Do you notice you lose more hair when fasting? It’s not you pulling your hair out with hunger this is an actual phenomenon.
In the Majhima Nikaya, Sutta 36 Buddha was sitting after many days of fasting and he rubbed his arm. All the hairs came out from the root.
He states “the hair — rotted at its roots — fell from my body as I rubbed, simply from eating so little.”
This experience was instrumental in his realization that extreme self-deprivation was not the path to liberation, leading him to discover the Middle Way.
Hair loss from fasting is now however more than acetic observation, it’s a scientific fact even with far more gentle fasts than the enlightened one undertook.
Studies do show that fasting leads to hair loss. It effects men more than women and seems to be consistent across mammals.
What causes this? There seems to be a few factors at play, the main being that the mitochondria in the hair follicles for various don’t do well when you are in fat metabolism.
So what can you do?
Rub vitamin E into your scalp.
A study published in Cell Research (2025), researchers applied topical vitamin E to fasting mice and observed a significant reduction in hair follicle stem cell damage. I suspect the same will work for us.
Of course we should also learn from buddhas experience and keep to moderate fasts.