Daily fasting 20 hours and eating 4 hour

This topic contains 12 replies, has 10 voices, and was last updated by  bigbooty 5 years, 9 months ago.

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  • Hi everyone,
    I was reading about this Fast Diet and I wanted to give it a try. My motivation is that I want to lose weight. I used to be 220 lbs 7 years ago when I got married and the weight increased gradually and the amount of my activities reduced due to family obligations and life style.
    I started my diet 10 days ago to fast everyday except the weekend. I don’t eat anything from 10:30 pm to 7 pm the next day. 20 hours of fasting and 4 hours of eating window. I only drink water and 2 cups of coffee on my 20 hours fasting days. The first couple of days it was difficult but gradually it got batter and I wasn’t thinking about food or eating. After the first week I weighted myself and I was down 5 lbs but since I have gained all back again when i weighted myself again today. I am still fasting as usual of my 20 hours not eating.
    anyone has any suggestions I could use?

    Mory, you are doing time restricted eating, not fasting. It can certainly work and I incorporate it in my WOL as well as fasting.

    First off I’m going to assume you you are not a night shift worker. Eating all your calories right before bed is not a good idea. Your body clock wants to shut down digestion and your insulin sensitivity is at its lowest at night. It’s much better t eat earlier in the day.

    Also the amount of calories you eat still matters. If you eat over your TDEE you will gain weight.

    5:2 cycles calories, 5 days at TDEE 2 days at <600 calories.

    No I am not a night shift worker. I have a 8:30 am to 6 pm job and its easier for me to keep busy and not think about eating at work. When I am at home on the weekend and week nights, myself and my wife tend to snack watching TV or reading so its harder to not eat.
    So you think eating one meal a day at 7 pm and one snack around 9:30 is not a good idea? How do you suggest to change that?
    what has been your experience with these type of diets?

    If you eat at 7:00 will you be hungry at 9:30? Research shows that if you eat the same number of calories in a compressed time frame (<10 hours) as you would grazing for a longer period you will lose more fat. It assumes that you are eating less than TDEE. Calories still count.

    My results have been good with TRE. I eat between 8:00AM and finish by 6:00 PM latest.

    I haven’t calorie counted what I am eating for dinner but its not out of extra ordinary. Its my usual dinner that I eat. I am not hungry at 9:30 pm but having a pop corn while watching a movie.

    Hi Mory and welcome:

    What you are doing is not a weight loss diet, and by just eating in an ‘eating window’ you cannot expect to lose weight. The only way you can lose weight using an eating window is by making sure you are eating less than your TDEE in that window. The name of the eating window you are using comes under the popular name of the ‘Warrior Diet’, which has been around for at least 15 years or so. It has a slightly smaller window than the more popular 16:8 ‘8 Hour Diet’, which boldly claims “In The 8-Hour Diet, bestselling authors David Zinczenko and Peter Moore present a paradigm-shifting plan that allows readers to eat anything they want, as much as they want―and still strip away 20, 40, 60 pounds, or more.” Of course this is hogwash, but it sells books!

    Almost everyone eats in an eating window. Most people have a window that starts when they get up in the morning and closes when they go to bed at night (leaving a ‘fasting period’ of roughly 12-14 hours depending on the timing of their last and first meals of the day). Some shorten that window for various personal reasons. Some believe that by not eating outside of whatever shorter window they set they will eat less than they would have otherwise (no snacks, for instance). Some believe they will burn more fat, although it has never been proven that materially more fat is burned just by eating in a shortened window. The only human research I have seen on an eating window (and it is like the one you are using) concludes that “The present findings suggest that, without a reduction in calorie intake, a reduced-meal-frequency diet does not afford major health benefits in humans.” https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2645638/

    Here are some more thoughts on eating windows: https://thefastdiet.co.uk/forums/topic/52-calorie-restriction-v-fasting-for-newbies/ In the Eat, Fast and Live Longer video that ‘started it all’, the human that had by far the best results followed an every day reduced calorie diet (around 1900 calories a day) and did not fast at all (no ketones anywhere). Basically, current research finds it is the reduction in calories eaten that yields the weight loss and other health benefits, not when the calories are eaten.

    Don’t worry about when you are eating and try doing 5:2 properly for a couple of months. I think you will be glad you did!

    Good Luck!

    I agree with simcoeluv. Try the 5:2 for a month or so and see how it works for you. It’s easy and doesn’t require a lot of thought. Only 2 days of counting calories, 500 for women and 600 for men. The other 5 days eat mindfully. Eat what you want but don’t go crazy. The biggest advantage is that it’s sustainable. If you don’t find a way of eating that you can stick with for the rest of your life, you might lose weight, but you’ll gain it all back when you go back to normal eating. How many of us here have lost weight on different diets in the past only to gain it back again? Keep it simple. And good luck with whatever you choose.

