Intermittent Fasting 101

Let’s just get to the point, can you imagine a meal timing strategy where you don’t eat for 16 hours of the day?

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It sounds scary, right? Well, the truth is it isn't.

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This  diet that I’m referring to is called Intermittent Fasting, or IF for short.

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Intermittent Fasting is essentially a meal timing strategy (or preferred eating pattern) that cycles between “fasting” and “eating” windows throughout the day.

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So, for some parts of the day you don’t eat, and other parts of the day you do eat. Doesn’t sound too bad when you put it that way, right? Right! Now let me explain the 16 hour break

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Generally, this is how your day might look when on an Intermittent Fasting program:

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You “fast” (or don’t eat) from the time you wake up until about 12pm, noon. Then from noon until roughly 8pm you enter your eating window, where you’ll have your meals for the day. Then, at 8pm your eating window closes and you go back t fasting until you fall asleep. Make sense?

And you might be wondering why the heck would you want to do Intermittent Fasting like this? Well, here’s why:

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Pushing breakfast calories back until later in the day (or adding them to a later meal) allows for larger meals rather than smaller ones. This is typically great for people who don’t love breakfast or doesn't have time to, aren’t hungry when they wake up (or prefer coffee to food early in the morning) and those who are dieting and can’t do the “eat every three hours” thing. Plus, Intermittent Fasting has shown to have some “fat burning” effects as the body is positioned to be in a fasted state (though this is largely up for debate).

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It’s also important to note that in your fasting windows, you’re ‘allowed’ to consume zero-calorie beverages to suppress appetite and hold you over. This includes black coffee (with no sugar. Yes, not a single small piece of sugar), seltzer water, water, etc. And furthermore, during your eating window you still need to be respectful of total calories for the day and making relatively good food choices. Got it?

Need other ideas for different diets? Check out our post on ways people are changing their diets to become a healthier one:

http://hlthylf.blogspot.com/2018/10/ways-people-are-changing-their-diet-to.html

Links:

https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/intermittent-fasting-guide
https://jamesclear.com/the-beginners-guide-to-intermittent-fasting
https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/intermittent-fasting-surprising-update-2018062914156