on February 5th and the difference in my blood was uncanny. It was beautiful. The sugar in my blood was not there. I knew that already. The whole experience was great and it gave me the confidence to keep on going with it. All of the detoxing that I had done. There was still signs of detoxing, but my blood was very, very clean and I've got another appointment to go back to have a look at it again. So I'll have the start, the middle, the near finish and then about two weeks after I start eating again and hopefully that'll give me some clues on what my issue is.
Speaker 1:But because I'm now thinking about being healthy and that was the original reason I'm sick of being sick my blood sugar has been pretty good. I'm in the sixes. I'm not in the fours, but I'm in the sixes and that's good. That's good with not very many spikes, although I've been good to be not eating processed anything, which is huge. But the key to the hangover is maintain the good habits that you've built For me, the good habits that I've built Drink water, keep the regimen going.
Speaker 1:I'm not drinking nine liters, but I am drinking five and I'm still starting my mornings with one liter while I'm lying flat on my back right. I'm not putting the salt in the water because the food that I'm eating has salt in it and I'm cutting has salt in it and I'm cutting my salt intake back. I've been a salt guy my whole life. My mother has been on me constantly you eat too much salt. I never believed that salt was a bad thing. There's lots of literature out there that say salt is not the cause of hypertension in most people, but I gotta know. So the next project, after doing all of this research and all of this diagnostics and this process, is reducing my salt and seeing if that is what has been driving my hypertension so well.
Speaker 1:Folks, on that note, on that note, I have taken up far too much of your time and again I thank you if you've made it this long. This health journey is something that began with me at the lodge. It is something that is key and you can tie this to every facet of your life and anybody out there that never, never too late to start. It's always better to start before you're chronically ill. But listen, start now, eat well, look after your body. Start now, eat well, Look after your body.
Speaker 1:And it is such a hard thing for me to sit here and come off like I'm preaching because listen, man, I know how difficult and how addictive food is. Food has been my biggest addiction bar none. You take nicotine, you take marijuana, you take alcohol, you take whatever you want to take sex, any addiction that you have ever had, and for me, food is the most difficult, difficult addiction and it is the most dangerous and it I believe that that um, um, it is every bit as dangerous as smoking and alcohol abuse. When you abuse um, um highly processed foods, and the problem is there are more people out there and more big companies out there designing food to make you addicted, and it's hard and it makes you sick. So, listen, good luck on your journey. I can't tell you how to do it. I can only tell you that you can do it and um, do your research. Start slow and um, god speed folks. Um, I truly, I truly hope that um somewhere out there. Um, this story has touched somebody because it's been for me close to 20 years in the making, right, but anyway, love y'all folks.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much for getting to this point in the podcast. I know it's a long one and if you have any questions, don't hesitate to reach out to me at steven, at fishincanadacom, and thanks again for listening. For anybody out there looking to partner up with us, willie and I have a great deck for diaries, and not only that a great deck for the Outdoor Journal Radio Network and the Fish in Canada television show Network and the Fish and Canada television show. Speaking of the Fish and Canada television show, get on over to fishandcanadacom and get your votes in on all of those giveaways. You can't put enough ballots in the box, folks. The more ballots, the more chances to win. Get some awesome stuff. Garmin's always a great person over there or company over there giving their beautiful equipment away, so get in on that and folks. Thus brings us to the conclusion of another episode of Diaries of a Lodge Owner. Stories of the North.
Speaker 5:I'm a good old boy, never meanin' no harm. I'll be all you ever saw Been railin' in the hog since the day I was born, bendin', my rock Stretchin stretching my line.
Speaker 4:Someday I might own a lodge, and that'd be fine, I'll be making my way the only way I know how, working hard and sharing the north with all of my pals. Boy, I'm a good old boy. I buy the large and live my dream. And now I'm here talking about how life can be as good as it seems. Yeah. Yeah.
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