Thread: What's the longest you have been without food?

No less than 3 weeks. So, 21 days. Possibly longer, but definitely not less.

A human can actually survive for a few months (2-3) without any food as long as they have adequate amounts of water.

Originally Posted by Aquanina

No less than 3 weeks. So, 21 days. Possibly longer, but definitely not less.

A human can actually survive for a few months (2-3) without any food as long as they have adequate amounts of water.

Well done. Was that for a hyper cleanising purpose? I couldn't have gone another four days. I had punished my body too much.

I'm considering seeing how long I can go now, lol. Once you become used to it, it really isn't any big thing not to eat. When I first started going without food for a while, I would get terrible stomach pains and always feel hungry, but I ignored it. About two weeks later I didn't even become hungry anymore. The longer you go, the longer you can go. I guess I'll start fasting now, probably report back in this thread no sooner than a week from now, if I remember to.

Food Stamps are provided by the State and county of residence for low income families. You have to fill out a bunch of paper work, giving information about your possessions and jobs/income, and information about who you provide for (spouse, children). The State then calculates how much your family needs to eat and how much money it would cost to buy it. If your situation changes (better job, better hours etc) then you have to report it and your Food Stamps are usually docked. State assistance is an honorable goal, but it needs a lot of work. It's almost impossible to ever "get ahead" unless you work under the table.
I was on Food Stamps 13 years ago or so and it's changed. When I was on it, we used "monopoly money". Now-a-days, people use a card (like a credit card). You can buy food items (even junk food) but no hot foods (you can buy some deli items for instance, but no hot subs and such).
When I was on Food Stamps, I would frequently give some to family and friends in exchange for cash so I could buy items like diapers, cigarettes and gas for the car. When they switched to the Card it was to curb people from doing that, but they still find ways around it.

22 hours, LOL.

Never more than 24 hours, haha
Though there was this one time when I went with very little food for about 3 days, but I started to eat properly again after I nearly threw up one evening. <--is terrified of throwing up.

You probably stop feeling hungry because your body starts to eat your muscles, fat and eventually your internal organs.

I did a fasting twice in which I only drank tea for a week. More recently I've tried again and I didn't manage to do it for even one day... I still aim at doing the 21 days fasting though. Seems to be miraculous for all kinds of diseases.

Ummmm.... Probably about 12 hours (awake). I prefer to eat small and regular, but I was having a busy day!

I took a trip to Paris last year. I came back feeling rough as hell. Basically 1-2 hours sleep per night, very little food and water, running around (pretty much all day) all over disneyland... 16 hour bus journey with a bunch of other teenagers... Yeah, never again. Or I'd actually eat something better than cereal.

Ah was fun though Good memories

3 1/2 days and another time 2 days. I fasted on purpose.

Originally Posted by mcwillis

My length of time

17 days and I nearly collapsed from malnutrition and stole food for the first and only time.

The reason I went that long

Homelessness and drug addiction

The point of this thread

I am aware that thousands of people starve to death everyday despite there being enough food produced globally to feed the entire population of the world several times over. That is what the United Nations say. Discuss.

The longest I've gone without food is 24 hours when I had stomach flu, all those years ago at the age 12. The closest I've been to homelessness was the eviction notice my parents got. Frightening and humbling.

There are a lot of homeless people in my city. We don't see them as much because the city has gone through great efforts to conveniently hide them from view by creating a massive shelter (some say prison for the poor) , so the tourists don't know. But even after building the largest shelter our city has seen, it feels like the number of homeless people has increased. And what's so different is their faces. It used to be mostly older men who look like war vets.

These days, I see young adults who look like me.

Since you've been there, what's the best way that someone like me can help a hungry homeless person? I've heard the argument that you shouldn't give them money because they'll just use it on drugs and booze. I don't know how true that is. Since you had an addiction, I thought maybe you can share your insight. Is giving money better than food? Or would have been just as happy with free food and maybe a bottle of water? Should I respect the free will of the homeless person and let them spend the money I give them any way they want? Or should I be concerned they won't spend it on what they need immediately?

