What is the difference between starvation and fasting?

[Tumbleweed2018]

Fasting has not helped me loose weight. It does lower my BG for a week or so after.

That's another puzzle for me. I've read about autophagy, which (I think) means the body "eats itself". For the people it works for they can lose vast amounts of weight without having loads of skin hanging off, and look as if they have never been fat. But for many people it doesn't seem to make any difference.

This man seems to have worked miracles with fasting :

https://www.dietdoctor.com/with-one-foot-in-the-grave-robert-turned-it-around-and-lost-200-lbs

I'm just a fraction of his 200lbs overweight. I just feel that there must be a secret to doing what he has done that somehow I am missing out on and I really want to know what that secret is, which was why I started this thread. I know that women tend to find it harder to lose weight than men. Being hypothyroid means my metabolism is slower than normal. I know I have a fatty liver which will be making my risk of full-blown type 2 diabetes much higher than it would be otherwise, as well as risking various other health issues.

 

[NicoleC1971]

I would love to be able to fast and lose weight like others do. I'm hypothyroid and my weight is going up and up. For the last few years I've felt like I'm re-living my late mother's life (in health terms), and I know how big she got. I don't want to follow in her footsteps.

Are you being treated for your hypothyroidism and do you know the origin of this condition? i.e. is it autoimmune (hashimotos' versus iodine deficiency or other?) If the former then there are reputed to be benefits to eating low carb/high fat and you may not need to dive off the deep end into fasting right away. It all depends on where you are now in terms of diet!

 

[Brunneria]

If you have hypothyroidism, and your medication isn’t tweaked to work properly, then you will find yourself at a massive disadvantage to losing weight. Same for people who have polycystic ovary syndrome.

don’t beat yourself up for something your body is doing that means it doesn’t react in the same way as other people who don’t have your hormonal imbalance.

i would suggest that you go back to your doc and get full thyroid panels done, so establish where (and if) your hypothyroid is blocking weight loss. Get that sorted, and you may find that your reaction to fasting and or weight loss changes.

 

[Tumbleweed2018]

So what are you eating? Maybe you could lose some weight without fasting by changing what you eat.

Or you may even find that changing what you eat may help with fasting too.

I tend to eat one meal a day. I can't go without food longer than that. I usually use one of the low carb or keto recipes from the Diet Doctor website. Because I'm not eating any other meals I tend to make the portion size a bit bigger than is suggested. If I don't use one of those recipes I will eat steak and eggs, or lamb or pork chops + vegetables or a large cheese and ham omelette with a salad.

 

[Hotpepper20000]

That's another puzzle for me. I've read about autophagy, which (I think) means the body "eats itself". For the people it works for they can lose vast amounts of weight without having loads of skin hanging off, and look as if they have never been fat. But for many people it doesn't seem to make any difference.

This man seems to have worked miracles with fasting :

https://www.dietdoctor.com/with-one-foot-in-the-grave-robert-turned-it-around-and-lost-200-lbs

I'm just a fraction of his 200lbs overweight. I just feel that there must be a secret to doing what he has done that somehow I am missing out on and I really want to know what that secret is, which was why I started this thread. I know that women tend to find it harder to lose weight than men. Being hypothyroid means my metabolism is slower than normal. I know I have a fatty liver which will be making my risk of full-blown type 2 diabetes much higher than it would be otherwise, as well as risking various other health issues.

For me LCHF was very effective. I lost 60 pounds and have BG in normal Range. I still have weight to lose but with PCOS it makes it difficult. Now I just skip breakfast and eat in a 8 hour window.
With a hypothyroid it would make everything more challenging. Maybe instead of looking at extended fasting concentrate on very low carb and a reduced window of eating.
Extended fasts are not for everyone. They are not for me.

 

[bulkbiker]

I tend to eat one meal a day. I can't go without food longer than that. I usually use one of the low carb or keto recipes from the Diet Doctor website. Because I'm not eating any other meals I tend to make the portion size a bit bigger than is suggested. If I don't use one of those recipes I will eat steak and eggs, or lamb or pork chops + vegetables or a large cheese and ham omelette with a salad.

