Intermittent and longer fasting
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@mariner4life said in Intermittent and longer fasting:
i don't know how you guys do it. if i skip a meal (which i do pretty regularly) i am feeling it within about an hour.
You start at 12 hours, then build up from there. I drink 2 to 3 litres of water a day, which fills you up, and start the day with black coffee. Have worked it to this week was averaging 22 hours and one meal a day.
Way better concentration and energy levels, and I do two hard workouts a week on that amount of food with no problem (other than my lack of fitness...)
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@Kirwan said in Intermittent and longer fasting:
@mariner4life said in Intermittent and longer fasting:
i don't know how you guys do it. if i skip a meal (which i do pretty regularly) i am feeling it within about an hour.
You start at 12 hours, then build up from there. I drink 2 to 3 litres of water a day, which fills you up, and start the day with black coffee. Have worked it to this week was averaging 22 hours and one meal a day.
Way better concentration and energy levels, and I do two hard workouts a week on that amount of food with no problem (other than my lack of fitness...)
that's impressive
i drink that much water as well, but doesn't make a difference
i am sure you condition to it though
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@mariner4life yep, according to the Zero app I use, I'm up to 277 fasts (and I had done more before that).
My longest fast is only 25hours though, so I'm facinated on how RoninWC pushed through.
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@Kirwan said in Intermittent and longer fasting:
@mariner4life said in Intermittent and longer fasting:
i don't know how you guys do it. if i skip a meal (which i do pretty regularly) i am feeling it within about an hour.
You start at 12 hours, then build up from there. I drink 2 to 3 litres of water a day, which fills you up, and start the day with black coffee. Have worked it to this week was averaging 22 hours and one meal a day.
Way better concentration and energy levels, and I do two hard workouts a week on that amount of food with no problem (other than my lack of fitness...)
That is exactly how I started. IF of 12/12 then went 16/8 and finally 20/4.
I found the 3 day, 72 hour fast to be really good. I found energy levels improved, clarity of thought improved and quite honestly, I was not hungry for most of the time.
The worst of it was the last few hours of the fast when you start thinking about food and planning how you will break the fast.
The results and expected bounce back have been really good. Even though I had a massive pig out session for Chinese New Year with the in-laws, I went straight back to IF, started some exercise and I am 0.5 kgs less than when I finished the 3 day fast.
The 5 day fast I'm planning for this coming Sunday arvo to Friday arvo will be interesting. To be honest, I did feel like I could have continued for another two days easily.
I look forward to it and will log here daily my experience before, during and after.
In terms of water, when IF I normally drink between 2 to 3 litres of water, black coffee once a day and a couple of green teas a day.
The black coffee once a day and 4 litres of water worked really well for me during the 3 day fast and that is what I will stick to next week.
I found the green tea would give me a slightly nauseous feeling in the gut but that was it.
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@Kirwan said in Intermittent and longer fasting:
Ok, that was a hell of a ride. Glad you are coming out the other side of all that!
I can certainly relate, my last 4/5 years was also pretty crap and I got to see more of the health system than I ever cared to. I sincerely hope that's all behind you.
You are doing the full on version of fasting, I never made it to the multiple day fasts so kudos for the willpower there. Regarding the fatigue, I found the fasting increased my energy a lot, so hopefully you get the same effect.
I'll be interested in the effectiveness of the multiple day fasts for you. I've found it harder to maintain the calorie restriction part of it while exercising, so upped what I have the day after exercising.
Specifically, how much you lose and what the bounce back is like when you go back to normal food schedule. How did you handle the hunger pains, lots of water?
Did you read that Dr Mosley's book on it all?
Thank you @Kirwan , having read your post/blog here which inspired me to write all of this... my trials pale in comparison to yours but I am grateful for your words of support.
Isn't it funny, I normally don't share much of this sort of stuff and like I said, my wife and family don't even know about the false positive cancer test. But then I'm happy to spill my guts and tell all to you strangers here on the Fern.
Actually, having been here for more than a decade, you lot often feel more like family than real family at times.
Cheers
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@RoninWC said in Intermittent and longer fasting:
@Kirwan said in Intermittent and longer fasting:
Ok, that was a hell of a ride. Glad you are coming out the other side of all that!
I can certainly relate, my last 4/5 years was also pretty crap and I got to see more of the health system than I ever cared to. I sincerely hope that's all behind you.
You are doing the full on version of fasting, I never made it to the multiple day fasts so kudos for the willpower there. Regarding the fatigue, I found the fasting increased my energy a lot, so hopefully you get the same effect.
