I guess technically that counted as IF as I ate (and drank) all my calories in around 3-4 hours that day... //

Not technically, that is IF. And if you did that enough times, you would then start to get the benefits, and it would just get easier and easier. You dont have to cut calories, or change what you eat, unless you need or want to. You just eat them all in that window you choose, so it doesnt have to be a diet at all..

From what I understand as long as you're only eating in an 8 hour window you'll get the benefits. I chose 12-8 because I have more energy and will power in the morning. My friend eats between 8-4.

FWIW, I lift three days a week. I typically perform compound Olympic lifts, and prefer to go heavy, with plyometrics mixed in. I work out until I've burned 500 calories, which usually takes 45-60 minutes.

Good to understand context.

Yes IF along with all other "diets" work for weightless as their common denominator all work on putting you in a caloric deficit. As long as you do this you will lose weight. IF just takes a different approach by restricting the time you can eat thus giving you less chance to eat more than you need. Many others do this similarly such as Keto utting out a ton of excess calories in highly processed carb foods. On the opposite end with the higher fat intake, just make sure your calories over the long term maintain you in a caloric deficit.

If your goal is weightless IF is not any better than any other diet. The "best" diet/eating approach is the one you can stick with in the long term.

Of course there is more to it than just that, but as long as you stay in a caloric deficit you will drop weight. I try to urge people to focus on habits and behaviors over a diet, but to each their own.

Just eating more slowly for most will yield weight loss over time.

I may give this a try when my blood-work comes back next week. I would like to see the benefits you have reaped for myself.

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"The great pleasure in life is doing what people say you cannot do."

I may give this a try when my blood-work comes back next week. I would like to see the benefits you have reaped for myself. //

And hopefully you have all your bloodwork going back a few years, maybe forever!! But it astounds me that when I ask friends if they know what their bloodwork is, they say it is normal. And then I ask what end of normal do you mean, or do you have your labs, hardly anyone does.. And it is so easy now, Quest and other labs have portals for you to store all of that stuff, and some really cool comparison charts over time on how you are doing, and which way things are trending. Having a magnesium lever of 1.72 when the low range is 1.7 and under is not the normal range. One hot workout, or even a normal training day could put you under that low end range. A big 6 hour ride in Kona could smash it, and you in the process. Yet the doc's will tell you all is fine, you are all normal....

I started by fasting until dinner once or twice a week about 6 or 7 months ago. Now do one meal a day 5 or 6 days a week (occasionaly splurge on the other days with coffee and heavy creamer in the AM). Heavily limited carbs as well (I started with keto as a goal as well and am now just kinda keto by going in and out of it). Every 5 weeks or so I mix it up my eating 3x a day, eating a pizza, shit like that. It might sound methodical but it really is not. After adapting to it your pretty much on auto pilot.

My goal was to just try something new as I always have enjoyed trying new ways if eating and training. The topic of autophagy was interesting to me as well. Lastly I had about 10-15lbs that was going to come off but melted off scary fast while doing the above

Energy is solid and I feel great. On that note I just wrapped up about 45 minutes of kettle bell and heavy bag training and at no point felt like I was out if gas.

If I could suggest one person on in the LR to really pay attention to on the topic it would be Sanuk. Had a ton of questions when I started and can tell you his experience/advice I certainly applied and appreciated.

One last piece of advice- hydrate well and get your electrolytes.

One last piece of advice- hydrate well and get your electrolytes.
^^^THIS is great advice for anyone doing this. I take at least two saltsticks at one hour intervals around 8 to 10 am. They dont break the fast as far as I can tell, and it keeps me from cramping up. I have read a lot of other peoples stories about being low on minerals while fasting, and paying a price..

A couple of questions for you:

When you say you eat whatever you want, what do you usually eat?

When you weighed 207, wasn't that because of an injury or something where you couldn't exercise?

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Long Chile was a silly place.

It’s easier to say what I don’t eat....

Dairy (except butter, lots of butter and occasionally cheese).

Bread

I’m alomost totally gluten free but I don’t make an effort to avoid gluten. Having a celiac wife and not eating any bread it just sort of works out that way.

A typical day goes like this (work day)....

Coffee in the morning (black) until I’m done. This could be 3-4 cups or 10.

Around 10:00-11:00 I’ll have a smoothie of the wife makes me one (green stuff and some peanut butter (I’ don’t ask questions)). If no smoothie and I’m going to noon jiu jitsu I’ll eat a snickers around 11:00.

“Lunch” could be anytime between 12:00 (if no BJJ) to 3:00. That could be tacos, sushi, burger (no bun), or maybe just graze some trail mix if I’m working (we don’t take “breaks” at work, we work until the job is done).

Dinner will be some kind of meat with some kind of vegetable and maybe some kind of sauce, sometimes potatoes or a salad. Or it could some shitty thing like fish sticks or whatever...

On days I don’t work I’ll eat a fried egg with some hot peppers and goat cheese around 10:00 (except sunday I have jiu jitsu at 10 so I don’t eat until after) and then pretty much graze all day on whatever I feel like.

Sometimes that’s a bag of tortilla chips with a tub of cream cheese....




No soda no juice no alcohol no crackers no cake no cookies no cereal

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Civilize the mind, but make savage the body.

- Chinese proverb

I’ve been doing time restricted eating for 2-3 weeks now, trying to only eat between 12-6pm. Otherwise I haven’t changed anything and I would guess I eat a fairly high carb diet.

I lift weights and do about 30 minutes of moderate intensity aerobic exercise most days. I’ve dropped 3-4 lbs, been surprised how much my appetite has changed. Not really hungry until late morning and it’s tolerable.

