The old adage advises us to ‘breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince and dinner like a pauper,’ and yet still for most Brits dinnertime is the biggest meal of the day. However, much has been written to suggest this old saying is really not far off the best advice.
Eating the majority of our calories earlier in the day is actually much better for us. It can help prevent weight gain, even promote weight loss, it is much better for stabilising blood sugars across the day by avoiding ‘sugar spikes’ and keeping our blood sugars at a consistent level. It has been proven to improve our general metabolic health and potentially prevent diabetes and other conditions.
Some people use the principles of incorporating intermittent fasting or time-restricted eating into their daily routine to assist them to better manage the timing of their eating window throughout the day/week.
Read on to get some facts about this…
What are the Health Benefits of Fasting?
When we talk about fasting, we effectively mean the abstinence for all food and drink or some food and drink for a given set of time and there appears to be several health benefits to undertaking this particularly when trying to lose weight and/or improve your overall health by:
- Promoting weight loss – you are likely to be consuming less calories, additionally blood levels of insulin drop significantly and the human growth hormone increases significantly both which facilitate fat burning
- Lowering type 2 diabetes risk – in lowering your blood sugars you reduce your insulin resistance which in turn protects you against type 2 diabetes
- Benefitting heart health – evidence in experiments with animals has shown the reduction in blood sugar spikes, reduced blood pressure and ‘bad’ cholesterol impacting positively on heart health
- Possible help with preventing some cancers – because of the impact on slowing down your metabolism research on animals has indicated it might help prevent or slow the speed of some cancers
- Protection against neurodegenerative decline – research, again predominantly on animals, has shown a small degree of protection against conditions such as Parkinson’s disease and Huntington’s disease
It is recognised of course that more research is needed with humans for much of the above.
There are of course some possible disadvantages of intermittent fasting including dehydration, as there is a lot of water in our food, so you are advised to drink plenty of water (up to 3 litres) or black tea/coffee, herbal teas etc to compensate for this. Some people experience headaches due to a lower than usual blood sugar levels and heartburn might occur for some due to having a near-empty stomach. Constipation can be an issue for some people too.
Types of Fasting Regimes
The 5.2 Diet:
This diet was created by medic and journalist Dr Michael Mosley in 2012. On this programme you eat ‘normally’ for five days per week and then on the remaining two days you reduce your daily calorie intake to 500 for women and 600 for men. On the two fasting days you are advised to choose very nutrient dense foods such as lean protein, vegetables and some fruit and you could lose approximately 1.5lbs per week.
The 16.8 Diet:
On this diet you spend 16 hours of each day consuming nothing but calorie-free beverages such as water, black tea/coffee, herbal teas etc. They do however advise against soda type beverages such as diet Coke/Pepsi etc so as to limit digestive issues. The remaining eight-hour window is where you eat ‘normally’ being vigilant not to over-eat of course. Most people do this by skipping their evening meal and not eating after mid-afternoon. You would commonly expect to lose approximately 1lb per week.
The Fast 800 Diet:
This diet was again created by Dr Michael Mosley. In stage one lasting between two and 12 weeks you eat 800 calories daily of lean protein and vegetables to prompt the body into ketosis which rapidly burns fat. In stage two you follow this same regime for two days per week only, eating ‘normally’ for the remaining five days. A stage three is a maintenance stage where you would continue with a low-sugar Mediterranean style of eating. You could expect to lose between 2-3lbs per week approximately.
All the publications indicate that intermittent fasting is not suitable for people who have eating disorders (such as binge eating, emotional eating or persistent overeaters). It is not suitable for children, pregnant women, those with type 1 diabetes or any individuals recovering from surgery, those with high blood pressure, kidney stones, acid reflux or who are on particular medications. Anyone considering an intermittent fasting regime would be strongly advised to seek approval from their GP.
