I have got out of the habit of eating after 14:00, and I have to eat to keep up to my target weight! (no sympathy expected)
I have been Intermittent Fasting (IF) 20/4 for over 18 months, and fasting for 68 hours most months - but I missed last month, partly because I was below my target weight (95kg, 14% body fat).
So I "ate plenty" over Christmas: (Do calories matter if you record what you eat?)
On Christmas day I ate my normal 1459 calorie breakfast:
Some community locals put on a party for about 100 of us that would have been alone at Christmas:
I had two large mince pies and chocolate biscuits with my coffee @ 11:00.
Bread roll with butter
Turkey and all the trimmings
A second helping of "pigs in blankets"
Profiteroles and cream
Christmas pudding and cream
more mince pies
two plates of biscuits and cheese.
They gave us all presents - but I gave away the large box of shortbread they gave me.
I have eaten nothing since.
20 hours later I was a kilo over my target weight, and I walked 8 kilometres. When you are fasting, once you have used up your glycogen energy store, you can only exercise at the rate at which you can get energy from your fat stores - so gentle, aerobic exercise is best. (Hunter-gatherers are so well fat-adapted that they can hunt, and run down antelope, having not eaten for a week or more!)
44 hours into the fast I was back to my target weight - and I will go for another walk.
68 hours into my fast (Saturday) I will break my fast (with full-fat yoghurt), as my son is meeting me for lunch.
If any of us were trapped or marooned, and could not eat for a few days, few of us would come to any harm, and Dr Jason Fung puts many of his acute diabetes on an initial medically-supervised two or three week fast.
...but, if you do not have acute diabetes, cancer or another non-communicable disease, are not at risk of losing life or limb, then it is best to transition into the Low-Carbohydrate, High-Fat (LCHF) diet and Intermittent Fasting (IF) over a few weeks, see:
That’s all very interesting. I don’t have diagnosed diabetes but a very informed person here thought I had a rare form of it. I could fast and live but not fast and live my life! After 4 hours without food I am shaking & very stressed & confused. I can’t speak coherently, drive a car, write legibly, safely use scissors or knives. I am sure that I could survive in a hospital under the care of Jason Fung, but not be a responsible adult with children or go to work. The answer for me is to stay away from sugar & refined carbs especially without fat, & eat little and often. I find medical professionals are great, when it comes up, they fully accept there are people who need to eat often, it’s not unusual apparently. This suggests I’m not alone in being unable to fast...
I think I recall that Jason Fung sates that his methods work for 60% of his patients, and Dr David Unwiun states that his Low-carb method works for 25%.
My thought is that compliance was a major factor - and people who paid to be in Dr Fung's clinic were more motivated than Dr Unwin's NHS patients - and Dr Unwin, I think, only uses the Low-Carb methodology, and not fasting as well.
It takes diabetics longer to get fat adapted.
I am not medically trained - but I would have thought that most people who would have difficulty fasting would be carbohydrate-dependant?
Not necessarily. There seems to be something wrong with my ability to convert glycogen to glucose, a task done by the hormone glucogen, to get enough sugar at the right time for my energy needs at that time. This is worse when I eat low fat carbs but still present when I am on a Keto diet. I also can’t absorb iron, however much people tell me a healthy diet is enough, and have to have iron transfusions - some people’s bodies don’t work the way they should. In a previous time, I would be dead.
I’d like to, and frequently remind my body that there is a substantial bottom & thighs available for it to make use of, but to no avail. I don’t think it’s the lack of glycogen but the speed at I can call on it (is the hormone effectiveness) which is a problem. Anyway, it’s annoying but hardly a huge deal as I don’t live in a famine region. It just makes it even more important to eat well every day as the fasting option is not an option to me to shift those fat stores.
But enough about MOI and back to the studies. I wonder if the patients the 2 drs work with are self selecting - if you knew you would be stabbing someone if you fasted, you’d probably give it a miss 🤣. I wonder also if they received any hormone supplements to make the fast with.
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Update on My Diet...
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Please Join Me for a Monday Weigh-in (22nd December 2014).
What do people mean when they say….
