ex115-2 review: Gained nearly all the fasting weight back

Even with an extremely controlled refeed, the fat loss benefits seem negligible.

These last 30 days I did ex115 for a second run. I was mainly wanting to see if the weight loss from 2 episodes of 5 days of water fasting each would stick, or if I’d just regain it all over the course of a month.

Previously when fasting, I’d “white-knuckled” it using willpower, ended up feeling totally starved, and then would go into crazy binges on the refeeds. No surprise I had always gained the weight back quickly.

But this time, I’d be smarter. I’d stop fasting the first sign of (metabolic) trouble, which tends to be sleep problems for me. That happened on night 5 both times, so I fasted for 5 days both times.

But instead of binging, I’d just return to my normal ex115 plan: 115g of grass-fed beef, some vegetables & sauce to go with it, and otherwise just ad-lib heavy cream.

If the weight loss stuck on this plan, cycling 5 day fasts might be a good way to lose fat.

Sadly, I’ve regained most of it, so I don’t think that strategy will work well. Also note: last time I did ex115 in July-August, I actually lost 3lbs - although I suppose even maintaining the fasting loss would have been a win.

You can tell that I lost a ton of weight very rapidly during the fasts, and the regain was actually quite a bit slower - in 7 days after the first fast I only regained about 5lbs of 7lbs lost. By 7 days after the end of the second fast, I was again only up 5lbs of 8lbs or so lost. At the time, this made me pretty optimistic about using water fasts to “ratchet down” my weight.. *ominous music playing*

But this experiment of 30 days ex115 after the fasts revealed that it simply took longer to gain nearly all that weight back.

I was back up to where I’d been between fasts after about 2 weeks. Toward the end of the 30 days, my weight seems to have stabilized around 218-219lbs. Let’s visualize it a little better:

Assuming it stays there (or comes back down after my protein refeed, lol), that would mean about 2lbs lost over a near 2-month cycle of fasting/refeeding. Not exactly impressive.

Remember, I lost 3lbs in a month of ex115 without ANY fasting as recently as late July/early August (2 months ago), beating the pretty intense fasting experiment by 50%.

Excuses for fasting

When I posted on Twitter about regaining nearly all the weight I’d fasted off, people came up with the expected excuses.

Bro you only gained the weight back because you binged

But I didn’t binge. At all. Not once. I ran the strictest diet protocol I have, ex115, without a single exception for the entire 30 days and the 7 day refeed between the fasts. I didn’t even consume noticeably more cream except 1 or 2 days after the fast.

Bro you only gained the weight back because you stopped fasting

Funny how that works. I suppose I could just starve forever. Problem solved!

A lil’ cold

I actually had a little bit of a cold about 2/3 through the refeed experiment. I didn’t notice any particular weight changes around that time, I just had a runny nose and a sore throat.

It took me a few days to even realize this. I don’t think I’ve been sick since the pandemic, so I just forgot that’s a thing. I’ve heard similar things from friends, and one theory was that the regular flu was just kind of suppressed for a few years. Maybe it’s back now? Or maybe a slightly runny nose & sore throat is what the latest variant looks like :) I haven’t checked in on this stuff in forever.

What the DEXA says

My body fat percentage came down about a percent, but really only because I gained some glycogen weight back. Remember, glycogen and water (and bloat) are all “lean mass.”

If we look at my total fat mass, it didn’t budge much if at all:

If you look really hard you can see it drop about .3 of a pound. Is that even real or just DEXA noise? Not sure. In any case, not super impressive after 2 water fasts of 5 days each with pretty much the most controlled/lowest insulin refeed you could possibly imagine.

Intriguing 2% OmegaQuant drop

One thing that surprised me: my linoleic acid on my OmegaQuant Complete dropped by 2.1%. That might not sound like much, but the entirety of the LA band in most people is about 15%. Hence 2% is pretty significant progress, something we would expect to see in 1-2 years, not a single month.

At 16.55% linoleic acid fasted this isn’t my lowest LA reading ever, but it is my lowest known-fasted reading. And, given I’m a huge coffee addict connoiseur, it’s probably safe to say I was highly filled up on heavy cream and therefore saturated fat when I’d taken the non-fasted OQs, skewing the older numbers. I’ve written before why I think taking the OmegaQuant Complete fasted overnight is a better measure of LA depletion.

I wonder if this is another measuring artifact related to fasting (like water weight), or a real thing. I suppose we’ll see when my next OmegaQuant comes in! Will the number stay around 16.55% or shoot back up to 18%?

