Intermittent fasting explained

Intermittent fasting isn’t a diet. To be more precise, it doesn’t involve the intake of specific nutrition for health and weight management. Intermittent fasting is more of an eating pattern that supports healthy body weight. It can be adapted and formed to meet personal preferences. Intermittent fasting doesn’t specify what you should or what you shouldn’t eat, but rather when you should eat. You give up on food for a certain period of time. You can choose to skip lunch or dinner. In other words, you make a conscious decision to skip meals.

Intermittent fasting is as old as time. For thousands of years, the Muslims have fasted during Ramadan, Catholics have resisted the urge to eat meat during Lent, and, last but not least, Jewish people have fasted on Yom Kippur. In spite of the fact that intermittent fasting has been practiced throughout history, it’s only recently that its many benefits have been discovered. While it’s nothing new, intermittent fasting has garnered lots and lots of attention. When you deliberately miss out on meals, you can significantly reduce your calorie intake and lose weight. So, exercise a little restraint and say no.

What are the most popular ways to do intermittent fasting?

Well, if you strive for optimum performance, mental and physical health improvement, not to mention body fat loss, you must give intermittent fasting a try. Once you get used to going through long periods of time without eating, you’ll shed those extra pounds and make sure they’re gone forever. In what follows, we’ll present the main types of intermittent fasting methods:

1.      16/8 fasting

Celebs, social media influencers, and Silicon Valley moguls have all tried this method of intermittent fasting. Here’s what you need to do: fast for 16 hours a day and indulge in something during the 8-hour window. The thought of restricting your food intake doesn’t seem tempting but think about all the calories you’ll burn. Calculate your TDEE and determine your needs. TDEE is an acronym and it stands for total daily energy expenditure. This is an estimation of how many calories you burn per day when you’re at rest or doing physical activity. Getting back on topic, skip breakfast and don’t eat anything between 1-9 p.m. It’s recommended to finish your meal at 8 p.m. and give up on eating breakfast the next day.

2.      Eat stop eat fasting

No, you don’t have to starve yourself to lose weight. Try the eat stop eat method. It involves fasting for about 24 hours, once or twice a week. While it seems virtually impossible to abstain from food an entire day, it’s doable. Maybe you think that you’ll start to feel sluggish and you won’t be able to focus at work. Far from it. It’s true that your metabolism begins to slow down, yet true starvation sets in only after a couple of days. You don’t fast every single day, which means that your daily schedule isn’t affected. Additionally, you can choose to fast on the weekends.

3.      5:2 fasting or the Fast Diet

This fasting method is so simple to apply that even you can do it. Eat whatever your heart desires for an entire week. Just make sure not to exceed the 500 calories limit. Reducing your calorie intake will lead to rapid weight loss. If you would normally consume 2000 calories, then you must limit your intake to 500 calories on fasting days. It’s not complicated at all. It just requires willpower. If you’re not interested in going on a crazy diet, this is the way to go. You don’t restrict how much food you eat. The only thing you have to do is to follow a strict caloric restriction 2 days a week, which isn’t a lot if you think about it.

Signs your intermittent fasting can become unsafe

If you’re the type of person who loves to experiment with new ideas, you won’t say no to intermittent fasting. Generally speaking, skipping meals and restricting your calorie intake isn’t unsafe or unhealthy. However, if you take things too far, it can become dangerous. Here are a couple of signs to watch out for. If you notice any one of them, intermittent fasting may not be for you.

·         You have trouble sleeping – If you awkwardly get up during the night, don’t be surprised. Cycling between periods of eating and fasting can take its toll on your sleep. If you find it impossible to get a good night’s rest, maybe it’s time to stop.

·         You constantly think about what to eat next – So, you’re thinking about food too much. Actually, it’s the only thing on your mind. This is a problem because you’ve developed an obsession with food. There’s no point in losing weight if you lose your physical and psychological power.

This isn’t to say that intermittent fasting is wrong. It simply means that you should quit this lifestyle if you see that things aren’t working the way they should. Maybe you’ll feel perfectly fine and lose weight. Maybe you won’t. the point is that there’s no way of knowing.

Add This Entry To Your CureZone Favorites!