Eating-window Sunrise to Sunset IF regime

During extreme weather events and a national emergency, I found it hard not to want to comfort eat at night. Especially with me having prepared some lovely low-carb desserts. And comfort-drink high calorific drinks! Be it stevia sweetened hot chocolates (with water and cream or coconut milk - lots of energy in those drinks!), or a dry wine.

And being high summer I have wanted to put off an evening meal to the actual evening, ie after nightfall. And all the wet evaporting in my poor sodden country makes for high humidity, even more than normal. And it's natural not to want to eat so much when it's high humidity, imho.

So had to apply extra discipline to get back into my usual IF sunrise to sunset 5 days a week routine. (During national emergencies the weekday versus weekend thing kind of disappears too! Of course. )

It's been easier again to eat most in the cooler less humid mornings. But have been getting used to having a two course dinner in the late afternoon (which I need to do in order not to want to eat in the cooler evenings.) (That's when I get to eat the lovely low-carb dessert.) I stick to herb teas in the evening.

I don't know how I would have coped with any of the restricted-eating routines I have experiemented with over the years without herb tea! It's the preparation aspect of it too - making it a bit more Zen. Sooooo many lovely herb teas out there to choose from.

So having to be super-disciplined, and keep my nights with netflix and low-carb snacks and more fun beverages down to the two - regardless of cyclones! Because the national emergency kinda threw the routine out, as such will, I have to pay more attention to the calendar and imposing, if you like, the IF routine more stringently.

This sunrise to sunset has been easy to follow in terms of a nice routine. But difficult when I want to comfort eat and drink during stormy days and nights? Yes.

Well, I've been doing the daytime eating regime for a year now, this being May.

I'm thinking about it a lot, as it has the most impact and effect during the darker months, (here May and June prior to the winter equinox at the end of June) which makes sense. i do know this now. So with daylight being between 7am and 5.30, my waking rhythm has changed and I remember it from last year when I started this thing. It means the eating regime has a much greater impact on the rhythm of my life.

It means an early dinner (which has definitely been the overall effect of the daytime eating window, as one would expect!), a much earlier bedtime, with falling asleep holding my phone watching it, REALLY early (one hour after nightfall). Waking up a few hours later. Going to bed and ditto, and therefore waking up early, and waiting for the sun to rise in order to eat. Two hours! Ouch!

But yeah, it does make breakfast super appreciated and welcome. And I have always eaten most in the morning, so I do the German thing and have two breakfasts, in essence, followed by lunch, an early dinner, and out. I am very grateful for herb teas. And the two days I have in the weekend where I don't IF. (I am pretty sure why this regime is sustainable for me.)

But I was happy this morning as my too high fasting blood glucoses have been getting me down, and it was a reasonable this morning, for me (still too high but better) today. So yay. Makes the waiting for breakfast for two hours easier, that's for sure. And writing this - I have been watching the dawn out my window, and knowing I have some lovely keto bread rolls waiting for me to heat up and slather with butter - yay! Then have some no-grainola with Greek yoghurt and a few blueberries - yay!

Poor Aotearoa - it is still windy and pouring with rain, on and on. (But now bizarrely - not cold! Unusually warm for May. Oh climate change....)
I have come to terms with not comfort eating to deal with it, and embracing the herb teas. I put on a fake fire, as it is too warm right now for a real one, but we homo sapiens love the light, don't we.

Off to breakfast.

Just my latest thoughts and experience with a long-term IF eating window regime. (I know there is an acronym for it - but I never learnt it!)

It's the day before winter solstice- just to remind - the shortest day/darkest day, after which the days get longer again and lighter over time until we get to the sunrise to sunset nirvanna time - summer! And the summer solstice.

And I found myself accidentally using the clock to have breakfast this morning, and not the light levels, on automatic pilot as it were. Which I am not usually on (autopilot), having been doing this IF regime for 13 months now (2 days off a week, usually Friday and Saturday or Saturday and Sunday, for social reasons).

So why this morning? It didn't get light till 7 (being the day before the solstice), and I was cold and hungry, and, had had a good night sleep. I forgot! My desire for my low carb rolls slathered in butter, with stevia sweetened marmalade, and a hot cup of coffee, or more, over powered my IF regime, unconsciously. Thought I would share.