Are you hungry after your OMAD?
It sounds a bit like you might not be eating enough and slipping into calorie restriction modre which can lead to metabolic slowdown. I'd suggest following up what @Brunneria has typed above.
Being male I think I react to things very differently... sorry.

 

[Tumbleweed2018]

Are you being treated for your hypothyroidism and do you know the origin of this condition?

I treat my own hypothyroidism. I was first diagnosed with having "borderline underactive thyroid" in the early 90s and was told that I didn't need treating. I got my first prescription for 25mcg Levo in 2013, over 20 years later. It made me feel dreadful. I gave up with Levo (after several months) and now treat myself with T3. When untreated my TSH is always over the reference range but never reaches the dizzy heights that the NHS expects it to reach before treating. I doubt I would get a diagnosis nowadays. When left to their own devices and untreated my Free T4 and Free T3 are usually in the bottom 5% - 15% of the reference range.

I suspect I have secondary hypothyroidism but since Levo makes me feel so awful I have never bothered pursuing a diagnosis.

I got my first ever very slightly positive test for TG Antibodies about a year ago. My TPO antibodies have always been in range.

 

[Guzzler]

That's another puzzle for me. I've read about autophagy, which (I think) means the body "eats itself". For the people it works for they can lose vast amounts of weight without having loads of skin hanging off, and look as if they have never been fat. But for many people it doesn't seem to make any difference.

This man seems to have worked miracles with fasting :

https://www.dietdoctor.com/with-one-foot-in-the-grave-robert-turned-it-around-and-lost-200-lbs

I'm just a fraction of his 200lbs overweight. I just feel that there must be a secret to doing what he has done that somehow I am missing out on and I really want to know what that secret is, which was why I started this thread. I know that women tend to find it harder to lose weight than men. Being hypothyroid means my metabolism is slower than normal. I know I have a fatty liver which will be making my risk of full-blown type 2 diabetes much higher than it would be otherwise, as well as risking various other health issues.

A better way of looking at autophagy is to think of it as recycling. Old and amaged cells are broken down into constituent parts and reused, nothing is wasted. Only with true starvation will the body access muscle tissue in extremis which is what I think you may be thinking.

 

[Tumbleweed2018]

I believe that the experts mostly say NOT to fast if you are underweight

I've never been underweight, only ever normal weight or over weight.

 

[ianf0ster]

I tend to eat one meal a day. I can't go without food longer than that. I usually use one of the low carb or keto recipes from the Diet Doctor website. Because I'm not eating any other meals I tend to make the portion size a bit bigger than is suggested. If I don't use one of those recipes I will eat steak and eggs, or lamb or pork chops + vegetables or a large cheese and ham omelette with a salad.

Hi,
On the surface you seem to be doing all you can to lose weight. -What, When and How much you eat has a much larger effect on weight than (additional) exercise does provided you meet the minimum NHS standards of around a 30 min brisk walk 5 times per week.

So it seems likely that the problem is something like an under-medication of your thyroid problem. Check with your GP and get a full set of thyroid tests done.

However it is remotely possible to dive into Low Carb or Keto too hard, so as to get poor results. By that I mean if you inadvertently reduce your total calorie intake before your body gets adjusted to 'burning' your stored body fat as fuel.

If that happens, your body reacts to the situation as one of starvation (not fasting since you are still taking in calories) and slows down your metabolism. This situation is extremely common in conventional diets ( WW, SW etc. and even to some extent in Newcastle and 'Blood sugar') and it is the chief cause of longer-term weight loss failure and often actually yoyo dieting and overall weight gain.

It is to try to distinguish what I do with LCHF from such diets that I call LCHF a 'Way Of Eating' - meaning don't go hungry, just let your body adapt and in most cases that leads to not feeling hungry at a meal time. When that happens, then there is no need to force oneself to eat and it confirms that the body is using up stored body fat for the purpose for which it evolved!

 

[Tumbleweed2018]

Are you hungry after your OMAD?
It sounds a bit like you might not be eating enough and slipping into calorie restriction modre which can lead to metabolic slowdown. I'd suggest following up what @Brunneria has typed above.
Being male I think I react to things very differently... sorry.

That does sound feasible. Maybe I should start eating breakfast again.

 

[bulkbiker]

That does sound feasible. Maybe I should start eating breakfast again.

