How to explain fasting to family and friends
By: Reinoud Schuijers
Tags: Culture, Health, Fitness, Food, Diet

It’s likely the result of older generations having witnessed times where abundance wasn’t the default. Larger families meant having to fight harder to “get your share.” If you wouldn’t stand up for yourself, you’d often be left with nothing to eat or drink. Poverty, war, famine — real things, witnessed by real people.

It makes sense that these same people — the ones who, out of no evil intent whatsoever, keep telling you to eat — are uncomfortable when they find out that you don’t. Eat. You purposely skip breakfast. And lunch. You go without eating for 18, 24, or 72 hours.

Many people associate skipping meals with anorexia and “not taking care of yourself.” People believe you’ll get sick, or worse if you don’t eat all the time. I once had a co-worker ask me: “But… doesn’t your body need energy?”, after I told her I was doing an 18 hour intermittent fast. She genuinely thought that a human body would get into trouble if it didn’t receive new energy in the form of food for 18 hours.

The hard part

Explaining to people that you do something because it’s good (for whatever reason), is hard. It’s hard because all they hear is, “I am better than you.” This is why changing your diet for ecological reasons, or for losing weight, driving an electric car, working out fanatically, redecorating your home, doing community service, or learning a new skill in your spare time are all things people don’t really like to hear about. It makes them look bad. It takes their fun out of binging on Dorito’s and Netflix.

The same goes for fasting. I’ve tried explaining in so many ways the benefits of it, the science behind it, how great it makes me feel, and how much easier it has become for me to maintain a healthy weight. Family and friends, they don’t listen. All they can see is that you’ve taken on something that works, but also something they’re not comfortable with doing themselves, and it makes them feel bad.

Instead of looking in the mirror, they will project these feelings on you. They will, without having any knowledge about the subject, tell you to be careful, tell you that it’s dangerous, and shower you with anecdotal evidence against whatever it is you’re doing.

Once they’re in that corner, there’s not much left you can do. No argument, no reasoning, nothing will sway them. They’ve made up their mind (what you do is crazy, and it’s bad, and you won’t keep it up anyway), and that’s the end of it.

Slippery slope solution

As a result, I have decided to stop trying to explain. I don’t lie about fasting. But I don’t mention it either. I plan my fasts around social gatherings, so I don’t have to skip snacks at a party or skip dinner with friends and family. For instance, I skip dinner so I can have lunch at work the next day, and I plan my longer fasts over the weekends.

Only my closest relatives know about my fasts, and remarkably, everyone I have discussed fasting with previously has already forgotten. They don’t ask about it, and I don’t tell.

Keeping the subject on the low saves me a lot of needless discussions and wasted energy. The people who are open to fasting will find me and ask about it, or embark on a Google adventure and gather the information they need. The ones who aren’t will carry on living their lives, eating around the clock “like they’re supposed to,” and be happy nevertheless.

Tiny disclaimer: don’t lie about skipping meals, ever. Also, don’t fast if you are underweight or close to it. Fast for health and well-being, or religious reasons, and read up on guidelines, do’s, and don’ts. A great source of fasting information can be found in the app Zero, which I use to track fasts and stay in the loop, scientifically.