Intermittent fasting: The good things it did to my body • Hacker News Board

Re: Intermittent fasting: The good things it did to my body

#91

Post by cma » Fri, Jan 03, 2014, 3:44 PM UTC

Theodores wrote: post #39

A lot of the diets mentioned on this thread are a long way from the diet used in this article. Note it is not mentioned in the article, however it is mostly vegetables with some fish. That is a long way from 'chipotle'!!! It is worth bearing in mind that a lot of things we consider to be food really does not want to be food. Grains want to be carried away by the wind to plant themselves somewhere else. Their ancestor…

>Not one single animal, insect or fish has evolved specifically to be eaten.

Many parasites have done just that. Also the females of some species eat the males after mating.

Re: Intermittent fasting: The good things it did to my body

#92

Post by jaiball » Fri, Jan 03, 2014, 3:46 PM UTC

brassybadger wrote: post #67

Interesting to see how mainstream intermittent fasting has become. It's worth noting where it started. A few years ago a few hardcore fitness fanatics started playing with the idea of using controlled fasting for weight loss and/or body recomposition. Two people that should be mentioned are Lyle McDonald[1] and Martin Berkhan[2]. Martin especially made IF popular via his blog, laying out the principles he used as a f…

Another recommendation for Leangains.com - been following it for over a year and have seen good results. Although I haven't followed the protocol to the letter - I eat a good amount of junk food during the week, but also good food as well. The point is to narrow your window of time that you eat during the day. I believe I could be doing even better if I concentrated on eating better and cutting out the crap, but now I have a pretty good balance of being in shape and being able to eat what I want.

Dr Mercola also has some really good articles on IF - www.mercola.com

Re: Intermittent fasting: The good things it did to my body

#93

Post by jaiball » Fri, Jan 03, 2014, 3:51 PM UTC

vidarh wrote: post #59

rosser wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Crash dieting", as commonly practiced, is to eat less until your weight goals have been reached, and then go back to "normal". IF is hardly that; instead, it's a controlled pattern of regularly , and for specific durations , reducing your caloric intake. Some IF practitioners use a 6:1 cycle, where they have one fast day a week, some 5:2, and yet others 25:5, as in TFA. Some just take a random fast day whenever they…

And some just reduce the window of food intake within the day . E.g. leangains is 16 hours fasted, 8 hours or less eating window. > IF is much less about weight than it is the other, generally scientifically demonstrated benefits of reduced caloric intake That depends on the type of IF. Again Leangains is not specifically about calorie reduction, but about obtaining some of the benefit of being in a fasted state part…

Agreed. The fasted state is key here, giving the body a chance not to be processing food. After doing this for a while I can't understand the deal with eating small meals a bunch of times a day.

Re: Intermittent fasting: The good things it did to my body

#94

Post by rficcaglia » Fri, Jan 03, 2014, 3:57 PM UTC

Maintaining a program year after year is more important to long term health than the immediate benefits of any diet. Most any diet studied shows a short term benefit. Even just participating in a study (placebo effect) usually happens short term. But few diets have notable retention rates after 2 years.

Having lost >30 lb multiple times and having regained more each cycle, the problem (for me) is that work, stress, sleep deprivation, children, family crises, work crises, business travel, etc. present significant obstacles to any extreme protocols.

I tried IF for 6 months; it worked short term. But I felt so unfocused and unstable during the fast days that it was difficult for me to maintain.

My latest effort (lost >100 lb, for over a year) has greatly simplified things - eat lots of veggies before I eat protein or other foods for any meal. No other restrictions, calorie counting, or biochemistry hacks. Very easy to eat out, travel, maintain. I did not join a gym or buy equipment this time - instead I walk to work (5 miles each way.) Also maintain sleep program - no more evening alcohol or coffee.

Re: Intermittent fasting: The good things it did to my body

#95

Post by isleyaardvark » Fri, Jan 03, 2014, 4:01 PM UTC

awjr wrote: post #7

Keats wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

8h without food wouldn't be intermittent fasting unless everyone does it when sleeping. There is one diet type quite popular right now in fitness called Leangains which calls for about 16h of fasting and a 8h eating window (granted that you can reduce the eating window if you feel like it). Some people even reduce the eating window to just one meal (warrior diet).

Isn't this just skipping breakfast?

Skipping breakfast and not eating anything after 8pm, typically.

Re: Intermittent fasting: The good things it did to my body

#96

Post by nsxwolf » Fri, Jan 03, 2014, 4:04 PM UTC

Blahah wrote: post #45

collyw wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I read that the liver is the only organ that can process fructose directly. I tried taking honey before bed in order to avoid hangover. Seemed to work, but may have been placebo effect.

did you try not drinking before bed?

http://www.theonion.com/articles/man-blames-hangover-on-ever...

Re: Intermittent fasting: The good things it did to my body

#97

Post by PavlovsCat » Fri, Jan 03, 2014, 4:04 PM UTC

bluedino wrote: post #56

PavlovsCat wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is taste other than a way to get us to eat things that are healthy for us? For example, I would think we like sweets because fruit are sweet, not because there is inherent value in things tasting sweet. > Apex predators are hard to kill for humans No longer true, and we still don't eat them a whole lot.

