What Brought Me to Do A 90 Hour Water Fast

What brought me to do a 90 hour water fast?

I went to the cardiologist sometime in August of last year and with the blood work my triglycerides were up. I told him that my mom and her two sisters have all had myocardial infarctions. In other words, heart attacks. With my cholesterol and triglycerides up, he immediately said that I should go on a "high" dose of statins. He didn't discuss diet, exercise, or weight loss, and, perhaps after about four months to come back and see him with a new set of blood work. He went straight to statins. I expected my glycerides to be up and I knew that I wasn't giving myself much self-care. At the same time, I was on guard about what the cardiologist would say and how I would react.

Working as a student nurse and as a licenced RN in a LTC facility, there were so many women (especially) in the facility with dementia. Guess what they were taking? Statins. I kept asking myself, there's got to be a reason why so many women are in the LTC facilities. Why? I didn't want to be one of them. 

Even before getting into nursing, I was always interested in nutrition and herbs and homeopathy. I grew up with grandparents that ate dandelion leaf salads, make homemade yogurt, drank dandelion coffee, ate huckleberries, gooseberries, and mushrooms they picked in the forest, and so much more! So when I see this problem in a hospital or a LTC facility, I wonder what was up. A lot of research that I've been currently finding is the link between statins and dementia and Alzheimer's. This research in not in your MSM for a reason and I wouldn't trust heading to CNN or BBC for any type of honesty journaling. With a decrease in cholesterol, the brain is lacking in fuel. So, I am definitely skeptical of statins and all other pharmaceuticals, for that matter. 

Obviously, I said "no", point blank and said that I will figure it out with diet and exercise or other. He definitely didn't like my response, and then continued to discuss how this was "genetic" and that I should take the statins "or else the future may be grim." Once again, I said no politely. Then he offered to take the calcium test for heart disease; it's called the coronary artery calcium scan. I said I would opt in to do that, for sure. He then stated that his office would call or email me. I still haven't heard from them. 

How I see it. You go with what they tell you to do. If you resist or want to try something alternative or natural, they clean you off the schedule. I'll let you know if they get back to me.

Anyway, I knew when I went in that my blood work would be off because I knew my diet, but the reason I went in was because I had an elevated heart rate at one point for about 8-10 minutes. I was wearing a FitBit. I couldn't get in to see a Dr because Covid arrived and with all the closures, I wasn't having any luck seeing a Dr. As well, my family physician, during Covid, left her practice and a new Dr didn't arrive for at least another year. At the time, we couldn't go the walk-in medical clinics either. So my reason to see a specialist was to ask about this sustained heartrate or tachycardia. Although I mentioned it, he kept on talking as though it meant nothing. I clearly felt fine, but what amazes me is that he wouldn't even give an answer to why it happened especially when I was fit at that time. I weighed 130 pounds and my BMI was 19. I was working out with a personal trainer for over a year. 

After that tachycardia event, menopause hit in Jan/Feb 2020. Covid already started but closures didn't happen until March 2020. With one thing after the other, eventually I couldn't even see my own Dr let alone a specialist. Menopause was really ramping up with symptoms and so I simply tolerated it. What was I to do? I was taking master's degree courses in nursing at the time too. I was busy and stressed as usual and trying to manage the symptoms. But at some point I began to worry, and I started considering Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT). Even with all the great stuff you see on social media, I still questioned it's efficacy. You see, I've been on several types of medications in the past. What I've learned from taking them is that the longer I was on them, the higher the dose would get. Dr's were always willing to go up in dose but never willing to discuss decreasing the dose.

At some point, I found Westcoast Women's Clinic. I had to do something; my mood swings were insane! So I paid out of my own pocket since this was a private clinic. I got onboard with one of the Dr's at the clinic. I started HRT. I was on both low dose estriol and progesterone for about 12-15 months. I felt somewhat better and decided to go off the treatment plan. The symptoms were not gone; they subsided slightly but I also started to meditate and walk regularly with my dog, so I honestly didn't know if it was my change in behaviour or the HRT.

Going off of the HRT didn't really change much. I felt the same as always but meditation and walking helped my mood. However, I was also working as an RN in very high stress environments. As a Quarantine Officer with PHAC with abusive travellers; an HCAP Vocational Instructor with entitled adult students (funded by the government) and no pay for overtime work; in management; and as a charge nurse. When you're working in such abusive situations without support from management, it takes a toll on you. 

