Intermittent fasting prompts anti-inflammatory response

https://academic.oup.com/ehjopen/article/1/2/oeab026/6363797

by geox • 5 years ago

197 179 5 years ago

academic.oup.com

oDot4• 5 years ago

For a personal anecdote, IF was the most impactful change I did nutrition wise, and I am currently midway testing diets from carnivore to vegan.

wpietri4• 5 years ago

Could you say more about your IF regimen? And what sort of impacts did you notice?

drodil• 5 years ago

I have done IF for almost 2 years now. Some personal experiences from my blog if interested: https://link.medium.com/ju1cOdlG9kb

oDot4• 5 years ago

Improved skin, clearer mind, less fatigue. I was doing 14:10 after years of irregular eating, then settled on 16:8 which also improved the above.

I tried 23:1 for a week but I could not eat enough in that one hour.

scruple2• 5 years ago

How long have you been on an IF style diet? I "ran" it for about 3 and a half years before moving on.

I'm curious to know what long term success looks like for people on an IF diet. I did get my weight under control on IF but when it came time to bulk or cut, in accordance with my strength and conditioning training, it simply wasn't working.

oDot4• 5 years ago

Since mid-2017. I agree it is not enough to gain muscle, but it also doesn't seem to hinder that for me.

wpietri4• 5 years ago

Ooh, interesting. This particular study is with full-day fasts 1-2 times per week. I see that insulin resistance improvement was also seen with eTRF (early time-restricted feeding, where one doesn't eat after, say, 2 pm). https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6627766/

sneak4• 5 years ago

It was a very weird transition, as a well-off American, from going to never, ever actually feeling _real hunger_ at any point in any of my normal days (our workplaces, transit hubs, homes, lifestyles, and app landscape are all designed to deliver/provide high caloric density food, in extreme abundance, at all times and places, from snacks to full meals), to regularly/often being actually hungry for some/all of most days.

It's done wonders for my well-being - anecdotally, of course.

It turns out we don't actually need to never be hungry; our society just pushes us to assume that even the tiniest pang of hunger is a negative health issue that is to be instantly eradicated. It's actually fine as long as you're not skinny or otherwise malnourished.

It's ok to fast, and to hear your body demanding sustenance and just say "no, maybe tomorrow" - doubly so if you're 10kg+ overweight like I have been (in my case, 20-40kg) my entire adult life.

freediver2• 5 years ago

You may be onto something here. I never thought about this effect of IF. The self-control aspect of overcoming hunger, or not just eating when you needn't to.

scruple2• 5 years ago

This self-control aspect also works in other diets, too, of course. It's why I prefer cheat days over cheat meals in my diet. I've found that keeping myself consistent with my eating, and make deliberate decisions, for 6 days straight leads to much better results than letting my diet slip occasionally through out the week and excusing it by convincing myself it's a "cheat meal."

nicoburns• 5 years ago

It turns out we don't actually need to never be hungry; our society just pushes us to assume that even the tiniest pang of hunger is a negative health issue that is to be instantly eradicated.

Huh, is that really something you feel like your society teaches you? In my upbringing (UK), snacking was very much discouraged (you won't eat your dinner) and although eating meals was encouraged, going without one was never seen as a health issue and would be seen as preferable to giving me other food if I didn't like what had been cooked for me.

sneak4• 5 years ago

Yes, that's what I got. Fast food everywhere, snacks constantly available, cookies and cakes in break rooms, vending machines, junk food, snack bars in offices, coffee milkshakes, kiosks in airports... everywhere you look in the USA there are people trying to sell you stuff to spike your blood sugar between meals. As opposed to Europe, there are entire aisles in the grocery stores here that are stocked solely with non-meal foods. This extends even to drugstores! CVS and Walgreens have a seasonal candy aisle!

I eat very low carb (I target <10g per day, with 20-30g as a hard limit) and it's sort of freaky how prevalent it is, because despite a million food options in some circumstances, precisely 0 of them are without carbs. I've been in airports when I haven't eaten for 18-24h with multiple places vending food and there has been approximately nothing available that would fit my diet.

johnyzee4• 5 years ago

Definitely. Just go look for the official line on how to eat for losing weight. They actually recommend lots of small meals as often as possible. It's ridiculuous.

limograf• 5 years ago

I notice this difference with my US friends. They do seem to think hunger is a genuine problem that must be resolved immediately. A sort of health risk. I've occasionally tried to press in on what the unspecified danger is meant to be but it's hard to do so without being obnoxious.

Obviously hunger where there is food insecurity is terrible. But the first pangs of hunger in an otherwise well fed and, in my case, well padded person? It doesn't seem like it's a big deal to me.

Snacking does seem to have become established in the UK now though for children at least. (I also remember being told not to spoil my appetite as a child.) The children I know now often have some kind of tiny packet of something on the go in between meals.

novok• 5 years ago

How do you deal with distracting hunger? I try ignoring it and then find myself subconciously going to the fridge every 10 minutes. And I'm not doing somewhat abnormal things like not eating for 20+ hours.

vishnugupta2• 5 years ago

I keep a glass of water on my desk and keep slowly sipping it, and refill when it runs out. It’s helped me significantly to reduce cravings.

sneak4• 5 years ago

I eat when the hunger is so distracting I can't not.

Consuming 3-5g of salt in 1L of water makes the distraction less sometimes, I find. Also, coffee helps, as does the keto diet.

johnyzee4• 5 years ago

society just pushes us to assume that even the tiniest pang of hunger is a negative health issue

This is the mistake. In fact, the hunger pangs and light headedness, nausea, etc. are the result of low blood sugar. This can be a dangerous condition, but our body is equipped to deal with that situation - it can create sufficient energy from stored energy (fat and glycogen) - and will do so if we let it. But most people have conditioned their bodies for a steady supply of easy energy, and this makes the body increasingly less willing to go to the stores for energy (we are at a hormonal imbalance with excessive insulin prevalence which works to lock up fat stores and crave quick increases in blood sugar).

