Fast Times in Chiang Mai

In a vain attempt to bridge the enormous blog block I’m gonna leap straight in with the most recent activities.

I’m here in Chiang Mai, northern Thailand. My hotel is overlooking the ancient city Thae Pae Gate, it’s about 30C and I’m a different person. 

Why?

Well, last week I did something I a/ vowed I would NEVER do and b/ didn’t believe I was capable of doing. 

I fasted.

For seven and a half days.

A bit of back story…

About five years ago my mate Gina did a fast in Koh Samui. It triggered a massive weight loss and huge improvement in her health. We did a tour together where she described the entire process in graphic glory, from the lack of food to the self-administered enemas. While I was impressed with her results, I was less than impressed with the methods! Laying on your back like an up-ended turtle, trying to stick a pipe up your arse, all the while sweating and slipping around didn’t sound like my idea of fun.

Fast forward to this January. Gina was in a spa in Chiang Mai doing her now annual fast/cleanse, and I was invited to go up and hang out, nothing more. I readily accepted and booked a one way flight up there.

I planned to stay no more than a week but within less than 24 hours of arriving at the resort I knew I’d be there longer. I can honestly say it’s one of the most peaceful, beautiful and magical places I’ve ever spent time. The climate is magnificent, none of the humidity of Bangkok and the south. Wonderfully fresh, clean air because the resort is up in the hills a few kms outside of the city. It’s been built in a style sympathetic to the local surroundings and generally resounds with simple luxury.

I quickly settled in and booked a further four nights in my Townhouse, but still adamant that unlike the group of fabulous women I met I wasn’t gonna be joining them in the cleanse. 

I did get into the raw food and for the most part I spent 10 days eating mainly veggie, mainly uncooked meals. All of them were delicious. As that 10 days passed, I watched my fellow Spa-ers go through the entire process and was incredibly impressed with the results. Glowing skin, shining eyes, not to mention weight loss, every single one of them was a brilliant advertisement for it. Importantly, every single one of them assured me that the enema (or colema as it’s called here) was nowhere near as vile as I was imagining.

I was slowing coming round to the idea and so it was that on Friday 18^th of January I found myself beginning my own seven day cleanse. 

It began with a weigh-in. I was delighted to find that in the two weeks since I’d left London I’d already lost seven pounds mainly down the the raw food diet at the Spa. I’d had my check up with the Doctor the previous day and all was good to go. 

I was given my first detox drink at 7am - a mix of clay and psyllium husk shaken with fruit juice and quickly downed before it set solid. This was followed 90 minutes later by six herbal supplements. These were to give me the essential nutrients and boost my metabolism. I had a little book with my schedule on it. Basically every hour and a half you’re doing something between 7am and 9pm. 

The "broth soup"

In addition to the five detox drinks and five doses of pills per day, you take two bowls of “broth soup” filled with minerals. This “soup” was more like the water left behind when you’ve boiled cabbage for about a week, but if you drank it rather than ate it like soup it was bearable despite the photos!

On day one you only do one “colema” and before you start you watch an instructional video and the doc gives you a physical demo of how to place yourself on the special board devised for this purpose. Not a complete demo I hasten to add!

The colema set up. Not sexy!

I won’t lie, my first day on this fast was tough. Almost immediately I got the headache from hell due my rather traumatic withdrawal from caffine. And when the time came to do the first colema, the process was far from simple. I ended up vomiting at the same time. Not the greatest of starts! If ever there was a chance of me quitting, day one was it!

Days two to seven passed without incident, I quickly developed a routine around the 90 minute intervals that encompassed meditation, exercise (including 200 sit-ups every day), and copious amounts of sunbathing. 

I can honestly say I never once felt really hungry. Of course you’re filling your stomach with all kinds of liquids on an extremely regular basis, and while I missed my morning cup of coffee I didn’t experience any real craving for it.

I even came to look forward to the enemas because there was the physical proof that the whole process was working. My results in that arena weren’t as striking as some people’s but it was still immensely satisfying to see all the old crap (literally) leaving my body.

On the morning of day eight you follow a sort of winding up procedure and reintroduce food very slowly. I was feeling weak by then and my body was definitely ready for some food, but on the whole the entire process was pretty simple and straightforward. 

Of course, it’s easy to do it in a place like this where everything is laid on for you and the most strenuous thing you have to do is walk up the hill to the meditation sala, but I think I’d even attempt to do it at home in the future. 

Before (left) After (right)

At the end of it all I’d lost a further seven pounds and now that I am eating again I’m still losing weight. I feel mentally and physically better than I have for a very long time, and have come away with a determination to do all I can to make sure I return to Chiang Mai again very soon.