Looking At The : 2 Diet
One of the better-known intermittent fasting diets is the 5:2 plan.
Under this plan, you eat what you want for 5 days each week and then limit yourself to 500 calories on the other 2 days.
In a recent study conducted at Queen Mary University of London, researchers said the results of 5:2 intermittent fasting are similar in effectiveness to traditional dieting.
They also found, however, that people generally preferred intermittent fasting and were more willing to stick with it.
The study included 300 adults with obesity 100 received information on conventional dieting, 100 received information on intermittent fasting, and 100 received information on intermittent fasting along with 6 weeks of support.
The researchers followed participants for a year, noting weight loss. At the end of the study, they noted:
- Fifteen percent of participants in the group provided with information on traditional dieting lost at least 5 percent of their body weight.
- Eighteen percent of people given information on intermittent fasting lost at least 5 percent of their body weight.
- Twenty-eight percent of people who received information on intermittent fasting as well as 6 weeks of support lost at least 5 percent of their body weight.
While weight loss was similar in the groups, the number of people who lost weight increased with intermittent fasting.
Researchers said the two groups who used the 5:2 diet had a more positive experience than people using the traditional diet.
Fasting For 2 Days A Week
People following the 5:2 diet eat standard amounts of healthful food for 5 days and reduce calorie intake on the other 2 days.
During the 2 fasting days, men generally consume 600 calories and women 500 calories.
Typically, people separate their fasting days in the week. For example, they may fast on a Monday and Thursday and eat normally on the other days. There should be at least 1 non-fasting day between fasting days.
There is limited research on the 5:2 diet, which is also known as the Fast diet. A involving 107 overweight or obese women found that restricting calories twice weekly and continuous calorie restriction both led to similar weight loss.
The study also found that this diet reduced insulin levels and improved insulin sensitivity among participants.
A small-scale study looked at the effects of this fasting style in 23 overweight women. Over the course of one menstrual cycle, the women lost 4.8 percent of their body weight and 8.0 percent of their total body fat. However, these measurements returned to normal for most of the women after 5 days of normal eating.
How To Intermittent Fast 16/8eating Or Drinking During The 16 Hour Fasting Period
All foods are eliminated. Zero calorie, zero sugar drinks are permitted as is coffee and tea. Its very important to eliminate all sugar and carbs during the fasting period. Eating any sugar or significant calories stops the ketosis and fat burning. Coffee or tea with artificial sweetener and a zero sugar coffee creamer are the best choice upon awakening. The zero sugar creamers or a ketone bomb increases the ketosis and fat burning during the morning fasting period. The fat in the creamers containing MCT oils quickly bypass the liver, goes to the the brain and circulation increasing the overall ketosis. This increases energy, decreases appetite and increases metabolism.
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How To Avoid Low Energy
Acclimating to intermittent fasting is similar to acclimating to the keto diet. In both cases, anything that helps you move toward fat-burning mode will help you make the transition. Supplementing with MCT oil, coconut oil, and other healthy fats may help with ketone production and overall acclimation.
Upping your caffeine intake a little may also help you avoid low energy, since caffeine helps your body mobilize fatty acids as fuel.
Potential Drawback: Fertility Problems
Some research in animals hints that intermittent fasting may impair female fertility. Its likely that this is caused by calorie deficiency, rather than by the practice of fasting itself, as pregnancy is a very energy-intensive practice.
Consider holding off on IF if youre pregnant or trying to become pregnant!
Men, on the other hand, can likely engage in IF without impairing their fertility rates.
There are also fasting strategies tailored specifically to female needs.
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What Is The 16/8 Diet
Fasting, or intermittent fasting, is a dietary approach in which one refrains from consuming any calorie-containing foods and beverages for a certain period of time.
The most well known form Intermittent fasting is known as the â16/8â, in which one eats during a chosen 8 hour window, and fasts for the remaining 16 hours of the day. The popularity of the 16/8 diet is likely owed to claims that itâs easy to follow, convenient, and a generally effective way to lose weight while improving overall health.
Hour Fast Benefit #: Improved Cognition
Studies show that intermittent fasting boosts several hormones, notably Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor , that are neuroplastic and neurodegenerative in nature.
In other words, fasting provides the perfect fuel for your brain. Increased BDNF levels are associated with improved mood, cognition, productivity, memory, and creativity. Harvard neuropsychiatrist John J. Ratey calls BDNF Miracle-Gro for the brain.
Its not known why intermittent fasting boosts BDNF so powerfully, but our evolution may give us some hints.
Throughout human history most tribes and people groups wouldve gone long stretches without food, say before their next successful hunt. During this time, peak physical and mental performance wouldve been paramount to securing the next meal and the body wouldve met this need.
