By Rebecca Drew
THIS FORMER London lawyer ditched the corporate party lifestyle that made her miserable and now leads a FRUITARIAN life that sees her intermittently dry fast for days at a time and she hasn’t DRUNK WATER for over TWO-YEARS preferring to EAT her water instead.
Fasting coach and entrepreneur, Alice Copilet (35) grew up in the UK and lived in London for a decade, working as a corporate lawyer in the capital for six-years. To onlookers, Alice had the perfect life; a successful career, lots of great friends, attractive boyfriends and a busy social life that saw her party hard every weekend and indulge in restaurant cooked meals rich in meat and dairy.
Behind her smiles, Alice was miserable and felt lonely and trapped in her career and found her comedowns and hangovers increasingly difficult to manage. Fed up of feeling this way, she decided to go on a meditation retreat in February 2012 for 10 days where she was surprised to find she enjoyed the delicious vegan food on offer there and left with a great sense of clarity.
After doing a vegan challenge the following January, Alice committed to a plant-based lifestyle. Six months later, she discovered raw veganism and fruitarianism on YouTube. Having always loved all fruits, Alice was instantly attracted to this way of life and decided to become fruitarian herself after seeing how at peace other fruitarians on social media were.
In October 2018, Alice moved to Koh Pha-ngan, Thailand, with her life partner, Toby, in order to explore the abundance of high quality delicious exotic fruits readily available over there and now follows a 95 per cent fruitarian lifestyle which she combines with intermittent dry fasting where she consumes no food or liquids for hours and days at a time. Alice hasn’t drunk water since December 2016, preferring to eat her water through fruit and juices instead.
Thanks to her complete lifestyle change Alice has gone from weighing 11st 11lb and a UK size 12 whilst in London, to being 8st 13lb and a UK size eight now. Her regime has given her a heightened connection with nature and more energy than she has ever had, last summer she hiked the Camino de Santiago in Spain.
“I’ve always been a very confident, happy-go-lucky, easy going, life of the party sort of person and never had problems making friends or having fun but there was a rift inside me and when I was alone, I felt miserable, scared and panicked,” said Alice.
“I always needed to go out and be with people, I always had to have plans, to know that I had something on later, I had to fill my life with things because I was terrified of what would come up if I just stopped and sat alone in silence.
“The pain, the sadness, the loneliness, the grief, the contrasts between the highs and the lows all became too much, which is what led me to actually stopping and sitting alone in silence, meditating for ten days at my first Vipassana course, which is where this whole journey started for me.
“I’ve always loved fruit – growing up in Romania, where the summers are really hot, I remember eating and enjoying so much amazing fruit: watermelons, cherries, peaches, grapes, I used to practically live in the giant mulberry tree outside my grandparents’ house when the fruit was ripe and bursting with juiciness.
“Even as a teenager and into my twenties, even though I ate a lot of meat and dairy, I still always loved fruit and instinctively gravitated towards it. It was about six months after I became vegan that I found out about raw veganism and fruitarianism on YouTube and I was instantly drawn in.
“The presenters seemed really vibrant, healthy, open minded, non-judgmental, often incredibly wise and very helpful, the vibe overall just felt so high, so that was definitely a big pull. I was also struggling in my life in a lot of ways at the time.
“I felt very stuck, unabundant and unauthentic in my career, I was partying a lot and the hangovers and comedowns were really challenging and increasingly low. So I knew that something had to change. I knew I didn’t feel right in my skin and in my life. This to me felt like something I could do. It felt empowering.
“All the YouTubers I was following were travelling the world, attending fruit festivals, connecting with magical, peaceful, earth loving humans, they were financially independent, they all seemed free. And I wanted that so badly for myself.
“When you come back to eating this way, to living in such a natural way, so connected to all of life around you, you’ll see that life can literally be a return to the Garden of Eden.”
