What's the longest you've gone without eating?
What's the longest you've gone without eating?
85 comments
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Three and a half weeks, 25 days.
More than forty years ago I was lost in the wilderness on a school camp. Broke both ankles and couldn’t walk. Drank water from a stream and waited.
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~72 hours. I think I went beyond that, but gave up because there's diminishing returns for fasting that long, that is, your body starts shutting down in a way that eating again after that period can be dangerous if not done very slowly with like bone broth or whatever.
Mind you, it's not easy fasting what with it being impossible not to flush out electrolytes, so making sure you get enough salt, magnesium and potassium supplements is a must. Obviously, other vitamin supplements doesn't hurt. The only dangerous one is potassium, so make sure the dosage is right. Oh, and there ought to be enough calcium in the tablets alone if you take vitamins daily and depending on where you live, if the water is hard enough (like here in Denmark), that's another source.
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About 30 days.
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Story time!
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It's not a great story unfortunately. When I was younger, and still believed in an imaginary sky daddy. I was told all throughout childhood that if you believe in him, anything is possible. My mother is a quadriplegic from a car accident when I was 14. So, I REALLY believed that she would be healed and walk again. I fasted for 30 days, praying everyday. After the 30 days I gathered my friends and we all prayed for my mom. As you can imagine, not much has changed, aside from me being an atheist now.
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Just diggin' that air, amirite?
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Air and water, what more could I ask for?
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Something like 65 hours. I used to routinely do 3 day fasts when I was working out a lot. But routinely like every 3 to 6 months. They are very hard to sleep and be functioning on.
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Fasts like that can feel so good, though - though my longer fasts were usually 36 - 48 hours.
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A few 24 hour periods for surgery. I've gone at least 48 hours without eating, it made me feel pretty rotten
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Something like 36 hours without food, and around 12 hours without water in prep for surgery. I was delirious the last several hours.
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Less than 48 hours, I'm sure, and I've been homeless.
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Around 30 hour when my great grand mother died.
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When I was in high school I went 48 hours just as an experiment when my mom went out of town. Now that I have GERD I don't think I could make it that long again though
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Yeah the acid from not eating sucks pretty hard. Thank goodness for pepcid complete.
Edit: Yep, GERD is right.
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I usually see it abbreviated as GERD when I'm dealing with doctors' notes, medical forms, patient charts.
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Probably around 72 hours. I had a severe bout of depression a decade ago. I’m not certain how long I went without food because my memory of that period is hazy, but I barely ate or left my bed for a week. A few years before that I had salmonella poisoning (do NOT recommend) and didn’t eat or really even sleep for something like 10 days. I drank sugar water and electrolytes to stay alive but I still lost about 10 kilos.
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It depends on whether you're working or just slacking off. I think i've gone for 60 hours without eating, but that was when i was a teenager and bed-rotting and just didn't care about eating properly.
Now, i don't do that anymore. While being active (going to school, working), i guess it's less than 24 hours.
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Like... less than 24 hours
I ain't trying to be the next Gandhi
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About 30 hours.
I had to go nil-by-mouth for 12 hours before an operation to repair a fairly serious injury and they kept pushing the surgery back and back and back. Higher priority cases were keeping the surgeon. It wasn't like I was low priority either, but my injury was stable and not immediately life threatening.
Did I mention I'd also lost blood? That made for a force multiplier.
In the end, they admitted defeat - the surgeon had worked too long anyway - let me eat something and rescheduled my surgery for the following day.
Let me tell you, that was the best chicken I ever ate.
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Probably a few days, like 3 maybe. I forget sometimes.
"Why hands shaky?"
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No one "forgets" to eat for 3 days.
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You clearly don't have low appetite
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ill often forget to eat until 8pm, and my mental health isnt as bad as it could be. very feasible to forget to eat for days on end, i have friends that it happens to
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Covid had be bedridden for about 3 days and feeling too sick to eat, and living on my own I had nobody to help me.
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At Ramadan
Wake up, eat breakfast at 4 am Go to work, come back home Fall asleep, don't wake up at the correct time, Come home, fall asleep, wake up late once more, break my fast because I gave up
4:00 to 21:00, sleep from 16:00 to 5:00, forget to break the fast, 6:00 to 20:00, finally break the fast
17 hours + 12 hours = about 30 hours
Even more if you include sleep (45 hours)
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When I was around 16 or so I decided not to sleep or eat for a week, which I did - so it would be that.