> What is taste other than a way to get us to eat things that are healthy for us? For example, I would think we like sweets because fruit are sweet, not because there is inherent value in things tasting sweet. Your body likes sugar because there's lots of energy in sugar. Humans evolved to crave it. > No longer true, and we still don't eat them a whole lot. The ones that taste good, we do. Shark, whale, alligator for…

> Your body likes sugar because there's lots of energy in sugar. Humans evolved to crave it.

Sweetness isn't just triggered by sugar, but yeah.. still, our threshold for tasting sweetness (energy) is much higher than that for tasting bitterness (toxins), because energy is not really useful when it comes bundled with poison.

Alligator meat is fine (Was there really ever a time when alligators where tricky to kill though? I mean, at least compared to, say, lions or wolves, which consider humans a food source instead of being afraid of them like alligators are), but shark and whale meat don't seem like good ideas:

Sharks: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercury_in_fish#Levels_of_conta...

Whales: http://www.hsi.org/issues/whaling/facts/human_health_concern...

> Pro-whaling nations insist that whale meat is healthier than beef. But the truth is that whales are particularly vulnerable to environmental contaminants, including organochlorines—such as polychlorinated biphenyl (PCBs), dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane (DDT) and dioxin—and heavy metals, such as methylmercury. Each of these environmental contaminants tends to accumulate in the bodies of top predators, including sperm whales, orcas, pilot whales, and false killer whales

Re: Intermittent fasting: The good things it did to my body

#98

Post by beagle3 » Fri, Jan 03, 2014, 4:14 PM UTC

tokenizer wrote: post #35

bobowzki wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a physician. While it's good to lose weight (at least if you are overweight), keep in mind that losing weight is not the only interesting outcome. Any diet might have long term side effects. Such as an increased risk of cancer, arteriosclerosis etc. Also remember that weight loss is not the only benefit of exercise. That said, congrats on losing weight. Now start exercising :-)

Regarding the diet above, which limits your sugar intake to 20 grams a day, what are some potential consequences of starving your body of sugars? Sounds good in theory (sugar is bad), but it sounds stressful (body starts producing ketones due to suck a lack of sugar, flu like symptoms for a week).

> flu like symptoms for a week

People assume that's a bad thing, but that's not a trivial assumption. Yes, it's not convenient - but e.g. fever - while indicative of a disease, is most of the time a good thing (unless it is life threatening, taking down the fever with Tylenol or Advil is likely to prolong the disease). Those flu- like symptoms might be a good, if uncomfortable, process.

I don't know myself - I'm just pointing out that it is not necessarily an indication that keto is bad for you.

Re: Intermittent fasting: The good things it did to my body

#99

Post by brazzy » Fri, Jan 03, 2014, 4:15 PM UTC

rficcaglia wrote: post #94

Maintaining a program year after year is more important to long term health than the immediate benefits of any diet. Most any diet studied shows a short term benefit. Even just participating in a study (placebo effect) usually happens short term. But few diets have notable retention rates after 2 years. Having lost >30 lb multiple times and having regained more each cycle, the problem (for me) is that work, stress, s…

What has been working for me (I've lost 8kg in 4 months) is Weight Watchers - not the meetings, just access to their points-rated food database via Web and App, which makes keeping track of your points budget reasonably convenient.

The biggest advantage is that you don't have to make any fundamental changes to your diet or habits and it's flexible enough to accommodate occasional big, unhealthy meals - so there's not too much self control necessary to stick with it.

It also subtly pushes you towards eating fruit and veggies because most of those have no points and thus can be eaten at any time, as much as you want.

Re: Intermittent fasting: The good things it did to my body

#100

Post by retzkek » Fri, Jan 03, 2014, 4:26 PM UTC

jimeuxx wrote: post #42

ehsanu1 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

fulmato, you were hellbanned after your first comment saying "this is bs". Not a great comment, but hellbanning for a single comment is quite extreme. Posting your useful comment here: On top of /r/keto Dr. Peter Attia has a great blog on this topic http://eatingacademy.com/ It's a great resource for a more scientific explanation of what happens to the metabolism when keto-adapted and on the effects of carbohydrates…

People like Attia live in a parallel universe where there are healthy populations on Earth that eat no carbs and East Asia doesn't exist. My Japanese is good enough now to explain to my wife's active octogenarian grandparents why rice is going to give them heart disease and diabetes. In all seriousness, the world of online nutrition is a nasty and insane place. There's a lot of dogma and cognitive dissonance in somet…

To my knowledge Attia has never claimed a low-carb diet is right for everyone, rather quite the opposite.

> the world of online nutrition is a nasty and insane place

Attia would agree with you, and not just regarding online nutrition, but nutrition as a whole. He started NuSi [1] not to promote his low-carb lifestyle, but to promote independent nutritional research, since there's clearly something wrong with what we're doing now and the motivations of government- and industry-sponsored research are questionable at best.

[1] http://nusi.org/