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Intermittent fasting


xjohanx
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IF is really the way my husband just prefers to eat. He doesn't really eat all day, but then has a few different meals in the evening. I used to lecture him about how unhealthy that was, but then I read about IF and realized that was basically what he was doing.

 

I don't know how I'd deal with it, I like to eat every 2-3 hours. Mostly because I love food.

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I used to eat every 2-3 hours but it takes time for the body to adjust. For most people it's like 3 days or something.

This: http://www.physorg.com/news170688849.html is a pretty good text about ghrelin and hunger that I think a lot of bodybuilders/fitness people can relate to. "If you eat all the time, ghrelin secretion will not be well controlled".

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I'm not sure what intermittent fasting is.

 

I *try* to wait until I feel my stomach rumble/contract before I eat. It seems to make it easier for me to maintain my weight, my food tastes better and I feel healthier. Common sense I guess. Don't put more stuff in until you fully process what you already put in.

Edited by beforewisdom
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On workout days, I do three meals and a snack after the workout for recovery. On days off, I do between 2-3 meals. I feel much better eating fewer times per day. My digestive system loves me.

 

If you eat fewer times per day for awhile, and don't eat like crap, you will stop feeling that nagging stomach hunger and it will become more of a chest/throat sensation. This is your telling you to eat to maintain or build your lean mass.

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I'm not sure what intermittent fasting is.

 

http://www.leangains.com has a lot of stuff on it. Dude who writes is from Sweden and basically he is the guy who is pushing this the most. He often reccomends 16 hours of fasting and 8 hours of eating. It's a great thing for people who want to loose weight but have low metabolic rates/NEAT and can only eat around 1200 kcal. Instead of doing the classis thing and "eat every 3 hours" which would mean around 6 meals of 200 kcal you can eat 2 meals of 600 kcal or for the hell of it 1 big meal of 1200 kcal and feel really satisfied instead of walking around half hungry all the time.

I think the main point to take home with this whole new "trend" is that meal frequency/"30 grams of protein every third hour"/etc is bullshit and something that is only pushed by protein powder companies, the old breakfast, lunch and dinner is awesome or the way that you do it BW, follow what your body tells you. The reason I'm doing IF is mostly due to the health benefits that have been found (when comparing isocaloric diets), like better insulin sensitivity for example. I also find it to be a lot easier for my digestive system to eat this way. There is a lot of research on this (mostly done on rats though) and you can find it if you search "intermittent fasting" on pubmed.

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I do this often, usually without choosing it. Like these days I'm travelling, in NYC I was eating sometimes just one meal in the evening, then I fasted for about 30 hours - only ate in the plane and then didn't eat during the whole time I was in London and until I got off the plane I only ate hours afterwards when I went outside of my hotel room to a nice small vegeterian/vegan restaurant. After many hours without food, the stomach digests very well.

I like food too and love to eat, but I seem to prefer eating in the evening, in the day I'm more in an active mode, I like to walk, run, exercise, etc...

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  • 2 weeks later...
After many hours without food, the stomach digests very well.

 

This is my experience too!

 

I'm still doing this and it feels awesome. My sugar cravings are in check for the first time since...ever. I only eat two meals per day now but I get in around 140 grams of protein plus I take 24 grams of EAAs around training. I would really encourage people that have problems maintaining a good shape all year to try this.

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After many hours without food, the stomach digests very well.

 

This is my experience too!

 

I'm still doing this and it feels awesome. My sugar cravings are in check for the first time since...ever. I only eat two meals per day now but I get in around 140 grams of protein plus I take 24 grams of EAAs around training. I would really encourage people that have problems maintaining a good shape all year to try this.

 

Are you timing one of the meals within an hour or so after training, or are you relying on the EAAs as your "recovery" nutrition?

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It is slightly different from day to day depending on how my university schedule looks like but usually this is the way it usually goes (sometimes everything* is an hour earlier and sometimes an hour later. *Except last meal which always ends at 11)

 

04.00 pm: EAA + creatine Training starts and lasts 45-60 minutes

05.15 pm: EAA

05.45 pm: Food

11.00 pm: Food

 

So I guess I can say that food is what I rely on for recovery after training since I don't get any carbs before that but the EAA is still a big part.

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Looks good. I am constantly considering dropping my morning smoothie. Other than that, I don't eat until after I finish training, around 2-4pm. I don't know if I'd still be able to down all the vegetables I want to, while still getting enough calories.

 

I was worried about this too but I manage fine. I eat around 1-2 kg of non starchy veggies a day (here I count carrots as non starchy) and I don't blend anything at all. But if you like your morning smoothie I don't think it's a big deal at all. If I eat breakfast I will automatically want lunch and maybe a snack so this way suits me better. It's good that you don't have meal frequency paranoia like most people

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I love how you quoted just the smiley, Joe.

 

Yeah, I am so back and forth with the smoothie. Having it in the morning doesn't make me crave lunch. Whether I have it or not, I am fine until mealtime. I guess since it is an entirely liquid breakfast, my body probably cruises through its digestion, getting back to a state of rest pretty quickly.

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Not sure if this counts or not but I usually have at least a 12 usually a 14 hour fast. I eat right after my evening workout and then I don't eat again until after my morning workout. I used to get some comments about how I couldn't have properly fueled up for my morning workout but it always seems to workout fine for me.

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I don't think there's anything that "counts" or doesn't, 12-14 hours is a pretty long time so I bet you get some health benefits out of it. The "classic" IF regimen is 16 hours fast and an 8 hour feeding window but everyone does it differently.

Regarding the fueling, I think doing what feels good is the only way to go and personally (like you) I don't need to fuel up a whole lot before a workout. I eat at 11 pm and train the next day at around 4 pm. I take EAA and creatine before and usually I try to drink some coffe or diet coke to boost myself with caffeine but I manage just fine without it. The people talking with you about not being properly fueled are probably people that are bound to eat every three hours and protein shakes too, at least they are in my case

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I do tend to eat every three hours or so in the hours that I am eating just to be clear but once I stop eating for the day I am done until the next post workout session which like I said is usually a 14 hour window and when I break that fast it is with a vega shake. Then a couple of hours later I actually eat. It's funny but the people that gave me a hard time about not eating before training were bodybuilders. They insisted that I had to be burning off muscle because I wasn't properly fueled. But being a female and not making serious amounts of test I don't really have hypertrophy or serious muscle built up so I don't have a real worry about it. Im more into performance anyway and I do feel like the fast break helps.

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yeah I found it funny too when Joe quoted a smiley.

 

I love fasting too. Its great when you just skip some meals because you're not hungry and you feel fine with lots of energy, I enjoy it more than if I decide to avoid eating just to fast.

I often fast for 12 hours since I dont always eat a breakfast or when I eat pretty early in the evening. I like also when I eat very little during the day, so that it keeps some benefits like a fasting. For instance few days ago I was training at the gym in the evening after eating only 2 slices of bread in the morning and a few apples throughout the day and was feeling perfectly fine.

Today I drank a cup of yerba mate at noon after 12 hours fast, I trained 20 minutes with pull-ups, chin-ups, then walked 7 km while eating 4-5 apples. Ate something higher in calories only around 5 p.m, some FlapJacks (oat bars). Then walked again 7 km while lifting a bag.

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I just skipped breakfast today, because my stomach has been cramping up really bad these past few days, which is I think due to stress from moving. I ate my first meal at about 3pm. I didn't go too crazy, just a green smoothie, some very well chewed carrots and a couple bananas with nut butter. A good quantity of food, but all stuff that digests easily. I liked skipping breakfast. I think I am going to try this for a few days and see what I think.

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