There are anecdotes about people using fasting to rapidly deplete their linoleic acid reserves. One theory is that eating practically 0 fat (like on a fast) forces the body to release more LA, just to get to the very low but existent “essential fatty acid” component.

Another hypothesis is that even “ancestral” foods have about 1.5-2.5% linoleic acid, and it’s extremely hard to average below that range unless you eat a fruitarian diet or fast. Even most pure starches and grass-fed beef have that amount of linoleic acid.

If you basically can’t get below the target number except through fasting or fruitarianism (which is near-zero fat), maybe even temporarily cutting it to 0 via water fasting makes a huge difference?

I’ll say I am somewhat skeptical. Could I just repeat this 5 day fasting cycle a few times and get my adipose LA down to 10.5%, the goal range?

I kind of doubt it. If so, there’s something major I don’t understand about this whole PUFA thing.

Here’s my prediction: unfortunately, I expect my next LA reading to be back up, maybe not exactly at 18.65%, but definitely above 17.5%.

Let’s hope I’m wrong haha.

Selected notes

Remember, this experiment came right after a 5 day water fast. The first few days describe the experience of refeeding on ex115 after water fasting.

Day 1

First morning after the fast. Not particularly hungry, only had 1 cup of coffee instead of binging. Good sign re. not down-regulating my metabolism much.
No dinner whipped cream

Day 2

Ok today I felt like I could drink way more cream coffee than normal, maybe making up for 5 days no carolies & no dinner whipped cream previous night.

Also eating lots of sauce w/ spoon, think sensory/flavor deprivation is one of the worst parts of fasting.

Day 3

Noticed again I’m eating lots of sauce, feeling kinda unsatisfied from ex115 slop lunch. Probably similar "depletion/craving" of whatever I was craving when I was doing the protein powder instead of beef.

Cream wise, today felt pretty normal, not like yesterday. Hit cement truck satiety shortly after starting a bowl of whipped cream.

Day 4

Pretty normal cream consumption. Bought & ate 2 cans of spicy chopped chilies w/ tomato sauce.

Wtf is this weird craving/pika? Also had it on chocolate truffle & protein powder. Skeptical of the idea that it represents a real lack, cause wtf is in chilies/tomato sauce?

(Note: A “pika” is a “craving” for something that is not food. This is often associated with certain mental health problems. Sometimes they show people on TV who have the desire to eat their couch cushions or pebbles or other non-foods. It’s like an addiction. I think I’m technically misusing the word here since chilies and tomato sauce are foods. What I mean is: a weird desire to eat certain foods that I don’t think contain anything I’m particularly low in. E.g. if it was a lack of protein or B vitamins, I don’t think chilies or tomato sauce contain either of them in particularly high amounts. Shouldn’t I be craving meat? Why does the chili/sauce craving go away when I eat meat, not chilies/sauce? It could be just an “umami” or “strong savory flavor” type thing.)

Day 5

Exact same weight as yesterday, has the regain stopped? Would be exact same 5lbs regain as last 5-day fast.

Making ex115stew/goulash, delish!

Ate mild diced chilies with tomato sauce again. No super strong cravings today, but like John Lawrence says: I resist willpower at all cost. So I bought the chilies.

Day 7

Pretty boring, nothing much to report. Cravings/appetite etc. back to normal.

Day 12

Weight slowly creeping up, sad! Fasting/caloric restriction cycle not working after all?

Day 13

Been super thirsty the last few days, which is a symptom of weight gain (fat or glycogen?)

Day 22

A little bit of a cold the last few days, runny nose, sore throat.

99.1°F, hours after eating. Low grade fever from my cold?

Stopped eating dinner cream after 1 spoon lol. Drank 2 cups of cream previous night, funny hot it carries over so exactly.

Day 23

99.1°F again.

Day 26

Kind of craved chilis so bought some diced jalapenos and ate with tomato sauce. Sign of skirting low-beef edge, cravings?

High-protein refeed for 3 days planned after this, haven't refed in forever.

99.0°F, hours after eating last.

Day 29

Ate chilis w/ tomato sauce again. Not strong craving, but f&*k willpower.

Super strong cement-truck satiety: made cream, ate 2 spoons, forgot about it for an hour, put bowl in fridge.

My major takeaway: I wasn’t particularly hungry and I didn’t overeat total carolies (in the form of ad-lib cream) after the fasts. The first day I could barely stomach any cream, the second day I had more than usual. After that, totally normal.

