What happens if you don't eat for a long time

How long can a person go without eating

It is not known for certain how many days a person can go without food. It is unethical to conduct life-threatening experiments on humans. In addition, everyone's organisms are different (age, initial weight, the presence of chronic diseases).

But sometimes a person is left without food for a long time, for example, when tragediesInjured hiker survived 24 days on mountain by ‘hibernating’ / The Guardian Outdoors, accidentsSwedish man survived in snowed‑in car for two months / The Guardian or intentional hunger strikesBlaine emerges from his 44‑day 'fast' / The Guardian. Based on this, scientists suggestP. Kottusch, M. Tillmann, K. Puschel. Survival time without food and drink / Archiv fur Kriminologiethat without food and water you can last from 8 to 21 days, but only without food - about two months.

What happens if you don't eat for a long time

When the body realizes that there is not enough food, it rebuilds

M.L. Steinhauser, B.A. Olenchock, J. O'Keefe, M. Lun, K.A. Pierce, H. Lee, L. Pantano, A. Klibanski, G.I. Shulman, C.B. Clish, P.K. Fazeli. The circulating metabolome of human starvation / JCI Insight your metabolism so as to last as long as possible.

1 day

First, the body uses up the stores of glucose obtained from food and stored as glycogen in the liver and muscles.

3 days

After 2-3 days, the body begins to break down fat in order to fatty acid became the main source of fuel. The liver produces ketones from them, which it can use instead of glucose. So it turns out to delay the time of destruction of proteins. There are more ketones in the blood, this state is called ketosis.

7 days

How many days will pass before the next stage, it is difficult to say. It depends on the amount of adipose tissue: when it runs out, the body will begin to break down proteins in order to obtain energy.

What are the symptoms of prolonged fasting?

due to prolonged fasting can be4 intermittent fasting side effects to watch out for / Harvard Health Publishing:

• headache;
• lethargy;
• irritability;
• constipation.

But for some, symptoms will appear by the evening, and for others in three days, because the “starting conditions”, that is, weight, age, health, lifestyle, are different for everyone.

But someone instead of the listed symptoms will feel a slight euphoria. Some scientists consider 1. A.J. brown. Low-carb diets, fasting and euphoria: Is there a link between ketosis and gamma-hydroxybutyrate (GHB)? / Medical Hypotheses
2. Feeling euphoric on a low-carb diet? The effect on your brain is similar to an illicit drug / The Conversationwhat's the matter with ketone bodies. Some of them are isomers (that is, substances with the same composition and number of atoms, but slightly different structure) hydroxybutyrate, a illicit narcotic substance from the group euphoretics.

But even if this theory is not confirmed, ketosis is still changesF.F. Operto, S. Matricardi, G.M.G. Pastorino A. Verrotti, G. Coppola. The Ketogenic Diet for the Treatment of Mood Disorders in Comorbidity With Epilepsy in Children and Adolescents / Frontiers in Pharmacology the balance of neurotransmitters - substances that regulate nerve transmission in the brain. This helps with depression and some other disorders.

What will happen to the body if it does not receive food for a long time

Since there are no long-term studies of fasting yet, about all the consequences for sure sayTo Fast or Not to Fast / NIH News in Health difficult. It may be that the potential benefits, such as reduced inflammation and protection against diabetes, are related to weight loss rather than fasting itself. But it is already known that after hunger strikes, gallstones are more likely to form.

For whom is prolonged fasting dangerous?

Not all people can go hungry. Especially this dangerousSymptoms of Not Eating / Very Well Eating:

• for children, because their bodies spend a lot of energy on growth;
• people with disorders of carbohydrate metabolism, such as diabetes;
• people with sickle cell anemia because they have higher protein requirements
• people with gastrointestinal disorders because they may not have the right supply of nutrients and therefore symptoms will appear sooner.

It is difficult to predict how a particular organism will react to food deprivation. Therefore, even a short planned hunger strike should be discussed with a doctor.