To this day its thought that the human body perceives fasting as a healthy stressor and responds by forming new neurons that prime your body to learn new skills. In this type of emergency situation, BDNF allows our brains to form new neural networks quickly.
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Rules Of Intermittent Fasting For Weight Loss
Lets be honest: I dont like rules! I get so frustrated when health experts say dont do this, dont do that, or when they act as if they have found the ultimate solution that will work for everyone. Or worst, when they make up a list of rules to follow and make simple things sound complicated. At the same time, I understand that for some people, having rules to follow is helpful. They can act as guidelines to ensure success whenever trying something new. Thats what I was envisioning when I wrote these rules of intermittent fasting for weight loss.
I Would Move Away From Intermittent Fasting For Fat Loss And If You Want To Adopt It Think About The Health Benefits Rachel Clarkson
Someone who has a high-carb diet might never move beyond the catabolic state as they will always have a reserve supply of glycogen. However, someone with a low-carb diet and who regularly exercises might move through it very quickly . I would move away from intermittent fasting for fat loss, and if you want to adopt it think about the health benefits, says Clarkson.
How to fast
To fast you have to downregulate the feeling of hunger, says Clarkson. Hunger is felt when ghrelin, a hormone released from our stomach, triggers the production of two other hormones, called NPY and AgRP, in the hypothalamus.
While these three hormones generate feelings of hunger, there are a multitude more that suppress it. Sometimes called the satiety hormones, one of the key ones is leptin which is released from fat cells to suppress the production of ghrelin basically telling the body “there is fat here that you can burn”.
Ghrelin is sometimes called the short-term hunger response because it is released when the stomach is empty and there is less pressure on the stomach wall. It can be overridden to a certain extent by drinking water. Leptin meanwhile works over the long term.
* William Park is a senior journalist at BBC Future and is @williamhpark on Twitter.
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Intermittent Fasting 16 8 Is It Really A Fast
Although this is really academic, it should be noted that this is not really a fast in the strict meaning of the word. Although there is no actual minimum time set for an official fast, it is generally accepted that to fast means to not eat for a whole day, and not to consume 5000 plus Calories over the course of two-thirds of a day.
Even the 5:2 intermittent fasting method, which sets 2 days a week with only 600 Calories a day, is not a real fast, as 600 Calories is a lot more than no food at all. Real fasts are of course not suited to those who are trying to get fitter and more muscular, and do not provide a sustainable method of weight loss either in short, they are mostly pointless.
How Often Should You Do 1: 8 Intermittent Fasting
You can do anywhere from one day of intermittent 16:8 fasting to seven days a week, because, unlike other intermittent fasting diets, each day of the 16:8 works independently to the rest.
Evidence differs, however, on whether it’s healthy to do intermittent fasting all the time. While research from Queen’s Medical Centre has proven that short-term fasting boosts the metabolism, longer fasts of around three or more days can actually suppress it and slow it right down. Plus, going without food for a long period of time can lead to an increased level of cholesterol, feeling sick in the morning , dehydration and spells of low blood sugar.
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Best Foods To Eat After A 16
Consume any of the above-mentioned foods in moderation to break a 16-hour fast. Your first meal should not exceed 500kcal, or 50% of your regular intake.
Also, to refill your body, choose whole foods and a variety of macronutrients. Another recommendation is to avoid carb-heavy meals and sugary beverages, as they will produce a surge in your blood sugar levels and making fasting for the following period much more difficult because your hunger hormones will be elevated
How To Get Started 16/8 Intermittent Fasting
16/8 intermittent fasting is simple, safe, and surprisingly easy to get started with.
Just pick an 8-hour feeding window, eat 1-3 nourishing meals within that window, and abstain from anything except coffee and water the rest of the time.
The most popular 8-hour window is 12 pm to 8 pm. That said, 16/8 fasting is highly flexible.
You can structure it around your work schedule, workout schedule, or family time. You can eat from 12-8 on weekdays and switch things up to 8-4 or 2-10 on the weekends.
Others opt to eat between 9 am and 5 pm, which allows them to have a more standard breakfast, lunch, and early dinner. This type of circadian eating is thought to be good for digestion.
IF becomes even easier if you already skip breakfast. Youll just need to refrain from snacking or drinking calorie-containing beverages outside of your preferred 8-hour window.
Most people find that their body adjusts to 16/8 fasting within a few days, after which the fast becomes surprisingly hunger-free.
Filling up on superfoods during your eating window can boost satiety enough to make your daily fast even easier. Consider including a nice balance of animal-based fats and proteins in each meal.
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How Can I Suppress Hunger During Intermittent Fasting
Eat high-fiber foods, such as nuts, beans, fruits and vegetables, and high protein foods, including meat, fish, tofu, or nuts, during your eating window, Varady advised. Chewing high-fiber gummies can also help.