This condition can be gradually fixed with intermittent fasting, which gives the body time to burn off the blood sugar spike, and concomitant insulin, and allow the process of fat burning to pick up, before you start feeding again.

The effect of the fasting can be enhanced by eating fewer carbohydrates (which are the main trigger for blood sugar and insulin), which is the principle behind the keto diet.

nailer• 5 years ago

There’s also a 500% spike in HGH after 48h according to Dr Ekberg

DrammBA• 5 years ago

Could you provide a source? I tried googling it but I'm getting a lot of obviously click bait and misleading articles/videos.

johnyzee4• 5 years ago

It is well established that fasting increases the level of growth hormone, quite significantly too. It's the leptin trigger. Just google effect of fasting on growth hormone.

I think the OP is talking about Steen Ekberg the keto youtuber. His stuff is legit and well sourced, but unfortunately marketed to look like facebook meme videos.

jasonhansel2• 5 years ago

That...isn't what the study says, I think. In fact, it says that the level of hsCRP--a marker of inflammation--actually increased in the subjects who undertook intermittent fasting, though the difference from the control group (1.02 ± 2.73 vs. −0.25 ± 5.66) was far from statistically significant (p = 0.23, see Table 3). That's the only part of the study that even mentions inflammation.

nabla9• 5 years ago

Can somebody comment the effects size of improvements

HOMA-IR (−0.75 ± 0.79 vs. −0.10 ± 1.06; P = 0.004) and

MSS (−0.34 ± 4.72 vs. 0.31 ± 1.98, P = 0.006).

Without knowing the normal range it's impossible to say how big change 0.75 (HOMA-IR) or -0.34 (MSS) are. The article says significant, but how much that is.

jasonhansel2• 5 years ago

Also worth noting that the sample (as a whole) was 96% white, 91% non-Hispanic, and 33% male.

Granted, the study was performed in SLC, but these numbers suggest that this is not even a particularly representative sample of SLC, much less of the nation as a whole.

ByThyGrace• 5 years ago

Also, this isn't IF as popularly understood. IF usually means uninterrupted water-only fast for a certain part of the day, e.g. 18:00-10:00.

The paper is about "low frequency" IF, which in this case means a 24h water only fast, twice a week for a full month, then only once a week for the rest of the trial.

phonypc4• 5 years ago

FWIW, this isn't atypical. IF in a scientific study pretty much always means some form of 24h+ fast. The more common practice of eating in a time window is usually "time-restricted eating/feeding."

Dah00n4• 5 years ago

5 days of normal eating, 2 fasting, every 7 days. That is the definition of IF in all places I have seen it mentioned. Skipping a meal now and again isn't really fasting at all.

hartator• 5 years ago

Does that mean a 24h fast but frequent is enough to trigger DNA repair mechanism? My understanding so far was you needed at least a 72h fast.

anonuser123456• 5 years ago

I haven't read enough on the subject, but Peter Attia has discussed this on a few podcasts. His general view is that no one knows; we simply don't have the biomarkers or lab tests to even run good experiments yet.

dvt2• 5 years ago

needed at least a 72h fast

I think you're thinking of ketosis, which is ~72hrs. You can also verify entering ketosis by the smell & color of your urine. We're not 100% sure how ketosis relates to cellular autophagy.

kilroy1232• 5 years ago

Autophagy? It's still unknown but many believe that happens around 48 - 72 hour mark.

shoto_io4• 5 years ago

I am a big IF fan. Specifically, I try to do it 3-4x a week. I skip dinner and start at 5pm and hold it until 9am. I tried skipping breakfast before, that didn’t work well for me.

Two things have been difficult for me lately:

A) sudden extreme cravings before I start at 5pm

B) a sore throat starting at around 9-10pm. I have no clue why it happens.

Do you guys experience something similar and how do you deal with it?

EDIT: Sorry for the confusion. I meant heartburn.

vegai_2• 5 years ago

I fast about once a week or once every two weeks.

A) sudden extreme cravings before I start at 5pm

Have you tried apple cider vinegar? That seems to work for me.

B) a sore throat starting at around 9-10pm. I have no clue why it happens.

I don't get that specifically, but I do get lowered body temperature. Could sore throat be a symptom of that? Have you tried hot water, perhaps with lemon and/or tea?

dqv• 5 years ago

Have you tried apple cider vinegar? That seems to work for me.

No comment on effectiveness, but for anyone who is going to do this, make sure to dilute the vinegar with some water.

shoto_io4• 5 years ago

I get the lower body temperature, too. How do you deal with it?

sneak4• 5 years ago

I can't speak to the sore throat but I do keto and on days I skip most/all food, I get crazy food cravings that can usually be addressed (provided I'm not recently re-entering keto but am a week+ fat-adjusted) by drinking a bottle of water with a squirt of electrolyte replacement concentrate (K+Mg) along with 3-5g of salt.

I normally eat a pretty high-salt diet (7-10g per day depending on if I eat out or not), keto or no, and replacing a day's salt with just 1-2g is insufficient to keep my body from cravings. I find that having 3-5g with my other misc electrolyte replacement generally makes it much, much easier for me to skip the day's meals.

Cravings are almost always your body asking for something; the trick is to learn what it's asking for that doesn't involve calories.

nuclearnice1• 5 years ago

I have moderate success solving A) by drinking a glass of water.

Also ignore it and it will go away helps.

nemacol• 5 years ago

ignore it and it will go away helps.

When I was young I would hurt myself somehow and go to my mother saying

Me - My arm hurts when I do THIS (bend arm at elbow, back and forth)

Mom- Don't do that and it won't hurt.