Then I heard about a story of an RN in her late 50's working at the LTC facility I was working in. She had a stroke at work. Most of the HCA's at this facility were amazing and so supportive. They've seen nurses come and go often over the years and were really sad when they heard I was thinking about leaving. They shared so much personal stuff with me; it was great! Anyway, this nurse who had a stroke due to the overwhelm in stress made me consider if this was the direction I should stay in. At the same time, my values didn't align well with the healthcare system: shortages of nurses, favouritism, management bullying, patient care compromised continuously, pushing vaccines that I wasn't aligned with, mass push of pharmaceuticals by pharmacists . . .  I was at the age where I said to myself, "this wasn't my fight." I didn't have the energy for the amount of change that needed to be done. So I started to consider a career shift, but what? I stopped applying for positions and went on pause in late 2024. 

Anyway, a bit off course, but my health was not the same. Energetically, I was tired. I didn't have the stamina anymore to "push" like I always had and probably for the majority of my life. That "push" was no longer there. I, also, over the years and since menopause, started gaining weight. Inflammation started to show with acne and rosacea. All the experimental fad diets and changes in the past prior to 55, worked: vegan diets, savoury and fruit juicing fasts, raw food diet, lemon-cayenne juicing diet, as well as holistic methods like colonic irrigation, acupuncture, homeopathy . . .. All of it worked to some degree. But at 55-6, nothing seemed to work anymore. I just kept gaining weight. That whole less food more exercise stopped working too, but I didn't even have the energy to get to the gym anymore and do the usual "drill" in such a boring environment.

I started to reconsider the entire HRT thing, but intuitively I was very skeptical. I said to myself, how could our body's be so "wrong" that we need to take drugs to get through menopause? I kept thinking that our body intelligence is smart, but we've been conditioned for decades that someone outside of us knows better, but do they? No. Absolutely not. I kept asking for answered. Then this book came to me, Breast Thermography Revolution: Boot Camp for an Estrogen Free Life. The author, Wendy Sellens, DACM, LAc, heavily discusses the environmental estrogens in our environment and the reasons for so many menopausal symptoms and causes of cancer. I decided to take her advice and continue to pursue health in a different manner. 

My biggest concern was a lack of energy and the overwhelm of fatigue. I considered the implants that I had and the problems that they caused between 2008 and 2011. A little history. I had surgery in 2005, implanting McGHAN (which was later acquired by Allergan) 10 textured BIOCELL breast implants. I started to get ill around 2008. That's when I had a noticeable decline in health. 

I reached out to my family Dr. She said I was "getting old"! I was 44 years old at the time. Go figure! So I went to see random Dr's in the area. To get in, I just said my family Dr was busy and I couldn't get in. To make the story short, they said I had Chronic Fatigue Syndrome only because one of the Dr said they didn't know what else it could be. I again asked these Dr's, could it be the implants? They all said, no. I finally got them removed in 2011after I got an epiphany during a mediation practice. 

At the time in 2011 the internet showed that the BIOCELL textured implants only "caused the symptoms of non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma (BIA-ALCL). It wasn't until 2019 that the FDA requested a worldwide recall of Allergan's BIOCELL textured breast implants and tissue expanders due to a link with Breast Implant-Associated Anaplastic Large Cell Lymphoma, a rare immune system cancer.

Thinking about this energy loss, and the previous implants, I started to go on a mission on how I could naturally heal myself. I got another insight, if the pharmaceutical industry is for profit why wouldn't the supplement industry be for profit. The supplement industry simply gives you a false positive that they are helping you, but are they? I started to realize that both the pharmaceutical and supplement industry were not there to help but to profit. Certainly, there are times and places for these. I am not completely against them, but I think we've fallen into a trap of "relying" on them and lost our innate ability to take our own advice by asking our bodies what we need. This is called self-care and self-empowerment - when we work to understand ourselves intuitively and follow that divine guidance.

So the mission continued, and all of a sudden Dr Mindy Pelz (chiropractor) was offering a 3-day water fast. I enrolled right away for January 5 start day. She was offering daily support calls to explain what was actually happening in our bodies while we were going to do the fast, and she offered a private group for us to share our journey. 

The education that I received from Dr Mindy and the coaches and others that had done several water fasts was immense and incredible! I've done various fasts in my past, but over twenty years ago. I've abused my body over the years, took it for granted, but, most of all, I took care of everyone else around me and neglected my own self-care. Something shifted inside of me. I finally committed to my own self-care and weight loss goals. I bought her book Fast Like A Girl. I jumped on YouTube and binge-watched videos and podcasts on fasting. They all talked about blood sugars, insulin and so much more! It made sense especially for menopause and post-menopausal women. The water fast started out as a 3-day water fast or 72 hour water fast, but I continued for 90 hours instead.

So 2026 will be my journey into consistent fasting and learning about myself and how I work or operate while doing it all. I am excited. In another post, I will share with you what I went through and all the symptoms I dealt with during the 90 hour water fast. I will share information about each day and how I managed to get through it. It was tough!!! Really tough, but I did it. The support with much discipline and determination helped. 

Cheers to your health! I hope you find your groove too for better health and longevity.

Much love and until we meet again!