Alice has been practicing intermittent dry fasting for two-years now, fasting daily for 16 to 24 hours, weekly for 24 to 36 hours and once a month she dry fasts for two-days at a time.
Her diet is largely fruit based, with 95 per cent of it consisting of high-water content fruits such as; mangoes, watermelons, papaya, oranges, tangerines and mandarins. The rest of her diet is comprised of salads, the occasional vegetable soup or curry but she never eats grains, tofu, soy, beans or lentils and is mindful of keeping her salt intake at a minimum. Alice eats low-fat and adds no oil or additional fat to her foods other than those which occur naturally in her favourite fruit, durian which is 20 per cent fat, or tahini, but admits she did struggle with cravings at the outset.
Alice went into detail about the benefits of not drinking water and how it encourages the kidneys to filter the body’s lymphatic system.
“After a certain period of time without any water whatsoever, the body begins to access water stored within the body, in a process not too dissimilar to that of a camel, whose hump is full of adipose tissue (fat) which in turn is full of water and when the camel requires access to its water stores, its body very effortlessly and naturally burns off those fat cells to access the water they contain,” she explained.
“Not drinking water allows the kidneys to start filtering the lymphatic system, which is how excess acidity is eliminated by the body from the body, through the urine. This whole concept that urine should be clear, otherwise you’re dehydrated is a complete fallacy.
“All clear urine means is that the kidneys aren’t filtering, which means a stagnant lymphatic system, which is the root cause of all disease. That’s why the first wee of the day is always dark, because the body did some dry fasting during the night and some lymphatic filtration took place.
“The body only wants and only recognises living water. Water from fruits, veggies and coconuts. This is what hydrates the body at a cellular level, not plain water, which merely acts as a solvent, flushing through the body but not hydrating the cells.
“The process of intermittent dry fasting and then rehydrating with high water content fruits like melons, citrus, grapes and berries, a process I call eating our water is how the body will rehydrate at a cellular level. Drinking water slows down the detox.
“Cravings have been a challenge at points – from subtle nagging but manageable type cravings to full blown crazy person pacing up and down the house, opening and closing the fridge door twenty times, eventually eating the thing, loving it, then feeling guilt, shame and disappointment with myself.
“Then the physical repercussions; bad digestion, skin breakouts sometimes, the emotional fallout, it took time to learn how to practice self-love: this path, which is now central to what I now teach is absolutely essential and it’s subtle.
“It took me many years of trial and error to finally get to where I am today.”
A typical day for Alice sees her wake up at around 7am, dry fast until 1pm when she drinks a litre of fresh orange juice or has a couple of young green coconuts followed by two litres of coconut water, fruit juice or sugarcane juice. In the evening Alice usually has some fruit, either mango, papaya or durian. For two or three days a week, she follows a liquid diet where she doesn’t eat any whole fruit.
Alice shares her fruitarian lifestyle on Instagram and Facebook.
“Now I feel whole – there is no separation between me alone and me with others, I feel equally at peace and equally content in either context,” she said.
“This way of life truly is a path of peace, love and balance, the authentic natural way of living in oneness with nature. Many think the journey, the transition, will be tough and I really want to dispel this myth. The path will be as gentle, self-loving, gradual, indulgent and abundant as you allow it to be.
“What’s truly tough is regret, living with the knowing that deep down you know that you’re not living authentically, that you’re just going through the motions, that something vital is missing.
“Living in a body that suddenly begins to fail you, that’s real tough. Some detox symptoms here and there, these come and go, they’re transitory, but with each layer that you shed, you’ll feel more light, more empowered, more in tune with the wisdom of your body, more flowy and abundant in life
“You’ll attract all the right people and opportunities to you and synchronicities will soon lead the way to actual magic unfolding in your life when you take the reins and start being in the driving seat of your life, of your body, mind, emotions, health, destiny. It’s all available to you. The path is here when you’re ready.”
For more information see www.instagram.com/fasting_with_alice and www.facebook.com/FastingwithAlice
