I've been practicing Intermittent Fasting (IF) since summer 2017, 18 months ago as of the time I write this blog. That doesn't mean I can't eat yummy foods like home-made buckwheat pancakes with fresh whipped cream (all organic, and yes I made them myself :)
At 50+ years old, it was the only method that worked to melt off the last of the belly fat I was trying so hard to lose.
It takes some getting used to, but there are SO many benefits. Check out the NY Times article below for some recent research. I have 1st hand experience with the following benefits:
1. Reduces body fat
2. Melts belly fat (for me, that was hardest to lose)
3. More energy
4. Less joint pain & inflammation
5. Better sleep
6. More strength
7. Saves money
8. Stronger immune system
9. Saves time
10. Simplifies my life a bit (2 meals per day + healthy snacks w good fat: nuts, olives, avocados)
What is it? For me, I do 8 & 16: 8-hour window of eating, 16 hours of fasting…every day. I generally eat my first meal about 4-5 hours after I wake up (so around 11 or noon), then my last meal is 8 hours later (around 7-8 pm).
I generally go to sleep around 11 and wake up around 6:30 or 7 (I am consistent about getting 7 to 7.5 hours of sleep, minimum).
Think about it: we evolved over hundreds of thousands of years to eat one big meal per day, usually (two if we were lucky), with snacks of nuts, seeds, berries, etc. Now, society tells us we should eat 3 meals per day, but our bodies were not designed to process that much food. Assimilation and elimination are the two most important functions our body performs. If we throw too much food into our systems, the body must work super hard to digest it and assimilate the nutrients properly. This generally takes several hours.
But if we throw more food in our system too soon (just as it’s getting through the last meal), many of the nutrients will not be properly assimilated and the body will be forced to eliminate a lot of the food that it doesn’t have time to process. That’s not only wasteful, it leads to incomplete assimilation and challenges with elimination. Over time, these imbalances can lead to a whole host of health problems that may manifest in dangerous ways.
When We Eat, or Don’t Eat, May Be Critical for Health
A growing body of research suggests that our bodies function optimally when we align our eating patterns with our circadian rhythms.
See NY Times article here or https://getpocket.com/a/read/2268038902.