Me - (Pikachu meme face)

xhkkffbf• 5 years ago

I find that many times I'm just thirsty not hungry. If I chug a big glass of water, maybe two, I can easily skip a meal or more. This routinely makes 16 hours of fasting possible.

op00to2• 5 years ago

Sore throat sounds like acid reflux. Can you take an antacid?

pbhjpbhj5• 5 years ago

Or, address the cause of the reflux?

nobrains• 5 years ago

Why don’t you have a filling meal at 4.30 or 4.45 ?

dazc• 5 years ago

Cravings and weird side-effects suggest you're lacking some basic nutrient/s. Have you tried varying the types of foods you eat to counter this?

shironandon2• 5 years ago

have had similar and suggest:

- swap coffee for green tea

- supplement phosphatidylcholine daily

- drink hot water with a spoonful of apple cider vinegar and honey at night

- measure humidity in your home and make sure it isn't too dry

For me this reduced inflammation and GERD issue presenting sore throat at night. May take over a week to start noticing results.

shoto_io4• 5 years ago

Yes, green tea has helped a lot compared to coffee! It’s not completely gone though.

rootusrootus5• 5 years ago

start at 5pm and hold it until 9am

Isn't that basically normal? We call it breakfast for a reason, and 5pm to 9pm is extremely close to what many people do habitually. Maybe a slightly early dinner and a slightly late breakfast, but not by much.

pelasaco• 5 years ago

interesting. I do IF since 2018, but because I normally do heavy sports at night, I cannot sleep if I don't eat. So I eat well after training and then go until 14:00 without food other than coffee and water.

shoto_io4• 5 years ago

Well, it was never normal for me. I used to eat until 10pm or so and then start eating right after getting up at 7am. So 5pm-9am adds 7h of fasting for me.

pbhjpbhj5• 5 years ago

Sore throat might be heartburn, have you changed your diet? Perhaps you're eating too quickly? Are you drinking enough water?

Might be an idea to consult a registered dietician or a GP (general practitioner, a generalist doctor, sometimes called a 'family doctor').

Dah00n4• 5 years ago

The cravings are likely low blood sugar. Eat more fat, less carbs.

phonypc4• 5 years ago

Odd title. Study doesn't mention any anti-inflammatory response. The change in hsCRP in Table 3 actually seems to show a (non-significant) pro-inflammatory measure.

programmarchy• 5 years ago

I came here to say the same thing. The improvements are to insulin resistance and metabolism. Are those factors well-known to be related to inflammation?

Swizec• 5 years ago

I’ve long considered my Sunday runs (26km usually) as a form of sped up intermittent fasting. There’s something fascinating about burning a day’s worth of calories in 2 hours.

Took a few years of practice to get my metabolism to the point where it can burn ~2000 calories in 2 hours and munge through enough food to feel fully operational the same day. I wonder if the overall effects are similar to intermittent fasting.

Anecdotally I’ve noticed that training for long distance running has made me a lot less sensitive to energy-from-food fluctuations. If you can run for 2+ hours while eating 100cal of running gels, what’s a little missed lunch while sitting at a desk?

DerekBickerton• 5 years ago

I'm a big fan of Intermittent Feasting.

Joking aside, I've tried intermittent fasting and had more balance / homeostasis as a result. They say `the first element of discipline starts with your diet`. Control diet, and you control many other things.

pmarreck• 5 years ago

So does nutritional ketosis... which is probably why this result was found... because when you fast, you go into slight keto

if you don't like CR or fasting (or being hungry), consider keto as an alternative, just realize that you'll have to do your homework

I've definitely seen the same anti-inflammatory results that this has.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1IEuhp8RFMU

encoderer4• 5 years ago

I’ve been doing IF with some interruptions for about 10 years. It’s absolutely changed my life because before that I was steadily gaining about 5-20lbs per year and it had really added up over my 20s. Now I’m 39 in the best shape of my life.

So I’m invested in this technique, but I really believe the primary and possibly exclusive benefit is simply calorie restriction.

In a typical “diet” you attempt to restrict calories by remove foods from your diet. The problem is, cravings are real, abstinence doesn’t work, and there are always new foods and new temptations.

On an IF regimen, you restrict calories by removing eating hours from your day. You don’t have to abstain from anything. Temptation is managed by just having a little patience until your next meal.

Possibly there is a deeper truth to why this lifestyle works but I personally like the simplicity of it.

It’s like a rate limiter, for daily food intake.

jimmaswell5• 5 years ago

cravings are real, abstinence doesn’t work, and there are always new foods and new temptations

If IF worked for you that's great, but you shouldn't imply every other diet doesn't work. In my case all I did was track calories of everything I ate (Lose It app, highly recommended) while maintaining a normal eating schedule. Down 105lbs so far. For me I feel like if I just ate whatever I wanted in specific timeframes it'd still be too easy to eat 3000-4000 calories.

claaams• 5 years ago

I was like that too but eventually after doing one meal a day Ive been feeling full on anywhere from 1200-2200 calories. Really depends on the food where I'm at and what's around. But you're absolutely right, there's not one BEST method for everyone. I personally cannot stand the minutiae of calorie counting and measuring portions so it's not good for me. I will measure portions to learn to eyeball things but yeah, can't do it every time I put food on a plate.

freediver2• 5 years ago

I think what the OP meant is that IF has all the benefits in one, simple to use format.

You do not need any apps, you do not need to count calories and you do not need remove food you love from the menu.

And while it may sound that you would try to overcompensate for not eating during specific timeframes, what happens in reality is that your body responds by wanting less food, not more.

encoderer4• 5 years ago

That’s fair, in my head I was singling out food-restrictive options like no-carb fad diets. Navigating this world of abundance with our ancient brains is hard so however you do it, congratulations

hn_throwaway_992• 5 years ago

I think what the comment you are replying to is saying, and which I agree with after trying IF, is that IF works simply by making it easier to restrict calories for the average person, not that other methods are impossible or can't work.

