intermittent fasting

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ed7walsh
ed7walsh Posts: 5
in Health and Weight Loss
I discovered intermittent fasting 10 years ago. I dropped 44 pounds and have managed to keep most of it off. Because it's simple and free, I’m wondering why intermittent fasting isn’t more popular than the name-brand programs. What was your experience if you've tried it?

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  • Iknowsaur
    Iknowsaur Posts: 777 Member
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    I would be careful about giving out fasting advice on this site. It can be taken the wrong way, and eating very few calories can be a dangerous road for a lot of people both mentally and physically.

    I learned the hard way by asking about 1,000 calories a day. And while people were kind of harsh, I learned why that wasn't a healthy, sustainable idea. Neither is fasting.
  • ThickMcRunFast
    ThickMcRunFast Posts: 22,511 Member
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    Because IF didn't make you lose weight, a calorie deficit did.

    If it fits your lifestyle and you meet your nutritional requirements, then its fine, but its not a magic bullet for weight loss.
  • rejectuf
    rejectuf Posts: 487 Member
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    Intermittent fasting gets a bad rap because it's associated with unhealthy calorie restriction, but that's not a fair association.

    I tried it awhile when my job was super hectic. I got to work at 6:30am, and worked without a break until 4 or 5pm. Lunch was not an option, and often I just didn't feel like eating breakfast. I fell into the fasting routine out of necessity.

    I still ate the normal amount of calories a day. I just ate them in a shorter window. My first meal was normally a huge salad with some tuna or chicken, then I'd eat a huge dinner + some snacks to meet my needs.

    If you use it as a way to severely restrict calories, it's a terrible idea. If you do it because it works for your schedule and habits, and you make sure to eat lots of food during your window then cool. Some studies show that during a short fasting period your body increases fat burning. I personally do my best strength training on an empty stomach. Just depends on the person.
  • ed7walsh
    ed7walsh Posts: 5
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    I would be careful about giving out fasting advice on this site. It can be taken the wrong way, and eating very few calories can be a dangerous road for a lot of people both mentally and physically.

    I learned the hard way by asking about 1,000 calories a day. And while people were kind of harsh, I learned why that wasn't a healthy, sustainable idea. Neither is fasting.

    I don't associate intermittent fasting with severe calorie restriction. My problem was that if I ate something for breakfast I would be very distracted by hunger by 11 AM and go to the cafeteria looking for chocolate covered donuts. I found it a lot easier to eat nothing than to eat a little and stop. If I ate nothing until 6 PM, I didn't get hunger pangs. Then I could eat what I wanted without counting calories and still consume less than I would have distributed throughout the day.
  • ed7walsh
    ed7walsh Posts: 5
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    Because IF didn't make you lose weight, a calorie deficit did.

    If it fits your lifestyle and you meet your nutritional requirements, then its fine, but its not a magic bullet for weight loss.

    I agree that a calorie deficit was the cause of my weight loss. I had been slowly putting on weight over a period of years. But since I didn't change the composition of my diet, I think IF was a magic bullet producing the calorie deficit that let me start getting rid of about 2 pounds of fat a week. After not consuming any calories all day, I was capacity-limited at night and could eat until I was full and still have a calorie deficit.
  • Graelwyn75
    Graelwyn75 Posts: 4,404 Member
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    I would be careful about giving out fasting advice on this site. It can be taken the wrong way, and eating very few calories can be a dangerous road for a lot of people both mentally and physically.

    I learned the hard way by asking about 1,000 calories a day. And while people were kind of harsh, I learned why that wasn't a healthy, sustainable idea. Neither is fasting.

    You might like to educate yourself on what Intermittent fasting actually is, before passing such a comment.
    It has nothing to do with eating too few calories. In fact, I was eating 2000-3000 a day whilst doing it.
    Intermittent fasting can involve eating all your day's calories in a 8, 10, 6, even 2 hour window each day, and fasting the rest of the day(including sleep time). There is a lot of research on it, there have been several television documentaries on it, and several pretty popular books have been written around it, including the 5:2, where people eat 500 calories on two days of the week, and eat normally the other 5 days. Some people also do a 24 hour fast once a week.
  • ed7walsh
    ed7walsh Posts: 5
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    Intermittent fasting gets a bad rap because it's associated with unhealthy calorie restriction, but that's not a fair association.