This last week I have also been missing out on dinner, or linner (mid to late afternoon for a combo of lunch and dinner), because I had too much to do in the daylight hours. For physical activity I need lots of breakfast, and lunch. Especially when it is clear skies and low or no wind. So by the next morning, yeah, I am really hungry, and I have been facing my large windows waiting for the sun to rise, for sure. And as I always say - I could not do this without coffee.

This is the time when this particular IF regime is the hardest! When it is the darkest for longest.

Hi @JenniferM55 . Thanks for the heads up on the youtube on fasting conclusion, and the very interesting study on melatonin. Lots of info in there, for sure, and the reminder, right at the end, that the info in the paper "emphasises the importance of biological rhythms for metabolic regulation". Indeed!

CatsFive said:

I wonder where she lives? Not above the artic circle I bet! Where I live, sunrise is 4:21 and sunset 22:05. In 6 months - the 20th Dec 2023 - it will be 8:43 and 15:34. And in December, if there is thick cloud it never really gets properly light.

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Hi there! Dr Boz is based in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, in the US of A. It's northern midwest, so intense but not long winters. compared to other more, ah, challenging ? lattitudes, like the north of the arctic circle you mention (No, I would not entertain the idea of doing a sunrise to sunset eating window in a Swedish long cold and very very dark winter for instance. Quite right!)

Roggg said:

Very interesting and thanks for sharing. Yeah my lattitude would make this pretty impractical. Daylight right now is nearly 16 hours. For me I dont consider an eating window bigger than 12 hours to be fasting of any sort (for me...not judging others) and an eating windows bigger than 8 hours is not all that helpful.

I like the idea of having my eating window in the morning, but I have to cook for my family at dinner, so not centering my windows on my "kitchen time" is just a recipe for disaster.

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I hear you Roggg. Impractical indeed! (But your current daylight hours make it wonderful for reading the paper outdoors at midnight? A neato thing to do for sure!)

I think, @CatsFive, that Dr Boz would assume such folks would count themselves out of a dawn to dusk fasting schedule if living in such lattitudes! . I know I would.

Which is why when I opened this thread I mentioned that I lived in a lattitude that has fairly equal day and night hours all year round. (Aotearoa/New Zealand.)

Anyway - living in very unequal light/dark regions and countries can be challenging. Our species has evolved whole colour/ melatonin differences in order to adapt to greater dark or greater sunrays! (thinking of very pale skin, blue eyes, light coloured/blonde hair.) for the far north and far south (actually - no-one has lived in the far south/Antarctica indigenously for - can't be bothered looking it up, lol - ever?) But where our species began, Africa - dark skin and dark hair and dark eyes to deal with lots of sunlight with no/thin fur. i love evolutionary biology so I am very happy to discuss such.

I have not been going online and checking my stats on this, but I gather far more humans live in more light conditions than live in greatly more dark. My second/adopted country is Sweden, and no Swede I know actually chooses to retire to northern sweden, where for some of the year the sun does not shine at all (even though all that snow and ice is absolutely magical) - for very good reason I might say. The challenges for us of living in such lattitudes can be just too great. (I know and am indirectly related to LOTS of lovely folk from northern Sweden, so my basis for these comments are not... baseless.)

If I was to go back to live in Sweden, which I would actually like to do, at least for parts of the year (guess which parts!) this thread would probably end! At least from me. Just to make clear - as doing a sunlight based fasting regime would not be tenable. Either lots of light with the midnight sun, or, very little light. If going back to live, I would not go north of Sundsvall for health reasons, due to my severe insulin resistance. And, interesitng that the endo-folks who came up with the definition of 'severe insulin resistance diabetes', are Swedes. (Albeit southern ones! Where not coincidentally - is where most Swedes live.) (Stockholm is actually a southern Swedish city.) It's challenging enough to get enough light for health (ie vitamin D) in southern Sweden. I personally wouldn't push it.

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Antje77 said:

Light and dark is equally spread across the globe.
Close to the equator, light and dark don't change much throughout the year, but the further north or south you go, the more difference it makes.

My cousin lives in Harstad, and while the sun doesn't make an appearance for months in winter (although the light does), the sun doesn't drop below the horizon for months in summer.
So all in all, over the year there are no places more dark or more light.

The far northern parts of the world have been inhabited for a very long time too.

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Inhabitated - Not by a lot of folks Antje! Relatively speaking.

We are a magnificent beast, and adapt, but, one of the ways we adapt is by moving to easier climes, lol.