I mean, just take your example. Counting calories for everything you eat is a significant amount of work, and it's really easy to cheat if you're feeling hungry ("Oh, look, my app says that an 'average' blueberry muffin is only 250 cals, so that's what I'll put in, despite this muffin being the size of my head").

With IF, all you have to think about is whether you're in your feeding window. You can still cheat, but there is no ambiguity about it, so for many people (or, fine, at least for me) it's easier to keep with it. I found myself getting super hungry during my fasting period, but I knew I just had to wait until my feeding period, and I actually found it difficult to overeat during my feeding period because I would just eat until I was full and then would "run out of time" to overeat.

rootusrootus5• 5 years ago

Lose It app, highly recommended

It has become such an annoying nag though. If they offered a reasonable one-time payment -- not even for premium features, just to make it stop nagging -- I'd pay it. But no, they want me to subscribe. No thanks.

hh3k02• 5 years ago

You don’t have to abstain from anything.

I mean, you _do_ abstain from eating. But I always found it easier to abstain from something entirely rather than to do it in moderation.

chiefalchemist• 5 years ago

But I always found it easier to abstain from something entirely rather than to do it in moderation.

Not a knock or being troll-y but that sound like a religion. As in, funny how patterns established in religion are just as effective outside that context.

encoderer4• 5 years ago

Ok I am not a philosopher but is it really “abstinence” if you only have to wait 8 hours?

polishdude20• 5 years ago

I think with IF it exploits the fact that your stomach can only take so much food at a time. If you restrict your eating to a small window, you can't eat a whole day of calories in that window just because your stomach can't take that much food. It's like exploiting the fact that your stomach is a buffer and you fill it only at certain times of the day.

hsn9153• 5 years ago

I used to be way overweight. A few years ago I lost a lot of weight by basically walking a lot and doing intemittent fasting.

Then I stopped it and started to slowly gain more weight. Now I'm on an IF regiment again.

Now, I really doubt it's the calorie restriction that's at work here.

The human body is not a simple physical machine. It's a complex system.

A simple machine would be some like like a car that has a set amount of energy needed and simple mechanism to switch energy source when one of them is almost depleted.

A complex machine is one that responds to the environment and changes its internal behavior. For example, it can decide to activate or shutdown internal systems that use energy in order to conserve energy. It can decide to let go of conserving energy and just make sure the body has a lot of energy for performing the current activity.

Common wisdom says that the body goes in hunger mode if you restrict calories. But I don't think that's what's going on. Because you also restrict calories on IF. Instead I think that when you consistently eat low calorie meals, it activates some mechanism in your body that's meant to conserve energy when you are living through some sort of a famine, or something like that. (another possibility: instead of a famine, it thinks you became a low status individual within your tribe). But when you do IF you typically eat normal size, filling meals, so this mechanism never gets triggered. Further more, there's probably no mechanism in your brain that thinks that going for many hours without food is a bad thing. Quite the opposite: it's just the normal expected thing.

So if you do some exercise while in a fasted state, even though you are technically low on calories, your brain probably thinks you might be hunting for food so it will make sure you can utilize all the energy you need and some more.

The problem is, cravings are real, abstinence doesn’t work,

I'm not sure what you mean here? Surely fasting is abstinence, is it not?

You can at any time decide to open the fridge and eat something. You can decide at any time to go to the nearby convenience store and buy something to eat.

jokethrowaway5• 5 years ago

There are studies on this and, from what I can remember, meal frequency didn't seem to have an impact on weight loss or muscle gain.

You don't need to eat 6 meals or 1 per day to lose weight, just do whatever makes it easy for you to consume the amount of calories you want.

I agree that doing 1-2 big meal makes it easier to eat little calories because you can stuff yourself up to a point.

fjabre2• 5 years ago

Yes I agree with you. Body does not go into starvation mode during IF. One meal a day is ideal.

My eating window is around 4-8pm most days the last 6 months. Usually just one meal of literally anything I want and Im still finding I have to eat more to stop losing weight.

vb6sp6• 5 years ago

I think he is saying you can have ice cream or pizza or whatever. Just not right now. So you get the benefits of calorie deficit now and can satisfy the craving later

Dah00n4• 5 years ago

Common wisdom says that the body goes in hunger mode if you restrict calories.

Is it common wisdom though? As far as I know common wisdom says that if you restrict calories then the blood sugar drops and that cause the body to go into hunger mode. The difference being that you can eat, say, 1000 calories of your normal diet and go into hunger mode or you can eat a diet that causes the blood sugar to be stable and not go into hunger mode. This is one of the two main reasons LCHF work so well (the other being that you are way less hungry after 1000 calories of a high fat diet than after 1000 calories of high sugar).

amelius2• 5 years ago

I totally agree. Since I started IF, my gut seems healthier which is probably interconnected with how I process energy.

refurb• 5 years ago

Temptation is managed by just having a little patience until your next meal.

My hypothesis is this is the key.

I do something similar to IF. I’ll eat two meals before 10am then won’t eat until 7pm or so.

It’s not that I don’t get hungry it’s that I kind of don’t care? It’s not a big deal and I can wait until the next meal.

Overcoming the psychological “need” to eat is a big part of it.

nick_• 5 years ago

I like this approach. My understanding of my metabolism (and I suspect most others') is that if I eat a fair amount all morning, my body is fueled up and can therefore spend energy without worry of conservation to survive starvation.

If I skip breakfast, my body and especially my mind seem slower and weaker for the entire day. I feel like I have to drag myself through the day rather than be pushed. And, when I do get hungry later in the day it's very difficult to ignore. I suspect this is because my body is worried about food.

