1. Get a complete body nutrient test to see what nutrients you're missing and start taking those nutrients right away

   Many people don't realize how critical this step is. You can't move forward at all if you don't focus your attention on what nutrients your body is missing.
   After the tests are done, find natural foods high in those nutrients and make them part of your daily diet right away. Or in extreme cases, get nutrients tablets but remember some will have side-effects on your body. Getting a plain multi-vitamin is NOT RECOMMENDED.
   
   Personal Note: I used Thyrocare for my blood tests as they are cheap in packages, and for medicines, I went with Carbamide Forte tablets on Amazon India from Recommended Sellers only.
   You absolutely don't have to use these, it's just that these are the ones I found and used and found to be okay. I tried the Patanjali or it's Nutra something tablets and they didn't seem to work at all so I started looking for alternative and found this.

2. [2 months] Decide that you want to be on a better health journey by yourself and start reading/listening to books AND NOT SOCIAL MEDIA

   This is also crucially important. You have to decide for yourself and you can't force this on other people. They have to make their own decision. I found two months to be adequate amount of time to let your body know,
   

   "Enjoy these last two months staying as you are but after two months(this date), we are starting on a better health journey that we will not abandon no matter how hard it gets and we will keep trying again and again when we do fail."

   
   In this time, find resources like the books below.
   BUT STAY AWAY FROM VIDEOS(ESPECIALLY YOUTUBE VIDEOS). Digital Health is another big thing but just know that video platforms like YouTube, Instagram, Facebook and any other thing that comes later should be COMPLETELY AVOIDED.
   Stick to physcial or audiobooks and listen to them instead. Listen to the authors who know the shit they are talking about like Robert H. Lusting & Jason Fung whose books I have already recommended below.
   Yes, there might be good content even from these authors on YouTube but the problem is the whole way these platforms are made where you will only end up wasting precious time instead of actually doing something.

These are principles that I have tested and finally made part of my habit. Most of them have been very very tough to implement but I have now done them.

• Fasting
  • 4hrs eating window and one day full fast→ In progress

    Some white bread, sugar sweets caused late night eating and broke 20hour fasts to pathetic 12-14hrs fastings and hence stopped me from trying two full day fasts. So taking step back and focussin on 4 hrs eating windows and one full day fast now.
    Also, parents are not yet ready for two ~40hrs fast a week for now.

  • 6hrs eating window everyday and one day full fasts→ Easy now and done.

    Yeah, been doing this for quite a long time now and this was the main thing that helped me drop from 107kgs to 90kgs in five months(Feb-July 2025).

• Processed Foods Elimination:
  • No more packaged white bread

    During a brief period of my fasting (06-Apr to 09-Apr 2026), I bought a packet of white bread which was meant for mother's training in another district that got cancelled and we had white bread in house after a long time.
    
    I ate lots of homecooked sandwiches with potato and ghee and even fried omlette. These foods were late in the night which is usually what I don't do as I pretty easily end my food after sun-down and just having this white bread caused the

  • No sugar syrups marketed as Health Drinks(Horlicks/Complan/Britannia etc...)

    Something with so much sugar, even if it is healthy, the large amount of sugar cuts it out. And I don't even need to go into the preservetives and other stuff they are adding, just the sugar content is enough.
    
    You want to take it or give it to others, sure, go ahead, but don't pretend it's healthy. It's not. It's horrible. And the earlier you make a commitment to yourself that this month is going to be my last I ever touch this vile drink, the better.
    
    Complan:
    I used to love complan as a kid and even when I grew up. The plain white milky flavour. I used to eat them right out of the box, that sweet nightmare. And with milk, *oh* :* I became a crack-addict with them. They were really really tasty and sweet BUT THE AUDACITY OF THE MARKETING TEAMS TO CALL THEM HEALTHY! was unbearable.
    
    Horlicks:
    Same was my story with Horlicks where with added milk in high concentration, it was just so so so tasty, it also gave you diaorrhea. If you ever have constipation, drink a thick glass of horlicks and milk and you will s#it like you have not s#it before.
    
    I bought one last packet of each Horlics and Complan(The shopkeeper must have thought it was for my kid) but

  • No Tomato Ketchup Bottles(from Market) at home

    Too much preservaties and harmful chemical to keep you addicted to it. Also, made the taste of other foods bearable when we should not have got those in the first place. This happened unconsciously. Didn't really require a big effort. As soon we cut down on Burgers and Pizza and Chickens, the need for Ketchup disappeared(I should however point out that with a good pizza we didn't actually need ketchup). Note: Complete elimination of ketchup, the small packets we get with burgers/pizzas is not covered in this, it's below.