    Don’t let the naysayers take this excellent tool away from you. It works 🙂 But you do still need to eat well during the window. My advice would be to stop eating processed carbs and sugar and make sure you meet all your nutritional needs by eating a colourful variety of vegetables with healthy fats from olive oil and nuts and seeds or cheese or full fat plain yoghurt. An eating window is enormously useful as your appetite is less when you eat this way. You develop a rhythm and the gut benefits from the rest and your body benefits from not trying to do two jobs at once. Digesting food is hard work and diverts energy from daily living and from healing. I lost over 100 lbs in the last year by combining this with alternate day fasting at 800 calories. I am still losing weight despite having met target and dropping the ADF as my gut and my metabolism have healed. Had I not used the eating window I would have been hungry all day and compliance would have been much more difficult. It is a tool that makes it easier which I think the naysayers fail to understand. It sounds super strict but it actually removes the need to be focused on food all the time. So it benefits your head and your body. I have made mine a bit longer now that I have lost all the weight, I aim to only eat between 2 and 8pm but for me it is something I intend to keep to forever.

    I too find an eating window helpful – mine is approx 16:8 most days. However I do it in combination with 5:2. My window is usually noon-8pm, and I usually eat lunch and dinner. I try to never eat unless I’m genuinely hungry. This means some days I’ll start eating later than noon, however 8pm is an absolute curfew that I never compromise.

    The eating window means I don’t eat mindless empty calories watching tv in the evenings – this was a long term problem for me and a habit I struggled to break without an absolute curfew on my eating window. It also means I eat when I’m actually hungry – which I rarely am in the mornings.

    However without the two 500cal fast days per week I do not lose weight. In fact I even struggle to maintain my weight without them. For me, both 5:2 and an eating window have benefit. I also have to be quite careful that I don’t overeat on normal days or the extra calories easily cancel out any under-eating from other days. I found it was very important not to treat non-fast days as a “free for all” where I ate whatever I wanted. I lose no weight and often gain if I do that.

    I think there is much more to IF than losing weight. Weight loss will be primarily driven by calorie intake although there is possibly an argument that macronutrient make-up will also be a factor (fewer carbs and sugars is best). But there are other important health factors in play i.e. the benefits of fasting with respect to longevity and maintained health (fewer cancers and better retention of cognitive capacities). A smaller eating window maintains a person in fasting for longer and by extension could improve the non-weight-loss benefits of fasting, especially if combined with IF (meaning the fasting window >36 hrs). Also, there is the circadian rhythm angle – everything in our body follows this rhythm which unfortunately modern life messes up (with resultant disturbances to sleep and long-term health deterioration). There is some good evidence from mice that shortening the eating window to 8hrs or less improves synchronization and restores the circadian rhythm.

    Hey Mory…..although a few weeks after your post, I just wanted to say the same thing happen to me. I started off with an 8hour eating window (faster for 16hours) and besides some fantastic health benefits, I wasn’t losing any weight, because I was informed I could more-or-less eat what I like. I then went to a 6hour eating window (fasting for 18hours)and yeah, I lost a little bit of weight, but even better, over a couple of weeks I noticed my body changing. My body was firming, muscles more defined and changing shape for the better. Although the scales were telling me otherwise, the fasting was definitely improving my body tone and shape.
    I found the fasting super easy, so I then went to 4hour (some days 3hour) window eating period and I found it near impossible to over eat; I just wasn’t hungry enough to fit in all the calories I needed for the day; hence I started losing weight. My eating window was (and still is), 12 noon lunch, 1.30pm snack and 3.30pm dinner, but I find dinner is only very small because I’m just not hungry enough to eat a big meal.
    “IF” isn’t a diet, it’s an eating pattern with health benefits, so if you want to lose weight, I’m afraid you have to eat in a calorie deficit. You need to shorten your eating window or count calories so you eat less than what your body is burning. But the good news is, it won’t be forever.
    I only have to lose another 5kg and I will be at my BMI and goal weight. I will continue to fast because it suits my lifestyle and it’s easy, but I will extend my eating window back to 6hours and have two meals and a snack.
    Good Luck with it…..

    I am a women in her mid 50th. I have always been a slim women but due to bad knees I am unable to run like I use to. this has lead me to gain a tire around my waist. no leg or arm gain just my waist. started the 5 hour window diet for 2 days now.

    However, I get really jittery at night around 9pm. I have both high blood, diabetes, and cholesterol. (ALL CONTROLLED with medication). is this unhealthy for me?

    Blue-Angela, as a diabetic you need to discuss fasting with your doctor. Your medication may need to be adjusted. Do not fast until you have his or her approval and supervision.

    @ba. Are you type 1 or type 2? Im assuming you have a blood glucose monitor? What is your BG when you get jittery? Hypo or hyper? Discuss your diet with a dietician.

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