Is metabolic economics a thing?

markus_zhang• 5 years ago

Thanks for sharing. Does that mean if I do IF I can still consume the same calories I consume right now, just in a shorter period?

BTW what does your IF plan look like? I'm thinking about between 4pm (needs a coffee around 2 or 3) and 8am but not sure if it actually is IF.

pbhjpbhj5• 5 years ago

The idea is you can eat whatever, but when you come to it there's a natural limit for most people then you feel full and don't want to eat more.

If you imagine it to extremes, if you put all your food for the day on a plate and gave yourself 1 hour how much could you eat if you weren't trying to make yourself sick?

For most people of you only eat between noon-8pm, say (”18-6”) then you'll reduce your calorie intake naturally. Couple it with appropriate exercise and you'll lose weight (doesn't mean you'll be healthier necessarily though!).

vishnugupta2• 5 years ago

I'm thinking about between 4pm (needs a coffee around 2 or 3) and 8am

This is (called 16-8, 16hr fast and 8hr eating window) is actually a recommended way to start IF. I've been on it for ~4 months and can second the effectiveness of weight loss.

About the calorie intake; a funny side effect is that I'm now naturally less hungry even during the 8hr window so the calorie intake has automatically reduced.

I was wondering why would that be and then learned about insulin resistance and things began to fall in place.

Now I'm doing 16-8 IF and close to zero added sugar diet (which is painfully difficult in Indian cuisine, more so during this festival season :-|).

fortran77• 5 years ago

abstinence doesn’t work

Well, it does. I don't like to feed the myth believed by overweight people that they won't lose weight if they simply started eating 2000 kCal/day. It's psychologically hard, sure (for some) but it would work.

However, it's often easier to eat "nothing" than a little -- especially of high-carb products. It's easier to eat no tortilla chips than to have "just one".

And getting used to a np-food period of the day similarly helps to stop the cravings.

tonyedgecombe• 5 years ago

People have been banging that drum for decades, meanwhile the developed world is becoming increasingly obese. It's quite clear that telling people they should just eat less doesn't work.

jokethrowaway5• 5 years ago

The problem I noticed with IF or other "diets" which don't track calories in some way, is that people may tend to eat a lot more once they start doing physical activity, negating the weight loss benefit or gaining too much fat.

The method I recommend nowadays is to keep your diet as constant as possible, then replace meals or snacks with protein rich, lower calories alternatives until you're satisfied with your protein intake (depending on your weight) and you hit a maintenance diet and , as in your weight doesn't change averaged over two weeks, while doing your normal training regimen (which should include some incremental resistance training for muscle gaining or preservation and some cardio for heart health).

Then you have the choice of adding a 200 calories protein rich snack if you're trying to build muscle, removing a snack for 200 calories (if you can manage that) or adding some daily cardio consuming an extra 200 calories (like a 20m cardio class, 2x20 minutes walk, a martial arts class, gymnastic skill-work). You should always weight your self to keep track of things. Eventually you'll weight will stabilise to a new low or a new high and you can go through the process again.

In this way, you don't really count calories, you just roughly know that you'll have a few eggs for breakfast, some pasta for lunch, meat or fish for dinner.

redisman2• 5 years ago

What meal do you skip? My problem is that I can’t skip breakfast or I get lightheaded (I’ve passed out working out before breakfast multiple times). And I feel like during the work day I need glucose for my brain to function.

jswzz2• 5 years ago

If you're gonna work out early in the AM it does make sense to have some kind of fruit or light snack right before. Or you can drink BCAAs during the workout to keep you energized. Just don't let that turn into eating a proper breakfast at like 6am otherwise you're going to end up eating an extra 500+ calories a day.

dsizzle• 5 years ago

I find breakfast the easiest meal to skip, and putting sleep in there and skipping late nate snacks makes a 16 hr fast fairly easy.

My wife is like you though, so obviously it depends on the person.

amelius2• 5 years ago

I had the same problem, but it gets easier if you train it.

I recently started cycling for 1h in the morning without having breakfast, and after a few days it became quite easy. Just don't try to convince yourself that it is somehow a bad thing to skip breakfast. Breakfast only makes you hungry for the rest of the day.

I'm doing 16h/8h intermittent fasting, and I only feel slightly hungry on some days in the last 1h before my feeding window.

encoderer4• 5 years ago

I skip breakfast aside from one cup of unsweetened coffee and on the other end I brush my teeth for the night with my daughter when she goes to bed at 8pm.

ravar• 5 years ago

At some point your body starts making modest amounts of ketones overnight/until you eat, so you can still be productive without eating.

halfmatthalfcat• 5 years ago

You still have to abide by Calories In, Calories Out though. If you're eating 3000+ kcals but doing IF, you're still going to gain weight.

jb1991• 5 years ago

Didn’t work in my case. I could fast 16 - 18 hours a day without difficulty. But I made up for it in what I ate in the remaining. Always felt hungry and ate more than I should when not fasting. Still gained weight. Tried IF for months without losing weight, and actually gained a little.

tootie• 5 years ago

Same. I toughed it out for almost 6 months because your body is supposed to adjust but mine never did. I was doing 12-8 and some days I was so hungry I would start getting blurry vision by 11am. Didn't lose an ounce either.

ec109685• 5 years ago

36 hours was the key for me because you can’t make up for that the next day (eat at night and then nothing the next day until the following morning). If I stick to that once a week, I am good. Otherwise, not.

saruken• 5 years ago

I've been meaning to get into IF forever. Do you mind sharing what system/method in particular has worked for you?

thhyjjoiffd• 5 years ago

Your intuition is pretty close to the science: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BaDmSEVPZiM

theodorewiles2• 5 years ago

I’ve lost 20 lbs on IF and this is spot on. It’s just a lot easier (for me) to eat way less. I just only eat after 5pm every day. Much much less for me to think about vs any other diet. Its tough at first but mind and body adapted after a few weeks.

edanm• 5 years ago

I agree with everything you wrote, and kudos for finding something that works for you.