  • No Soft/Cold Drinks at home

    Due to intermittent fasting, I no longer have the burning senstation in my stomach for which I used to get cold drinks in the first place. Therefore, it's no longer needed.

    However, until we have found a proper healthy drink that we can make at home on a regular basis we have replaced it with plain sods and jaljeera and nimbu mix(no sugar) so we can still take it during fasts.

  • No Packaged Fruit Juice

    Even if they were the perfect juice with no added sugars, you still need preservatives to keep them on the shelves. However, little fruit extract, lots of added sugar are enough for most. For other, remember eating the fruit directly gives you fibre that stops you from eating a lot.

    Don't even remember when we decided it but yeah it's already decided. We don't drink any packaged fruit juices. We eat the fruits, yes, but no longer take these packaged fruit juices.

• Daily Food Changes
  • No refined processed wheat flour as daily wheat(Mixed flour as substitute)

    Already done. All the flour in our home(daily) is stone milled locally. We used a mix that was suggested for diabetes and blood pressure alike, so jowar, bajra, wheat of course, methi and more. Will update in a video also.

Outside Food Elimination:
• What influenced you to open the food delivery app?

  As you're about to order something from a food delivery app, pause and ask yourself, "What influenced me to order this?"
  And if the answer is, myself or someone else in the family when they actually decided it for themselves, go ahead and order.
  But if it was influence due to any external factor(social media, movies, tv shows etc...), just don't order.

These are health principles that I am either already working on or have to implement in my life

• Fasting(Water only in short term[<20hrs], some additives for survival like salt-water, electrolytes and more in longer fasts[20hrs+]):
  • [In Progress] 6hrs eating window + 2x36hrs fast every week.

    Plan: Everyday I eat between 1200hrs-1800hrs except Tue and Thur when I don't eat anything and Wednesday linent 6AM-6PM eating window.

    The 90kgs I have had in mid-July 2025 sadly shot up to 102kgs now in mid-Dec mainly because during June-July I really pushed myself to the edge with fasting and the body retailiated. I didn't realize I was still malnourished and I focussed on getting my vitaminsa and other stuff to normal before I re-attempt anything.
    It's now mid-Dec 2025 and now I am ready with it.

  • [After above becomes easy routine]

    Undecided yet. I know that longer fasts in one go is the best but my parents get very worried so this will mainly depend on them as the main struggle with fasting is only in the first 24 hours.
    So if they do get worried, I wll continue with 3x36 or 6hrs eating window and 3 day of full fasts. Or, I can maybe try to reduce that 6 hours eating window to 4 hours but this will be a much bigger challenge as it depends on other people too not just me.

• Outside Food Elimination:
  • Junk Foods that require Ketchup and soft-drinks mainly Fried Chickens, Burgers and Pizza.

    It's mainly Occassional Burgers,Pizzas & KFC that come with these and we have heavily cut down on all such stuff, however, it's still an occassional treat when we need to celebrate. We haven't ordered these for months a now but only when we have stopped ordering them for an year I will consider these done.

• Processed Foods:
  • Complete Elimination of Processed Ketchup from our diet

    We already don't buy Ketchups at home. This is about small 1rs. packets that come with junk foods and is linked to the below ones.

  • Soft drinks that come with junk foods

    Again, just like Ketchup above, we have already stopped cold-drinks but until and unless we complete stop foods that require cold drinks with them, this can't be closed.

  • No Pre-cooked noodles like Maggie

    Already removed it all from our diet but we need a replacement as we did love chowmin as a kid which we made with love at home. I want to get back to that and I have ordered a few healthy stuff after some discussion and will let you know how it goes.
    Because if there is no replacement, we might just go back to eating the same salt-inflused stuff before.

    Ordered there already: Naturally brewed Soy Sauce | Whole Wheat Noodles | Rice Vinegar

    Of course these are very expensive and you might argue that maggie is so much cheaper but what you don't take into account is we eat very little maggie at all now. Earlier we used to finish the biggest pack of maggie in a few days(Due to the salt thing, it's addicting and hence we would eat up all of it regardless of how much we had) but now the last maggie pack we had lasted for a month or so.

Fasting requires it own section as there are a lot of misconceptions and it requires some prepratoins and small baby steps.

