JUNE 2023 IF/EX Chat Thread (All welcome)

(KCKO, KCFO) #1

Wow, half of the year is almost over.

I’m doing a lot of 2MAD and the occasional OneMAD, staying at my goal weight so I am a happy camper.

May 2023 IF/EX Chat Thread (All welcome)
(Bob M) #2

That sounds great!

I’m taking steroids due to tangling with an errant rose bush. Don’t stop until Wednesday. Supposedly, can’t take them without food. But maybe I’ll try a 36 hour day on Thursday?

#3

Oh, the thread arrived!

I do things kinda right, I still started with eating around maintenance but I do is simpler and in a small eating window :slight_smile:
As 2-3 hours is tricky for me (I just don’t get hungry so quickly unless my first meal is too tiny), I wondered about OMAD again but of course, I can’t force it…
But it happened yesterday and it was so, so great! A small meal and extremely high satiation all day! Okay, it can’t work for long due to the low-cal but it’s neat occasionally :slight_smile:

And I get better at resisting food when I have an appetite but no hunger or just a tiny, lovely one that I like to have for some reason (I like being satiated even more but a tiny, not annoying hunger feels fine too). Good.
Sometimes I seem to have a proper hunger during a walk but I come home, do this and that (like cooking, that’s usually the best) and it disappears! :smiley: So good. I really don’t want to eat super early like at noon!
Yesterday my OMAD was between 4 and 5pm, it’s about the perfect time for me.

I aim to keep what I have, it’s nice to it gives me motivation and guidance if I would feel tempted for some reason…
I am hopeful I will lose some fat already but as usual, it’s not my main goal.

I even wonder about my chances with EF again… Maybe my body will be on board soon. But I accept a tiny eating window with simple, moderate feeding for now.

(Oliver ) #4

Right so I find its interesting that low carb, keto and fasting does not seems to be very popular today. I think I know exactly the reason why as well… Eh I have written some more about this topic in a blog post which I might publish soon if there is any interest hehe (or as an topic in forum).

Its also interesting that I personally still like IF very much. Feel super good and focused while Iam doing it.

(Bob M) #6

I think that too much fasting can be bad. But I still don’t eat breakfast, although that’s because I literally cannot, not because I’m trying not to eat breakfast. And I still think >24 hour fasts are good. They are just a lot harder for me to do.

Consider the following. Today (Thursday) is the best day for me to fast, as I don’t exercise. It’s one of the two days during the week I don’t exercise, the other being Saturday (and there’s a zero percent chance I’m fasting on Saturday). During the school year, I can go to work then pick up my daughter from dance at 7:45 pm, which means I only have to get home then go to bed. The perfect timing to fast.

Today, however, I’m working from home because I have to take my wife to work and get both daughters to the bus. I then will work all day from home, but also have to go get my wife after work and take her to a different town, where her car is getting fixed. Then come home, but everyone will be home and everyone will have dinner. I’ll be lucky to eat OMAD.

For me, it’s more of a timing issue. And now that I exercise 5 days a week (up from 3), and I’m more muscular and stronger, and even thinner, I find it harder to fast.

(KCKO, KCFO) #7

I find I usually enjoy working out more when I am into a fast. I do strength and Zumba cardio exercise while fasted all the time with no issues.

#8

I do my workout when well-fasted but I like to eat afterwards :slight_smile: Maybe I will try without it one day, it seems so logical to me to eat and I know I used to get hungry, now I am unsure, my well-fasted hunger is softer lately… I know I have this mental thing (I did my workout, some food surely does good to my body), I do like to eat every afternoon too… But I am curious what would happen if I just tried to skip my meal - and if it didn’t work, would my workout be the culprit or just my usual inability to fast a bit longer than normal…?

(Bob M) #9

I can end a fast with a workout and be fine. I have found, though, that, over time, it’s much harder for me to fast when I exercise a lot. In fact, having a rest day THEN a fast day makes the fast MUCH easier than if the day before the fast is not a rest day.

Right now, I have the following schedule:

Monday: 50-55 minutes body weight training, 1/2 the body, slow burn (3 reps, each taking 20 seconds)
Tuesday: 50-55 minutes body weight training, the other 1/2 of the body, slow burn (3 reps, each taking 20 seconds)
Wednesday: jogging 30+ minutes, with the pup
Thursday: attempt to fast
Friday: body weight training for full body, 1:20-1:30, usually 1:30
Saturday: off
Sunday: jogging 30+ minutes, with the pup

It’s harder to fast on Thursdays now. I’m often starving by 10am.