I'll be interested in the effectiveness of the multiple day fasts for you. I've found it harder to maintain the calorie restriction part of it while exercising, so upped what I have the day after exercising.
Specifically, how much you lose and what the bounce back is like when you go back to normal food schedule. How did you handle the hunger pains, lots of water?
Did you read that Dr Mosley's book on it all?
Thank you @Kirwan , having read your post/blog here which inspired me to write all of this... my trials pale in comparison to yours but I am grateful for your words of support.
Isn't it funny, I normally don't share much of this sort of stuff and like I said, my wife and family don't even know about the false positive cancer test. But then I'm happy to spill my guts and tell all to you strangers here on the Fern.
Actually, having been here for more than a decade, you lot often feel more like family than real family at times.
Cheers
No worries, a good part of this area is the anonymity, there are no consequences to sharing that information here. So hopefully a good sounding board.
And while I had some narly experiences/surgery, I don't think your trials pale in comparison at all! Sounds like a tough experience, and without getting all happy clappy, it's worth talking it out with your wife. Just taking care of the stress helps enourmously.
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@Kirwan said in Intermittent and longer fasting:
Gee, you have me tempted now. Good results over the three days?
I would have to say excellent results.
I walked into work on Friday on the last day of the fast and I was getting compliments left and right.
I had dropped over 3kgs and kept them off dropping another .5 over this past week.
This weekend will be about preparation for a 5 day fast. The one thing I found is that eating normally then nothing, my poop was pretty foul for the first half of the fast. I also think I had too much carbs in my last couple of meals on the Sunday and will look to cut down significantly on carbs Saturday and Sunday with the goal to start the fast at about 5 pm Sunday.
The thinking is to get into ketosis quicker where as last time I think it took a good 12/16 hours before ketosis hit.
So I've asked my wife to help me with this and to avoid carbs and just go with meat and veggies this weekend.
Also, I'll start drinking 4 litres of water per day from tomorrow also in preparation.
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That is excellent. I just got back from holiday where I put on 2.5kg taking a complete break from fasting (which are supposed to periodically so your body doesn't get used to it) and it took 5/6 days to take it back off again just jumping back on the schedule.
I do want to get well under 80 though, so not the holiday season is over I'm getting geared up to take step back to where I started. Your thread is perfectly timed for motivation.
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@Kirwan I’ve had an interesting 12 months with what turned into intermittent fasting. I’m retired and active on my small farm. I raise and breed poultry and my feeding/ watering round in the morning jumped with an expansion in what I was doing.
I started to regularly have breakfast when I’d finished, usually around 10.30. No big goals or anything. I still had a supper snack at night. But I started to lose weight. Interesting, I thought, did a little reading and sharpened my understanding of Int Fasting. Without setting myself up with too many rules, I tweaked things when It seemed time. So the night snack went, for example. I usually go 14 hours, sometimes more.
I’ve lost 15 kg over the year and am still dropping. It hasn’t been hard and I see this pattern as life-long, really. Valuable for one’s wider health including the insulin metabolism.
I’m quite relaxed about all this but surprised and grateful. If I’d set out to lose weight I doubt I would have been as successful. I’ve dropped from 94 kg to 79. Have been as high as 104 in the past. I’m 70.
The key things are that I stumbled into it and had complete confidence in what was happening before I read any detailed rules and systems. My lifestyle helps. My morning round is like a light workout with lifting, carrying, walking, bending. I’m busy and occupied and in fact have never had much trouble delaying breakfast although I followed the “breakfast like a king” myth.
The only rule I follow is to generally go 14 hours. I eat passably well, but don’t lay too many rules on myself otherwise.
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@beardie One book I found useful is “The Natural Prescription” by Dr. Andreas Michalsen. He’s a highly credentialed German doctor who also works with and researches some of the traditional natural remedies. The chapter on fasting is informative.
I’m not keen on some of the popped up, pepped up programmes that get hustled online.
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@Kirwan Yes, it’s a clear and simple eating pattern. I was fortunate the effectiveness of doing it was proven before I was even labelling what I was doing ! That sidestepped the emotional
snags and has made it fairly easy. I still shake my head about it from time to time. -
Second day into this planned 5 day water fast or as my app tells me, 39 hours done, 81 to go!
As planned I started at 5 pm Sunday afternoon Sydney time.
Doing really well, not feeling hungry now at all. Yes, for the 8 hours when you wake up that first morning, you are naturally hungry. But after that, I haven't felt hungry at all including waking up this morning.
