Intermittent Fasting - Things You May Not Know!!!!

Im currently 20 + hours into my intermittent fast. Hoping to make it to 40 hours this week. I can hear many of you gasp in horror, omg how can you do that, you're starving yourself!!! But in fact I am not starving myself as I am doing it correctly and the benefits far out weight the negatives. Read on to find out how fasting works.

Intermittent fasting isn’t just a weight loss strategy– It is at its best a healthy lifestyle formed by human evolution and the study of the metabolism. It asks the human body to be much more efficient and self-protective than it is accustomed to in modern times.

Fasting is an ancient practice that involves avoiding calories for a period of time. Yes It is a simple way to control your weight that doesn’t require you to follow a specific diet, count calories or measure food and there are many ways in which you can incorporate into your diet dependant on your goals and lifestyle. Some popular ways to do intermittent fasting are:

#1 - Time Restricted Eating

This involves consuming all of your meals within a period of 4-12 hours in a day. For example, you could choose to have your meals and calories between 8 am and 6 pm. Limiting your calorie intake to daylight hours is called “eating with the sun”. Time-restricted eating is particularly beneficial if you eat your meals before sunset. Not only does this help you eliminate bad habits like late-night snacking, but it improves your sleep and blood sugar control. Over time, this can lower your blood sugar levels, make you more sensitive to insulin, and reduce your blood pressure.

#2 - One Meal A Day (OMAD)

This involves packing all of your day’s calories in a single meal that you consume within 1-2 hours. A small study showed that fasting for 24 hours 3 times a week and eating only dinner on fasting days, eliminated the need for insulin in type-2 diabetic patients. This fasting approach also resulted in improved HbA1C, lower body mass index, and reduced waist circumference.

This fasting approach also resulted in improved HbA1C, lower body mass index, and reduced waist circumference.

#3 - Alternate Days Fasting

This involves alternating between days in which you consume no calories and days in which you eat normally. Another way of looking at ADF is as three 36-hour fasts per week. For example, eat normally on Monday until 6pm. Don’t eat until breakfast on Wednesday morning. Finish dinner by around 6pm Wednesday night. Now don’t eat again until breakfast on Friday. Eat normally the rest of the day and finish dinner by 6pm or so Friday night. Now don’t eat again until breakfast on Sunday. This type of fasting is the most studied method of intermittent fasting in humans, and it’s been shown to lead to weight loss and to improve heart health, as it reduces circulating levels of LDL or ‘bad’ cholesterol.

#4 - The 5:2 Method

This method is the one that I choose to implement into my lifestyle as it seems to work the best for me! The 5:2 method involves eating normally for five days each week and then fasting for two. For example, you might decide to fast Monday and Tuesday and then eat normally the rest of the week. You can also look at it as one 60-hour fast per week. Finish dinner at 6pm on Sunday night and don’t eat again until breakfast on Wednesday morning, for example.

What happens to your body during Intermittent Fasting?

This is the juicy stuff you really want to know!!!! There are so many things that happen during intermittent fasting that don't happen or happen very very slowly when we are always eating.

When we are continuously feeding our bodies our cells are in constant growth mode, insulin and mTOR pathways are signalling cells to grow, divide and synthesis proteins are active. mTOR loves nutrients especially carbs and proteins and growth active tells the cell not to conduct autophagy which is a recycling and cleanup process that rids your body of damaged and misfolded proteins. Well fed cells have many genes and in periods of the cell growth some genes are turned off. Some of these genes that are switched off during a well fed cell are related to fat metabolism, stress resistance and damage repair. During intermittent fasting some of your fat gets turned into ketone bodies that appear to reactivate these genes so they can do the jobs they are meant to do.

The body goes through many phases when you are intermittent fasting; by 12 hours the body is entering a state called Ketosis in this state the body starts to breakdown and burn fat for fuel. By 18 hours the body has switched to fat burning mode and creating a considerable amount of Ketones which act as signalling molecules, similar to hormones, to tell your body to ramp up stress-busting pathways that reduce inflammation and repair damaged cells. Within 24 hours, your cells are increasingly recycling old components and breaking down misfolded proteins linked to Alzheimer’s and other diseases (Alirezaei et al., Autophagy 2010). This is a process called autophagy. Autophagy is an important process for cellular and tissue rejuvenation – it removes damaged cellular components including misfolded proteins.

Intermittent Fasting is one way in which you can increase autophagy in your cells and possibly reduce the effects of aging. A 2019 study with 11 overweight adults who only ate between 8 am and 2 pm showed increased markers of autophagy in their blood after fasting for around 18 hours, compared to control participants who only fasted for 12 hours. A second study detected autophagy in human neutrophils starting at 24 hours of fasting. In a third study, skeletal muscle biopsies of healthy male volunteers who fasted for 72 hours showed reduced mTOR and increased autophagy.

By 48 hours without calories or with very few calories, carbs or protein, your growth hormone level is up to five times as high as when you started your fast (Hartman et al.,1992). By 54 hours, your insulin has dropped to its lowest level point since you started fasting and your body is becoming increasingly insulin-sensitive (Klein et al., 1993).

So how does one actually Intermittent Fast?

If you are thinking about trying intermittent fasting, I recommend slowly working up to your target fasting schedule over the course of several weeks or months. Start by reflecting on your eating habits. Do you snack in between meals or after dinner? If so, try a 12-hour fast overnight. This means you finish dinner by 7 pm, for example, and don’t eat anything else until 7 am the next day. If you usually don’t feel the need to eat after dinner or between meals, try a 14-16 hour fast (For example, finish dinner by 6 pm and don’t eat again until 10 am the next day). If you’d like to fast longer, add 1-hour increments every 5 days or so. Drink water to keep you both hydrated and distracted from hunger. If you need caffeine, drink unsweetened black coffee and tea.

The most important stage of intermittent fasting – the re-feeding stage! It’s important to break your fast with a nutritious, balanced meal that will further improve the function of cells and tissues that went through cleanup while you were fasting. This doesn't mean to break your fast with lots of carbs and sugars, which may in fact lead to problematic blood sugar spikes. A few carbs can go a long way. It’s best to break your fast with a balanced meal including plenty of vegetables, plant fibers and plant fats, with healthy proteins and some whole grains or legumes if you choose. Avoid simple sugars and processed/packaged foods. I prefer to have something light but jam packed full of easily digested nutrition in the form of a smoothie, for me it is more gentle on my stomach and over the next 24 hours I introduce my solid nutritious foods. Learn what works best for your body, and what you feel best eating following your fasts.

So what are you waiting for? Try fasting for 12, 16, or even 48 hours or more. I use the Life Fasting Tracker App in conjunction with an all natural supplement to boost my fasting. If you'd like to know more, reach out for a chat before attempting fasts of 48 hours and longer or speak with your GP to determine if Intermittent Fasting is suitable for you,