The idea of fasting has been around and used by many cultures for thousands of years. Abstaining from food is a very old idea, whether it was done as religious practice or as a necessity when food was scarce.
In today’s times we have many forms of fasting called intermitted fasting or time restricted feeding that can be used in a way that meets the demands of your life while offering many health benefits. I have been using this way of eating for 4 years and it has helped me lose at least 30 pounds without having to go through the stress of counting calories, limiting carbohydrates, or eating 5 to 7 meals a day. I eat in a way that doesn’t take away the foods I enjoy.
This article will tell you about you all about intermittent fasting, its benefits to your health and give you access to a bonus resource that simplifies the process of getting started.
Intermittent fasting and its benefits
Intermittent fasting is an eating protocol that cycles between short periods of fed states and longer periods of fasted states. In other words, you have short periods of eating and longer periods of not eating.
When I first heard about it a colleague of mine told me that he went 16 hours without eating but then in his 8-hour feeding window he could eat WHATEVER he wanted. My goal for fasting wasn’t about restricting foods during my fasting window only to binge on them in my eating window.
I really wanted to understand what it did for my body. How to learn more about how my body responded to different and types of fasting which is why it took me 2 years from that conversation to try intermittent fasting.
I have tried everything from eating 5-7 meals a day to eating one meal a day and most things in between. I needed to do that so I could find a method of fasting that truly works for me and fits my busy dad life.
Benefits of Intermittent Fasting (IF)
I have already mentioned that intermittent fasting is an eating protocol plan that cycles between periods of fasting and eating. The easiest thing I had to get my head around was that I was already doing this cycling between periods of fasting and eating long before I had ever heard of intermittent fasting.
I went to sleep all night without getting up for a snack so what intermittent fasting did was help me prolong how long I went without food.
There are different fasts you can do with different windows you can try; I have created a handy Fast Start Guide to Intermittent Fasting you can download and save for quick reference.
In this post I want to focus on the Intermittent fasting benefits I found. As well as some of the backed by science. The biology teacher in me geeks out over some of this stuff but I think you will find it interesting too.
Intermittent fasting can be an effective way to combat aging and many diseases, but I highly recommend you following the advice of your physician before making major changes to the way you fuel and nourish your body.
My number 1 tip is to start slowly because most of the benefits you read about come from fasting over a long period of time. What you do often outweighs what you do occasionally or when you feel like.
Intermittent fasting (IF) has several health benefits so here are 2 that had me seriously thinking about what I was missing out on:
- Reduces oxidative damage. Normal cellular metabolism produces free radicals. These highly reactive molecules cause damage in your body. Antioxidants are one class of nutrients that counteract these effects. Intermittent fasting reduces the presence of free radicals, resulting in less oxidative damage.
FUN FACT: Oxidative damage is also suspected of being one component of aging. The damage of oxidative stress eventually adds up, and the organism eventually dies. Hence, by doing IF you can actually extent your lifespan as a dad.
- Reduces inflammation.
Inflammation is in the news on a daily basis. Systemic inflammation is caused by the immune system. This low-grade inflammation is rarely noticed, but it’s implicated in many chronic diseases. Hypertension, arthritis, and asthma are three examples. Lupus and inflammatory bowel disease are also caused by inflammation.
FUN FACT: The foods we eat are major contributors to inflammation. By going a longer period without food, you can reduce the amount of inflammation in your body.
Other benefits of Intermittent Fasting
Gives you energy
When you grow up with the mantras like “breakfast is the most important meal of the day” and “food is fuel” its easy to think that without food you will not have energy for anything but when I fasted that wasn’t the case.
We already know how to fast because we don’t get up in the middle of the night to eat nor do we eat as soon as we wake up. I found that when I exercised first thing in the morning without eating, I was fine and if I was working before breaking my fast, I had more focus.
When you have had a big meal the last thing you feel like doing is exercising or working because breaking all that food down and digesting it is an energy intensive process that results in large amounts of blood being directed to the digestive system.
When I was marathon training, I was able to run for almost 2 hours regularly with water only, so it proved that food is not the only fuel. I’m sure there is a scientific way to describe it but what I know is that even when I hadn’t eaten my body had enough energy to meet the demands, I placed on it.
Saves time.
I used to spend so much time researching, planning, and prepping meals especially when I focused on eating 5 meals a day. The different fasting protocols I have tried all freed up so much of my time.
Choosing meals became a lot easier because I had one eating window to think about. When I tried the one meal a day protocol the time gains were immense because during school hours, I could work with begrudging the fact that by the time I sat down to eat it was time for my next class and it took the enjoyment out of the experience of eating.
Intermittent fasting was also very easy to fit around family time too.
Once my wife and daughters knew what my eating schedule was, we could time it around our meals together and because I was fasting 5 days a week I had the flexibility of eating whenever I wanted to at the weekend.
By reducing the number of meals, I had to think about and prepare, fasting simplified my day.
Saves money
When you eat less often you don’t spend as much money on food. My biggest bug bear when it comes to food is paying for something I don’t enjoy. I like eating good food but the experience of eating is a big enjoyment factor too. Although I made my own lunches for school not having enough time to eat them got in the way of my enjoyment.
When my body took longer breaks from digesting food I became more aware of the tastes and textures of the foods I was eating so what looked like my pallet was changing, was actually my body choosing good quality food because it made me feel good afterwards.
The first lesson I learned early on was that cheesecake is a rubbish fuel for exercise and every time I had cheesecake desert my workout the next day was rubbish. My energy levels were all over the place and moving my body become more challenging, so my solution was to eat less cheesecake. I didn’t restrict cheesecake I just found that it didn’t fuel my body and allow it to meet the demands I was placing on it. ….birthday cakes don’t count though, especially when you turn 40 in the middle of a global pandemic!
Intermittent fasting has been shown to provide numerous health benefits BUT it’s still very necessary for you to choose your foods wisely.
The quality of your food is still important. No way of eating will turn doughnuts and cookies into health foods…your job is to nourish your body well with healthy wholesome foods.
Thank you for reading this post.
Things to do before you go
- Please share your thoughts in the comments and let me know what you thought.
- Be sure to click the link and download the Fast Start Guide to Intermittent Fasting for quick reference.
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