I don’t like diets.
But I do diet….
And the diet I use if I want to lose fat is always intermittent fasting (IM).
Of course, I’ll be the first to admit that there’s probably nothing special about it. Although you may hear about the medical miracles of fasting, the intermittent fasting protocol I use involves too narrow of a fasting window to have any benefits beyond those that come from a reduced caloric intake.
Said bluntly.. The magic from IM fasting rests largely in tricking you into eating less than you normally would.
So, why does it always work for me if I need to drop 10lbs?
Because it fits my lifestyle.
The IM protocol I use is the 16/8 one. And because I’m a simple person that can rarely do two things well at once, I only have two rules when using it:
1. Fast for 16 hours. Eat for 8 hours.
2. Eat 1 gram of protein per lean pound of body weight.
Simple. Right?
In fact, that’s precisely why it works… Simplicity.
A few things to take note…
The fast isn’t as miserable as it sounds..
I sleep 8 hours every night so my fast is immediately cut in half. I stop eating 3 hours before I usually go to bed so that means my last meal is at 9pm, which keeps me full until I fall asleep at midnight. I’m down to 5 hours now. My morning shift at the pharmacy is exactly 5 hours so by my lunch break I’ve entered the feast phase. With water and a diet soda, the fast is painlessly manageable, even for a carboholic like myself.
The feast isn’t as appetizing as it sounds
Of course, when you imagine you won’t touch a piece of food for 16 hours, you assume you’ll eat everything in sight as soon as that 16th-hour hits. You won’t because:
1. When you imagine gorging on food during your feast window, you assume you’ll have 8 straight hours to eat. You won’t. You’ll have kids to play with, errands to run, exercise to do (hint, hint), and fifty other things on your agenda in addition to eating. More than likely you won’t have time for more than 2 actual meals and a snack.
2. Because the window is only 8 hours, it’s hard to have two huge meals back-to-back.
3. The 2nd rule regarding protein helps control the binge since protein is the most satiating macronutrient. If you have 120lbs of leans mass, consuming 120 grams of protein in an eight-hour window will reduce even the most ravenous appetite.
It’s not time-consuming.
The last thing I need in my life is more complexity. Counting calories, meal prepping on Sundays, and hitting macronutrient targets just don’t work for me. I usually start off like a champ, but by week 3, I embarrassingly become a chump. With IM fasting, I only count protein. No meal plans. No meal prepping. No macro counting. And because I’m a pretty habitual eater, adjustments are easy since I’m only eating 2 meals per day along with a snack. Even at my busiest, IM fasting still fits my lifestyle.
Again I want to emphasize that I lose weight, not because of any magical properties IM fasting has, but instead because I eat fewer calories than I normally would on it. That’s it.
Is IM fasting for you? I don’t know. Does it fit your lifestyle?
