Five Reasons to Try Intermittent Fasting

The Reality…
 
There are so many different diets out there, it can be overwhelming to assimilate not only the sheer volume of information, but also reconcile the conflicting information you come across in trying to find the right diet for you. 
The Challenge…
I’m 52 years old, and I have struggled to one degree or another since law school to find the PERFECT diet for me…. a diet that wasn’t too terribly complicated or difficult to implement since I had a time-consuming and stressful career as a lawyer, and was a single parent to boot.  You can’t imagine how many different diets I have tried during that close to thirty-year span of time.  At most, I have had temporary success with the different diets I have tried.  I have learned from trial and error, and also watching the successes and failures of my friends, that each human body is different and there is no single RIGHT WAY to achieve and maintain a healthy body.  I entered my 50s still looking for MY right way to do it, and less and less confident that permanent weight loss would be possible at my age. 
Enter Intermittent Fasting.  This past year I tried Intermittent Fasting.  If your eyes are rolling back with skepticism right now, I completely understand.  It’s hard to fathom that Intermittent Fasting could be healthy for your body, especially when many of the latest diet trends recommend small, frequent meals to keep metabolism revved up.  I was well aware of what the naysayers were saying about Intermittent Fasting when I first decided to try it.
Since each person’s body and habits are different, I can tell you right up front that Intermittent Fasting may not be your personal answer to achieving a healthy weight and body.  However, at this point I’m a true believer in its many benefits because I know how I look and feel after adopting it.  
By the way, my brother, who passed away in an accident five years ago, was a big fan of periodic fasting, although the last thing he ever needed was a diet.  He fasted for health and spiritual reasons.  Looking back, perhaps he didn’t need to go on a diet BECAUSE OF his decision to incorporate periods of fasting.  After my own experience, I believe periodic fasting was his secret to a healthy body. 
What is Intermittent Fasting? Intermittent Fasting is basically a pattern that cycles between fasting and eating, essentially defining some window of time in which you eat, with the remaining periods allowing the body to rest and recover via a fast.  We humans naturally fast each evening when we sleep, but Intermittent Fasting incorporates extended periods of fasting into our waking hours. 
Our caveman predecessors experienced periods of fasting whether they wanted to or not since food was not so readily available in those times.  Imagine how much leaner we would be if we actually had to hunt our own food and grow our own fruits and vegetables. Our bodies haven’t changed all that much since caveman times, but our conditioning to desire and consume food, and our accessibility to food, certainly has undergone dramatic change.  The reality is our bodies are more naturally designed for periods of fasting than they are for frequent eating and the consumption of large amounts of food in a sitting.  Don’t you quickly feel that when you’ve eaten way too much??
With Intermittent Fasting, there aren’t really any rules as to what you should or should not eat, so it’s not really a diet in the ordinary sense of “eat so much of this, and don’t eat that.”  There’s none of that, although Intermittent Fasting is certainly more effective if you incorporate healthy food decisions into its basic structure.  I will explore the variety of different Intermittent Fasting methods in a subsequent blog, but for now I want to detail five reasons you might want to give Intermittent Fasting a whirl.
The Solution…
You may want to try Intermittent Fasting for the following five reasons:
  1.  Reduction of calories (weight loss)
  2.  Increases your metabolic rate so you burn more calories (weight loss)
  3.  Reduction of insulin (weight loss and disease prevention)
  4.  Increases human growth hormone (HGH) which promotes cellular repair (anti-aging)
  5.  Improves numerous risk factors for heart disease such as blood pressure, cholesterol levels, triglycerides and inflammatory markers (heart health)
The Invitation….
To get started on a deeper dive into permanent weight loss, click on the calendar below to schedule a FREE mini-session with me.  What do you have to lose but some weight??  

📅

                   

Five Intermittent Fasting Methods to Kickstart Your Weight Loss

The Reality…  
In a prior blog, I addressed the basics of intermittent fasting and why you might want to give it a try to achieve your weight loss goals.  As mentioned, intermittent fasting is essentially a pattern of eating that defines a specific period of time during your waking hours in which you will eat, and then you fast for the remaining hours.   
The Challenge…
If you research intermittent fasting, you will find that there are variety of different methods from which you can choose.  It can be a challenge to find the right method for you with all the available options, but as is the case with finding the right formula for diet, exercise and stress management, you must investigate and test the options and find the perfect fit for your body and lifestyle.  Below are the top five popular variations of intermittent fasting, with a brief description:
  1. 16:8 Method: Using the 16:8 method, you would eat during an eight-hour period you select, and then fast for the remaining sixteen hours.  There are no limitations or calories restrictions on what you are allowed to eat during your eight-hour eating window.  
  2. Eat Stop Eat: This method features a full 24- hour fast either one or two days per week, with normal eating the remaining days of the week.  
  3. The 5:2 Diet:  This method features a modified fast two days of the week (only 500 to 600 calories), with normal eating the remaining five days of the week. 
  4. The Warrior Diet: This method permits a four-hour eating window in the evening, and “fasting” the remaining 20 hours of the day by only eating small amounts of raw fruits and vegetables.  
  5. Alternate-day Fasting: Using this method, you would fast every other day, either by not eating anything or only eating a few hundred calories.
The Solution…
Assuming any sort of intermittent fasting is something you would like to try, it makes sense to give each of these methods a try and see which one works best for you.  I personally use a five-hour eating window (generally between 11:00 am and 4:00 pm), and fast for the remainder of the day.  I adjust my eating window on a weekly basis depending upon what my schedule holds for the upcoming week. 
The Invitation…. 
To get started on a deeper dive into permanent weight loss, click on the calendar below to schedule a FREE mini-session with me.  What do you have to lose but some weight??  

📅