Note: Missed days are hard to plot since I also do more than 24 hour fast. I tried plotting them but it took more effort than it was worth and instead I am focussing more on keeping consistent fasting schedule instead so that's not needed anyways.
Also, note, fasting here means: Water Fast and if the fasting is more than 24 hours than electrolytes or no caloric drink mainly Jaljeera, soda water and lemon to keep the essential nutrients normal. Since I am not going for more than 44 hours fast, I will not go deep into the other stuff but maybe I should, will let you know when I do do my first plan 44 hour fast upcoming Tuesday.

• 1993-2016: Not real weight gain actually. Stable 66kgs.

  • <2009: Around 2005. Around the time I started to have a small belly although hidden but always being told, "Your stomach is coming out," and it started there and continued until now. "You're Getting Fat," "Your stomach is coming out," started here.
    

    

  • 2009
    

    2009

  • 2011 → Got slightly large belly due to Delhi fried food at PG mainly but shed it off after running a bit.
    

    

  • 2011-2016 → Maybe a very small belly but I was very thin throughout. This is also when I first did a lot of gym but had to quit due to "life". However a picture from 2015 does show that small belly.
    

    

• 2016-2018: First move from 66gs to ~80kgs(+14kgs)

  Just after college, moved to Delhi and physical activity became very little and Zomato and the food delivery apps with their discounts and coupon codes got to me and also it was a very depressing time for me unable to decide on one thing in life and other stuff.

  

  

• 2018-19: First job that gave me 1kgs/month and was one of the saddest period of my life.

  For any other human being, this was the best well settled easy job that is for life and you actually start marrying people and actually two did, right after getting this job. That's how stable and easy this job was, but every time I thought I would be stuck in this, just look at my face:

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

• 2019-Nov 2024: From 80kgs to 107kgs(+27kgs): Various Jobs but slowly YouTube Started

  During this period, I never wanted to get my picture taken and stopped taking pictures altogether. However, once I recorded my 107kgs weight in the app I was eating, I wrote:
  "That's enough"

• Nov 2024 - July 2025: Fasting over-pushed: 107kgs to 90kgs(-17kgs)

  Extreme Fasting and just drilling through everything even though I had just was diagnosed with many vital missing vitamins, iron, testosterone and more. I really shouldn't have pushed it too much but I did and eventually after I hit 90kgs, I rebounded.
  I didn't use anything to track the food but used alarms to eat food instead while not really regulating what I was eating.

• July 2025 - Dec 2025: Rebound Weight 90kgs to 99kgs (+9kgs): Goal: Focus on fulfilling nutrient deficiency regardless of weight gain

  

  
  Note: The 103kgs weight was actually with my winter clothes on and I didn't realize until I took a bath was actually 99kgs or lower.

• Jan 2026 - February 2026 Goal: Focus on consisten 20hrs fast everyday and make it natural

  January, February→ Focussed on daily consistency of 20hrs fast with some success.

• March 2026 Goal: Lower Recovery Period after 38hrs fast to two days instead of 3+ days

  New to Old:
  As you can see from the attached graph, things took a wild turn at the end of the month. A few days of missed full day fast and everything got ruined. I was only able to do one 40+hrs fast this month and the weight data shows.
  After the second long fast, I realize that I can easily take upto three days to recover, by which I mean on the days after the long fast I tend to WANT TO TAKE A REVENGE AND GIVE MYSELF SYMPATHY by eating lower than 18 hours and allowing the eating window to move by many hours especially late at night. I want to reduce this number to 1 day only extra like if I do a complete fast on Tuesday and eat on Wednesday, by Thursday I should be quite normal.
  Right now I am normal by 3 days. So, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and normal by Saturday. This is going to be my main goal as with 3 days I won't be able to do two fasts a week which is my next goal.
  Even if I do a Tuesday fast, then +3 do another on Saturday, I only get 2 days to get back to the next fast. So that's my goal right now, I guess. To lower the recovery period after a 38hrs fast from 3 days to 2 days.
  
  Mother looked at my face just after the fasting day and said it has shruken a little bit. I had noticed the vast change in body shape from 107kgs to 90kgs but not at the current around 98kgs. In face I actually gained some weight if I compare against the last long fast (96.8kgs vs 97.5kgs), however, weight isn't everything and my face showed that I have lost fat this time around and the lower weight isn't simply due to no water intake or empty bowel(which can themselves add 3kgs in this weight range as per my calcuations).
  
