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Intermittent fasting works – not only for weight loss but also for heart health

washingtonpost.com

11–20 of 214 posts

Re: Intermittent fasting works – not only for weight loss but also for heart health

#11
post #9
post #2

I love-hate online nutrition articles like this. They all tell you to stop snacking, don't drink soda, limit carbs, etc and then have some little gimmick. The quirk on this one is that occasionally you skip breakfast, too. Makes sense to me. It's just nice to read an article that's not about covid or BLM.

> The quirk on this one is that occasionally you skip breakfast, too. I've done intermittent fasting (IF) for the past 5 years. Apart from a black espresso every morning, I skip breakfast all the time (not just occasionally). Skipping breakfast is a psychological trick (that doesn't work on everybody, but works well enough to make a difference). The real goal is to entice oneself to eat less by eating fewer meals in…

My experience with 16:8 IF has been almost similar. I skip breakfast too, and found that to be the easiest to follow with a black coffee (very light by normal standards). I can’t tell either if it works to provide any claimed benefits. But I’m used to it and psychologically feel better, especially not eating for several hours before bedtime.

I attribute the weight loss I experienced to cutting out processed foods and cutting out oils (I do consume these once in a while, and when I do the scales show me I’ve fallen off the tracks).

Re: Intermittent fasting works – not only for weight loss but also for heart health

#12

He lost 45 lbs, that’s what probably removed his sleeps apnea. Not because of some other magical ability of intermittent fasting. One of my friends also lost a lot of weight and his apnea went away, he went off of his CPAP machine.

You're probably correct, in that losing a lot of weight greatly improved his health. That said, losing weight is freaking difficult, and if intermittent fasting is a path towards that, it'd be very useful. I've done a lot of fasting. The results seem pretty good. Pulling it off is non-trivial. At this point, we need "magical", because nothing else has really seemed to work in general for losing weight. (And no, didn'…

If calorie counting and exercise aren’t working, it’s time to go to the doctor. You may have a hormonal imbalance or something. It affects more people then realize it.

Re: Intermittent fasting works – not only for weight loss but also for heart health

#13
post #5

https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2018-05/esoe-cif0516... warns you intermittent fasting diets could increase diabetes risk. I wish I had data from before but after I attempted intermittent fasting I was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. It's possible I had it before, I alas haven't had blood work done for a few years prior. I changed my diet, never attempted fasting again and the 6.8 HbA1c dropped to and stayed…

Fasting will make any deficiencies in your blood sugar regulation very, very obvious.

Re: Intermittent fasting works – not only for weight loss but also for heart health

#15
I’ve been thinking a lot about how humans evolved and how differently we do some things. Is there consensus on the eating patterns of prehistoric humans?

My understanding of how humans evolved to eat is pretty limited, but I would guess unintentional intermittent fasting would have been commonplace in humans over the past few hundred thousand years.

There seems to be consensus that eating a large variety of foods is great for you, but is shifting your eating pattern, or even grazing, better than eating at the same time, the same amount, every day?

Does your ancestral background impact how frequently you eat? Similar to how some cultures are lactose intolerant due to historically not having access to cows, could similar issues present based on how frequently we eat?

I’d love to find resources that have dug into those topics if anyone has recommendations.

Re: Intermittent fasting works – not only for weight loss but also for heart health

#16
post #9
post #2

I love-hate online nutrition articles like this. They all tell you to stop snacking, don't drink soda, limit carbs, etc and then have some little gimmick. The quirk on this one is that occasionally you skip breakfast, too. Makes sense to me. It's just nice to read an article that's not about covid or BLM.

> The quirk on this one is that occasionally you skip breakfast, too. I've done intermittent fasting (IF) for the past 5 years. Apart from a black espresso every morning, I skip breakfast all the time (not just occasionally). Skipping breakfast is a psychological trick (that doesn't work on everybody, but works well enough to make a difference). The real goal is to entice oneself to eat less by eating fewer meals in…

> Skipping breakfast is a psychological trick

Perhaps, but for some people it's also a physiological risk. I eat about 1200 calories for breakfast as my body otherwise cannot function for the day.

Whether fasting is appropriate depends on one's body composition, daily exertion routine and physiological factors. For most people I'd recommend exercise instead of fasting.

Re: Intermittent fasting works – not only for weight loss but also for heart health

#17
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The quirk on this one is that occasionally you skip breakfast, too. I've done intermittent fasting (IF) for the past 5 years. Apart from a black espresso every morning, I skip breakfast all the time (not just occasionally). Skipping breakfast is a psychological trick (that doesn't work on everybody, but works well enough to make a difference). The real goal is to entice oneself to eat less by eating fewer meals in…

> Skipping breakfast is a psychological trick Perhaps, but for some people it's also a physiological risk. I eat about 1200 calories for breakfast as my body otherwise cannot function for the day. Whether fasting is appropriate depends on one's body composition, daily exertion routine and physiological factors. For most people I'd recommend exercise instead of fasting.

Diet is so much more important for weight loss / maintenance than exercise. You can obviously have a healthy diet that does not include IF, but for most people they need to do something about their diet, and can’t just add exercise.

Re: Intermittent fasting works – not only for weight loss but also for heart health

#18
I have been following IF on-and-off over the past few years. It has helped me lose weight initially and then maintain it at a good spot. I have not done detailed before and after blood work to know whether it has had other effects. But one problem I have started having recently is acid reflux and acidity. People immediately pounce on this and tell me that skipping breakfast is what is causing increased acidity levels in my stomach. And my doctor is also suggesting that I do not skip breakfast. The problem is I do not have any concrete evidence for either case (skipping breakfast causes/does not cause acidity). I am hoping to get my acidity issues under control first and then maybe give IF another shot to see whether the acidity issues return. Just wanted to throw out there that different people might have different experiences with IF and it is very important to listen to your body.

Re: Intermittent fasting works – not only for weight loss but also for heart health

#19

I have been following IF on-and-off over the past few years. It has helped me lose weight initially and then maintain it at a good spot. I have not done detailed before and after blood work to know whether it has had other effects. But one problem I have started having recently is acid reflux and acidity. People immediately pounce on this and tell me that skipping breakfast is what is causing increased acidity levels…

Binge eating can cause acid reflux, so I wonder if it’s a similar mechanism. Something about eating so much food in a small window maybe (?) doesn’t give your body time and space to digest it properly

Re: Intermittent fasting works – not only for weight loss but also for heart health

#20
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The quirk on this one is that occasionally you skip breakfast, too. I've done intermittent fasting (IF) for the past 5 years. Apart from a black espresso every morning, I skip breakfast all the time (not just occasionally). Skipping breakfast is a psychological trick (that doesn't work on everybody, but works well enough to make a difference). The real goal is to entice oneself to eat less by eating fewer meals in…

> Skipping breakfast is a psychological trick Perhaps, but for some people it's also a physiological risk. I eat about 1200 calories for breakfast as my body otherwise cannot function for the day. Whether fasting is appropriate depends on one's body composition, daily exertion routine and physiological factors. For most people I'd recommend exercise instead of fasting.

> I eat about 1200 calories

Do you have a medical condition? that's a lot of calories to take on for Breakfast, that's almost half my daily quota.

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