Fasting discussion

jpscloud

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726
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Type 2
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Hello all, I hope it's ok to start a new thread for general discussion about fasting, whether you're interested in fasting, currently fasting or an experienced faster willing to give advice and support.

I have been experimenting with various fasting lengths, between 16 hours and 4 and a half days so far. Lately I've been struggling, I think mostly because of reaching the weight loss plateau point and having a bit of regain. I'm also struggling to stay away from carbs and failing horribly sometimes.

Still, I think fasting is really helping me, and I feel great when I'm doing it, so onward I go.

This week I've completed a 40 hour fast (was going to be 36 but felt happy to continue to 40) and I'm very happy with that, as I have been finding it difficult to go beyond 24 hours recently. It has reset my appetite a bit, which 24 hours wasn't doing any more, and I'm delighted with that. I still have a lot of abdominal fat to lose, and of course I understand my lapses with carbs won't help, so I am trying to sort that out.
 
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Dexterdobe

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305
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Diet only
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Being unwell and seeing BG levels soar
Hello all, I hope it's ok to start a new thread for general discussion about fasting, whether you're interested in fasting, currently fasting or an experienced faster willing to give advice and support.

I have been experimenting with various fasting lengths, between 16 hours and 4 and a half days so far. Lately I've been struggling, I think mostly because of reaching the weight loss plateau point and having a bit of regain. I'm also struggling to stay away from carbs and failing horribly sometimes.

Still, I think fasting is really helping me, and I feel great when I'm doing it, so onward I go.

This week I've completed a 40 hour fast (was going to be 36 but felt happy to continue to 40) and I'm very happy with that, as I have been finding it difficult to go beyond 24 hours recently. It has reset my appetite a bit, which 24 hours wasn't doing any more, and I'm delighted with that. I still have a lot of abdominal fat to lose, and of course I understand my lapses with carbs won't help, so I am trying to sort that out.
I'm not too sure what to say to you to be honest. I find that eating all my food in an eight hour slot and fasting 16 hours a day is useful, but I wouldn't think of fasting for several days. The Newcastle diet is based on 800 calories a day for at least three months. It has helped a lot of people to go into remission without the need to fast. We are all different, so do what works for you, but do be careful of long term fasting as the body can start to burn vital muscle. You are trying to improve your health, not make things worse.
 
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bulkbiker

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but do be careful of long term fasting as the body can start to burn vital muscle
Would like to see some evidence of that.. I think it will burn body fat first?
Would be a pretty stupid body if it had a ready source of fuel to hand but instead burned off hard earned muscle first.
 
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There is no Spoon

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but do be careful of long term fasting as the body can start to burn vital muscle. You are trying to improve your health, not make things worse.
Hi Dex not sure what you mean with long term fasting i.e one long prolonged fast or small fasting periods for years.

My understanding of the benefit of fasting is weight loss which is done by breaking down body fat and sending it to the muscles.When we sleep at night our body effectively goes into repair mode (repairing the micro damage to muscles that has been done through out the day).

It is illogical to think that the body will break down muscles to repair muscles when there is fat that can be used. o_O

This is just an opinion: I think that this is the perceived effect "fast = muscle loss" because muscle loss can be seen in as little as 2 weeks if you stop excising and people have been attributing this to diet/fasting for years and it has just become a "Known Fact" ;)
:bag:
 
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jpscloud

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I'm not too sure what to say to you to be honest. I find that eating all my food in an eight hour slot and fasting 16 hours a day is useful, but I wouldn't think of fasting for several days. The Newcastle diet is based on 800 calories a day for at least three months. It has helped a lot of people to go into remission without the need to fast. We are all different, so do what works for you, but do be careful of long term fasting as the body can start to burn vital muscle. You are trying to improve your health, not make things worse.

Hi @Dexterdobe - I've done my homework very thoroughly, and don't feel in danger of muscle wasting. Extended fasting is increasingly recognised as the way to access and use the body's fat stores. As Jason Fung puts it - if humans lost muscle every time they missed more than a couple of meals, we'd have died out as a species long, long ago.

