Magic Happens With the Clean Fast
Heather Dramnitzke
A little bit about me.
Hi! My name is Heather and I’m 42 years old (43 in March 2022), a wife, mother of 2 wonderful kids and a teacher. I live in Southwestern Ontario, Canada.
My diet history.
For most of my life, I have been overweight. I was still fairly active as a child, teen and young adult, and I have been a Synchronized Figure Skater since I was 8, despite being heavier than my peers and teammates. I have tried many diets, as many others have, including Weight Watchers, Cabbage Soup Diet, Atkins, Southbeach, Dukan Diet, the list goes on! I was actually quite successful with Weight Watchers, losing about 45 pounds (25kgs). I also worked out at least 5 times a week, mainly doing group exercise classes at the gym. I went to Jamaica for a week when I was at my lowest weight (around 157 pounds/71kgs), but unfortunately, after that trip, I started to slowly gain it back, even though I was still attending WW meetings.
Stats
- Starting weight: 209lbs/95kgs
- Goal weight: 145lbs/66kgs
- Current weight: 188lbs/85kgs
- Highest weight: 240lbs/109kgs
- Height: 5’6/168cm
When I met my husband in 2011, I was up about 15 pounds (7kgs) from my lowest adult weight, and of course, slowly gained more as we dated, moved in together, and eventually got married. Our first child was born in 2014 and I was able to lose most of the baby weight and was very motivated to get into my bridesmaids dress from my sister’s wedding, 14 months after giving birth to our daughter.
In 2016, our second child was born. I went back to work when he was 6 months old, and at that point, I didn’t really realize how much weight I had gained. I knew that my clothes were tight and that I was buying the next size up, but I really had no idea what my weight was. We had Spring photos done at school and when I got my pictures back, I was in absolute shock! At that point, I knew I had to do something, I didn’t even recognize myself in the picture!
My husband and I had done Paleo before our wedding and had some success, so I decided to go back and start researching again and looking for Paleo meal plans. It was then that I stumbled upon the Ketogenic Diet. I read everything I absolutely could about it and started it right away in April of 2017. I was 240 pounds (109kgs) when I started Keto, and in the first year, I lost 55 pounds (25kgs)!
Discovering IF.
During this time, I also started reading about Intermittent Fasting. I remember one day having a huge brunch – bacon, eggs, cheese and a keto english muffin with butter. I didn’t eat until dinner the next day because I was so full and didn’t feel one pang of hunger! Shortly after this, I discovered Dr. Jason Fung, realized that I had done a fast that day, and started to dabble in IF more regularly.
I was still having coffee with heavy cream and sweetener, flavoured sparkling water and diet pop here and there during my fasts. This made it a lot more difficult to fast, even though I was fat adapted. I didn’t fast consistently, and I would go months between fasts, but still stuck to Keto. I would try Alternate Day Fasting (ADF) and make it about 3 days before I would give in to the hunger, not realizing that the flavours in my sparkling water or the cream and sweetener in my coffee were having an effect on my success. I always felt tired, miserable and “hangry” on my fasting days, so it just wasn’t going well. I’ve never been a big breakfast eater anyway, so my window was probably 16:8 most days, but again, I wasn’t doing the “clean” fast yet, so I was really just setting myself up for failure when I did try to extend it.
The big stall.
From 2018 to 2019, my weight stayed fairly steady at around 185 pounds. I wasn’t at my goal yet (150 pounds/68kgs), but I was fairly happy with where I was. I did want to lose more, but was having a hard time. I think my body was happy with where it was, but I wasn’t. Throughout the holidays and into the new year, I gained a bit of weight back. By January 2020, I had been in a “stall” for about a year, but I was committed to working out daily, tracking my Keto food intake and macros, and was very motivated, as I had a wedding coming up that summer that I wanted to look great for.
Then COVID hit.
Of course, in March 2020, everything changed for everyone. I’m a Kindergarten Teacher, and I think that I was in a bit of shock that I couldn’t go to work each day, see my students and colleagues in person. Fear of the unknown set in, and I started to eat a lot more. Even though it was keto, the volume of food was just too much…too much snacking, too much low-carb beer at night, too many mixed nuts, too many “treats”, too many creamy coffees throughout the day. I started gaining again and eventually ended up over 25 pounds (11kgs) above my lowest weight with Keto.
Feeling desperate.
September 2020 was a very stressful time, as I returned to work as a kindergarten teacher during COVID. So many protocols to follow, students and staff getting sick, my class being quarantined, teaching online for parts of the year, being quarantined myself due to exposure at work, etc., etc. I truly believe that a big part of the reason why I couldn’t lose weight was because of the stress. I started trying different Keto meal plans, counting macros again (which I HATE), I tried Carnivore, more IF (not clean fasting yet), etc.
In the summer of 2021, the school year was finally done (thank goodness) and I was trying desperately to find a plan that would work for me. Like I said, I hated counting macros, but I would try and try again to make that work. I tried strict Carnivore in the early fall, but didn’t find much success with that, as I would have “cheats” when we went out to eat, so I wasn’t really getting the benefits from it. I was feeling really desperate and almost panicked about my weight and how I was going to lose it. I started working out again, but I have a shoulder injury, so I wasn’t able to stick with it for long.
Discovering Gin Stephens, Graeme Currie, and the Clean Fast.
At the end of October 2021, a friend of mine sent me a video of Graeme Currie in a podcast interview. I listened to it and it was truly a lightbulb moment. I had actually seen Graeme’s before and after pictures in Dr. Fung’s Facebook group, The Fasting Method Network by Dr. Jason Fung & Megan Ramos, and I had always wondered who he was and what his story was.
I ordered his book, The Fasting Highway, right away, and also downloaded Gin Stephen’s book, Delay, Don’t Deny, as he spoke a lot about Gin in the interview. After reading Graeme’s story and DDD, I immediately started clean fasting on Monday, November 1st, 2021. It was the perfect day to start! I started OMAD and the clean fast made all of the difference in the world. Something just clicked. I had started drinking my coffee black about a year before, so that wasn’t an issue. I quickly downloaded Gin’s book, Fast. Feast. Repeat. as well, and knew that this was it!
It is now the beginning of March 2022, and I have fasted clean every single day for over 4 months now. I’m down 22 pounds (10kgs), and feel absolutely fantastic! I love the freedom that I have, and I have shifted towards more of a low-carb/paleo eating style. I love that I can include things in my window that I had previously thought were off limits for the rest of my life because they weren’t considered “Keto.” I still limit sugar, bread, pasta, etc., as it just doesn’t make me feel good, and causes a lot of inflammation. But I’m able to enjoy hummus, dates, and other foods that I had denied for a very long time.
I’ve tried ADF and different eating window lengths, and continue to have success. It feels great to experiment and see what works for my body. This is truly my lifestyle now, and I can’t imagine NOT clean fasting every day for the rest of my life.
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