I was fine, overall, but did get some leg cramps when I cycled 12 miles on the last day. I had no great desire to eat at the end - that had faded over the week, really, but it came back pretty soon once I did actually get something down.
Of course, it is a very different thing if you decide not to eat, and have no particular stresses or anything going on to being deprived of food.
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Was this part of an eating disorder? A week of not eating for a person who can already cycle 12 miles seems unusual.
(Hope that’s not too sensitive to ask, feel free not to respond)
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No. I had nothing much going on for a while and just randomly decided to see what it would be like. Yes, it was 'unusual', but 'unusual' has been quite common for me over the years one way or another.
It was some time after this that I discovered what the record for not sleeping was at the time (around 10 days as I recall). It is probably just as well that I did not know that at the time, or I would have tried to beat it - not that I was being supervised or anything, so it wouldn't have counted, but...
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Not sleeping is even crazier! You're getting into psychosis territory.
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Were you not hallucinating like a madman?! I've gone into total fantasy land after 3 days. Talking to people that weren't there, my desktop wallpaper was trying to speak, all that. Nothing like LSD or shrooms.
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No, nothing like that really. Sure, my body was running on serotonin after a while so I was probably unduly relaxed and positive, but nothing like hallucinations or anything. When I found that that the no-sleep record was only 3 days longer than I had gone, I was a bit surprised, since it hadn't really seemed that hard so far, but I am sure that I would have experienced something more serious before long.
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Did a 3 day fast once.
It was actually amazing. The last 8 hours were where it got rough, but from hours 12 to 66, I basically wasn't even hungry because my body entered ketosis. Did full keto for a month afterwards because I was already there. Dropped 15lbs and felt like a golden god for months afterwards. I've done some 36-48 hour fasts since then, but even 48 hours isn't the same thing.
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A week for medical reasons, but I was being given intravenous water and nutrients the whole time. Those don't stop you from feeling like your stomach is empty, unfortunately. The first slice of toast afterwards was possibly the best thing I have ever eaten
Out of choice, maybe 32-ish hours? A full day plus sleep the night beforehand
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About 6000 kilometres :p
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About 3 days. I do it every now and then since it does help relief a medical issue.
Interestingly, I don't get hungry and don't feel much difference overall. I could go much longer, but I don't want to worry about refeeding syndrome.
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10 hours, but I'm also a fatty.
Back in college, my buds & I did a road trip across America, so of course we stopped at the Grand Canyon. Breakfast was just a peanut butter & bread "sandwich", at which point we started hiking down the canyon. If you've ever been, they have numerous signs saying "Do not go past this point unless you are packing food". But hey, we're college kids, and we're not going to go THAT much farther... Long story short, that night the rangers had to chaperone us as we fucking crawled back out. One of us 'got' to ride in a helicopter to the medical building. For the other 3 of us who could still move, they manged to find a dusty MRE at the last way station. That was the absolute best chicken & pea soup in a tin foil bag I have ever eaten in my life.
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Woof, those choper rides aint cheap. That is exactly why all the signs/books/guides say "dont go past this point, unless you know what your doing" and "only stupid people do the rim to river and back in a day". My folks and I did that last one back in the day, it was fun, but dont try it (seriously dont). It took us 20 hours and almost didnt make it back before sunset.
The best part of that hike is thanks to my mother, who froze an extra water bottle and hid it in each of our bags before we set out at sunrise. We are hiking back on the bright angel trail and get to the waysation half way up and find it. Its 3PM, at the height of summer in the grand canyon, and my father and I are sitting around drinking ice water, I have never see more envious hikers in my life.
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Roughly 3 days as well. The shakes were crazy since I was drinking coffee and abusing amphetamine like mad as well.
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3 days here, and yes, it took meth. Glad those days didn't last long and are decades past.
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About three days. I get headaches, and shakey, and at some point in the first twenty four hours the hunger pangs vanish. So if I focused through something without eatung I might only realize due to headache and the empty vibrating feel.
