Your body has the amazing ability to stay alive when in the face of peril and danger. When your access to food and water is cut off, leaving you to fend for yourself, your body’s natural instincts take over, and you’re able to survive for much longer than you’d think.
Your natural instinct is to survive. While our modern society knows almost nothing about surviving in the wilderness, our genetic makeup allows us to subconsciously remember how to build basic shelter, find food, and look for water. It’s what our ancient ancestors did, and you can do the same if you’re in that situation.
But when you’re lost and haven’t eaten or haven’t had anything to drink in a very long time, here’s what happens to your body:
Your Body Feeds on Fat
Ever wondered why the fat guy lost in the woods will always last longer than the skinny guy? It’s because he has plenty of fat reserves for his body to feed off of to create energy.
The skinny guy will still have fat for his body to eat and provide him with life-saving nutrition and energy, but that will quickly run out, leaving his body to eat his muscle tissue instead.
You’d much rather lose fat than muscle tissue!
But regardless of body type, this is usually the first step when you haven’t had any nutrition in a while.
Next, Your Mind Wonders
The natural progression of your state of being is that your mind tends to wonder, and then your mental state quickly declines.
You start asking yourself if you’ll live, or if you’ll ever make it out alive. These things tend to drive the average person a bit mad, and you’re left with a seriously decreased mental capacity. This can hurt your ability to think clearly, and you may not have the power to actually have the basic survival instinct.
Last, Your Body May Succumb to Coma and Cease
When you reach around the 4-5 day mark without drinking any water, this is when your body starts shutting down. Your heart loses its rhythm, your organs don’t have enough power to circulate your now thick blood, and your brain can’t handle any information.
Eventually, you would slip into a coma and eventually die.
What to Take Away
Water is the most important thing in the wild. You can last much, much longer in the wild without food than you can water.
But at you’ll have an idea of what happens to the average person! Hopefully you never have to deal with this.