I'll point out that IF didn't work for me, at least after an initial small drop of bodyweight (2-3kg IIRC). As you said, the reason IF works is the same reason any diet works - it helps restrict calories. But in my case, there were a few problems:

1. I was soon adjusting to the "eating window" and was eating extra portions, cramming in dessert before the window closed, etc. This meant I wasn't eating less calories.

2. I found it very inconvenient to stick to - family dinners, going out to nice restaurants for celebrations, etc caused issues.

A different approach worked much better for me, namely tracking calories using MyFitnessPal, and learning to eat more satiating foods (low calorie density foods as some call them). And especially "anabolic" recipes as they are known around YouTube (basically, low calorie high protein foods).

This gave me way more flexibility, for one thing, but also a much better understanding of how food and energy work - what kind of substitutions are "free" from a food-enjoyment perspective, but super helpful to lose weight.

But like you said - whatever diet is sustainable for you and causes you to eat less calories is a diet that will work.

jokethrowaway5• 5 years ago

I accidentally did intermittent fasting as a teenager for years. I just didn't have breakfast, had lunch and dinner and oddly enough it matched the requirements to be considered IF.

One day I got interested in IF, looked up the rules and found out I was already on it.

I can't say whether it did anything but it definitely made it hard to consume enough calories, so despite training a lot and despite eating a lot at lunch and dinner, I've always been skinny.

I assume IF could be a good choice for someone who's overweight and barely training or not training at all.

I was training bodyweight and gymnastic at the time, making significant progress in terms of strength - despite that, I saw very little muscle building. I suppose being that lean lowered my testosterone production resulting in little gains.

I had the brilliant idea of even trying going vegetarian, vegan for a while, shifting to a source of proteins which is not as complete and not as well absorbed as proteins coming from animal sources.

After 20 years of reading on the subject and looking at what studies are saying nowadays, if I could go back through my teenage years I would eat close to paleo, 6 times per day and lift weights.

throwaway984393• 5 years ago

The cult of IF among tech nerds is one of those bizarre subcultures I'll never get used to. Here we are, modern human beings who live twice as long as their forebears, and yet a small fraction of them feel they need to regularly and intentionally starve themselves in order to be healthy. Humans are goddamn weird.

rootusrootus5• 5 years ago

I don't know if it's limited to tech nerds, though, I find that pretty much everyone loves to give diet advice complete with mounds of anecdotes about how it improved their life in immeasurable ways, and IF is popular with them too. Hell, my 80 year old mother lectures me occasionally on how much skipping breakfast has improved her life.

I do find it interesting that a group of people I would otherwise suspect of being more pro-science would be so enthusiastic about bro-science.

BirdieNZ• 5 years ago

The real pro-tip here is that basically everything you read on HN for which you are not an expert has the appearance of expertise and authenticity. Once you see those same people speaking on a subject which you know a lot about, you realise that HN is only actually high-expertise on tech and entrepreneurship. The users here (myself included!) are probably quite good at programming, business, and maybe project management, which gives us false confidence in our abilities in every other field that exists.

dvt2• 5 years ago

a small fraction of them

Fasting isn't really that weird at all, people have been doing it for literally thousands of years. Christians do it, Muslims do it, Jews do it, Buddhists do it, and so on. A small fraction?

I do IF just because it makes me feel better and more healthy, but sometimes I fast for religious reasons.

pbhjpbhj5• 5 years ago

They're pretty different things. Isn't the whole point of religious fasting that it is a different regime, and that the hunger felt is used as a reminder to focus the mind/spirit on higher things than bodily needs. Religious fasts are purposeful privations.

Whilst with IF it's about adopting a habit that stays constant and that negates the potential feelings of hunger by teaching your body that there's no point in complaining food comes in this time-period no matter how hungry it pretends to be. IF is about creating a norm that is no longer experienced as a privation.

redisman2• 5 years ago

You could phrase most healthy behaviors as bizarre in todays world tbf.

Look at these idiots spending an hour preparing green leaves and lean cuts of chicken when I, a intellectual just buy a box of Twinkies and get my calories in a fraction of the time and effort. I am obviously the superior Hunter gatherer

silverpepsi• 5 years ago

So let me get this straight...

I and at least one other friend (coincidentally who is a hardcore athlete and in accounting not tech) both noticed it really is the food that clouds our minds and makes us unproductive at work and fall asleep in meetings. And the improvement onLy got better going from low carb to IF eating daily or per 48hrs, so we are weird for having common sense? Or basic logic skills? If brains only work correctly when in "starvation" perhaps it is you who needs to work on rewriting some definitions of words. !!! Astounded.

jokethrowaway5• 5 years ago

I'm sure it's different for everyone.

I never experienced a "food coma".

If I'm starving I can't think straight.

ensiferum• 5 years ago

Fasting isn't starving. It's living off of the food and energy you ate before. I.e. done properly you're tapping i to your bodyfat for energy and there's absolutely no hunger.

zajio1am• 5 years ago

I guess that for short-length fasting like IF it is more your glykogen reserves than your bodyfat,

goboronshka• 5 years ago

Many of us are insecure from being bullied as kids and being in a profession where we are often surrounded by people who are smarter than us. Also the extremely high pay creates an imposter syndrome, where we feel like society has "selected" us to be the most intelligent and we can only live up to that standard by having contrarian views on a wide range of topics.

The sad thing is most of us would be better off lifting weights or making money or going to social events than developing eating disorders.

LightG3• 5 years ago

Colitis - I haven't read the article but will soon. But here is a data point for anyone with Colitis, if it helps.

I started IF in July as a means to lose a bit of lockdown weight.

