Everything you could ever want to know about intermittent fasting weight loss!

Great Reasons to Give Intermittent Fasting a Try!

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You might ask yourself why such a diet like Intermittent Fasting would work and what the benefits to it would be. There are quite a few actually.  One of the first, and probably best for time saving in such a busy society is that people who practice Intermittent Fasting tend to eat a lot less frequently than other people.  Why is this important? Well, first, it saves you time and money, something we can all appreciate.  There are plenty of diets that tell you that eating 5-6 smaller meals a day is the key to weight loss, but who has the time, or discipline to schedule their life around their food rather than the other way around? And in fact, there is no proof that this is of any greater benefit than any other way of eating. As long as you consume the same amount of calories in the day, there is no difference in eating 5 or 6 meals as opposed to 2 or 3, or even 1.  (One study even showed that eating more frequently through the day can actually LEAD to weight gain because most people don’t get the “I’m full” feeling, making them eat more because they think they are hungry.)   The key point here is that eating less frequently generally results in eating less calories overall, which is important for weight loss. Reducing the number of calories can and does help people to lose weight, and Intermittent Fasting is great for that.  Just think about it for a second. If you have a plan that requires you to fast for 24 hours once or twice a week, you are drastically reducing your overall caloric intake for that week (provided you don’t go overboard during the rest of the days).

Also, reducing and restricting calories has other benefits than simply trimming the waistline.  When you fast, your body is forced to look for energy from sources other than food.  It does this on an individual cell level. The cells in your body will use its own damaged proteins as their energy source.  This doesn’t sound like something that should be praised, and if it were continued for a long time, it would cause damage. However, Intermittent Fasting requires that your periods of fasting are short enough to not do any damage. As soon as you start eating again, the cells in your body will have other sources of energy again and replace anything that was consumed. The new replacement proteins are healthy and new, instead of old and damaged, promoting greater cell health, and possibly preventing disease and premature aging.

And let’s not forget hormonal benefits to Intermittent Fasting.  The first and best known hormonal benefit to this type of dieting is improved insulin sensitivity.  Don’t let the title fool you, this is actually a great thing, despite sounding terrible (if you are like me and have enough people in your family who suffer from diabetes, the words insulin and sensitivity in the same sentence seem scary). Insulin sensitivity is something that all dieters want. Why? Well, basically it boils down to this: the more insulin sensitivity you have, the more likely your body will be to lose fat and gain muscle.  Fasting helps with this, and when paired with exercise, can help you start to achieve your goals.  Another great hormonal benefit to Intermittent Fasting is that it helps your body to secrete more growth hormone. This is great for lots of reasons, the most important for dieting being that the more you produce, the faster your body loses weight and can gain muscle.

Does intermittent fasting weight loss really work?

Although this is technically a diet, the term doesn’t exactly fit. Intermittent Fasting is more like a lifestyle, a way of eating, rather than a simple diet. It’s meant to help you find a way to eat healthier, and give you a means to sustain that weight loss. There are plenty of quick diets out there that can help you lose a few pounds rather quickly. However, most of the fixes they offer are short term.  Most “diets” cannot be sustained, and people fall off the wagon, often gaining much more weight than they started with.  Intermittent Fasting is different.  Once you begin to adopt this lifestyle, you’ll find that it’s actually not that hard to stick with it, and is something you can do for the rest of your life.

Can I stick to an intermittent fasting diet?

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Intermittent fasting can be a healthy way to shed excess body fat.  The basic premise is that the individual engages in periods of both over-eating and under-eating.  The overeating period allows indulgences that wouldn’t normally adhere to most diet plans, so this can help people stick to the intermittent fasting pattern even if they’ve had difficulty with other diets.  Many people have a much easier time staying away from food entirely than moderating the amounts that they eat.  On a normal three meal per day diet (or even worse, the five or six meals per day that is often recommended), the dieter has numerous chances per day to lose control and overeat.  However, with intermittent fasting, dieters can stay clear of temptation throughout most of the day, encouraged by the fact that they a nice, big meal waiting on them at the end of the day.  This gives them something to look forward to which can further bolster their willpower.  The over-eating period also lets them get the completely full and satisfied feeling that they have come to associate with a good meal.  By continuing to eat the proper number of calories in a day but compressing them all into a small window of time, or even a single meal, intermittent fasting allows people to eat a healthy number of calories without feeling deprived of the things they enjoy.  It’s easier to skip the random midday snack if you know you have a delicious dinner waiting on you a bit later in the day, and it’s even easier to skip the desert at lunch if you never go to the company cafeteria at all!

Intermittent fasting really works?

