Fasting: Incorporating Fresh Pollen

Can you give us a broad outline of your book Le jeûne - Une voie royale pour la santé du corps et de l'esprit (Fasting - A Royal Road to Body and Mind Health) published by Éditions Dangles?

The distinctive feature of the book I have written is that it offers the most comprehensive vision possible of fasting and the virtues it possesses in its various forms. Every angle is covered. Thus, whether for one's own health, or for therapists looking after that of their patients, everyone will be able to find something of value in the light of the latest scientific research and data, which are often little known in France. Of course, I explain how fasting works, what it is used for, how to practice it, and any potential contraindications.

It is truly an exhaustive work that addresses fasting on a physical, psychological, and spiritual level simultaneously.

The book starts with human history. We are the heirs of those who successfully adapted to the impermanence of food. Even though this programming is buried deep within our DNA, we ourselves are fundamentally adapted not to eat constantly. What I wanted to highlight is that in the past, dietary breaks were forced fasts due to periods of scarcity and war. Food was not available all the time. As for the first humans, they had to conquer new territories to gather their food, much like wild animals. Meanwhile, we, who are collapsing under abundance—think about it, there are now more overweight and obese humans today than undernourished ones—are degenerating because of this excess. The problem is that we are better adapted to scarcity than to excess, which leads to a large number of metabolic, chronic, and degenerative diseases.

For our generation and our descendants, my feeling, if not my certainty, is that fasting is increasingly becoming an absolute necessity in the 21st century. Indeed, the main health problems we encounter are related to an excess of calories and poisons, and paradoxically, a lack of essential nutrients. Let me explain: on one hand, we have the accumulation of waste produced by the body (toxins) and external toxins (food and environmental pollutants), and on the other hand, micronutritional deficiencies. These deficiencies are caused by industrial food and depleted soils, leading to a lack of micronutrients (vitamins, minerals, enzymes, fibers...) as well as increasingly frequent absorption issues. The main reason is the presence of numerous poisons that prevent us from correctly absorbing certain micronutrients that are nevertheless essential for our cells to function properly.

This is where superfoods like fresh pollen, its leading figure, come into play.

Because our plates increasingly contain what nutritionists call empty calories, we are forced to fill up on micronutrients through superfoods.

The book also aims to explain many other virtues beyond simple detox. The Ancients, the Sages, as well as all spiritual and religious traditions, have always used fasting for the purification of the body, but also on a psycho-emotional level, in order to access wisdom and transcendence.

Finally, I wanted to strongly emphasize that fasting is becoming essential in the 21st century to empower our own self-healing capabilities and activate self-curative pathways.

A regular practice of fasting is the best self-curative medicine to fight progressive chronic illnesses, or so-called diseases of civilization, such as osteoarthritis, type II diabetes, but also chronic fatigue, as well as all neurodegenerative diseases, which are currently exploding. Not to mention cancers and cardiovascular diseases, for which fasting is a powerful preventive tool.

We have wonderful capabilities at our disposal—Hippocrates spoke of the inner physician—that we no longer use. Everything relies on external solutions, even though we harbor some of the most powerful solutions within ourselves. Fasting reopens the path to these capabilities, whereas eating too much, too often, shuts them down. Remember that our biology was not initially programmed to eat all the time.

Compared to fasting, which is a very current topic, we hear very different advice regarding its duration and frequency. It is very difficult to find your bearings. Is there a need for a consultation, for personalized advice, or do you have simple tips to offer to help choose the method that suits us?

Of course, a consultation with a healthcare professional specialized in the physiology of fasting will always bring added value. This way, it will be possible to offer a tailor-made approach and address the few contraindications to practicing certain types of fasting. People taking medical treatments must also seek advice from their physician.

But not everyone will necessarily take that step. One of the book's goals is to talk not about fasting in general, but about the different forms of fasting. There is a whole chapter dedicated to personalizing one's practice in light of individual goals or potential unique characteristics. Are you overweight? Have you passed a certain age? Are you a high-level athlete and don't want to lose muscle? Beyond the philosophical, historical, and scientific aspects, the book is also intended to be a guide for the first-time faster—the future faster who lacks experience and feels a bit lost in the mazes of various blogs. Let's just say it is a genuine practical guide for anyone wishing to fast at home.

There are several types of fasting, several fasting durations, and each duration and method of fasting has its own distinct characteristics. I am more a proponent of taking things slowly when doing this alone at home.

Start with intermittent fasting: instead of eating morning, noon, and night, take a short break once or twice a week, where you experiment with the so-called 16/24 fast. You go 16 hours without eating, and you do your eating within the remaining 8 hours. You have 2 meals, or 2 meals and a snack over 8 hours, and you will see that going 16 hours without eating instead of 12 changes a certain number of things. Later, when you want to go further, you will have plenty of avenues and possibilities because I explain which fast brings which benefits. I have also created a summary table for this purpose.

The detox break allows the body to eliminate as much of its waste, toxins, and poisons as possible. It offers unparalleled opportunities to repair certain functions, restore many metabolic pathways, modulate inflammation, and improve the signaling of highly valuable cellular receptors, such as those for insulin (which are struggling in many of us) and those for leptin for satiety signaling.

After this immense "reset" work, it is time to eat again. At this point, it is time to integrate superfoods into the refeeding phase and then into the post-fasting routine.

Speaking of this nutritional advice, you have given a significant place to fresh pollens. In the course of fasting, when do you recommend consuming these superfoods?