    ...

    If you use it as a way to severely restrict calories, it's a terrible idea. If you do it because it works for your schedule and habits, and you make sure to eat lots of food during your window then cool. Some studies show that during a short fasting period your body increases fat burning. I personally do my best strength training on an empty stomach. Just depends on the person.

    I started intermittent fasting before I knew it was intermittent fasting. I had heard that marathon runners "hit the wall" when they've used all the glycogen they've stored from their last meal and have to burn fat. It seemed reasonable that if you didn't put any calories in your body for 20 hours it would have to burn fat.
  • GymTennis
    GymTennis Posts: 133 Member
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    Intermittent fasting has nothing to do with calorie restriction.. It's not a diet either... It just tells you when to eat and when not to eat..
    You can get fat easily while intermittent fasting if that's what you want..

    .I've tried 6 small meals a day which I don't think is beneficial over traditional three square meals a day.. I've tried intermittent fasting with two meals a day, sometimes even one huge meal.. It all comes down to calories in versus calories out..

    The only reason why i tend to intermittent fast most of the time is because it fits my schedule better and I like to train fasted most of the time..
  • Maddius
    Maddius Posts: 78 Member
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    Personally I Love it, I find the folk who are negative on it don't know, and generally haven't taken the trouble to find out about it.
    For those interested this is a good place to start. http://jamesclear.com/the-beginners-guide-to-intermittent-fasting

    I've now been doing IF (5:2) for probably 6 months and it will always be a part of my life going forward, may go down to 6:1, but it will always be there in some form or another. The health benefits (apart from weight loss) are well reported, in that time I've avoided going onto cholesterol meds, which my Doc had said would be unavoidable, as he cited lifestyle and dietary changes were secondary to my genetic makeup. It was a Great day when I visited my Doc and All of my blood test results came in after 3 months of fasting with dramatic improvements in my numbers. In addition I've now been able to forgo meds I was taking for years for a gastric ulcer. Now at 58 years old I'm not taking any meds.

    For the first 4 months I did my fasts sans any food, until my weight loss plateaued. I now do my fasts with an evening meal of 600 cals and I've begun losing again. An interesting point is even though I had 6 weeks in a row when I didn't lose weight, I continued to lose size. Have now gone from a 38" pants seriously nudging 40" to 34".

    I started with MFP, exercising and monitoring my intake diligently for 3 months prior to incorporating 5:2 and it was only then I started to get results. Coincidence ........ maybe, but I don't think so.
    The below video is also well worth a watch.


    As I said I currently do 5:2 with a 600 cal meal at the end. Thinking of adding 16:8 to the mix to shake it up a bit, I exercise on fast days with zero problems. Current exercise includes boxing, swimming, and circuit training including lifting

    I'm not saying folks should or shouldn't do it, but at least understand what you're saying no to.
  • GymTennis
    GymTennis Posts: 133 Member
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    Personally I Love it, I find the folk who are negative on it don't know, and generally haven't taken the trouble to find out about it.
    For those interested this is a good place to start. http://jamesclear.com/the-beginners-guide-to-intermittent-fasting

    I've now been doing IF (5:2) for probably 6 months and it will always be a part of my life going forward, may go down to 6:1, but it will always be there in some form or another. The health benefits (apart from weight loss) are well reported, in that time I've avoided going onto cholesterol meds, which my Doc had said would be unavoidable, as he cited lifestyle and dietary changes were secondary to my genetic makeup. It was a Great day when I visited my Doc and All of my blood test results came in after 3 months of fasting with dramatic improvements in my numbers. In addition I've now been able to forgo meds I was taking for years for a gastric ulcer. Now at 58 years old I'm not taking any meds.

    For the first 4 months I did my fasts sans any food, until my weight loss plateaued. I now do my fasts with an evening meal of 600 cals and I've begun losing again. An interesting point is even though I had 6 weeks in a row when I didn't lose weight, I continued to lose size. Have now gone from a 38" pants seriously nudging 40" to 34".