No breakfast, no lunch, only a substantial dinner. 4-5 Drinks taken throughout the day. No real restriction. Lots of walking to keep busy.

I've noticed a significant improvement in management of Colitis. No flares. Enabling me to get back to normal life without worrying about the condition throughout the day. Just (sorry TMI), emptying bowels first thing in the morning (2-3) times. Then don't have to worry all day.

Considering colitis is a primarily inflammatory response (I believe), then this article rings true. YMMV

Once I reach target weight, not sure what I'll do. Maybe just add some more protein or good fats to evening meal. It's been too helpful to give up the routine.

boplicity2• 5 years ago

What does your diet look like otherwise?

I have Crohn's, and mostly manage it through diet, and am always curious what other people are doing for their IBD.

LightG3• 5 years ago

Non restrictive. I definitely enjoy all manner of food, sometimes even fast food. Though I'm 95% vegetarian and very occasionaly eat fish, which I love. Have to admit, I'm quite carb-dominant at the moment, potato, bread, pasta, but I do consciously try to balance that stuff out.

Sadly and strangely, any time I've made a concerted effort to really eat a model, healthy diet, I react badly after a few weeks.

So, as with everything, I guess, all things in moderation has generally been the key for me lately. Along with IF.

How about yourself? I'm similarly curious.

jokethrowaway5• 5 years ago

The study seems to say the opposite of the title.

A marker for inflammation (hsCRP) increased. Weight and waist circumference decreased. Risk of diabetes (HOMA-IR) decreased. Risk of cardiovascular issues (MSS) decreased.

Nothing extraordinary, I think the caloric deficit reduced the weight and weight loss brought down risk of diabetes and cardiovascular issues.

I don't think it says much about IF.

LightG3• 5 years ago

Thanks

spfzero• 5 years ago

I've been doing time-restricted eating for maybe 5 years, only eating between 12 and 7-ish. It's not what this experiment studied but is supposed to have similar effects. One thing I can say is you get used to it quickly and no longer feel hunger in the same urgent way as before. Hunger is more of a vague "yeah, I could eat now" feeling in the back of the mind, which can be easily ignored for several hours. Mood never changes, either.

On the few occasions I've gone 24 hours+, the hunger feeling is a little stronger, but still pretty easy to ignore. For one example, there is no difficulty going to sleep.

None of this applies when you are first starting out though :-)

gnarcoregrizz3• 5 years ago

It seemed to have helped my epilepsy. It’s mentioned in the bible as a treatment for the disease, and diet based treatments are experiencing a resurgence in use. Keto is sometimes prescribed in kids with difficult cases, and low GI (the south beach diet) is similarly being prescribed to adults since keto is too difficult for most. I haven’t heard of IF being prescribed but my doctor said it may be effective when I brought it up.

I did low carb/cal AM (1 egg) and didn’t eat til 3 PM. I did this most days of the week. There are other confounding variables so don’t take it as medical advice, since the diet can also exacerbate seizures.

pbhjpbhj5• 5 years ago

Could you give that Bible reference please, thanks.

gnarcoregrizz3• 5 years ago

Mark 9:14-29, depending on the translation. The translation of biblical fasting is suspected to be one meal a day type thing, like Ramadan.

More about the history of fasting and epilepsy here (which also cites the Bible verse, god forbid):

https://www.medlink.com/articles/ketogenic-diet-in-the-treat...

Of course I’m being downvoted because I mentioned a religious text. It’s in other secular ancient texts as well. My point was more about how fasting and the ketogenic diet has been recognized as a treatment for mental diseases for a long time. As it relates to the title, a lot of them are suspected to have roots in inflammation and metabolism.

victorvosk• 5 years ago

This study seems a little weird (crap) in that they started with a hardcore twice a week fast for a month then dialed it back to once a week. Unless I missed it, I don't see an explanation of why this approach was taken in the paper.

Given the subjects were high cholesterol and/or diabetic, it makes me think their life styles sucked already. I couldn't imagine living like then suddenly being told to stop eating for entire days. I would not be shocked if people didn't really adhere to the guidelines. It seems a food diary was the only thing keeping them "honest". Also a staggering 40% of all participants refused to answer how much alcohol they consumed on average.

If you are going crazy with food or lack of exercise for 6 out of 7 days, I don't think taking a break for one day a week is going to make much of a difference.

skerit• 5 years ago

The worst thing I ever did was start eating breakfast. Turns out I was doing IF for over 20 years, because only after I started eating (even a healthy) breakfast did I start to gain weight.

koonsolo2• 5 years ago

Yeah, they never should have started the "breakfast is the most important meal" when there was no evidence to back this up.

For me also breakfast doesn't come natural to me, unless my kids bake croissants in the morning ;).

CodeGlitch• 5 years ago

I think this starts in childhood. My daughter always wakes up starving, so she usually eats a big bowl of porridge. I think we all do this, and out of habit continue this into adulthood.

mensetmanusman2• 5 years ago

I accidentally started IF after being annoyed at my lack of mental alertness after lunch and breakfast.

I found that one coffee for breakfast, lots of water/herbal tea throughout the day, and then eating a huge dinner and whatever I want between 5-9 works for me. It seems I can consume over 2k calories in those 4 hours.

godDLL2• 5 years ago

It's very important to know when you're heading for bed, if that's the case. My own time window is 2-5, but I turn in at 9.

1024core• 5 years ago

For those who are upbeat about IF: some simple questions:

1. Does coffee/tea count as a "meal"? I can't get through the day without a couple of cups of coffee and tea.

2. This study mentioned a 24-hour water-only fast, not the IF that most commenters are talking about in this post. Thoughts on that?