Humans evolved to fast and feast, but in the past century in many parts of the world we have completely dropped the fasting, and followed the urgings of Big Food to eat not only three meals a day but also to snack throughout the day.

That often means weight gain as our bodies store fat for leaner times - which nowadays never come for many of us. So I'm choosing to have leaner times - for me to access my body fat as fuel, shorter fasting times are not as effective as longer ones.
 
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I’m a fan of fasting for the glycemic and therapeutic benefits. Unfortunately for me, with a BMI of ~19, I’m not carrying enough luggage around to make fasting longer than 24h pleasant or even worthwhile, as I get hungry too readily at around 18h. If I’ve been lifting weights then forget about it.
 

jpscloud

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Type 2
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I read about a medical doctor who is type 1 and runs marathons in the fasting state (presumably he's supremely fat adapted) but if I had little body fat and a non-fatty liver, I'd probably not fast longer than 16 hours either.
 

Dexterdobe

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Type 2
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Diet only
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Being unwell and seeing BG levels soar
Hi @Dexterdobe - I've done my homework very thoroughly, and don't feel in danger of muscle wasting. Extended fasting is increasingly recognised as the way to access and use the body's fat stores. As Jason Fung puts it - if humans lost muscle every time they missed more than a couple of meals, we'd have died out as a species long, long ago.

Humans evolved to fast and feast, but in the past century in many parts of the world we have completely dropped the fasting, and followed the urgings of Big Food to eat not only three meals a day but also to snack throughout the day.

That often means weight gain as our bodies store fat for leaner times - which nowadays never come for many of us. So I'm choosing to have leaner times - for me to access my body fat as fuel, shorter fasting times are not as effective as longer ones.
When I said i don't know what to say to you, I wasn't being critical. I genuinely don't know how to respond. I have lost the weight I needed to and reduced my BG to normal levels without the need to fast beyond 16 hours. If you feel its beneficial to fast for longer periods then fine. The only comment I would make is that, yes, they did have to fast for long periods between meals in the distant past, but they were dead before they were 40 weren't they;). That last comment was a tongue in cheek, by the way.
 

jpscloud

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Type of diabetes
Type 2
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When I said i don't know what to say to you, I wasn't being critical. I genuinely don't know how to respond. I have lost the weight I needed to and reduced my BG to normal levels without the need to fast beyond 16 hours. If you feel its beneficial to fast for longer periods then fine. The only comment I would make is that, yes, they did have to fast for long periods between meals in the distant past, but they were dead before they were 40 weren't they;). That last comment was a tongue in cheek, by the way.

Well done on your weight loss. I don't know how long-lived our ancestors were to be honest, and it wasn't my intention to end up defending extended fasting - if you're interested, you can read up for yourself. At the risk of creating exasperation in fellow members, though, I would like to continue posting about my fasting attempts, even though I'm not perfect. It helps to motivate me to keep trying, rather than to give up entirely.
 

Lamont D

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I do not have diabetes
I use intermittent fasting as a tool to help cope with my condition, it is my go to state of treatment, because it is food that causes my symptoms, especially carbs.
I use fasting to help my pancreas have a easier time during the day. Fasting also helps me stop obsessing about food and when I need to eat.
I have discovered that I'm better off not eating at times, I don't have regular meals, my work life, doesn't allow a nine to five regime in feeding myself. Breakfast, lunch, dinner, supper and snacks in between is probably the indirect cause of my condition and has no meaning now in my life, I travel a lot and its easier to fast, than eat the fast food in services, it's not the same as a home prepared low carb meal. I have to be so careful.
Fasting will also help your wallet!
And the time spent away from the cooker, fridge and setting the table, prep and actually eating! And don't forget the washing up!!!!!
 