Ketosis should be setting in now well and truly and autophagy should be kicking in now.
Obviously, these are the two biggest benefits of a water-fast for both weight loss and over all health benefits.
I strongly recommend to anyone to do some research about autophagy and the benefits it has on the human body.
Prep wasn't as good as I hoped, on Friday afternoon, the wife who had had a pretty shitty week and day says, let's have a drink tonight. Well those are the magic words so as soon as I got home, I had a gin whilst getting the ingredients to make margaritas and putting together some finger food.
Wife got home and it was margaritas and then a bottle of wine with some light finger food. Saturday was better making a concerted effort to lower carb intake and better quality protein and lots of veggies.
Sunday went a bit array when the wife announced she wanted to make home made pizzas. Can't turn those down so that was lunch. Dinner was at 4 pm and was again, focusing on good quality protein, in this case salmon for the protein and fatty acids.
I actually stopped eating at 4 pm but calling it a 5 pm start.
About to have the only non-water drink I will allow myself, a morning coffee and this time I'll put in a pinch of salt.
Still tossing up as to whether or not I need to supplement some minerals, more salt as well as potassium and magnesium which tend to be the ones most often recommended.
Anyone got any thoughts on this?
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For the longer ones, I've seen people say they have better results keeping their electrolytes up, in terms of health. So the mineral approach is a good idea.
You must have a large amount of willpower, I tried out a longer one over the weekend and got to 44 hours (I had crossfit so can't do that fasted). I can see a 72 hour one as doable, but I was really ready to end at 44. Only hungry during my normal feeding window, rest of the time was fine, just have to keep busy.
Still, I'll give it another spin this weekend and see how part two works.
Five days is impressive!
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I have been doing similar to @beardie
I have dinner, may have a peice of fruit or snack a bit later, but wont eat anything again until >12pm, so going 14+hours, although I do have 2 coffees between 7.30am and 10.30am...so a little cheating.
Some days I am hanging out, but think it is more mental than anything.
I'm not trying to lose more than a couple of KGs, which I have done, so now is more about managing my weight.
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@taniwharugby said in Intermittent and longer fasting:
I have been doing similar to @beardie
I have dinner, may have a peice of fruit or snack a bit later, but wont eat anything again until >12pm, so going 14+hours, although I do have 2 coffees between 7.30am and 10.30am...so a little cheating.
Some days I am hanging out, but think it is more mental than anything.
I'm not trying to lose more than a couple of KGs, which I have done, so now is more about managing my weight.
Black coffee with no milk and sugar is fine, doesn't break the fast. I'm still at one coffee, but I'm new to it so still get a good pick me up from it.
It really is easy to do 16-18 hours fasting, and I find I have way more energy doing that, as you say it's not much of a change to the schedule.
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@Kirwan I still have milk but no sugar in my coffee...
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@Kirwan said in Intermittent and longer fasting:
@taniwharugby said in Intermittent and longer fasting:
I have been doing similar to @beardie
I have dinner, may have a peice of fruit or snack a bit later, but wont eat anything again until >12pm, so going 14+hours, although I do have 2 coffees between 7.30am and 10.30am...so a little cheating.
Some days I am hanging out, but think it is more mental than anything.
I'm not trying to lose more than a couple of KGs, which I have done, so now is more about managing my weight.
Black coffee with no milk and sugar is fine, doesn't break the fast. I'm still at one coffee, but I'm new to it so still get a good pick me up from it.
It really is easy to do 16-18 hours fasting, and I find I have way more energy doing that, as you say it's not much of a change to the schedule.
And if I can add to what @Kirwan has said because absolutely, black coffee doesn't break a fast.
@taniwharugby I would suggest not having that snack, or if you do want to snack, make it a paleo or keto snack, that is, protein without carbs.
This will keep you in an insulin sensitive state which means your insulin levels don't rise. But as soon as you add carbs, then your body starts pumping out insulin. This is best to be avoided until a larger or main meal as increased insulin levels will make you hungrier.
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@taniwharugby said in Intermittent and longer fasting:
@Kirwan I still have milk but no sugar in my coffee...
Then technically, that will break your fast @taniwharugby
If you want to sustain a fast or keep the benefits going, remove the milk. What you can do to keep the benefits going, i.e. insulin sensitivity, is to add some butter to your coffee. You can also add salt which is what I do during this water only fast without the butter of course.
Adding butter sounds crazy but it will keep you in a ketosis state and your insulin levels under control.
