In the last couple of days, I was just so intrigued about this craze, Intermittent Fasting that I decided to take a deeper look and find out for myself. Yes, I have decided, let me experience this for myself and share my findings with you.
It’s still early days like Day1, so I guess it’s a bit too early to share and talk about my result. The first question all the experts’ are asking is, WHY, do you want to fast? I think it’s a relevant question, don’t you?
Why do you want to fast?
“We don’t ever consider giving our heart or our lungs a timeout, so why do we feel the need to shut down the digestive tract for a day or two?,” This the question Susan Bowerman, Senior Director, Worldwide Nutrition Education and Training at Herbalife asks anyone who ask her opinion on fasting. Is this exactly the case, do one put their digestive system on hold? Some experts’ believe and some studies found that when fasting, you can improve your gut health. But we will get to this a bit later, let, s first get to the WHY?
Some people feel they want to lose weight and yes you can lose weight when you create a caloric deficit. IF forces the body to take calories from the reserves or specifically fat cells. My reason for doing the fasting program is simply to tell people about my personal journey, I think this is the best way, find out for yourself. I am going to this for 7 days and then share everything from my eating to how I felt while on it. Look out for my results article in a few days. Wouldn’t it be great to hear from a person with firsthand experience, if intermittent fasting really does work?
Other people do it for health benefits and some claims that they had various health improvements and there is evidence of reduced inflammation, reduced blood pressure and resting heart rate. There are also claims of reduced risk of breast cancer in women and many other benefits.
Building lean muscle is reason number three, I think there are a lot more reasons, eg. religious reasons and many a practising this method in their religions over many hundreds of years now. My advice to anyone who wishes to embark on this journey is, ask yourself, WHY? Now WHAT?
What is Intermittent Fasting? (IF)
I guess we should have asked this question first, but okay we are here now. What is Intermittent fasting? Let me help you get this right from the start. INTERMITTENT FASTING IS NOT A DIET! It’s a pattern of eating or not eating. In other words, when you don’t eat, you are fasting and when you are not fasting, you are eating, simple hey?
There are different patterns like for example I decided to keep it simple and start off slow by eating between 8 am and 6 pm and so fast for 14 hours.
So I just planned my meals within the 8 am to 6 pm time frame and then I don’t eat anything for 14 hours, sounds hectic, doesn’t it? I know I said slow and 14-hour fasting is quite a fast start. You could do 8 hours and then 10 and increase your fasting time gradually.
I am allowed coffee, herbal beverage or plain water during my fasting period because it’s very important to stay hydrated when fasting.
Some people choose the 8:16 plan which they choose a time frame from breakfast to supper. Talking about breakfast and this question comes up a lot. Breakfast simply means to break the fast. Let’s say you wake up at 6 am, decide to eat at 8 am and you have gone to bed at 10 pm the night before, then it means you have fasted for 14 hours. That is if you did not have any foods or drink in between the 10 pm – 8 am time frame except water or other drinks with no caloric effect on the body. Hope I make sense for you here?, Great!!
Sample Diet
I was looking for a sample of intermittent fasting diet and most of the sites want you to pay. Seeing that IF is not a diet, you can choose your own diet plan. As a Herbalife Ambassador, I have just decided to add my program within the hours of 8 am to 6 pm to see the outcome.
Let’s take today, I woke up at 4 am having a cup of coffee, love my coffee and then I had a cup of instant herbal beverage round about 6 am. At 8 am as I was starving, but I had to pull through. Say about 8:30 am I had a Green Smoothy with avocado, an apple, lemon, ginger, Herbal Aloe Concentrate, Apple Cider Vinegar, Baby Spinach and Cayenne pepper, followed by lemon sprinkled pancakes with 3 eggs and Herbalife Protein Drink Mix, it was divine and filling.
How’s that for breakfast?
Whatever your dietary preferences, it’s all up to you, just choose the time frame that will work for you and see how it goes.
Look out for my 7-day program in a few days.
Does IF work?
I am a firm believer in everything works when you work, hence my decision to find out myself. There is a lot of info on this topic on the web and you can believe it or not. You know, my wife lost 22 kilos in about 7 weeks by doing this IF thing with her Herbalife program of course and I will share that in my 7-day program with you in a few days. A while back we all used to do these intermittent fasting anyways.
Remember when we had to eat our meals at a certain time because we had no microwaves and we had to eat as a family at the table and no one was allowed to eat anything after those times? We did it already unknowingly and we were all in good shape. Then we got the microwaves and you can eat later, and the TV’s and we ate in front of the TV’s and the computers and we got bigger and bigger. How funny is this that we all with such a lot of things want to go back now, why? Because it works for us then.
What some Experts say,
I am not a doctor, neither a dietitian, I did some research and listen to some experts’ on the topic and I am testing it out by myself. According to these experts’ here are some reasons intermittent fasting can work for you. When a person eats normally for a few days and fasts the other days, then those people can shift the bodies metabolic processes in ways to promote optimal health.
According to Mark Mattson, chief of the Laboratory of Neurosciences at the National Institute on Aging and a professor of neuroscience at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, who have done multiple studies on intermittent fasting, says, “there is evidence that these fasting programs can bolster stress resistance and it can also combat inflammation at cellular level.”
Michelle Harvie, a research dietitian with the Prevent Breast Cancer unit at the Manchester Breast Centre in the UK says, “intermittent fasting can be good for weight loss in obese or overweight people.” For normal people, it still a long way to go in terms of studies, but according to her, she thinks it may be beneficial for anybody, suggesting you see a physician before you start.
A few tips before you decide to fast
It is always a good idea to speak to your doctor before you give it a try.
Start slow, maybe like every other day and maybe fast for 6-8 hours first before you go for the Big run.
Make sure you stay hydrated during the time and remember to stick to the old rules of health because there is no workout or fasting program that can outrun a bad diet or unhealthy lifestyle.
Stay healthy, stay awesome.