BMR and fasting. Help me understand

(Alex Dipego) #21

The goal should be to strengthen your metabolism. At my leanest 8% at 165lbs I was eating 3600 calories regularly. It took me a year getting my metabolism there. Adapting takes time and fasting shouldn’t slow your metabolism. Under feeding will. Going with The warrior fast let’s say is a 20:4 fast that promotes berries and veggies throughout the day under 500cals then a huge meal before bed.

Metabolic health is based on regular fuel and if you’re so lean that you think you’ll under eat then you may need to not fast. Or just fast and be okay losing some protein from the body and enjoy the health benefits. Fasting isn’t impossible when lean, it just hard.

(Alex Dipego) #22

Your metabolism adapts to its input and what kind of input. You eat a lot of calories you’re metabolism (if healthy) will increase. If you under eat your body adapts to it. Glucose in the blood isn’t the problem. It’s insulin the the blood. Keto life has high levels of glucagon which increases sugar in the blood so your body doesn’t crash (with a healthy pancreas). Glucagon presence increased the presence of things like HGH, neo/epinephrine which have metabolic boosting properties by increasing your cortisol levels which in this case is something you want as it sends fat burning signals.

(Crow T. Robot) #23

Interesting! What was it when you started and did you mainly get there through IF or were there other factors?

(John) #24

So it sounds like something like an alternating day fast, with high calories on feast days would be optimal correct. Eat more, metabolism goes up, or at least doesn’t go down, fast which does all sorts of things including prevent your metabolism from dropping.

(Alex Dipego) #25

I started at 2200. I ate 2 times a day until I could manage a single meal at high calories. I then took my week total, so let’s say I ate 15000cals that week, I’d bump it to 15100-15300 depending on my weight change. If I dropped 1.5-3lbs I’d add 250-300 cals extra a week. If it was <1.5 than I’d add a 100 or so. Realize what I’m doing though. Spread 100-300 calories over 7 days it’s nothing. It’s almost irrelevant, which was the point. I was adding such a minuscule amount that my body found it easier to adapt to.

(Alex Dipego) #26

Really it is using fasting to fit your lifestyle without thinking you have to not eat. If you are lean you probably should be eating a lot of food, but I say this due to activity level. You don’t have to be super active but naturally humans store fat to survive long hours without food and to travel long distances. We’re amazing at it. If you wish for super leaness you have to hack around a bit because it’s not optimal to be super lean. You may want to look 5% BF but the body probably wants 12%. I felt shitty at 8% BF but I wasn’t keto adapted and my fuel was all messed up. It felt like I was fighting myself. Now I’m at 12% and I’m happy I feel great but I know I need to play around to trick myself leaner but I want to do it without the huge negatives.

(Mike W.) #27

Also feasting then fasting helps your body get used to burning more fuel during your fast.

#28

Brilliant!

#29

If I drive up my metabolism on feasting days, won’t that prevent any drop in BMR during fasting? According to @richard ''s calculator, I would have to eat 120 calories in fat during fasting (my BMR is about 1200) to prevent a drop. Megan Ramos suggests feasting prior to fasting to drive up metabolism to get the most benefit from fasting. And the science shows that metabolism increases during fasting. So I shouldn’t have to eat fat during fasting if I feast first, right?

(G. Andrew Duthie) #30

Sorry, but I just don’t know the answer to that, though I suspect it partly depends on the length of the fast.

I’ve certainly heard plenty of folks share n=1 success stories with feasting and fasting cycles, though.

(VLC.MD) #31

I wonder how many “calories”/energy is “saved” by not having much digestive work to do (fasting)? It might not be very much at all.

#32

@Abrane I wanted to follow up with you on this strategy. I’ve been applying it for the last several weeks and I’ve gone from a maintenance level of calories of about 1400 a day to 1610 a day. I can’t believe it’s working! I plan to keep this up until I’m in the 2000 calorie range. For a 55-year-old female, 5’2" and 121 lbs, I would be so pleased if I could comfortably eat 2000 calories of glorious meat and fat per day. The last couple of days, however, I’ve noticed a drop in my appetite. Did you experience periods of lower appetite when you were steadily increasing your maintenance calories?

#33

What a fascinating thread, so glad I took a look!
And, according to the calculator @richard I only need to eat about 2 teaspoons of coconut oil/day to stay in the fasted state? I could do that!

#34

I am so excited to hear that this is working for you, since I am a 51 yo woman who would also love to eat so many calories of meat and fat! (Of course, you are also on maintenance and I am not there yet.)
What was the calorie increase each week, 70 it appears, which really does seem minuscule. However, over time, this has led to another few strips of bacon or some slices of rib eye…I like this trend.
I hope you’ll keep the experiment updated, I am really curious to see how this goes. Best wishes for that upgrade! :wink:

#35

@Helewisa I hadn’t really looked at it that way but yes, it’s like adding an extra strip of bacon of bacon each day. :smile: To expound on what I’m doing here, I’m really letting my hunger be my guide. Based upon my hunger, I may consume 1100 calories one day and 2000 the next. I don’t eat a preset number of calories but if I’m really hungry on a given day and I know I didn’t eat much the day before, I allow myself an extra meal or really slather on the homemade mayo, for example. It’s been working out that each week I see an increase in average daily calories.

The last few days, however, I’ve noticed a consistent decrease in hunger. I’m not sure if I should eat anyway just to make sure I don’t lose my increased BMR, or if the BMR will stay elevated despite the lower food intake.

Also in the last few days I’ve made more of an effort to keep fat high and protein lower than I usually do and I wonder if the decreased hunger and lower protein intake are related.

I’ll definitely post updates now and then.

#36

The whole idea that I would have to count calories has my stomach churning…but I know that there is a limit and that there is a connection to BMR as well. I would like to get an idea where my “limit” is, but it seems so difficult to really know since our bodies, hormones, gut and all of the complex bits, utilize the energy in ways that we don’t yet understand…

Letting hunger be your guide, and recognizing real hunger is one piece of the puzzle certainly.

This is all a curious observation for me, and I may take a little walk down this path myself if it continues to show positive results. I’d love to get that BMR elevated and keep it there! Thanks you so much for your sharing your efforts.

Oh, and I agree, I think that keeping your fat high and lowering the protein could be why you have felt a little less hunger the last few days.

(VLC.MD) #37

If your goal is weight loss, only eat when hungry.

#38

Update @Helewisa I’m now eating an average of 1750 calories a day and maintaining my weight. This method of increasing my BMR seems to be working well. Thank you @Abrane! I switch up my eating pattern depending on my hunger, but generally I eat once or twice a day with a window of between 18/6 and 23/1. I usually don’t eat after 3 pm because eating later disturbs my sleep. I don’t use artificial sweeteners and I drink my tea and coffee black.

#39

Thank you for your update, this is great news too, what a nice increase in bacon or rib eye, butter or chicken wings you can enjoy :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:
I would do well to avoid eating later in the day but find it very difficult when my husband is usually eating dinner at 8 PM and munching for another hour afterward.
The sleep is an issue when I eat later than 7 PM as well and so I think I’m going to try to cut it back to that time if I can. There are other time factors due to my job responsibilities that often times leave me with the hour of 6 or 7 PM arriving before I can stop to prepare something for supper so…
When life settles a bit (Mwahahahaha!) I would like to do some more n=1 experiments with my use of artificial sweeteners and different types of dairy.
Enjoy your added consumption allowance, it sounds wonderful!

(VLC.MD) #40

Interesting. Before Keto I had to eat to make myself sleepy.
Sometimes I wasn’t hungry, I just wanted to go to bed.
I’m so glad to not to have to deal with that anymore !