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jpscloud

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Messages
726
Type of diabetes
Type 2
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Tablets (oral)
I use intermittent fasting as a tool to help cope with my condition, it is my go to state of treatment, because it is food that causes my symptoms, especially carbs.
I use fasting to help my pancreas have a easier time during the day. Fasting also helps me stop obsessing about food and when I need to eat.
I have discovered that I'm better off not eating at times, I don't have regular meals, my work life, doesn't allow a nine to five regime in feeding myself. Breakfast, lunch, dinner, supper and snacks in between is probably the indirect cause of my condition and has no meaning now in my life, I travel a lot and its easier to fast, than eat the fast food in services, it's not the same as a home prepared low carb meal. I have to be so careful.
Fasting will also help your wallet!
And the time spent away from the cooker, fridge and setting the table, prep and actually eating! And don't forget the washing up!!!!!
I couldn't have put that better myself, @Lamont D - thank you! My current problem is that I am falling for carbs when I'm not fasting, and might slip into the habit of using fasting to compensate for an undesirable way of eating. With that in mind I'm trying to get the fasting protocol firmly in place, and then work harder on reducing carbs when I find the right protocol.

I think a 36 to 40 hour fast during working days works really well for me, but I'm not sure if I can do that effectively during school holidays when I'm not working... we'll see!
 
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Listlad

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Personally I find it hard to fast. I have missed meals owing to being too engaged in something else but never deliberately fasted. Occasionally when on lchf when travelling, I might miss a meal.

However a colleague of mine used to fast for 24 hours or even 48 hours at a time, quite successfully. She did this for weight regulation and it worked. I did wonder how she managed it though, especially when her family were tucking in to a meal in the dining room.

I did see a good tv programme on it a couple of years ago.

I think it was this one:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b01lxyzc/horizon-20122013-3-eat-fast-and-live-longer
 
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AloeSvea

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Just popping in to add my two-cents worth on fasting as regular treatment for type two/diabetes.

I have not been able to find anything that has the same obvious fairly swift health benefits as periodic not eating - however you choose to not eat, or not eat as much as usual.

I got out of the rhythm of IFing, or regularly fasting over a period of days, about nine months ago, and my insulin levels, as in being too high (and therefore my BG rising) rise all too easily, have risen too high again. As in - way over high end normal levels even. Even with LCHF- Keto ways of eating. (I get my insulin levels checked in a C-peptide test, along with my HBA1c and blood lipids, regularly, as I have very severe insulin resistance.)

It reminds me, if I need reminding (and I always live in hope of being able to live healthily without medicating and without regularly not eating also! But alas, this is not the case) - that not eating from time to time really is part of my treatment program. This is as a (now) normal weighted, fit regularly exercising, low-carbing person, in steady remission at prediabetic levels since changing the way I ate and moved post diagnosis. Without periodic not-eating, my diabetes health status deteriorates. And it doesn't take long. (Within a few months.)

I add my experience in here from time to time, as according to the Swedes, about 15% of all those with diabetes have severe insulin resistance. (These are the folks, like me, who don't enter into the world of remission at non-diabetes levels after losing a ton of weight and maintaining it, and eating low carb/keto.) If I can help any other person in my position (as in having severe insulin resistance - called SIRD) by talking about the role of not-eating, then I am very pleased to do so.

I am giving myself a kick in the diabetes-backside by getting into periods of not eating again, and I have to say it is clear that fasting in the warm season/summer is MUCH easier than in the cold season/winter. (I am currently in the depths of a cold season.) (I think this is the role of carbs, even low carbs, as comfort food, and the role of food as energy in helping keep you warm.) And that if you haven't fasted for a while, you can have the same not pleasant symptoms of fasting that regularly fasting deals to - which is very clear to me now. (Headaches, feeling jittery, weak even after a shortish time of not eating - that kind of thing.)

Aloe's moral of the moment - if fasting is part of your treatment plan don't let it go for too long! (yeah, yeah, yeah - life gets in the way of a good treatment plan sometimes!)
 

Goonergal

Master
Retired Moderator
Messages
13,466
Type of diabetes
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Just popping in to add my two-cents worth on fasting as regular treatment for type two/diabetes.

I have not been able to find anything that has the same obvious fairly swift health benefits as periodic not eating - however you choose to not eat, or not eat as much as usual.