3. I've been thinking of going on the "Phil Mickelson" diet: https://golf.com/instruction/fitness/phil-mickelson-age-defy... Any thoughts on that?

tomp• 5 years ago

1. no. a "meal" could be sugar or cream in the coffee though. zero-calorie drinks don't count as a meal

some people "cheat" by considering cream-only coffee acceptable as well (it's keto/zero-carb so might not raise blood sugar levels) - see e.g. "bulletproof coffee" by Dave Asprey (NOT ENDORSING ANYTHING ELSE BY THIS SCAM ARTIST)

kilroy1232• 5 years ago

I regularly do IF and I drink black coffee in the morning while I'm fasting. I try to time it so even that is at the tail-end of an 18 hours fast.

theodorewiles2• 5 years ago

I SLAMMED coffee the first few weeks and would also drink like a gallon of water a day. Helped a lot. I think the key is to choose the schedule that works for you.

boplicity2• 5 years ago

If you want to have an "anti-inflammatory" response, then try to maximize your fiber intake from a wide variety of plants.

This will increase the quality of your microbiome -- which in turn, will produce substances that are anti-inflammatory.

johnyzee4• 5 years ago

"All disease begins in the gut" -- Hippocrates

It seems we just keep discovering more effects of the microbiome on health. I heard about this anti-inflammation effect just yesterday. I think it was explained as gram negative bacteria overgrowth in the gut (due to a bad bacterial balance). Those bacteria have a hard 'shell' that triggers a potent immune response (with inflammation) when present in the blood stream, which they enter from the small intestine.

So I think your advice to maximize fiber intake is sound. This feeds gut bacteria (unlike most other food which is broken down before reaching the small intestine). Another intervention would be fermented foods.

consumer451• 5 years ago

Jumping in to share my anti-inflammatory story.

I used to have a limp for the first 2-3 hours of the day due to very early onset arthritis at 30 in my ankle. Around 38 I discovered that minimizing by nightshade intake nearly "cured" me of the problem.

What a huge change in quality of life.

I still eat some potato, tomato, and eggplant - but I never make or order nightshades on purpose.

crazybLanKeT• 5 years ago

IF is great. IF + low(ish) carb is even better. IF + low(ish) carb + eating calorie amounts matching your healthy weight is amazing.

There is more than one way to lose weight just like there is for gaining weight. Minimize as many of the offending behaviors as possible. Consistency is key. Don't pick something you cannot consistently repeat unless that limited time run is all you're after.

Of the different IF schedules people pick -OMAD, 20:4, 16:8, 5:2, etc-, start with anything that you can do initially without getting frustrated and giving up. You will be able to increase the fasting window over time. It just really works.

Don't get discouraged by words from people that tried and failed (or gave up too quickly), or not even tried but talk out of prejudice. Listen to the encouragement from so many that successfully do it.

Best of luck!!

rewgs2• 5 years ago

Wondering if anyone is in a situation similar to mine (probably not but it's worth a try):

Earlier this year I developed about 30 food allergies (IgE-mediated; I'm using the term "allergy" accurately, not in the fuzzy way we colloquially use it to refer to intolerances, etc, which are entirely different, mechanism- and prognosis-wise). This has absolutely decimated my ability to eat out at restaurants (I literally can't eat anything I don't prepare myself). Logistically it just sucks. It'll be evening after work and someone on the other side of town says "come hang out." I'd love to, but I'll have to drive home one direction, eat, then drive twice as far the other direction. With traffic it'll be 9pm before I can leave, so...yeah, not happening. It's destroyed my social life. My allergies have also affected things that are "quick" or "travel" foods, so basically I always need to heat stuff up. God it sucks.

Naturally, I've arrived at the thought of training myself to "officially" work IF into my life. Unofficially, I do it all the time by way of just...having to go somewhere unexpectedly or staying somewhere longer than I thought, and I don't have any food. About 50% of the time I feel fine and can power through, the other 50% I feel faint and hangry. Can't figure out why.

The other side of this coin, though, is that I'm trying to build muscle mass. Nuff said.

Anyone find a way to satisfy all these competing interests successfully?

godDLL2• 5 years ago

I got repeated food poisoning x4 around January last year, and since can't do sugar at all, carbs very little, coffee once a week (if that). Also can't do any oil but olive oil. Butter I can.

Kinda similar to your situation.

I have to prep my own meals, always (it's OK, I'm a very well versed cook, and enjoy everything about that). I sourdough my own bread and portion to two slices a day max. I do a lot of soups and salads (that's new).

And I have a keto week, once a month. That starts with 3-4 days of basically water fast, where I am allowed a cup of soup after sunset, but that's all. Also no smoking or coffee these three days. I do a lot of stretching, but little exercise at that time. It helps to have something to do when a craving comes, so I just go stretch or do hot-cold-mild shower, Wim Hoff style.

You feel amazing at the end of day two. Just gotta hold out.

And it continues to the rest of that week where I eat in a window between 14:00 and 17:00, limiting carbs to 20g, protein to 180g and having lots of fat with it. I try to have my protein first, as well, so that the two meals are a salad with olive oil dressing and three eggs in butter for the other one, or whatever.

That's where I do exercise. Short, violent bursts, short rests, stretches. Feels great, helps with the keto, and redistributes body mass towards eh, fighter-style body, I'd say?

The windowing of eating stays, but the amount restrictions go for the remaining three weeks.

Before I added that keto week it was a struggle, as you describe. But now it is not. There might be many reasons for that, but maybe you should try something similar and find out how it maps onto yourself.

Cheers.

rewgs2• 5 years ago

That's the missing link, unfortunately -- I'm allergic to keto staples such as avocado, coconut, fish, egg (yolks only, whites are fine).

I have so very few foods left that I really just have to eat what I can. And more are dropping all the time.

That said I'll try and adapt your suggestions onto my life as best I can. Thanks.

GDC7• 5 years ago

Ferritin is a marker of inflammation of the liver and anecdotally it rises when fasting.

Intermittent fasting prompts anti-inflammatory response

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