Considering Intermittent Fasting to bust through plateau! Thoughts?

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  • stefchrysler
    stefchrysler Posts: 47 Member
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    This is horrible for your body. You starve yourself of needed nutrients you could cause metabolic imbalances. Sounds like another fad diet. You shouldn't do this in my opinion.
  • Christine_72
    Christine_72 Posts: 16,049 Member
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    stefchrysler wrote: »
    This is horrible for your body. You starve yourself of needed nutrients you could cause metabolic imbalances. Sounds like another fad diet. You shouldn't do this in my opinion.
    Intermittent fasting is not a fad diet.
    To explain it simply and why it works for me is because I find it easier to "diet" every other day, than everyday. Pretty simples ;)
  • obscuremusicreference
    obscuremusicreference Posts: 1,320 Member
    edited February 2015
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    stefchrysler wrote: »
    This is horrible for your body. You starve yourself of needed nutrients you could cause metabolic imbalances. Sounds like another fad diet. You shouldn't do this in my opinion.

    Nope. IF means jamming all of your calories into a certain time frame. You're not starving yourself of nutrients. People actually use this "diet" to GAIN weight.
  • miriams76
    miriams76 Posts: 138 Member
    edited February 2015
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    I've been trying it for about three weeks. I'm on my 6th fast today actually. Weight loss has been steady - 1lb a week on average despite a dramatic drop mornings after fast (2+ lbs). It has had other benefits though which is actually why I started - for the past year I've been getting coarse black chin hairs around ovulation time. These varied in number but definitely noticed more if I was eating 150> carbs on average. Was worried it might be PCOS or related to developing insulin resistance. Tried low carbing but found it really hard to stick to.

    Since starting a 5:2 program 3 weeks ago not a single chin hair. They would have cropped up about a week ago normally. Still try to low carb on non-fasting days but find the fasting easier to stick to. Physically it's not exactly easy but mentally it is ..
  • shaneenmnoble
    shaneenmnoble Posts: 5
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    loulamb7 wrote: »
    shaneenmnoble wrote: »
    I read up on how to get past a plateau and this was one of the suggestions. But I'm unsure. I've given up all grains, I've upped my exercise, but after losing 10kg, nothing! !! ! What's going on?

    How long have you been on this "plateau"? How did you lose the 10kg and long did it take? Have you changed anything in your routine?

    I'd say about 3 weeks. Do you think it's not long enough to be called a 'plateau'? I think I just got concerned because I wasn't losing weight as consistently as before.I used to lose around half a kilo or a whole kilo a week. It took me three months to lose the 10k; there were ups and downs. The biggest challenge being exercise- I'm not too fond of it! Also added coconut oil to my diet; thought it was a good thing, now everyone's telling me about the saturated fat content that's actually bad!!
  • Springfield1970
    Springfield1970 Posts: 1,945 Member
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    I always plateau on a cut for about 4-6 weeks. It's because I exercise and my body holds on to water, then I totally believe in the woosh effect where the fat cells empty and fill with water...then release all the water in one go, when the message gets through that this really is going to go on for a while.

    Intermittent fasting works well for men, I think it suits the ancestors way of life where the men would hunt for hours on an empty stomach, but we've probably moved on genetically from that, I heard somewhere that it takes 20 generations to make big changes.

    Anyway IF turned me into a miserable, lethargic dizzy person. I would eat my dinner at night and go into a food coma. I wasn't good for anything after that!

    Maybe try a 14 hour fast, 10 hour eat.
  • snarlingcoyote
    snarlingcoyote Posts: 399 Member
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    Personally, I love IF. I do 6:1, 5:2 or 4:3 depending on my schedule, how my clothes fit me and trends in the dread scale.

    I'm a short chick with generous curves that I don't lose no matter how skinny I get. IF means I don't have to worry about food for a day or 3 a week, depending. I was nervous about running on an empty stomach at one point, but I've recently discovered that so long as I don't go under 500 calories on a fast day (which is what I'm supposed to eat on a fast day anyway) I enjoy my runs MORE on fast days.

    It also means that when it's an eat day, I'm not picking at itsy little half-portions of this-n-that, I'm eating something sensible that I really enjoy and might even indulge in something slightly decadent here and there. (Like a slice of bacon on my meal!)
  • J72FIT
    J72FIT Posts: 5,951 Member
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    SLappe wrote: »
    Don't do it! It's called an eating disorder

    In reality it's just an eating pattern. That said, to your point, certain personality types can develop disordered eating patters from it. Sadly IF is not for everybody...

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