On food breaks of 3 days or more, we enter a cleansing phase that serves a dual purpose: detoxifying (getting rid of toxins and poisons) and repairing. The body repairs itself, and then we provide it with the right fuels. Doing this over seven days is even better. In my opinion, there is no need to go beyond that. Longer fasts are therapeutic fasts with specific objectives, often requiring medical supervision.

What you need to know is that fasting and sports share a common trait: once you have completed a relatively long endurance activity like running, cycling, cardio training, or a fast, the body has overconsumed a large part of its micronutritional reserves. Therefore, the very first thing it will do is rebuild its stocks. Thus, the post-fasting phase is a privileged window of opportunity for us to fill up on superfoods.

In nutritionist jargon, we have an optimization pathway regarding absorption. This means optimized absorption for micronutrients and high-quality amino acids. Knowing this, during the recovery phase—after one or two days of cooked vegetables, prioritizing greens—I will give my body the opportunity to optimally absorb all micronutrients. For me, pollen is the richest food in micronutrients found in nature. It is not the only one, but I put it in the number one spot. Why? Because first of all, it contains fiber, which is excellent as a prebiotic to reseed the gut flora that naturally diminishes during fasting. There is nothing pathological about this; it is normal. When we reintroduce fiber, we provide snacks for the microbiota. Furthermore, fresh pollen contains all vitamin groups, especially the most important ones. It is rich in minerals as well as precious enzymes. And this is highly important because, thanks to the enzymes contained in pollen, we are going to kickstart the machine.

Regarding the sugars contained in fresh pollen, even though they are high-quality, since many people suffer from sugar addiction in the Western diet, I advise taking it slowly at the beginning. I suggest a teaspoon starting from the 2nd or 3rd day after the fast, then gradually increasing. I do not provide a strict guide because you also need to listen to your body.

If there are no specific sugar addictions, or if people wish to resume physical activity fairly quickly, it is possible to start with a tablespoon. Outlining the plan, it is one tablespoon per day for the first week, with the option to increase gradually to two for the second week, and even three for the third week if there are severe micronutritional deficiencies or if the need to revitalize is high. The same goes for individuals who need to rebuild muscle mass. Indeed, there is a great abundance of bioavailable amino acids in fresh pollen, so in this case, 3 tablespoons by the 3rd week is justified.

I stay aligned with early naturopaths such as Paul-Valentin Marchesseau, one of the fathers, if not the father, of naturopathy in France, who used to say that after detoxing, you must revitalize!

I chose Nutripollen from the range offered by Pollenergie, as it is the complex that seems the most comprehensive to me. It features a wealth of lactic ferments, proteins, and vitamin C all at once. When there are specific needs, I may direct the person toward other pollens, but in 90% of cases, it is NUTRIPOLLEN.

In terms of bioavailability, I recommend pairing it with fruit or a fruit compote during a snack. For people implementing intermittent fasting by skipping breakfast, the pollen will be taken during an afternoon snack.

Your experience as a fasting retreat supervisor has extensively informed your book. What are the expectations of the people you welcome? Is there a typical profile, or rather a multitude of health-related expectations?

To answer your question, before accepting registrations, we have participants fill out a medical questionnaire, which is indispensable given the potential contraindications. Indeed, while there are many indications for fasting, there are also a few contraindications. I also need to check whether a medical opinion is required, for instance regarding medication use. This questionnaire asks the future faster about their motivations and expectations and helps them prepare internally and psychologically. Often, the majority of people come because they feel the call, they feel their body is asking for it; this can manifest as being overweight, but that is not the majority of requests—it is mostly because people feel clogged up. We have welcomed fasters from 20 to 84 years old, with a majority of women, and this can be naturally explained because women, through their psychological and perhaps also biological makeup, are more attuned to their bodies in order to pass on life. I think there is a greater sensitivity.

The second reason why people want to practice fasting is because they feel the need to break away from their daily routine. This is an excellent reason because fasting away from home and its usual constraints is extremely interesting for the mind. Participants release the stress accumulated when they operate with their "nose to the grindstone."

Fasting naturally has anti-stress virtues. It regulates many metabolic pathways in brain chemistry, and this is interesting to know. This can be explained because our ability to adapt to fasting in order to live without eating was not supposed to impair our physical and mental performance so that we could continue to gather food from nature. Also, a major and very surprising revelation for first-time fasters is that the brain functions better during a fasting period (not to be confused with hypoglycemia) than when we overeat.

Excess food does not just weigh down the body; it alters our mental, intuitive, subtle, and spiritual functions. I witness this regularly: people see life from a different perspective while fasting. "Because my body is asking for it, because I need to cleanse myself, but also I need to cleanse myself, I need to take a break."

Finally, others come for health reasons related to chronic problems such as fatigue, osteoarthritis, inflammatory pain... There are indications, and these are detailed in my book; I address all the functions of fasting, which are extremely numerous.

Our promise is to say that when you leave, you will be different; you will leave with a know-how, as we are committed to offering a transfer of skills.

Just one last question: there is a lot of talk about the benefits of fasting during chemotherapy. Do you discuss this in your book?

Yes, I do address it. In France, we tend to be cautious, yet we have evidence and studies highlighting the benefits of such a practice. Not all patients can fast during chemo, but when it is possible, the benefit is enormous because 90 to 95% of side effects are improved or even nonexistent, thanks to fasting 2 days before the day of the chemotherapy plus the day itself. But where the practice of fasting truly excels—and this is also my creed—is in its capacity to prevent cancerous diseases. Prevention is better than cure will be my final word.