  This second fast I MADE SURE to stick to the schedule especially on the day just after the fast where I would tend to not eat from 8-18 but instead just 8-12 or something giving myself a head start for the next days. And this was precisely which ruined thee last long fast's aftermath, so this time I forced myself not to start the fast until I have reached the planned 1800hrs on the day after the fast and it's now Thursday and I feel just fine and I could do another longer fast with ease.
  So with that I will stick to schedule in two longer fasts in April if the last fast(last Tuesday)'s aftermath is still as calm as this one. It will be another problem to convince my mother however.
  
  The first time I did the long fast this month, I was agitated for days after trying to eat any junk I could find as if I was taking a revenge on the long hours that I HAD not eaten. However, this was mainly because I realized that I kept pushing too much into the schedule. Where I have a four hour window, I would often end food in an hour and start the timer thereby later feeling like dropping everything completely and just eating whatever junk I could find.
  This actually went on for 3 extra days from Tursdays to Saturdays and hence until I don't figure out a solution to this, I am not going to increase fasting days in April as planned.
  
  March→ One 38-hour fast & five 20-hour fasts.
  Earlier it was 20-hour for seven days so 140-hour fasts. Now it's 138-hour fast which is less by 2 hours but the longer 38-hour fast is more beneficial.
  Eating Windows 14-1800hrs everyday except Tuesday which is full day fast & Wednesday when it 8-18 because Mother lost her shit when I said I will eat at 1400hrs on Wednesday after 44hrs fast.
  March→ Focussing on daily fasts of 20hrs along with Tuesday no eating.

• Apr 2026: Getting back into the routine of 20hrs again!!!!

  This time it wasn't that much about not knowing stuff but allowing it to happen anyways. I was gladly doing Tuesday fasts but one week I was really hungry and mother said to eat and so I ate. I started to allow myself to be influenced by my parents.
  On top of that palm oil fried bhujiya and Dalmut which were not the part of our household for many months suddenly came back and healthy or not healthy, they do promote over-eating and I used to break my fast early just because they were in the house. They are now finisehd and I won't buy them anymore and if I do buy it for my parents it won't stay outside like before.
  On top of that, even knowing that sugar stuff is not good, I still ended up eating them.
  Honestly, I am thinking of leaving home just so that I can eat as per my schedule.
  
  Anyways, the point is, I stopped Dancing and muscle exercises last month, will start that again.
  4 hour default eating window all days I am not on fast will start.
  Tuesday nothing eating is being re-instatated as we speak.
  Now I am confused about starting Thursdays and Saturday fast but I have still put them on optional for now. If I can get away with it, I will do full day Thursdays and Saturdays fast even if I have to lie myself to do it.

• End Apr 2026→ Realizing that real weight loss has only happened when

  

  
  So sticking to this idea in my mind that I need to do one day/week complete fast to see any weight reduction, I forced myself and mainly my mother to not make me eat on this Tuesday i.e. 26-may-2026.
  
  She took out food for me with her even though I had said not to cook anything for me without me knowing and while I was lying down just distracting myself with fiction audiobook and waiting for the hunger pang to subside, she kept telling me to eat and that you should eat and fasting is bad and all that.
  
  She said she won't eat until I ate so I went out and said I will eat and she started eating but then after she had completed her eating I told her that I genuinely don't feel hungry anymore(the hunger pang had subsided with those few minutes) and I put the whole food back into the container.
  
  If I had ate, I would have lost all respect for myself. Just to be clear, if there is any actual signs that I should end fast(light headedness, glucose level going down dangerously and other things I have picked up) I wihtout a question always end my fast but there are no such signs right now, actually I have never had those signs simply because I have not bothered with more than 48hrs fast which require special stuff that I am unwilling to do right now.
  
  I am not blaming my mother, she does what any mother would do for her child but I need to be stern with my food. Even my mother's sister and her mother(mausi and nani) both do the exact same thing when I say I don't want to eay will take out food all the time.
  
  I never actually say no to many people in my life and that has been me for most of my life and I guess it starts now, at least with food.
  
  Due to not doing these long fasts I even started to have the burning stomach sensation which keeps me awake at night now and as soon as I go back to my one day/week and 20+hrs fast I will go back to a calmer stomach and can sleep properly.
  
  They day is not over yet. There is still 2 hours to go but I plan to going to sleep immediatly after drinking lots of water so as to not be tempted to eat at all.
  
  P.S: No gaming, No Youtube experiment means I can't distract myself with video entertainment like I used to so i am busy creating something, anything.