Depending on when you have your main meal.. I tend to not eat in the morning but always have dinner and sometimes lunch so I try to maintain a 16-18 hour fasted period.

 

[ianf0ster]

That does sound feasible. Maybe I should start eating breakfast again.

If you try 2 meals per day, then both for Blood Glucose and for Weight, it is better if they are both within a 6hr to 8hr time window. This is known as Time Restricted Eating.

So it would be better to eat either Breakfast and Lunch , or Lunch and Dinner - rather than Breakfast and Dinner.
But eat enough each meal to keep you going until the next meal - it is important NOT to go hungry!

 

[Resurgam]

Comparisons done decades ago found that eating low carb resulted in more fat loss than fasting, so it isn't something I'd recommend. It might result in more weightloss because things other than fat loss happen when fasting - but if the aim is to reduce body fat fasting is not the way to go.
I was eating twice a day early and late as that helped control my blood glucose better than not eating breakfast.
Since getting dehydrated and over heated on one day in August I have not been eating as much and often only eat once a day. Odd how something apparently random and unrelated can change things. It isn't something I'd recommend, and have not made much of it as I don't understand it.
Previously I could fast for twelve hours or even more as I did not need food, did not even think about it. I think that when starving people think of nothing else, but on my diet I am fully nourished by what I do eat.
If fasting reduces activity, or energy, or the ability to control what is eaten after breaking it, then it isn't really a good option.

 

[ianf0ster]

I had been thinking of starting a thread called "It's Not Rocket Science" about Metabolic Syndrome/ Diabetes/ Hypertension/ Obesity, But here and now seems as good a place to mention the basics (all fully accepted by conventional medicine except where I note otherwise:

Insulin is the Fat regulating hormone - it drives Glucose in the Blood into either muscle Cells (for use as energy) or if more energy is not needed into Fat Cells for storage. Muscle cells (and the Brain) can't store much glucose and the blood stream can only hold the equivalent of around 1 teaspoon of sugar, so stored Body fat is vital for human life. But because Insulin causes excess Glucose to be stored as body fat, it also prevents body fat being used to fuel the body at that time. It is far more important to use up the excess Glucose in the blood stream!

Eating carbohydrates increase/spike Blood Glucose -almost instantaneously since they even break down in contact with saliva and can be absorbed in the mouth.

Now the part that (stupidly mainstream medicine has a problem with:
Isn't it obvious from the above accepted facts that you can't burn body fat while you have high Insulin. Therefore you can't do it while frequently eating carbs. Therefore it is almost impossible to lose weight on a higher Carb diet - which is just the diet that mainstream medicine says we should eat !

Solution: Eat lower Carbs - and to make sure your body doesn't defeat that by going into starvation mode, increase the calories which have no effect on Blood Glucose - those are the Fats and Oils !

 

[ianf0ster]

Comparisons done decades ago found that eating low carb resulted in more fat loss than fasting, so it isn't something I'd recommend. It might result in more weightloss because things other than fat loss happen when fasting - but if the aim is to reduce body fat fasting is not the way to go.
……..
If fasting reduces activity, or energy, or the ability to control what is eaten after breaking it, then it isn't really a good option.

With respect Resurgam, I think you are talking about comparisons between Intermittent fasting or OMAD and Low Carb rather than fasting for weeks/months as is done by the morbidly obese at Dr Jason Fung's practice in Toronto.

Lets face it, few people could stand to lose several hundred lbs.

But I would agree 100% that Low Carb is easier ( don't go hungry, count carbs, not calories) and is tolerated well by most people.

Long term fasting doesn't in fact reduce energy - but it takes from 3 days to more than 1 week in order to turn the body to 'fat adapted' , have lots of energy and banish the hunger.

 

[LittleGreyCat]

I tend to eat one meal a day. I can't go without food longer than that. I usually use one of the low carb or keto recipes from the Diet Doctor website. Because I'm not eating any other meals I tend to make the portion size a bit bigger than is suggested. If I don't use one of those recipes I will eat steak and eggs, or lamb or pork chops + vegetables or a large cheese and ham omelette with a salad.

