What is it that you feel a lot of, every day?

For me it’s fear. I grew up with fear, fearing to be hurt, to be punished, to be abandoned. That was the fear of physical and mental pain. My other fear was that of starvation (hence my experiment with six days of no eating). I was afraid there wouldn’t be enough food. Some days there wasn’t enough, and I learned the terrible, sharp pangs of starvation (I wasn’t quite one year old when I had to have a blood transfusion in a hospital to survive from severe malnutrition or dystrophy—from what I’ve been told, my father gave me his blood because my mother didn’t feed me—what was the truth? Who knows).

Incredibly, this phrase popped into my head on the very first day of my vacation in Venice, Italy. A dream trip. My first real vacation in a little over eight years, since I started writing. And wrote I did, as you know. Every day. For four to six hours, sometimes more. Never taking a weekend off. A holiday. Nothing. I wrote like I was possessed, and I was possessed. Writing was my salvation.

Until this year my body told me to stop.

It proved to be too much for my body—ten days. Ten days without food, drinking only water (no electrolytes, no broth, no NOTHING). Five days would’ve been perfect, and six days was a bit too much, so I had to stop. I started feeling very weak as my body has virtually no more fat to lose, after years of ketosis, and I was losing 1-2 pounds a day, so after six days I’ve lost seven pounds and got down to 107 pounds or 48.5 kilograms, the weight I haven’t been since I was sixteen. And even then I was 50 kilo, which is 110 pounds, which was my original goal (fret not, after eating for three days, I’m quickly back up to 110 pounds). 

Well. What an adventure (here is why I have decided to do it).

The experience itself was incredible in that it made me realize several things:

I’m writing this on a chocolate high. I didn’t actually know chocolate high was possible. Tomorrow I’m starting a 10-day water fast. Meaning, I’ll be eating NOTHING and drinking only water for 10 days straight. So for three days prior to this I’ve been slamming my body with high-calorie foods, binging on chocolate and chocolate ice cream until it started falling out of my ears (almost). Also, fried chicken, lots of veggies sautéed in olive oil. Nuts. Seeds. Berries. Oh, and a bathtub of cherries. Well, maybe not as much as a bathtub, but you get the idea.

I can hear you wondering. First, why do it? Second, is it safe? Third, what does this have to do with writing?

EVERYTHING.