Intermittent Fasting Support Group?

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Replies

  • pork_belly
    pork_belly Posts: 144
    I've been doing 19/5 for six weeks and I can't think of a better way to eat for me. It gives me more resolve in controlling when I eat. It definitely got easier after the first couple weeks. I also throw in 36-40 hour fast when I feel I need the extra effort to hit a weight goal. Mind you I am not trying to build muscle. I do light dumbell work outs to maintain muscle tone and that walking, too.

    When I look at my progress report I can see when I started IF. There is a steeper drop in my rate of weight loss than previous.

    My diet is pretty close to Atkins. I would say its a combination of Atkins and the Tom Ferriss slow carb diet. I get a cheat day but don't find myself taking it much these days.
  • firedragon064
    firedragon064 Posts: 1,082 Member
    I could not do IF this week since I'm surrounded by food all day but I hardly sit still so I think I'm OK.
    I'll hope I won't gain weight.
  • chrisdavey
    chrisdavey Posts: 9,834 Member
    Three days of 16/8 down.

    Decided to continue doing 16/8 daily, instead of making today a total fast. Thanks for the advice!

    Definitely liking it so far.

    How long have you guys been doing it?

    I think that's a good idea :smile:

    I've been LG style IF'ing for a bit over 6 months now I think. I only had a break for a few weeks after my hip injury when I couldn't really do any exercise.

    Have been able to lose weight when I wanted, gain when I wanted and strength has been increasing the whole time :happy:
  • Acg67
    Acg67 Posts: 12,142 Member
    I suppose i should chime in, i've been doing the LG approach for 2 months and got over my plateau and havne't felt better. and it's more convenient for me as well. I have a small meal pre workout since i'm not a morning person and don't really want to get up at 5am to hit the gym before work
  • hush7hush
    hush7hush Posts: 2,273 Member
    Hooray for support. [:

    Chris, did you see that debate that went on on my status? It was like, massive bro-science all the way.
  • claudiathegrate
    claudiathegrate Posts: 1
    Is this group still active??

    I just discovered this and well, it's just what I've been doing as an experiment the last week or so (a little longer)! I've been having really vile digestive problems so I started experimenting leaving a bigger "fast" period for myself.
    Benefits:
    1. No more night stomach issues
    2. WAY more energy during the day, almost a buzzed need to keep working, even on days when I don't have enough sleep
    3. Just feel good, lighter
    4. I've lost 2 pounds this week

    I haven't really restricted anything I like from my diet. I still enjoy cookies/doughnuts/wine etc., just in much smaller doses because I just allow myself to eat for about a four-hour window. I don't see this as a "diet" but rather something I can see myself continue doing. I think the only draw back is people at work thinking I'm weird for knitting during lunch instead of eating!
  • holly_v
    holly_v Posts: 292 Member
    I suppose i should chime in, i've been doing the LG approach for 2 months and got over my plateau and havne't felt better. and it's more convenient for me as well. I have a small meal pre workout since i'm not a morning person and don't really want to get up at 5am to hit the gym before work

    this makes me feel good because i have been on a plateau for 2 months and i started 16:8 this week to try to break through!
  • chrisdavey
    chrisdavey Posts: 9,834 Member
    I'm still here :) I'll have a look now Hush

    hehe, just added a response.
  • anspots
    anspots Posts: 1
    I fast one day a week also. I feel fantastic. I do it for religious reasons. My body may be in "starvation mode" but my mind is sharp. After a fast my body almost feels like it cleanses itself because I drink a lot of water. Call me crazy, but fasting makes me feel better.
  • rileysowner
    rileysowner Posts: 8,313 Member
    I fast one day a week also. I feel fantastic. I do it for religious reasons. My body may be in "starvation mode" but my mind is sharp. After a fast my body almost feels like it cleanses itself because I drink a lot of water. Call me crazy, but fasting makes me feel better.

    Your body is not in "starvation mode" in any way. In fact your metabolism will increase during a 24 hour fast. Slowing of metabolism doesn't happen for up to about 72 hours.
  • hush7hush
    hush7hush Posts: 2,273 Member
    Pretty much just posting so that it bumps back up in My Topics. [:
  • Kaycurrier
    Kaycurrier Posts: 231
    I support fasting, I however do not know much about it? Can anyone help me understand it better so that I may use it to my advantage better? All I do now is five hours a day, basically not eating after 5.
  • rileysowner
    rileysowner Posts: 8,313 Member
    I support fasting, I however do not know much about it? Can anyone help me understand it better so that I may use it to my advantage better? All I do now is five hours a day, basically not eating after 5.

    A good place to go is leangains.com lots of information there. If you want to spend some money you could purchase the book Eat Stop Eat by Brad Pilon. Brad also has a bunch of videos on youtube just search for Brad Pilon there.
  • pork_belly
    pork_belly Posts: 144
    I support fasting, I however do not know much about it? Can anyone help me understand it better so that I may use it to my advantage better? All I do now is five hours a day, basically not eating after 5.