Ah!
Then you are already fasting
One Meal A Day (OMAD) is generally considered to be a form of fasting.
OMAD is the same as a 23 (unless you eat very slowly) hour fast if you eat at the same time every day.
You are also almost certainly keto adapted.

Is your problem, then, that if you skip your one meal and eat nothing for a day your body "shouts" at you?
That is, going straight to a 48 hour fast?
Facing a whole day with no prospect of food can be very mentally daunting.

If you want to fast for longer than 24 hours then you could try slipping your next meal.
For example:
Day 1 - eat lunch at 12:00 noon.
Day 2 - eat evening meal at 18:00 (30 hour fast)
Day 3 - eat breakfast at 08:00 (just an overnight fast)
Day 4 - eat evening meal at 18:00 (34 hour fast)
This way you are fasting for over a full day each time on Day 2 and Day 4, but you always know that you will be eating at some time during the day so shouldn't be as anxious.

If you can manage this then you might eventually fast from 18:00 through a whole 24 hour day and then eat at 08:00 the following morning. That might be a big mental hurdle, but in fact it is a 38 hour fast which is only 4 hours more than Day 4 which you have already managed.
However you would have proved to yourself that you can go a whole day without eating and without too much anxiety.

I tend to eat one proper meal a day plus I have coffee + cream + butter first thing in the morning.
Some people sometimes have the coffee mixture in the morning and then fast until next morning.

As others have suggested, you may be eating too little and a small snack at another part of the day (or the loaded coffee in the morning) might make you feel better.

 

[DCUKMod]

I would love to be able to fast and lose weight like others do. I'm hypothyroid and my weight is going up and up. For the last few years I've felt like I'm re-living my late mother's life (in health terms), and I know how big she got. I don't want to follow in her footsteps.

To be honest, Tumbleweed, if you are hypothyroid and not absorbing your nutrients well, I would challenge if your hypothyroidism is well enough treated. Feeling unwell, gaining weight and a diminished ability to absorb some nutrients are all issues for some people living with hypothyroidism.

When was your thyroid last checked and tested. By tested, I don't just mean a TSH figure. In my view, once diagnosed the TSH is not a useful measure. Do you know if you have Hashimotos?

TSH is a signalling hormone. It tells the thyroid how hard to work. It doesn't indicate the thyroid actually works, or if it does work that it completes all it's processes, like converting your natural and supplemented T4 into T3 which is the really clever hormone.

Have you discussed this with your doctor?

 

[Resurgam]

With respect Resurgam, I think you are talking about comparisons between Intermittent fasting or OMAD and Low Carb rather than fasting for weeks/months as is done by the morbidly obese at Dr Jason Fung's practice in Toronto.
Lets face it, few people could stand to lose several hundred lbs.
But I would agree 100% that Low Carb is easier ( don't go hungry, count carbs, not calories) and is tolerated well by most people.
Long term fasting doesn't in fact reduce energy - but it takes from 3 days to more than 1 week in order to turn the body to 'fat adapted' , have lots of energy and banish the hunger.

No - fasting as in not eating at all. It was only for a couple of weeks - I suspect that when the results started to go the wrong way the trial was stopped. It was a properly done trial with various measurements being made and the type of body tissue being lost was either calculated or measured somehow.
The fasting did, I believe result in more loss in weight, but as of it was water and some muscle. I think the subjects were obese teenagers.

 

[DCUKMod]

I treat my own hypothyroidism. I was first diagnosed with having "borderline underactive thyroid" in the early 90s and was told that I didn't need treating. I got my first prescription for 25mcg Levo in 2013, over 20 years later. It made me feel dreadful. I gave up with Levo (after several months) and now treat myself with T3. When untreated my TSH is always over the reference range but never reaches the dizzy heights that the NHS expects it to reach before treating. I doubt I would get a diagnosis nowadays. When left to their own devices and untreated my Free T4 and Free T3 are usually in the bottom 5% - 15% of the reference range.

I suspect I have secondary hypothyroidism but since Levo makes me feel so awful I have never bothered pursuing a diagnosis.

I got my first ever very slightly positive test for TG Antibodies about a year ago. My TPO antibodies have always been in range.

Tumbleweed, you state where your FT3 and FT3 readings sit, in range, when untreated. Where do they sit when you are medicated?