It happens less as I get older as I understand body signals better and eat before the point when the hunger pangs fade.
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12 to 14 hours, or so. That's how I found out about hypoglycemia. Played paintball all day, started feeling sick and was throwing up and passing out walking home, someone called an ambulance and after they checked me out they said I just needed to eat. 🤣
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When you're paintballing so hard you almost die. This is something I can appreciate.
Brings back good memories of playing woodsball. That shit is more taxing than people realize!
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About 4 days. multiple times. I was really poor once. I used to take Tylenol and Tums to keep away the hunger pains, and I am surprised I still have a liver and kidneys.
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I am surprised I still have a liver and kidneys.
You would be surprised how resilient the body is when it comes to hunger. My answer would be like yours, I would say I went a few days if not a week without food multiple times, though for me it's less about resources than stress (I am what many would call a "stress-starver") and everything in me related to eating is not only intact but in average condition.
Back when tribes were still a thing, it was written that it was normal for the local tribes where I live to deprive new children (because adoption from other peoples was common) of food on two day patterns, especially when a trek was going on, only to feast on the third day.
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32 seconds and you're my next meal
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A couple of days, but I was really sick. When healthy*, I’ll sometimes do 24 hours, but that includes big meals bookending that time. I do also tend to have coffee with oat milk, protein drinks, and/or juice during that time, so it’s not without nourishment, just without solid foods.
*don't be like me, kids. It’s not good to eat too sporadically (I’d be much worse about it if my husband were not basically samwise gamgee). I’ve got adhd and forget to eat sometimes, and I’ve noticed it’s always more difficult to eat if I’ve eaten very little lately.
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4 or 5 days, just forgot to eat tbh
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40 days
Take potassium and calcium supplements or your bones are gonna hurt
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War there a reason for such a long time without food?
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From a Sunday lunch through dinner Wednesday evening.
Not a purposeful fast, I just had a huge hours-long meal of endless samples of steak, lamb, and chicken at a Brazilian Steakhouse. Also several large salads, and a small dessert.
So anyway, I just wasn't hungry for days after that. I didn't have any constipation, no drop in energy, so I went about my business as usual, but without eating for a few days.
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Keto diet may be for you then.
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19-ish hours. I practice intermittent fasting and sometimes I unintentionally go over my standard 16 hours because I’m busy doing something and I forget.
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A bit over 24 hours probably. No eating or drinking, mostly because I forgot to eat supper the previous night then stayed in bed the next day
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I used to fast 36 hours a week, but I am sure the 4 day migraines are the longest (can't even drink water without puking). Unless it was that one time we all got the flu, 10 days, but we did drink stuff with calories to stay alive.
So:
From poverty or ED never more than a day. Plenty of skipped meals and undereating but no long stretches with nothing.
Voluntarily fasting, only a couple of days
From sickness 4 days or 10 days, depending on how you define not eating.
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I'll do the occasional 72 hour fast. A 24 hour fast once a month. These days I change the 72 hour to a 48 hour then blood test every hour or two until I see a blood sugar rise. That's when the body starts to cannibalize muscle tissue so I stop.
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I accidentally intermittent fast all the time, adhd brain along with weird lunch pattern at work. I think at this point, I should just say I do it to sound cool.
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Maybe like 30 hours. I was feeling depressed and didn't want to eat at the time.
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7 day water and electrolyte fast
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probably like 18 hours max
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That's not too uncommon for me. Eat dinner at 7PM, don't eat again until noon or so the next day.
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32 hours after making a dumb bet. It messed up my appetite for months afterwards. I got $20 though. Not worth it.
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What effect did it have on your appetite?
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I totally lost my ability to tell whether or not I was hungry. I don't keep a regular meal schedule anyway so it was hard for my body to adjust back, I think.
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40ish hours without eating or sleeping, I was just busy and didn't get to it.
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A couple of days, I was doing Atkins diet at the time and completely lost my hunger, so I just forgot to eat for two days until someone asked me what I had had for lunch and I realized I hadn't eaten lunch, or dinner, or lunch the day before, or dinner the day before that. It was a weird feeling realizing I had gone almost 48 hours without food without even noticing.
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Two and a half day for a fast. I don't count being ill, like a flu
85 comments