Drink lots of water. People tend to think theyre hungry, when they are really just thirsty, she said.
Go for black coffee or tea, or cinnamon or licorice herbal teas. These beverages may have appetite-suppressing effects, Varady noted.
Watch less TV: I know this sounds strange, but while you are watching TV, you are bombarded with dozens of ads for food. This can make you feel hungry, when in actuality, you are not hungry at all, she said.
Remember, being a little hungry is the best thing that can happen to you, wrote Madelyn Fernstrom, health and nutrition editor at NBC News, calling it a true mind-body connection that helps you recognize fullness.
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How To Avoid High Stress Hormones
Avoiding the cortisol increase that accompanies fasting can be done by many of the same things we mentioned above.
Drinking coffee with some clean-burning MCT oil or coconut oil mixed in may well be enough to help your body transition with a minimum of stress.
Partaking in gentle activities, like swimming or yoga, may also get your mind off of food and your body into fat-burning mode.
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Is 12 Hour Intermittent Fasting Enough
This is the million-dollar question among beginners and long-term intermittent fasting practitioners.
While research shows that 12 hours is enough, those who practice intermittent fasting and follow a keto diet swear by the 16-hour fasting window to help them stay in ketosis.
That said, many people do intermittent fasting without keto to achieve their health goals.
The Unexpected Benefit No One Talks About
Lost amid the talk of IFs various health benefits is a very real secondary perk: saving money. When you cut your diet down to one or two meals per day, your food costs drop accordingly. Its impossible to say exactly how much you stand to save, because it depends on how often you dine out, what you buy at the grocery store and so on.
But even if your total food expenses drop by just 25%, thats a huge difference. Suppose you typically spend, say, $100 per week on food. If you subtract the cost of seven meals per week, that might realistically lower your expense to $70. Over the course of one month, youd save $120. Over one year, $1,440.
Thats a vacation. A down payment on a new car. And theres a bigger-picture benefit as well: Youre lowering your impact on the planet. Imagine if entire populations switched to two meals a day from three. We could get by on fewer crops and animals, which in turn would reduce overall water consumption. Maybe thats a bit of pie-in-the-sky thinking, but theres truth to it.
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I mention all this because after I started IF, I noticed I was spending less on food. And then I started thinking about the external benefits of less food consumption, and that made me feel even better about it. Eat less, help the planet. Win-win!
More recently, I realized it also means fewer trips to the grocery store and carry-out restaurants, meaning less chance of exposure to the coronavirus.
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Are You Getting Enough Sleep
If you’ve cut out late-night snacking, that alone could help you go to bed earlier a very crucial component to any weight loss plan. Getting seven hours of sleep per night has been linked to better weight management, reduced risk of chronic disease, and improved metabolism.
The bottom line: Its simply not feasible for many of us to restrict food entirely for set periods of time in order to achieve better health. In addition to being difficult socially , self-imposed rules are simply not as joyful as having the right information and making choices that empower you versus hold you back. It’s best to find ways to make eating nutritious food work for you in the context of your day-to-day life. If you are considering intermittent fasting, Id encourage you to try it by starting small and keeping it as simple as possible: Close your kitchen after dinner, aim to get more sleep, and sit down for a full breakfast at your usual time tomorrow.
What Am I Allowed To Drink While Fasting
There are a variety of liquids that may be consumed during fasting to prevent breaking the fast. They are as follows:
- Tea and coffee without sugar.
- Distilled apple cider vinegar this might be used to break the fast.
- Alcohol- It is advised to avoid alcohol after breaking a fast, especially if it is longer than three days. This is because excessive alcohol intake can lead to ketoacidosis, a condition in which ketones are very high in the blood but blood glucose levels are dangerously low. Ketoacidosis symptoms causes stomach discomfort and vomiting. While the illness is most frequent among alcoholics and those who are overly reliant on alcohol, it is also possible that persons who do not eat enough/who fast and then consume a lot of alcohol with little to no food intake thereafter will suffer from ketoacidosis.
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Concerns About 16/8 Fasting
Intermittent fasting, especially the 16/8 approach, is completely safe and beneficial. Contrary to common belief, moderate calorie restriction is a healthy practice that improves your metabolic health.
However, if youre using it to get into ketosis, it might not be enough to get you there. If your fasting goal is to enter ketosis, you also need to follow a keto diet.
Intermittent Fasting And Ketosis
One of the best things about fasting is that it can help you get into ketosis faster.
The two are related for a few reasons:
So, is intermittent fasting 16/8 guaranteed to get you into ketosis? No, but it can help get you there if you do it along with a keto diet.
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