    It seems that there are two parts to Intermittent Fasting. One is frequency and the other is nutrition. Some fasting routines have nutritional guidelines based on muscle building or body recomposition. An example of this is Lean Gains. Some just offer frequency guidelines such as Fast-5. For myself my current goal is losing weight so I follow a low carb (similar to Atkins) diet using the Fast-5 frequency.

    http://www.fast-5.com/
    http://www.leangains.com/
  • shellbell525
    shellbell525 Posts: 80 Member
    Hi everyone. I'm so glad i found this thread. I just recently started researching/getting interested in IF and I'm loving the idea. I remember growing up and during my thin adult life i was basically following the 16/8 rule with out ever knowing it. Then i fell in love and started going out to and making a lot more dinners, got a desk job and gained weight. In trying to lose weight initially i was trying to follow the eat more often rule but i always found it hard to divide up 1400-1500 calories between 6 meals. Plus i really don't like eating breakfast. I'm so glad i've found eatstopeat and IF, i started trying to follow these guide lines the past week or so and i feel so much better. I feel it really fits in to my lifestyle and i don't feel guilty when i bend the rules a bit. I finally feel free from all those restricted diets, plus its always been hard for me to say no to things that i crave... and when i do it usually stays on my mind until i break down and give in... and then i feel aweful about it. NOT ANY MORE!
  • pork_belly
    pork_belly Posts: 144
    Hi everyone. I'm so glad i found this thread. I just recently started researching/getting interested in IF and I'm loving the idea. I remember growing up and during my thin adult life i was basically following the 16/8 rule with out ever knowing it. Then i fell in love and started going out to and making a lot more dinners, got a desk job and gained weight. In trying to lose weight initially i was trying to follow the eat more often rule but i always found it hard to divide up 1400-1500 calories between 6 meals. Plus i really don't like eating breakfast. I'm so glad i've found eatstopeat and IF, i started trying to follow these guide lines the past week or so and i feel so much better. I feel it really fits in to my lifestyle and i don't feel guilty when i bend the rules a bit. I finally feel free from all those restricted diets, plus its always been hard for me to say no to things that i crave... and when i do it usually stays on my mind until i break down and give in... and then i feel aweful about it. NOT ANY MORE!

    Welcome!!! Glad you found this thread!

    http://www.fast-5.com
    http://www.leangains.com
  • hush7hush
    hush7hush Posts: 2,273 Member
    Okay, so, apparently my "off days" from work are going to pose an issue.

    This week I ended up sticking with IF on my first off day. Second off day ended up being a bit of a binge (bad, I know). Third day ended up being a total fast until 7pm today, at which point I resumed eating for my 8 hour window.

    Not sure if this is the smartest way to do it (obviously a binge is never good, it was more like a semi-high calorie day.) But it seemed to work. I'm finally into the 160's today! Hoorah!
  • chrisdavey
    chrisdavey Posts: 9,834 Member
    I don't really see how you cam have binges on lg style if? As long as its a workout day and you stock toyour high day macros, its ask good.
  • hush7hush
    hush7hush Posts: 2,273 Member
    Because it ended up NOT being lg style anything. I went off track. It's only my first week doing it, I'm not good at keeping it up yet. Working on it.
  • Alloranx
    Alloranx Posts: 51 Member
    Hello everyone,

    I saw some posters earlier asking about every-other-day fasting, so I thought I'd give an update on my progress with that.

    I have been doing alternating days of 24hr fasting and 24hrs eating for 9 weeks now, fairly strictly following that pattern, though I do take an extra eating day rarely, and rarely I do a 36 hour fast for the heck of it. On my fasting days I usually consume nothing but water, and sometimes I use some of that zero calorie water flavoring called Mio. I eat normally on my feeding days, I haven't changed my diet at all in that respect from what I was eating before I started this diet.

    I started at 207 lbs, and as of today (9 weeks on Tuesday), I am 186 pounds, so 21 lbs lost, with an average of 2.4lbs per week. I've only been doing mild exercise in that time, mostly push-ups, pull-ups, crunches, walking, and elliptical machine, and without any schedule, I just do it when I feel like it. My body fat has decreased from about 18% at the beginning to about 10% now per my use of one of those Accumeasure calipers. So I've lost approximately 2.5lbs of lean weight, with about 8 times that much being lost as fat. I imagine that ratio probably could have been improved if I had been doing serious weight training all this time. Despite that, my strength has increased over that time, I can now do 66 push ups (in several sets) where I started at about 36, 9 weeks ago.

    I also had a cholesterol screening done at about 3 weeks in, and the results were interesting. I had a cholesterol screening 1 year prior to compare against. My total cholesterol went down from 217 to 195, LDL from 145 to 135, HDL about the same 44 to 46, and Triglycerides went down from 116 to 68. My fasting blood sugar was 88, implying good insulin sensitivity. Keep in mind, this was with about 11 months of status quo eating, and only 3 weeks of actually doing this IF diet. Pretty impressive, I think. I'm considering getting another one after I hit my goal weight to see if it has continued to change.

    I plan to keep going to 183 lbs, and then start doing maybe once a week 24 hour fasts for the foreseeable future and trying to put back on some muscle. Might try Lean Gains, who knows.

    My opinion overall? This is "easy mode" dieting, folks. I will never do anything else if I ever need to lose weight again. Are there strong hunger pangs sometimes? Yes. Can you just ignore them and go on with your day? Yes. I actually found it helpful to redefine the hunger pangs in my mind as probably representing the feeling of fat burning off my belly. It works, try it!

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