@mattyb sorry forgot to mention I do have sleep apneoa and use CPAP. The longer fast was done about 5 years ago when my stresses were higher. The family stressors are not going to go away and are related to my childrens disabilities and another with mental health issues. Yes I have done some CBT since starting that fast and have maintained the same weight for a year now. The thing is that my reaction to acute stress is over the top and as I understand from @gbolduev that fasting will make cortisol receptors more sensitive and enable me to be more resilient. My thoughts about eating have changed over the years, the all or nothing thinking was holding me back I have since cut sugar and all caffiene from my diet for the last 3 months. At present I am not feeling like eating much and I have holidays until the end of January. So it feels like a good time to fast and instead of re feeding with fruit which is the mistake I made before. I would like to try the lemon egg soup idea. I figure that If I can do some shorter fasts and come off successfully it will build my confidence in being able to do it plus I think that it would be good to come off keeping carbs low. I am more interested in the fasting to fix my cortisol than my weight, I figure if I can fix copper and cortisol that will be half the battle in the weight loss anyway. I have finally come to the point where I realise that I cannot go back to the eating habits that I had before. I am starting a juice fast today but if you really think it is contraindicated will stop. I expect that it will be very very uncomfortable as the stress levels will be pretty high but if I can break through that I hope to gain some benefits for being more sensitive to cortisol. Extrinsic stress levels are low at the moment so I will only need to deal with myself and I am able to rest as I need to. Thanks for your input.