Don't know what you mean by light and dark being equally spread across the globe. I live in the subtropics, and have lived in northern Europe. Clearly not the case that light and dark is equal everywhere, so I think you must be talking about something else. Do you mean all year round or? (Not sure what you mean...)

Once a teacher always a teacher?! For general knowledge, not directed at anyone - Here is a link to a good world map with lattitudes

@Antje77 , I guess technically you are right, but that is not how it is experienced, I believe. Swedish land of the midnight sun is very intense and - short! The winters are very (very) long and dark. In the subtropics where I am, the solstice times are not extreme or lengthy, so the experience of them is nothing much to write home about, imho. I have written about it only because of the permutations of a sunrise to sunset fasting regime , from my light vs dark environs.

So much of my adult life has been comparing the subtropics with a real northern climate, due to being around Swedes, where the adaptation to the lack of light for so many months has a tremendous impact on daily life and culture. (Think gorgeous affordable interiors/IKEA, candles, great affordable clothes.) Including - health, and metabolic health. My own story is testament to this, as I had a serious deficiency in vitamin D both times I developed life changing insulin resistance, during Swedish long cold dark winters. Which is where this thread went with the melatonin introduction, and the whole pineal gland thing.

When people ask me about Swedish winters, I always say, it isn't the cold - easy to buy lovely winter clothes that protect you from that. And, Sweden has gone to great pains to no longer step over frozen dead - from malnutrition and the cold - children in the street - all folks have great heating, if part of the Swedish system. It's dealing with the long periods of darkness that is the real difficulty. I have had 40 years of thinking about these things! And listening to Swedes talk about this. And 30 years with insulin resistance off and on, before I knew that's what it was. Which is why I can write about it so readily.

Totally agreed @CatsFive - we are a pretty amazing species in many ways. But. I mention "a lot of folks" - meaning these areas in your far north tend/to be/are relatively sparsely populated - life is very hard in such climes. In the winter. (and in the antarctica - all year round, hence folks not indigenously living there). No one lived in the far south indigenously for good reason! Always happy to be corrected if anyone knows otherwise. I am using folk knowledge as NZ has quite a lot to do with the Antarctica. I even had a job offer for there as a young woman which I won't go into! Lol. But the far south is a very distant presence for Aotearoa. But none of us come from there . Unlike Hawaiki .

Don't make me Google this y'all! Lol. It's Saturday morning and I have errands to run . All I can say is a dear friend from Northern Sweden (and all his ancestors come from the far north), has been following this exchange/further discussions on the habitability of the far north, and it has been very jolly hearing him laugh. He really knows how hard it is to shovel snow for six months of the year. (As truly beautiful as snow is. Northern Sweden is absolutely gorgeous. As long as you aren't shovelling snow and chopping wood perhaps, stoking the fire is life and death important... do I really need to spell out why the subtropics are easier? OK, he has stopped laughing, and is recommending expeditions by doubters to north of the arctic circle during winter. (Or, I would say - you can just go to youtube and have fun with it...)

In the equal spread of light and dark discussion above, I realise we left out why folks are not getting their full complement of sunrays in northern Sweden during the short intense light summer. Because - folks need to sleep! And northern clime folks go to great lengths to provide themselves with blacked out bedrooms in order to get healthful sleep.

So, that means for 6-9 months, they may not be getting enough light in waking hours. Wonderful of evolution/adaptations to provide all that light skin, eyes, and hair to help them get more light on them in those challenging times.

And why if you want blackout curtains - THE place to buy them is in Scandinavia, for a delightful range. (I have never lived in Siberia or Alaska, so don't know what homeware shopping is like there - but I do know it is magnificent in Scandinavian countries.)

If you do spend too much time in the sun in Sweden/the far north of the northern hemisphere, you do run the risk of malignant melanomas (skin cancer). Sweden is number three for skin cancer, a big drop in numbers from Australia and Aotearoa/NZ, but number three nonetheless last time I looked it up.

Humans have a definite need for synthesizing sunlight on our skins for the essential Vitamin D, but some climates make that challenging. Vitamin D is an essential part of the blood glucose regulation system - without enough of it, it won't work properly.

I guess it is now a personal story of mine which I hope to entertain Swedish folks with in the future, of how I had to explain all of the above, at some length, why a sunrise to sunset IF regime is not practicable in the real northern lattitudes of the northern hemisphere. And to remind no-one has lived indigenously in the far south!