As for ending hunger globally, I think its important to first act local. Every city in the US has its share of hungry and homeless. Donate to your local food bank, or give them a call on what they really need. Right now our local food bank has "passively" complained that they're getting too much junk food donated, and not enough healthy food. Which compounds a problem on top of another, because the American obesity crises has been linked to poverty.

On a global scale, its not realistic to say that the solution is for foreigners to feed people on a different continent. That may be necessary for natural disaster emergencies, but in the long run, every nation needs to be able to feed itself. There are a lot of factors that lead to a hungry nation. But most importantly, we need to be humble and realize everything we eat originated from the earth. There are nations, after years of habitat loss, have created a desertification. This desertification makes it hard to grow anything. If you look at the HUNGRIEST nations, habitat loss is a reality staring right back at you.

America learned her lesson quick.

The Great Dust Bowl taught us the importance of looking after our soil. We've mastered the art of growing a bounty. (It's water conservation now that's biting us!) You'd think all nations would have learned from our mistake, but they haven't. China is over due for a dust bowl. And if China has a dust bowl, were talking massive wide crop failure. China can't afford that.

Fortunately, horticulture is a science. And after thousands of years, we humans know how to turn even the poorest soil into a productive field of crops. There are organizations that go to those hungry places and literally teach them how to feed themselves.

And homelessness? I think the western nation can learn from tribal cultures. In a tribal culture, unchanged by time, there is no excuse for anyone being without a home. It's a community responsibility to ensure that everyone has a roof over their head. Home building in the west has become so complicated, you need a number of signatures to build anything. Those signatures cost MONEY. And if you don't get those signatures, well the city bulldozes your house down.

In other words, our legal and capital system has made it very hard to ensure a basic human right, according to the oldest tribal cultures.

But, luckily for many nations across the world, the building codes are far more lax. Earthen building is ancient, eco-friendly, easy to learn, the cheapest building method, hurricane and earthquake durable, non-toxic, and proven by time to be the most stable building structures. There's an organization or two empowering impoverished communities to put a shelter over their heads, just like our ancestors have always done.

That doesn't mean the homes have to look like ugly huts. They can still look very modern and beautiful.

I've been "eh" about donating to major groups claiming to feed the world (I'd rather donate locally). They've been at it for so long and not much has improved (that and a good chunk of the money doesn't feed anyone). And nothing will improve if we don't approach the problem from bottom up, that is, empowering the people to feed and cloth themselves.

Originally Posted by juroara

Since you've been there, what's the best way that someone like me can help a hungry homeless person? I've heard the argument that you shouldn't give them money because they'll just use it on drugs and booze. I don't know how true that is.

I have personally become engaged in a movement of volunteers in my city which every night gets food from restaurants and stores, prepares it in the morning after and delivers it to the homeless people. Every day and every night there's a different team, so we share the burden very efficiently. It costs almost nothing, just 300 EUR/month for renting the kitchen, because the food is for free and the transportation is done with the volunteers cars. If only every city and village had a similar system fully operational, at least there would be no hunger in our countries - although this is just a quick-fix, not the solution. The solution is that we reorganize society so that every human being finds it's place on it and is never left empty handed and hopeless.
My long term plan is to have my own farm, take my whole family and some friends to the countryside and offer them a life and a fulfilling job and be as much as possible self-sufficient as a community. Then instead of having half of the family unemployed, living on few EUR from social welfare and so on, we will be proud and productive human beings, with food that we won't need to depend on someone else to get. If one out a certain number of families, did the same, society would go back to balance and hunger would be greatly reduced around the world. The problem is the abandonment of the only job that actually produces something that we all need: farming. By moving all to cities and by working all on producing disposable objects and offering services, we live on a illusory bubble without a strong base to support it. This civilization as we know it nowadays won't hold on much longer, because we need people on farms, taking good care of the land and producing good food. If we leave it to corporations to produce large scale monocultures that offer low nutrition, soon we'll all depend on synthetic food from labs, because there will be no fertile land left. I mean, we can live like that, but we would very quickly degenerate as a species. People have no idea how much we depend on Nature's balance and healing energies to keep going.
Well,... I'm drifting already, but that's it: if we want to fight hunger, we must produce food - not in quantity and with GMOs and all that agribusiness crap - we must take it in our hands, at family level! From the US suburbs to the most remote African villages.

