The Days Just Go By So Fast

Its 3:30pm, and so far today I’ve eaten 50 calories.  I’m doing a semi-fast today, and plan to eat somewhere around 500 calories for the whole day.

Why in the world am I not eating today?  A great question, especially considering that I eat more than just about anyone I know on a regular basis, and am a food-fanatic.  Sitting at home reading a book or working on a computer I probably burn 3000-3500 calories a day.  This is great, since it means that I don’t get cold as easily, but it also sucks, since it means that I have to eat all the time, and that I am susceptible to crashing if I can’t eat regularly.

Back to the question at hand – the real reason that I’m fasting is that sometimes my knee doesn’t like mountaineering.

Seem like a bit of a disconnect?  That’s because there’s a fair bit in between.  First a bit of history:

I first hurt my knee while mountaineering down in the Chilean Andes while I was studying in Santiago in college.  On that particular trip, I slipped and banged my kneecap on a rock just 200 feet below the summit, bruising it.  Then, I proceeded to descend over 7000 vertical feet on my aching knee, and by the time I made it back to the trail head I was in major pain.  The bruising of the kneecap subsided fairly quickly, but the inflammation of the meniscus would stick around for about three months before a doctor would finally diagnose it correctly as patellofemoral syndrome, and then another two months of physical therapy would remain before my knee was feeling close to its pre-accident form.

Now, four years after returning from my adventures in South America, the meniscus inflammation is back for the third time.  The second time it was caused by doing a 34 mile day hike with over 10,000 of elevation gain and loss.  This time, it was caused by climbing two of the Three Sisters (10,000 ft tall volcanoes in the Cascades just outside Bend) in a day, covering probably 10 miles and 6,500 ft of gain and loss.  Hmm… I think I see a pattern.

The second time I got the inflammation it wasn’t nearly as bad, and so I didn’t feel like paying mucho $$ to go to a physical therapist, but at the same time, it didn’t get fully better on its own.  About this time, a friend of mine told me about this crazy doctor who lived outside of Palo Alto (where I was living at the time).  He was doing research on fasting and starvation and how it affects health and longevity.

Its well known that calorie restriction will lead to increased lifespan, significantly less signs of aging, and a decreased chance of degenerative disease like cancer, Alzheimer’s, cardiovascular disease, and, importantly, chronic inflammation.  There have been many studies showing this in rats, monkeys, and even humans.  Furthermore, restricting calories by 30-40% still leaves you with energy and the ability to work and exercise.

Don’t get me wrong here though – if you eat 30-40% less, you’ll get really really ridiculously skinny.  Some might even call it anorexic.  Plus, it would just plain suck to be hungry all the time.  So, regardless of what kind of inflammation I had in my knee, I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t do the whole permanent calorie restriction thing.

What this doctor in Palo Alto had discovered, however, was that alternate day fasting could give the same effects as permanent calorie restriction.  By alternate day fasting, I mean reducing calories one day, and the next day eating as much as you want of whatever you want.  For me, this means eating probably 5000 or more calories on my “up” days, and I don’t really end up losing any weight (which is good – since I’m already pretty wiry and scrawny).

Additionally, I’m taking two herbal anti-inflammatories, resveratrol (which is also supposed to activate the same gene that alternate day fasting does), and a boswellia extract, which is supposed to regulate the 5-LOX enzyme that also plays a role in inflammation, particularly joint inflammation.

So, with some information from the crazy doctor in Palo Alto, and a little bit of gumption, I did the alternate day fasting thing two years ago, along with taking resveratrol.  Within two weeks, my knee was fantastically better, and I didn’t have any problems again until going mountaineering in the Three Sisters Wilderness a little over a month ago.

Now?  The knee is feeling better after fasting every other day for a week and a half and taking the resveratrol and boswellia.  Not perfect yet, but definitely improving.  As to whether this cures it completely, or whether I need to go see a physical therapist, only time will tell…

Check out my first update to this post here.