    I started with MFP, exercising and monitoring my intake diligently for 3 months prior to incorporating 5:2 and it was only then I started to get results. Coincidence ........ maybe, but I don't think so.
    The below video is also well worth a watch.


    As I said I currently do 5:2 with a 600 cal meal at the end. Thinking of adding 16:8 to the mix to shake it up a bit, I exercise on fast days with zero problems. Current exercise includes boxing, swimming, and circuit training including lifting

    I'm not saying folks should or shouldn't do it, but at least understand what you're saying no to.

    Nice story Maddius.. Personally, when I'm in my fasting stage I feel stronger, faster, more energized etc.
  • Maddius
    Maddius Posts: 78 Member
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    Totally Agree GymTennis
  • MaggieLoo79
    MaggieLoo79 Posts: 288 Member
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    Different plans/strategies work for different people. I lack portion control/will power, so IF works for me. I have a two hour window in the evenings to eat my calories. That means I can pretty much eat whatever I want for dinner (though I try to stay healthy).
  • Iwishyouwell
    Iwishyouwell Posts: 1,888 Member
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    I discovered intermittent fasting 10 years ago. I dropped 44 pounds and have managed to keep most of it off. Because it's simple and free, I’m wondering why intermittent fasting isn’t more popular than the name-brand programs. What was your experience if you've tried it?

    People have largely bought into the myths about needing to eat every day, all throughout the day. They think fasting in any context is "unhealthy". A complete ignorance about how the human body works, how human beings traditional ate, keeps people terrified that if they miss a meal, nevermind an entire day of eating, something nefarious and "bad" will happen.

    Meanwhile there are so many beautiful benefits to folding in fasting into your diet, with weight loss/management just being one of them. I've lost close to a 100 lbs using IFing as my tool for deficit, and it's going to be my maintainence for life. It's allowed me to lose without calorie counting, something I once did, but will never do again; I don't like having that kind of relationship with food. The great thing about a maintenance 5:2 program is that it'll allow me to consume an extraordinarily high amount of calories on my 5 eating days, giving me the freedom to LIVE and have exactly the kind of relationship with food that I enjoy. I like eating and I like fasting, and IFing gives me the best of both worlds without having to count, weigh, or measure my food for life.

    Unfortunately we live in a society that is obsessed with food and eating, so IFing isn't likely to ever really catch on. Even though it is the perfect solution to combating a culture of overindulgence.
  • supra_driven
    supra_driven Posts: 90 Member
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    Can't say enough good things about IF. Personally I don't have the time and patience to stop what I'm doing just to eat a small meal every 3-4 hours only to continually feel hungry. While calories in vs calories out is the main reason weight loss occurs, we can't ignore that hormones play a very important role in that process as well. IF helps you control your insulin and Hgh to better aid in your weight loss goals.

    I still can't believe people associate IF with not eating. <- This drives me nuts when people ask me how I lost the weight.
  • darklord48
    darklord48 Posts: 114 Member
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    I have been doing intermittent fasting for six weeks now. I love it. I am fasting from just after dinner time on Monday until dinner time on Wednesday. That is roughly 48 hours depending on when I eat those evenings. In between I only drink water and those 10 calorie crystal light packs. I am down 16 pounds so far out of the total 70 that I need to lose to get below the overweight category. I started out obese, but I am approaching the overweight/obese threshold.

    The rest of the week I watch what I eat, not out of calorie counting, but out of curiosity. I don't stop myself from eating any certain foods, or from eating a lot of something. I just track it so that if there is a downward trend in how much I eat, I'll have it documented. Studies have shown that people following forms of IF will start to eat less as time goes on.

    On fasting days, I do get hungry, but just like the urge to go the bathroom, if you ignore it for a while, it will pass. Sure it will come back again later, but hunger doesn't steadily increase, it is just the same. Personally I find that I get hungry at lunch and dinner times.

    Feel free to message or friend me if you have any questions, or are doing IF as well.

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