Originally Posted by Zhaylin

Food Stamps are provided by the State and county of residence for low income families. You have to fill out a bunch of paper work, giving information about your possessions and jobs/income, and information about who you provide for (spouse, children). The State then calculates how much your family needs to eat and how much money it would cost to buy it. If your situation changes (better job, better hours etc) then you have to report it and your Food Stamps are usually docked. State assistance is an honorable goal, but it needs a lot of work. It's almost impossible to ever "get ahead" unless you work under the table.
I was on Food Stamps 13 years ago or so and it's changed. When I was on it, we used "monopoly money". Now-a-days, people use a card (like a credit card). You can buy food items (even junk food) but no hot foods (you can buy some deli items for instance, but no hot subs and such).
When I was on Food Stamps, I would frequently give some to family and friends in exchange for cash so I could buy items like diapers, cigarettes and gas for the car. When they switched to the Card it was to curb people from doing that, but they still find ways around it.

Thanks for the info, Ive wondered about that in the past.

Originally Posted by juroara

Since you've been there, what's the best way that someone like me can help a hungry homeless person? I've heard the argument that you shouldn't give them money because they'll just use it on drugs and booze. I don't know how true that is. Since you had an addiction, I thought maybe you can share your insight. Is giving money better than food? Or would have been just as happy with free food and maybe a bottle of water? Should I respect the free will of the homeless person and let them spend the money I give them any way they want? Or should I be concerned they won't spend it on what they need immediately?

Some addicts I know try to earn their drug money by playing music or doing pavement art. I give them money and I feel it's up to them what they do with it. If they are plain begging then I will get them something to eat. I used to do pavement art to make money. My stomach had shrunk so much anyway by the time of my lengthy fast the first two weeks was actually easy but the last four I was really unsteady.

Originally Posted by juroara

And nothing will improve if we don't approach the problem from bottom up, that is, empowering the people to feed and cloth themselves.

Exactly. They need food, water, medicine, shelter, clothing, tools, fertiliser and then they can start to fend for themselves. It's not a lot.

But the point of the thread was if a country has failed crops due to drought for example, why do we let a large amount of the population starve when there is enough wealth to help them. That is just inhumane and wrong.

If I had to guess I'd say 16-20 hours. I've never really done a formal im-not-gunna-eat session. That being said I'm not really a big eater in the first place, I regularly go 12 waking hours without eating while I'm at school.

In regards to the food crisis; I understand a large problem is American agribusiness product flooding the markets of foreign countries that have much larger concentrations of poor people. Local markets crash as the people of those countries just can't compete with American producers with their fertilizers, subsidies, industrial techniques, etc. As a lot of you know people of developing countries rely largely on their farms to provide for their families needs. More victims of the "free market".

Originally Posted by mcwillis

Well done. Was that for a hyper cleanising purpose?

Not quite.

I think I know why but I won't say as it is probably private. That would take an enormous amount of mental control.

Originally Posted by Aquanina

No less than 3 weeks. So, 21 days. Possibly longer, but definitely not less.

A human can actually survive for a few months (2-3) without any food as long as they have adequate amounts of water.

Wow 21 days? What were the effects?

Not long at all.

My friend went without food for three days. He was drinking juice though throughout this time, unaware that this was kind of cheating.

I think the longest I have gone without food is about 72 hours, because I was very sick and told by my doctor that I could only drink water until she could figure out what was wrong with me. It wasn't very long but it was very hard because I have an addiction to food!