Doing ex115, then fasting, then ex115 again might be skirting the lower edge of something, be it protein or B vitamins or maybe something else that’s probably in beef. Felt like I was getting those same weird cravings/pikas that I got on previous experiments when I replaced the beef with something else, even other forms of protein.

The Refeed: Ughhh I hate protein

A story in quotes lol:

Eating tons of high-protein foods all morning/for lunch, zero satiety. Just tastes good but I want to eat again almost immediately.

After a big high-protein breakfast and filet mignon + plenty of vegetables for lunch, 30min later I am really hungry for dessert.

Ate 1lb of yogurt with dark chocolate and macadamias sprinkled in; painfully bloated now but still ravenous. Ugh, refeeds suck and I’m only 5h in :)

Ughhhh feeling so sick and bloated. Threw out remainder of 85% chocolate bar, which used to be my favorite. Took 4h just get back to feeling halfway decent. Blood glucose hovered near 100mg/dL for 4-5h too.

Day 3: Glad the refeed is over. Reached full protein-induced constant hyperphagia. Ate a really big meal, went on a 1h drive. About halfway thru the drive, I was STARVING with a belly full of protein. Stopped to eat 2 double-doubles (no spread, protein style).

Probably ate 5,000kcal today, ate every 2h or so, satiety nowhere to be found. F*&k protein.

Saw 231.6lbs (+14lbs) on the scale in the evening. Thirsty all the time.

At least my muscles look huge and bloated heh, but so does my belly :’-(

Overall, this reminded me why I’ve been doing fewer and fewer protein refeeds. They just make me feel like shit. I didn’t even super binge/gorge myself this time, limiting myself to vaguely reasonable foods and amounts. I bought the smallest yogurt container, not the enormous one. I bought several small pieces of fancy cheese, not a whole wheel from Costco. I bought a very reasonably sized package of macadamia nuts. I bought a tiny half-sized bar of chocolate.

Fewer and fewer protein refeeds?

In the beginning, I did these every 3 days. Soon I realized they made me feel terrible. I intuitively reduced the frequency, and I think I’ve only done 3 or 4 this year including this one, and it’s October. This one, at 3 days, was the longest I think.

It’s sort of a tricky edge to skirt but also not: I don’t really see any downsides, and the weird pika cravings tend to show up very slowly and obviously if I pay attention. I normally don’t think about spicy food at all. If I catch myself circling the chilies in the supermarket aisle, I know something is up. I often eat a few spoons of tomato sauce just “for flavor” in the evenings. But if I catch myself eating a whole jar before cooking with it once, something’s up.

If 2-3 days every month is way too much, and once every 3 months isn’t quite enough, maybe I’ll just meander between these two and let the weird chilie pikas guide me lol.

In any case, I think I’ve now eaten about 0.28g of protein per pound of lean mass, or 0.14-0.2g per pound of total mass as my fat mass has decreased, for over 2 years with only occasional high-protein refeeds.

There don’t seem to be any downsides. I even gained strength and probably a little bit of muscle. No excess skin after 75-80lbs of weight loss. No metabolic down-regulation according to RMR, DLW, hormones, or body temperature. For the period where I have DEXAs (I didn’t start until I was 45lbs or so down), no lean mass lost.

I think this is somewhat predicated on the fact that I’m still overweight: while I “beat obesity” I’m still in the upper echelons of the “overweight” category.

Somebody much leaner than me can probably not stay on such a protein restricted diet for so long.

Conclusion: Water Fast Fat Loss Mostly Illusory

This is the most controlled and regulated form of refeed after a fast I could imagine. If going back to this ad-lib diet makes me regain nearly all the weight, then I don’t see much of a benefit to water fasting at all. At least when it comes to fat loss.

It remains to be seen if the fasting cycles were really amazing at lowering my adipose linoleic acid %, or if that was just an artifact of measuring the fast or a fluke.

I’m also consciously qualifying this as “water fast” every time, because I’m getting really excited about dry fasting. I’m honestly a bit scared of it, cause people make it sound dangerous & spooky. There are also a ton of absurd claims about it - I’m currently reading a book on dry fasting by a Russian doctor/guru, and he unironically talks about hexes (as in, magic spells) you can ward off, adhering to the moon phase, coffee enemas, and other stuff that just seems nutty to me.

But I’ve also heard some really impressive anecdotes about dry fasting from people I respect a lot. So I’m leaving the possibility open that dry fasting works much better for fat loss than water fasting.

If I ever try it, you’ll be the first to know.