Fasting Diet Facts
For Healthy Weight Loss
Looking for information to start a fasting diet? You have come to the right place.
This website is written by someone who has the real fasting experience and truly enjoys the health benefits of fasting.
Since 2006, I have been employing various modes of flexible short term fasting to achieve my weight loss and health goals with success. I’m here to share my experience with various fasting programs and to clear some of the misconceptions which you might have come across.
Fasting Diet Facts
Before you start a fasting diet, it is better to understand what fasting is and if it will benefit your body.
During a fast, a person purposely abstains from food for a specific period of time. During such period, if only water is consumed, we call it water fasting. Alternatively, if fresh fruit juices and water are both consumed, we call it juice fasting.
In terms of frequency, a one-day fast is very doable by any healthy person, even teenager. Slightly longer fasts between two days and a week are also pretty safe. This website is focused on short term periodic fasting generally within 24 hours – what we call intermittent fasting (IF). IF being practiced in a very regular manner is called alternate day fasting or fast every other day.
Remember, this website is all about how to make use of the various short term fasting programs for our health benefits. Our ultimate objective is to build a lifestyle that allows us to eat freely of what we love to eat while still having health and continuous weight loss.
Misconceptions
You may have heard about fasting horror stories such as starvation, slow metabolism, low energy level, lose muscle, regain lost weight quickly, even a very short term fast will cause damages to our bodies, etc. Be careful. People spreading these messages may actually have never fasted themselves.
As someone who has more than four years of fasting experience, I’m going to clarify some of the basic facts about fasting diets.
Periods of fasting enable our bodies to help increase the health of the digestive system, clean up waste and reduce toxins, help cellular repair, and many other important functions for optimal health. Reduced in calories stimulates a fat-burning environment which results in weight loss.
Are these true about fasting?
Fasting induces starvation
Not true. Most people don’t know what starvation is. If they do, they should know that fasting and starvation is just like black and white, there is no grey area, especially when we are talking about short term fasting. FACT IS: A 24-hour fast has nothing to do with starvation. Want to find out why? Read These articles: Fasting and Starvation, Starvation Mode Doesn't Exist.
Fasting induces slow metabolism / low energy level
Not true. I’m a live example who makes use of my lunch hour to swim almost everyday in a fasted state. View my blog post about this. FACT IS: If fasting ever negatively affects my metabolism or energy level, I should never be able to do this – not for a day or two, but for the past four years. Of course, you don’t have to do the same, but if you want to, it is possible.
HEALTH WARNING: If you are a newbie, it is more suitable to do some simple exercises while fasting rather than vigorous exercise like swimming. Wait till your body get used to your new eating habit, you’ll be free to do any exercise even you are fasting.
Gain back the lost weight plus putting on extra weight after giving up fasting
Partially true. This may happen if you had done fasting only once in life and say goodbye to it forever.
Not true. If you have your fasting diet ongoing every now and then, even once a week, you’ll still see the benefits. Ideally, if you keep on having two 24-hour fasting windows every week, your weight loss result is going to be long lasting.
Lose muscle
Not true. If you lose muscle over a short period of fasting, you are losing weight every morning, assuming you won’t wake up in the midnight and eat every three hours. We all do fasting after dinner until the next morning which lasts approximately 12 to 14 hours. That’s why our first meal in the morning is called ‘break-fast’. If we do lose muscle in a short fast, nobody will ever have to look for weight loss methods.
Additional reading - Debunk 6 Myths About Healthy Fasting
What Is The Most Ideal Fasting Diet?
The ones I list below are all good. Feel free to try and find out which suits you best.
Some people think that the weight you lose is actually water weight. Fact is losing one pound is one pound, no matter it is water or fat. Before starting your fasting diet, get ready a good scale. Be prepared to see the number keep decreasing when you weigh yourself.
Water fasting diet – you can expect losing no less than one pound a day. People with fast metabolism may lose weight at a higher speed however may experience some hunger pangs at the beginning.
Juice fasting diet – you can expect losing no less than one pound a day. It is more suitable for beginners or people with fast metabolism as fresh fruits and vegetables supply you with glucose, vitamin and a minimum of nutrients. You may even eat a banana or celery in case juices are not available. Psychologically you’ll feel good.
Lemonade fasting diet – a 10-day life transformation exercise. Also know as Master Cleanse. You can expect to lose up to 20 pounds, look younger, ease chronic pain, cleanse your body of internal waste, and boost your energy levels.
Intermittent fasting (IF) – you will experience steady weight loss and never gain back your lost weight. Simply omit two days of eating on a flexible and unplanned basis every week. Even once a week will be good enough to produce weight loss results. I’m personally on this fasting diet and find it to be win-win in a way that it has the least impact on my social, family and work life.
Alternate day fasting (ADF) - You can expect steady weight loss however in a more speedy way than IF. Some people find this simple and easy to stick to. However fasting on every other day requires discipline and persistency. So it is your personal choice of doing fasting in a flexible manner (IF) or strict manner (ADF). ADF does impact your life in way of lacking flexibility. Imagine your CEO comes from overseas and calls for a staff dinner, you told him ‘no sir, I’m fasting today.’ I would recommend doing ADF for a period of time when you find convenient and do flexible IF in conjunction with it.
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Click here for more fasting diets ideas
I enjoy eating freely without having to care about calories, food groups….
It is only after fasting that I truly value and appreciate each meal.
I eat with respect and enjoy the taste of food.
Successful Fasting Diet Strategy
Make fasting your lifestyle - integrate it into your everyday life. Would it be too demanding a weight loss plan? NO. It is not only a weight loss plan, it is a long term permanently weight management plan. And it is also a health plan which will keep you fit and healthy. You may want to take a look at my fasting health benefits.
Incorporate fasting into your daily life, you may find it as an additional task at the beginning, but you will soon find it as natural as breathing.
There are things you do everyday which seem like transparent. i.e., you do it naturally and routinely which you don’t really need to put in extra effort. For example, you brush your teeth every morning, bath every night, eating and changing everyday. You won’t find stressful doing these, will you? If you are determined to find a better way to eat and stay healthy, you will enjoy doing flexible intermittent fasting.
Take Control of Your Life
Do you want to spend every day focused on measuring calories, food groups and portions, or simply eat what you want to eat?
Trying to have exact calorie meals proportioned out 6x a day and the same calorie intake daily is very complicated however creates great market potential for weight loss companies to sell and even express these diets to you everyday.
Restrictive diets never work. You will gain back your lost weight once you give up. Fasting diets are far simpler and easier. So why not take control of your life? Start working out an IF plan that meets your specific lifestyle and comfort level.
There is no one right way to use IF. Make it a tool that works for you. Don’t be scared by the word ‘fasting’. Short term fasting isn’t going to make you hungry. In fact, I encourage eating EVERYDAY. My fasting window is usually 24 hours and I eat at least one full meal a day.
I’ve certainly found my beloved way to eat. What about you? Feel free to come back to this website for tips, guidelines and articles. You have all my support to help you build a healthy fasting lifestyle.
More insights from Brad Pilon about flexible intermittent fasting.
