The Perfect Intermittent Fasting Ratio for the Most Weight Loss (Fat Burning)

(Raj Seth) #41

por moi - 2ketodudes, Fung & Ramos - who needs anything else!!

(Doug) #42

I have to say that this statement is false. How long does it take for food to pass all the way through the stomach and small intestine? It depends on the type and amount of foods eaten, the individual person, and their particular state at the time. It can vary a good bit, but it’s often 8 to 14 hours.

At least this rings true, but it’s still advocating a very short time of being in the true “fasted” state as opposed to the “fed” state.

EDIT: Bunny, didn’t mean to sound so aggressively contrarty to you, but rather to Dr. Berg, there.

(I confess I’d like to reach through the screen and slap that vacant-eyed, dorky expression he so often has.)

Definitely agree. But if we are eating every 18 hours, and it takes 14 for the food to be all done with the stomach and small intestine, and to be absorbed into the bloodstream (and delivered and processed to the point where we are really ‘fasting’) Then we’re only talking 4 hours. Or, perhaps things go faster and it’s 6 hours. If it’s autophagy and “anti-aging” and a healthier immune system that we’re after, then compare that to a two day fast. Right away we’re up to 28 hours, versus 4, or 30 hours versus 6. In addition, while there is a lot more to be learned about autophagy, for humans it certainly seems like it’s the 3rd day when things get to the maximum, and that a very high level of autophagy is maintained through the 5th day - that’s a distillation of everything I’ve ever seen on it.

(Dan Dan) #43

|50% of stomach contents emptied |2.5 to 3 hours|
|Total emptying of the stomach |4 to 5 hours|
|50% emptying of the small intestine |2.5 to 3 hours|
|Transit through the colon |30 to 40 hours|

Gastrointestinal Transit: How Long Does It Take?
http://www.vivo.colostate.edu/hbooks/pathphys/digestion/basics/transit.html

Digestion time varies between individuals and between men and women. After you eat, it takes about six to eight hours for food to pass through your stomach and small intestine. Food then enters your large intestine (colon) for further digestion, absorption of water and, finally, elimination of undigested food.

Digestion: How long does it take? - Mayo Clinic
https://www.mayoclinic.org/digestive-system/expert-answers/faq-20058340

(Doug) #44

Dan, I’ve seen that site. I wish they wouldn’t do the “50% emptying of the small intestine” thing. What good is that?

On the flipside - my own experience with the ‘colon transit time’ (ha - funny-sounding phrase there) is that the websites often seem to understate it. 30 to 40 hours? With hot as in peppery-hot foods, I’ve often had proof that it’s more like 20 to 24…

(Dan Dan) #45

Try this one then longer but good :smiley:

(Dan Dan) #46

from mouth to anus :rofl::rofl::rofl:

(Brian) #47

24 hours is 1 day. 72 hours is 3 days. Kinda sounds like there’s a lot of variation possible in “normal” … movement.

Just the witness of seeing bits and pieces of things I recognize tends to lead me to believe I’m closer to 24 hours, maybe even a little less, most of the time.

(Rob) #48

I prefer from pie-hole to bum-hole…

(Doug) #49

Undigested remains of food are passed through a one-way muscular valve into the first part of the large intestine known as the caecum – a small pouch that acts as a temporary storage site. By the time food remains have reached this point, about 5–12 hours have elapsed.

I wish they would state it as “all the food remains have reached this point,” rather than it just being generalized, but no big deal, really. Maybe they need to do it that way, though, since stuff doesn’t move through the digestive tract in a uniform manner and different things don’t always even leave a given segment of the alimentary canal in the same order that they arrive. Some food is often entering the large intestine even before the stomach is empty, which I find odd but confirmed.

|Total emptying of the stomach |4 to 5 hours|
|50% emptying of the small intestine |2.5 to 3 hours|

If we go with this, then perhaps in a few more hours the small intestine will be empty enough not to worry about anymore, as with your 2nd site’s higher figure of 12 hours. Personally, after some big meals in the past, I know my stomach hasn’t emptied in 4 to 5 hours, but perhaps those meals were just larger than normal. :smile:

So 12 hours with eating every 18 hours only leaves 6 hours. Or, call it 8 hours, that only leaves 10. Going to a two day fast would boost it to 30 or 34. If it’s autophagy we’re after, things are going by then, but still have more to increase, from everything I’ve read.

It is frustrating that while there have been studies on mice, it seems like they don’t do them on humans, i.e. take some fasting subjects and measure their autophagosomes every hour or at least every 6 hours or so. I guess there isn’t money in fasting like their is in selling drugs and supplements.

(Brian) #50

It kinda begs the question… well, sorta in dumbed down terms…

Is one long stretch of 24 hours of autophagy better than six 4 hour segments of autophagy over the same week of living?

I probably asked that poorly but it’s something I was wondering about.

I see people referring to the desire for big things happening in relatively short periods of time but would the same desired effects be available to someone who is willing to get into that state of autophagy way more often, maybe just not for as long.

(Doug) #51

I certainly think so, since autophagy is increasing through the 24 hour mark. As I recall - in a mouse - which has a heart rate like ten times ours, and which will likely be dead after three days of fasting - autophagy peaked from 24 to 48 hours. There are different rates in different tissues. A good many people claim that day 3 is a high point for people, or days 3 to 5. I’m not sure.