I got out of the rhythm of IFing, or regularly fasting over a period of days, about nine months ago, and my insulin levels, as in being too high (and therefore my BG rising) rise all too easily, have risen too high again. As in - way over high end normal levels even. Even with LCHF- Keto ways of eating. (I get my insulin levels checked in a C-peptide test, along with my HBA1c and blood lipids, regularly, as I have very severe insulin resistance.)

It reminds me, if I need reminding (and I always live in hope of being able to live healthily without medicating and without regularly not eating also! But alas, this is not the case) - that not eating from time to time really is part of my treatment program. This is as a (now) normal weighted, fit regularly exercising, low-carbing person, in steady remission at prediabetic levels since changing the way I ate and moved post diagnosis. Without periodic not-eating, my diabetes health status deteriorates. And it doesn't take long. (Within a few months.)

I add my experience in here from time to time, as according to the Swedes, about 15% of all those with diabetes have severe insulin resistance. (These are the folks, like me, who don't enter into the world of remission at non-diabetes levels after losing a ton of weight and maintaining it, and eating low carb/keto.) If I can help any other person in my position (as in having severe insulin resistance - called SIRD) by talking about the role of not-eating, then I am very pleased to do so.

I am giving myself a kick in the diabetes-backside by getting into periods of not eating again, and I have to say it is clear that fasting in the warm season/summer is MUCH easier than in the cold season/winter. (I am currently in the depths of a cold season.) (I think this is the role of carbs, even low carbs, as comfort food, and the role of food as energy in helping keep you warm.) And that if you haven't fasted for a while, you can have the same not pleasant symptoms of fasting that regularly fasting deals to - which is very clear to me now. (Headaches, feeling jittery, weak even after a shortish time of not eating - that kind of thing.)

Aloe's moral of the moment - if fasting is part of your treatment plan don't let it go for too long! (yeah, yeah, yeah - life gets in the way of a good treatment plan sometimes!)

Very good advice in my opinion.
 

jpscloud

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Messages
726
Type of diabetes
Type 2
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Tablets (oral)
@AloeSvea thanks so much for that post, I'm having difficulty with staying committed to dealing with my metabolic disease, and it really helps to discuss fasting. If I stop reading and talking about it, I quickly slip into a kind of denial.

This week I'm trying low carb on roughly 16:8, with a couple of OMAD days.
 

AloeSvea

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You seem to be the opposite of in denial @jpscloud :) - wanting to discuss fasting, opening this thread, and so open to it all.

Yes, it's a balancing act between living your life as normally as you can, and dealing with trying to be as healthy as you can be in the wake of diabetes. The longer I live with diabetes, the more clear this balancing act is, for sure. Sometimes, indeed, other things in life just get in the way. (The thing for me was a really nice thing that interfered with regular fasting and IFing, ie meals as social occasions with loved ones, but that didn't make any difference to my insulin production and my liver churning out too much glucose!) (Alas! Wouldn't it be great if it did! :).)
 

jpscloud

Well-Known Member
Messages
726
Type of diabetes
Type 2
Treatment type
Tablets (oral)
You seem to be the opposite of in denial @jpscloud :) - wanting to discuss fasting, opening this thread, and so open to it all.

Yes, it's a balancing act between living your life as normally as you can, and dealing with trying to be as healthy as you can be in the wake of diabetes. The longer I live with diabetes, the more clear this balancing act is, for sure. Sometimes, indeed, other things in life just get in the way. (The thing for me was a really nice thing that interfered with regular fasting and IFing, ie meals as social occasions with loved ones, but that didn't make any difference to my insulin production and my liver churning out too much glucose!) (Alas! Wouldn't it be great if it did! :).)

That's the result of trying to not deny denial! If I slink off and stop posting, stop reading and thinking about it all, I will go back to the kind of denial where i wake up wanting this day to be the day that it all changes, but end up having one more day of - let's just say poor choices for want of a better expression.

There's a mix of record keeping and accountability to posting on the forum that really helps me so thank you!
 
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