Intermittent Fasters

Interesting... Bumping again.

By IF are you talking the 500-600 cal twice or three times a week? Or the not eating until 11 ish and eat all calories in 8 hours? I have seen both referred to as IF.

OH GOD! Eating just 500-600 cals a few times a week is not IF, that's plain starvation! IF is not a diet, it doesn't tell you what to eat or how much, All IF tells you to do is choose a period of between 16-20 Hours where you don't eat. Then during the remaining hours (4-8) you consume your normal macro goals. Basically you have a 'fasted' period and a 'fed period'. As to its origins, it's earlier forms were conceived in books like "The Warrior Diet" and a lot of it's percieved or theoretical benefit harps back to times when we did not have constant food supplies. It works to use our bodies evolutionary mechanics to our advantage by stimulating the fasted and fed states in strategic 24 hour periods. I am not claiming any of this as true fact nor overly endorsing it. I do it on and off when it suits me and it has been a positive tool for me, but I am simply saying this to clarify what it is.

Yeah I do know about IF. I actually looked into it but as I said whatever works for you and I know this wouldn´t do it for me. I´m not trying to start an argument about it, I just don´t agree. It´s taken me a long time to find what works for me, and honestly i´ve tried all sorts of diets, fads, right way, wrong way. Interesting subject and many opinions i´m sure

Sure, I can totally get that it might not work for you, but as to your concerns about it being unhealthy, it's no different than any other meal schedule in that, specifically, you are still required to adequately nourish yourself over time, just as you would eating 4 or 6 meals per day or whatever the case may be. Intermitting Fasting is just a different eating schedule.

Interesting... Bumping again.

By IF are you talking the 500-600 cal twice or three times a week? Or the not eating until 11 ish and eat all calories in 8 hours? I have seen both referred to as IF.

OH GOD! Eating just 500-600 cals a few times a week is not IF, that's plain starvation! IF is not a diet, it doesn't tell you what to eat or how much, All IF tells you to do is choose a period of between 16-20 Hours where you don't eat. Then during the remaining hours (4-8) you consume your normal macro goals. Basically you have a 'fasted' period and a 'fed period'. As to its origins, it's earlier forms were conceived in books like "The Warrior Diet" and a lot of it's percieved or theoretical benefit harps back to times when we did not have constant food supplies. It works to use our bodies evolutionary mechanics to our advantage by stimulating the fasted and fed states in strategic 24 hour periods. I am not claiming any of this as true fact nor overly endorsing it. I do it on and off when it suits me and it has been a positive tool for me, but I am simply saying this to clarify what it is.

OH GOD! Eating just 500-600 cals a few times a week is not IF, that's plain starvation!

Actually, it is just another method of Intermittent Fasting. It's just not the leangains approach. Done correctly, just like leangains, it's not starvation. You're still taking in adequate nutrients and adequate total cals and macros over the course of a week.

Ok, so you're saying that: if required maintenance calories daily are equal to 1200 (for seven days a week for a total of 8400), then you fast a couple of times a week for 24+ hours, from dinner to dinner only consuming 500-600 calories at those dinners and make up the rest of the 8400 calories on days where you are not fasting? This would essentially be a more extreme form of calorie cycling, then, right? It would still serve the same purpose of "tricking" the body by evading homeostasis, right?

I've been using EatStopEat for the past two months. It's great. The first two fasts or so were a bit uncomfortable, but my body QUICKLY got used to it. Now on my fasting days I rarely feel any hunger -- I just feel "normal". I'm pretty sure the "hunger" I thought I was feeling was actually just the habit of eating and some detoxing my body was doing. (Fasting has many benefits, detox included!) My gastrointestinal issues have vanished. I'm losing some weight. I'm sick less than anyone else in my family. The body can heal itself very efficiently when it's not constantly digesting and processing food.

For the vast majority of human history we did not eat every day. So why all the scare about "starvation mode"? If you miss ONE or TWO meals? It's the food and supplement industry in this country.

Guess what, NOBODY makes money when you fast. So our entire consumer society will by definition be stacked against this. But history (and personal experience) will tell a different story: Intermittent fasting is unbelievably healthy and good for your body.

I did this as part of Ramadhan - it was awesome! the first couple of days were really hard due to the caffeine withdrawal, but once I got over that, I did find I had loads of energy during the day & yes, more likely to exercise in the evening
In the end, whatever works for you I guess - I lost 7lb. They stayed off for a while, but then I started eating a little too many pecan muffins (damn you bakery!) so they went back on.