Intermittent fasting works by allowing the body to quite literally empty itself of food while teaching the dieter the real difference between real hunger and eating as a pastime or to battle stress.  By allowing the body to go without food for eighteen or even twenty hours, the body goes into an autophagic state normally associated with extreme calorie restriction.  The benefit here is that extreme calorie restriction can lead to considerably longer life-span, though at the expense of the enjoyment of some amount of calorie intake.  However, by using intermittent fasting to engage in long periods of fasting and brief periods of overfeeding, it is possible to gain some of the benefits of the autophagic state without the prolonged deprivation associated with extreme calorie restriction.  When combined with primal or paleo dietary practices, it may be possible to achieve even more pronounced results.  These diets focus on gaining the bulk of calories from fatty sources which are very calorically dense.  This lends itself especially well to an intermittent fasting lifestyle since it requires that you consume all of your daily caloric requirements in a small window of time.  Doing so with excessively lean foods would make the volume of food much too large for most people.  Luckily, the calorically dense foods are also those foods that people most often crave, making it even easier to stick to an intermittent fasting diet.

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Water fasting weight loss is not as hard as it sounds, and  is a great way to turn back the clock  and feel not only healthier but younger. Many studies have proven that fasting even for a day now and again can significantly improve your health, and water fasting is just one of the ways you can accomplish this.

Wise to take it slow and ease into it. This holds true with any type of intermittent fasting. When it comes to getting the best results, as in being able to sustain your weight loss permanently, it’s best to take things slowly.  To get to your ultimate water fasting weight loss goals, I recommend that at first you attempt to replace one meal with water per day instead of trying to replace them all. This way, you can ease slowly into it while increasing your intake of water, something most of us drastically need to improve upon.

Going from a normal eating schedule to a total fast is a great way to make yourself miserable, and up the likelihood of failure.  Give your body time to adjust to this new way of eating and drinking.  You can, of course, jump right into it and attempt this sort of fasting, but some preparation, both mental and physical, can save you a lot of hassle and  misery later on.

Once you have prepared your body for an actual extended intermittent fast, (try replacing one meal per day for several weeks) it’s time to take it up a notch. It’s best to start with 18 to 24 water fasting periods.  Small steps are best in order to help achieve and maintain your weight loss goals. If you can work it into your life style, you are less likely to drop it altogether and go back to eating unhealthy things in place of drinking lots of water.  The point behind water fasting weight loss is, after all, to detoxify your body and help you shed pounds.  Going with smaller intervals will help you stick with it. Once you have adjusted, you can start trying to go longer and longer.

Water Fasting Weight Loss: A how to for a 24 hour fast

The first thing you have to do is choose a particular day.  It’s best to plan and prepare yourself mentally for it rather than waking up one morning and deciding to try water fasting.  Any day will do, but it’s probably best to choose a day that is rather low key, such as a weekend or holiday.  If you are swamped with things to do, you are much more likely to be unable to resist the hunger pains because you’ll be using lots of energy.

You should start preparing yourself for your fast about a week before you try it. In order to do this, you need to cut back on your consumption of certain foods, such as sugars, fats, and if you are a coffee/tea drinker (or soda drinker), you should start limiting your intake of caffeine. You should also start eating more fruits and veggies and lean poultry or fish during the week leading up to your water fasting attempt.  Finally, you need to start making sure that you drink at least a half a gallon of water a day.  On the eve before you begin, make sure you note the time of your last meal. This is important because that is the time when your fast will end the next day.

On the day of your water fast, it is important to drink lots and lots of water. You can drink normal water, though make sure it filtered if you live in an area where tap water isn’t so great, or stick to bottled water.  For something different, you can drink seltzer water (which I hate but have been told helps curb some of your hunger pains/food cravings during the day). You can also drink teas, particularly green tea. However, if you normally sweeten your tea with sugar or honey, you’ll have to make do without it.  Throughout the day, whenever you feel a hunger pain, try to drink a glass of water, two would be even better.

Remember that is likely you will feel rather hungry throughout the day, so make sure to reduce the likelihood of cheating by staying away from the refrigerator as much as possible, and if you have family members who are not participating, it may be best to have them go out to eat during that day. It may not be practical, but the smell of food when you are hungry and can only have water makes water fasting that much more difficult to stick with.

Once the fast is over, it is best not to indulge in a large amount of food right away. Take it slow and easy. The best way to break your fast is to have  a glass of juice that has been watered down.  Later in the evening, have a bowl of fruit.  Eating too much after a fast can make you rather sick, and no one needs that.

 Remember That You are Only Human and Intermittent Fasting of Any Type Isn’t for Everyone

Try not to go too far too fast with this sort of dieting. Water fasting weight loss can be truly amazing. You can see great results and you’ll feel better than ever due to the fact that the water will help eliminate many of the toxins that have been making you feel less than great. But this is not an easy thing to jump immediately into.  It times some time and some patience for your body to adjust to running on water instead of food throughout the day. Be patient with yourself. If you feel like it’s too much, scale your efforts back to where you are comfortable, and start slowly increasing the length of your fasting.

Also remember that you don’t have to do this alone. If you have a family member or close friend who is willing to do this with you then take advantage of their support.  You will need it. If you don’t have someone in your life already who wants to give it a try, you can always find support groups and likeminded individuals on the internet to help you with your fasting goals.

Water fasting is a great way to help yourself feel better. This sort of intermittent fasting is definitely not for everyone, but if you are willing to give it a try and you stick with it, you can and will see amazing results and you will feel better.