#10

Interesting… So you do your workout, eat a proper meal and the next day still isn’t good for fasting…?
I only wouldn’t fast right after a workout, it makes perfect sense to me that my body wants its food and indeed, I tend to get hungry there (but as I get hungry almost every afternoon, maybe there isn’t such a connection. there was in the past but my hunger changed a lot as my carbs dropped even more).

I really wish to try fasting days soon and experiment more :slight_smile:

(KCKO, KCFO) #11

I have to get a colonoscopy done later this week. They sent over the current procedure for prepping for it. Turns out I no longer need to do a 3 day clear liquid fast this time, instead, two days of carnivore eating only and then a day of liquid fasting.

I was laughing so hard when I read that. The first time I had to have one, I was still on low fat, high carbs and it was torture. I could do three days fasting very easily this go around, but I think I will just enjoy those two days of carnivore eating instead. My family has a gene that is problematic, lots of my ancestors died of colon cancer, my sister and mother both had it, but was caught early enough to not be deadly for them. So I just get the scoping done.

(Bob M) #12

@Shinita I’m guessing that my body is still “hungry” from 4 days in a row of exercise, making it harder to fast on the fifth day. I used to exercise 3 days, take a day off, then fast on the fifth day. That was easier. But I wanted to get my puppy (16 months now) more exercise, so I decided to add another day of jogging, which happens on the 4th day. So, now, we both get two days of jogging in per week, if it’s not raining.

@collaroygal I just had a colonoscopy too, today. 3 days of low fiber eating (which is what I do all the time anyway), 1 day of fasting but drinking 1/2 gallon of a drink in the evening, getting up early (2:45 am) and finishing the other 1/2 gallon. That was tough (not the fasting, the drinking that much). The good news is that I got in about a 40 hour fast, and had nothing found, so I come back in 10 years. (I also don’t have a family history of it.)

Let us know how yours went.

They said that I shouldn’t defecate again for 1-3 days after the procedure. However, I ate and immediately went. I often wonder if some people – like me – actually have a very efficient system that extracts more energy from food? I read the book Burn, and in it, the author hypothesizes that someone like Michael Phelps was able to win because he could eat and digest so much. The author’s theory is that we can only digest about 5,000 calories/day at max, but supposedly Phelps was eating a few thousand more than that.

So, I wonder if some of us are able to extract more energy from the same amount of food. That is, I eat say 3,000 calories of food and extract nearly all the calories, while someone else eats exactly the same food and only extracts say 2,800 calories. It could (partly) explain why some of us gain weight easier than others.

Edit: I didn’t realize how dominating Phelps was:

image

#13

But how do they think that if you are allowed eating? The food just… Stays somewhere for days? :smiley: It’s not how our digestion works :smiley: I never skip a day. NEVER. (Sure, if I could do a very long fast, it would happen but I can’t do that.)

It’s obviously not a fixed number, we are too different for that (so it’s like “an adult needs 2000 kcal”) but yep, I heard such things myself (without a number). People eating 10-15000 kcal a day and not gaining accordingly (of course they could do some epic metabolism quickening too). If the volume is huge, it makes sense that the food can’t get digested, it doesn’t slow down enough for that…? If it’s small volume and easy to digest, it may be different…? I don’t know…

I have a great week eating wise, I eat super little (for me. if it continues I will start to worry and change something, so little :smiley: but not yet, I feel too well ~ and have my high-cal days too. one in 5 days this far) and my eating window is decent. OMAD or TMAD but my second meal is usually very tiny. I almost do lunch OMAD now, odd… So pleased. It’s all because of my food choices I think (what I choose and what I doesn’t ;)).

(Bob M) #14

I actually think Pontzer is correct. There’s a maximum we can digest per day. I’m not sure it’s 5,000 calories, but it makes sense that given our digestive systems, we can only absorb so much food.

It’s very difficult to test this, though, because unless you’re exercising a ton, there’s no way to eat that much. Even when he discussed Phelps, Phelps only guessed at what he ate. He didn’t keep records.

(KCKO, KCFO) #15

Had three extremely small growths removed, dr. said they looked healthy but he sent them to the lab to have them checked out, they are not a problem, so I won’t be doing this again any time soon.

I think all the fasting I do contributes to this family health issue not causing me an issue, I think Dr. Seyfried has it right and I will continue to do some fasting regularly.