Not noticed any other changes. Plan on trying some fasting at some point but I don’t think I could do keto, just seems like an entirely enjoyable way to eat.

 I just finished up a 48 hour fast and feel pretty wretched.

I guess my metabolism would do better on shorter stints. For anybody who does go longer, how long does it take you to get back up to speed?

You can transition to a keto type diet before fasting which will make it a lot easier. Your body may be crashing because it's not used to running off fat.

Also, using a electrolyte supplement may help.

I just finished up a 48 hour fast and feel pretty wretched.


I guess my metabolism would do better on shorter stints. For anybody who does go longer, how long does it take you to get back up to speed?


The fact that you feel wretched is normal and has nothing to do with your metabolism. It takes about 48 hours on average for someone to burn up their stored sugar (glycogen) and after that, it starts burning Ketones. People often experience the "Keto flu" and or headaches as they transition between burning sugar and ketones.


I've done regular 5-day water (and black coffee) fasts and by far the hardest day is Day 1, the next hardest is Day 2 and the easiest by far is Day 4. The real benefits start after 48 hours where your body starts burning ketones (fat) instead of stored sugar.


I would really encourage you to stick to it and try again. The key is to start your fast after good eating. You don't want to over eat or eat junk food and then fast. It is far easier if you eat lightly and well (doing things like eating 2 meals a day) for a week and then starting a fast.

thanks to you and Fishyjoe - what you say makes perfect sense.

I've done some spells of keto and never felt great during, even once past the flu. So it only follows that a deep dive in would leave me with the blahs.

I'm going to play around with duration but I think five days is well past my pay grade, Thanks so much to you both for the helpful feedback.

In all honesty, if you can go to sleep after fasting for 48 hours, that is by far the hardest part of a 5 day fast.

I typically eat dinner on Sunday and Monday and Tuesday at dinner times are the hardest. When I get hungry, I drink a large glass of water and it seems to curb my appetite. Many people mistake hunger for thirst. If I can go to sleep on Tuesday without eating, I know I can do 5 days because when I wake up Wednesday, I feel energetic and light and that motivates me to keep going.

I just started a 5-day fast after dinner Saturday night because I am going out next Friday so want to finish the 5-day fast on Thursday at dinner. It's always want to avoid having fasting interfere with my social schedule, it's important to keep consistency. Just work around your life and it is much better.

I am going to try a 7-day fast at some point in 2019. That will be difficult because after 5 days it does start to get hard. I find I simply miss eating and to be at 5 days on Friday and then go another weekend is something I have to mentally psyche up for.

I am really impressed with what you have done. After talking with you earlier in the year I tried limiting my food intake to certain hours, 12 - 6 PM and also intermittent fasting. I think the intermittent fasting worked best but I had problems getting the energy I needed for my workouts. Today I am eating less daily than ever, and losing about a 1 - 2 lbs a month. I have 13 more lbs to lose until I meet my goal, which is losing about 30 lbs. Keep up the inspirational work.

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"The great pleasure in life is doing what people say you cannot do."

How are things going with your weight loss?

I just finished a week of IF. I'm restricting eating to between 12-7ish, Monday-Friday. I started last Thursday.

First few days were easy. Yesterday was hard. Today just felt like torture. Does it get easier??

I haven't noticed workouts suffer, because I work out at 5am and always did that before breakfast anyways. But on the days I work out... Waiting until 12 to eat can be hard. Not only that, but trying to just eat a moderate lunch is even more difficult. I feel like I could eat a house, and if I only eat enough to temporarily curb my hunger, by dinner time I'm absolutely ravenous.

I don't have much weight to lose, maybe 10lbs, I just wanted to give this an honest shot and see how I feel. I figure I will keep it up until the holidays then reassess. After one week, I'm just not sure IF is for me.

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Long Chile was a silly place.

What are you eating, when you eat? In my experience Ketosis was the key to make it easier. Not easy every day, but easier.

Typical day:

Wake around 4-430.

Work out 5am-6ish.
Walk dog 630-7.
Help get family ready for the day until around 8, work from 8-430/5.

I'll have my first meal at 1130-noon. Typically it's a smoothie. I try to make it as satiating as possible (yoghurt, berries, big scoop of protein powder, banana, avacado, oats, nut butter is my usual). I'll have a few snacks before end of work day (jerky, apple, nuts).

Dinner is usually something reasonably healthy. Typically involves some meat, which I eat around 630-7. By the time dinner rolls around I will eat my shoe if I stare at it long enough.

In bed around 930.

I'm 36, 6'1", 190lbs. Exercise around 4x/weeks, and have a physical job.

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Long Chile was a silly place.

It does get far easier but it takes time.

I had a typical diet, 3 meals a day and snacking at night for my entire life. I generally ate well but the fact that I needed snacks was a sign of a problem. You don't need to eat so often.

I now do a 48-hour water only fast every week and most of the other days I eat only dinner, one meal a day (OMAD). I'm just not that hungry and all cravings have gone. They key is to increase the fat content of your meals (ie. nuts, cheese, eggs, avocados, olives, olive oil, butter, cream etc.). Increasing the good fats when you eat will rid you of cravings but you have to be consistent.

Every few months I still do a 5-day water only fast but it is far easier now that I do regular 48-hour fasts.

I started with IF, eating only lunch and dinner and found that as long as I avoided all sugar and didn't snack at night, I would wake up with far more energy. That motivated me to keep going and eventually just stopped eating lunch. I am a CPA and have a sedentary job but my energy levels for things like exercise are far higher than when I ate 4-5 times per day. If you struggle to get between meals, eat a little more good fat in your eating time and that should carry you to the next meal. You really have to avoid carbs though, or it doesn't work well.