cheat meal of fasting day?

I sometimes give myself a cheat day (first time in a month this weekend) but i would never eat less that 1400 calories during the week at all.

Many people use the 5:2 method where they choose two non consecutive days a week to eat less than 500 calories for women, or less than 600 calories for men but eat normally on the other 5 days. I occasionally do a fasting day. Normally I do 20/4 IF so I fast (no calories) for 20 hours and then I eat dinner for 4 hours. Yesterday I didn't feel like eating so my fast won't end until dinner tonight.

both sound logical

both are wrong

so i have heard that a cheat meal once a week can help boost your metabolic rate back up to normal and so does no/little harm to a diet AND allows you to eat what you want once a week.

My mother also told me recently that if you go one day a week with VERY low calories (700) this allows you body to "reconnect" with hunger signals and makes you WANT to eat less.

both sound logical but its very conflicting information unless i do them both (say cheat on friday and fast on sunday.) would this work? just wondering about other peoples views on the subject.

what?? that sounds logical to you?

I'm not an expert but have read alot abou this.. When you have a "fast" day of extremley low calorie day.. even over 6 hours without enough energy/food, your body immediately goes into stavation mode and tries to reserve as much fat from what you do eat as possible.

I read that people who do this throughout their lives have a much higher chance of being overweigh/obese later in life as it is distructive to the metabolism long term.. I think adding a cheat day as well as fasting day would be a bad idea as your body will want to hang onto any fat from your cheat day unless it's over a week/few weeks apart!

As far as cheat meals, I never give myself a green light to eat whatever I want without limit even if its one meal. On the other hand, nothing is off limits either, I ate pretty crappy food this weekend but I was craving a Big Mac so I made sure it hits my macros.

In a few weeks I'll be raising my calories to maintenance levels for two weeks in order to give my body a chance to recover from being in a calorie deficit for so long. But I don't think a single meal will have the effect of shocking your system and boosting your metabolic rate.

As far as fasting, I am a huge fan of IF. I wouldn't say fasting makes me want to eat less, but I find I am much more aware of the difference between my body being actually hungry and me just craving food or feeling like eating because it's lunch time or I am bored. So I maybe in that sense it does make me want to eat less.

I'm not an expert but have read alot abou this.. When you have a "fast" day of extremley low calorie day.. even over 6 hours without enough energy/food, your body immediately goes into stavation mode and tries to reserve as much fat from what you do eat as possible.

I read that people who do this throughout their lives have a much higher chance of being overweigh/obese later in life as it is distructive to the metabolism long term.. I think adding a cheat day as well as fasting day would be a bad idea as your body will want to hang onto any fat from your cheat day unless it's over a week/few weeks apart!

I don't want to be mean but that's nonsense. "Starvation mode" takes weeks of restricted calories. The opposite is more true, intermittent fasters and alternate day fasters tend to be lean and healthy. Eating a totally balanced diet every single day has only recently (in evolutionary terms) been possible, your body can cope very well with deficits and surplus over the short term.

I find fasting to be helpful. But I suspect it's because I'm insulin resistant and fasting has been shown to increase insulin sensitivity which is probably the same reason I respond so well to a low carb diet.

Here's a blog post with a few links to some studies if you want to see why some people are saying fasting is healthful:

https://www.marksdailyapple.com/fasting-weight-loss/

so i have heard that a cheat meal once a week can help boost your metabolic rate back up to normal and so does no/little harm to a diet AND allows you to eat what you want once a week.

My mother also told me recently that if you go one day a week with VERY low calories (700) this allows you body to "reconnect" with hunger signals and makes you WANT to eat less.

both sound logical but its very conflicting information unless i do them both (say cheat on friday and fast on sunday.) would this work? just wondering about other peoples views on the subject.

what?? that sounds logical to you?

Yes it does.

a high calorific meal stops your body from thinking it is starvation mode and boosts metabolic levels back up to normal or slightly higher than normal. I could probably find a million places that confirm this fact.

a super low calorie day can reduce appetite and help the body "deal" with anything in it that shouldn't be (essentially a one day detox) allowing it to function better one of my many sources for this information: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-19112549.

if your going to be offensive please do your research first.

So with this said, i quote the article

'Current medical opinion is that the benefits of fasting are unproven and until there are more human studies it's better to eat at least 2000 calories a day. If you really want to fast then you should do it in a proper clinic or under medical supervision, because there are many people, such as pregnant women or diabetics on medication, for whom it could be dangerous.'

So technically, there is no research on the matter and the BBC is not a reliable source of information.

I'm not here to argue anything, just supply my own experience and results.

I try to practice not eating after 3pm, 2-3 days a week and when I do, I am significantly more in control of my hunger and make better choices when I practice this. It works for me, and allows me to eat more on the days I eat dinners. I love the flexibility it gives me in my diet, and I feel much less deprived overall.

As long as your weekly average is near your calorie goal, it's all good.