(Karen) #52

Table to toilet…

(Doug) #53

(I moved this over from the April Zornfast thread.)

Dan, I looked through the comments there, but can’t pick the ones that caught your eye. ??

Quoting from the article: Lower insulin means greater fat loss --Agreed 100%, no doubt about it.

Many of the beneficial effects are entwined with lower levels of insulin. Agree here too, and I think this goes toward my “longer is better” thesis, at least longer than what one will achieve eating every day. Insulin levels are declining well past that time frame. For many of us, they’re still declining after fasts of 7 or 10 days, for example. Not saying that “one has to at least get to 7 days” for it to be good, but I’m thinking of “IF” as eating every day, from all at once up to an eating window of 6 hours, and then a transit time through the stomach and small intestine of from 6 to 14 hours. This would mean a fasted time of from 4 to 18 hours - that’s really as wide as I can go, there.

From the study itself: Plasma insulin decreased by approximately 50% between 12 hours and 72 hours of fasting. Quite a drop there.

The article says, Of the total decline in plasma insulin, 70% occurred within the first 24 hours of fasting. Okay, makes sense - the fastest rate of fall will be in the beginning, so often the case with such processes. At 24 hours of fasting we are already beyond the 24 hour cycle IF deal. These were young, healthy men - I am presuming that insulin resistance was not a problem for them - and I’m also figuring that for the majority of us on this forum, it’s a different story, i.e. some degree of insulin resistance is there, and the rate of insulin blood level decline will be less overall and less at a given time of fasting.

FastingDurationInsulin
FastingDurationInsulin.jpg702×499 69.5 KB

No, I would say that it’s not the sweet spot. Between 12 and 24 hours of fasting was when the insulin level was declining most rapidly, for the healthy young men, that’s all. From the chart, the markedly lower insulin level at 54 hours would be the sweet spot for fat burning, and for autophagy as well, to the extent that lower insulin promotes it.

most people don’t want to fast very long, and after a certain time most people get hungry. But they do want to lose fat. – It’s a very common occurrence to not be nearly as hungry once we get past the 2nd day, and for fasting to become easier as we practice it.

I realize that fasting is not for everybody, and that for some people, IF on a 24 hour cycle is the best. Yet if we are talking about weight loss, lowering insulin, and autophagy, then there is a substantial case to be made for longer fasts.

(Victoria Mc Coy) #54

Yep. For me, and I suspect others with much weight to lose and significant metabolic challenges, my sweet spot sits between 36 and 54 hours at least two or three times per week. Makes a difference to know where we start the journey and what we are carrying with us, so to speak! :wink:

(Trish) #55

30 to 40 hours transit time my ass! LOL. I know my “transit” time is more like 3 or 4 days. I had that flex sig last week. Had done a 3 day fast then eaten one meal, then fasted again 3 days. did the whole pre- procedure prep clean out thing and ate that night afterwards. At that point of eating I was 70 hours fasted again and ate from then on. It was Sunday before I needed to go after having been eating since Wednesday night. So that’s 3.5 days or about 90 hours. Come to think of it, it may have been Monday not Sunday (losing track of days here being snowed in). In any case a hell of a lot longer than 30 hours LOL.

#56

When you say the plateau broke- how did your eating change then, did you continue to do EF or food you go back to OMAD

(Doug) #57

:slightly_smiling_face: Shallimar, I’m convinced there is great variation among people. Women, on average, have a longer transit time than men, and fasting slows things down, I’d think. Food going into the stomach signals the whole digestive system to “move along,” no?

And as for cheese, eaten in quantity, like a pound or 500 grams, there definitely is a “binding” effect.

(Trish) #58

ya totally makes sense. I did find the significant timing variation comical though. On the other hand, a Big Mac goes through almost instantly :wink: LOL.

(TJ Borden) #59

I went back to OMAD for a while, then when things seemed to stall again I actually went to three meals a day for about a week. I was amazed when I actually lost a little doing that too. Then I went back to OMAD and the scale still kept moving, slowly but surely.

I’ve just been trying to mix it up as much as I can to avoid homeostasis.

(charlie3) #60

There is also a variation with different macros and foods. Apparently a large percent of calories are needed to simpy digest what we eat, depending on the food. Digesting protein takes the most calories and in particular pork. Carbohydrates is the next most energy intensive to digest and then comes fat, the easiest by a wide margin. I believe I’ve also read that the digestive system won’t dump nutrients into the blood stream in unlimited amounts which makes sense. This interests me because I’m weight training and want to encouage muscles to grow and want to maintain conditions for that without departing from a good implimentation of keto practice.

I’ve eased in to a pattern of eating that seems promising, skip breakfast Monday-Friday and eat on a 16:8 schedual, then eat nothing on Saturday, then eat without time restrctions on Sunday, and, all the while, I’m not snacking–period. Recently I relazied this reduces the number of times I eat from about 35 times per week in my high snack carb burning days to just 12 times per week. That’s fewer opportunites for insulin to respond to my eating and with keto there is only a trivial amount of carbs in that food. It seems to me that should be reducing the amount if insulin getting into the blood stream dramatically and that’s the point, right?