5 ms·

As someone who's had Extensive experience with fasting, both intermittent and extended, I would hardly even consider this study 'Time Restricted Eating' much le

As someone who's had Extensive experience with fasting, both intermittent and extended, I would hardly even consider this study 'Time Restricted Eating' much less fasting.

arcticbull 6y ago
Indeed. This is just eating lunch at noon and dinner any time before 8pm with unlimited snacks allowed in between. That's not much of an intermittent fasting regimen unless you're eating all the time.
RandallBrown 6y ago
Why isn't eating only between noon and 8pm time restricted eating? I thought that was one style of intermittent fasting.
- arcticbull 6y ago
  I don't want to move the goalposts here because I think this is worth studying and I'm happy to see any studies being done at all. From my research, and I'm happy to dig up my sources: The longer you go between meals the more pronounced the effect. 16:8 with ad libitum eating is what a lot of people kinda do naturally if they skip breakfast. The longer you abstain the more pronounced metabolic changes you see. Human growth hormone levels triple over fasted period of, for instance, 5 days. Glucose levels fall off a cliff, and so do free fatty acids. [1] It's unclear that fasting for less than a day would yield similar effects. I think the idea that if you don't eat, you lose weight, is pretty well documented so it feels like all we can really take away from this study is 16:8 with all the food you can eat doesn't qualify. [1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC329619/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC329619/
  - vcxy 6y ago
    For a different point of view: I can't imagine being able to sustain restriction to 8 hours for more than a day. I've struggled with gaining weight my entire life, which is certainly not the norm, so I'm not really a central example of anything. The point about growth hormone is interesting. Im not sure if I'd be able to eat enough Calories in that time to survive, but if I were able to fit them all in to 8 hours, do you think someone who is under weight but doing consistent weight training would actually gain weight?
    - arcticbull 6y ago
      No idea, to be honest! I've been digging around from the all-to-easy-to-gain-weight perspective. It might be interesting for you to check out some of the 'leangains' guy's write-ups. He's a bodybuilder who incorporates fasting into his regimen.
      - vcxy 6y ago
        Thanks for the reference, I'll check it out! I definitely plan to do something like a 16:8 ad libitum (or actually, if I have a minimum to hit, I guess it isn't ad libitum?) eventually, but I'm still working on just getting used to eating at a small surplus in general. Not the typical problem, haha.
  - p1necone 6y ago
    "don't eat, lose weight" is obvious of course. "eat the same amount of calories but with different timing, lose weight" is more interesting. Does having higher growth hormone levels result in burning more calories with the same amount of physical activity?
    - arcticbull 6y ago
      Based on what I've read so far, and again, I'm not an expert, just sort of an arm-chair enthusiast. 1. One major component to weight gain is insulin. Insulin triggers the uptake of blood glucose by your adipocytes, and prevents its release. This means when your insulin is high, your body stores free sugar as fat and prevents your body from releasing it for consumption. 2. Insulin follows a positive feedback cycle and can exhibit a runaway condition, broadly speaking, called insulin resistance. You eat more sugar, your body produces more insulin, your cells get used to the insulin, and your body has to produce more insulin to lower your blood sugar. 3. Eventually your body can't make more insulin. It's tapped out. So your doctor prescribes you, usually, a front-line treatment like Metformin -- itself fascinating in its own right as a life extension drug. Once that's not sufficient to control your blood sugar, you have to start start injecting insulin. This is broadly speaking Type II diabetes and, eventually, metabolic syndrome. 4. The idea with intermittent fasting, or adjusting the timing of your meals, is that your body does in fact lower its insulin level once you stop eating. That much we know. Over time, longer periods in this low-insulin state this will reduce your body's concept of what a "low" insulin level is, walking back that runaway condition. 5. In time, this might reverse Type II diabetes [1]. The linked writeup is a small study, n=3, however: "All three men were able to stop injecting themselves with insulin within a month of starting their fasting schedule. In one case this took only five days." 6. Once insulin levels are normal, you're back to normal, too. HGH reduces body fat and increases lean muscle mass. [2] Further, when fasting, your metabolism is actually elevated, in part due to high levels of noradrenalin. Makes sense, if you're an ape in the jungle and you haven't eaten in a day or so, your body is primed to go out and get more food -- not to waste away. So, lots of moving pieces, and we're not 100% sure yet. There appears to be smoke here, IMO, which is why I mentioned I'm just excited to see any studies at all. [1] https://www.bmj.com/company/newsroom/planned-intermittent-fasting-may-help-reverse-type-2-diabetes-suggest-doctors/ https://www.bmj.com/company/newsroom/planned-intermittent-fa... [2] https://www.acpjournals.org/doi/10.7326/0003-4819-152-9-201005040-00007 https://www.acpjournals.org/doi/10.7326/0003-4819-152-9-2010...
  - LegitShady 6y ago
    What are the effects of hgh on a fasted nutrient state though? You aren't packing on muscle fasted for any length of time.
    - mikevm 6y ago
      You are correct - there aren't (see my post above)
    - arcticbull 6y ago
      Correct, it doesn't add to your muscle mass when fasting, of course, that wouldn't make sense. What it does is increase fat oxidation and prevent the breakdown of your existing muscle. The net of it is a better final body composition; specifically a better fat:muscle ratio.
      - LegitShady 6y ago
        But you can get that ratio with any caloric deficit - no fasting hgh required.
        arcticbull 6y ago
        There are physiological differences between caloric restriction and fasting approaches. Fasting naturally ends up in ketosis where you body has switched to using lipids as your primary fuel and hgh supports that process. This isn’t the case with normal caloric restriction diets generally speaking. Continually eating keeps insulin levels up, suppresses hgh production and unless you’re very intentional about it, keeps you out of ketosis making your primary fuel glucose instead of fat. Your body also produces substantial amounts of noradrenalin while fasting. Further compliance is another area where you may see differences. A lot of people find it much easier to eat nothing at all than to count and document each calorie. Certainly if ketosis if your goal where getting to that point takes few days and accidentally eating a few grams of sugar physically switches your brains primary fuel source from ketones to glucose. Lastly the other big difference between continuous caloric restriction and fasting is that your metabolism will slow down when you’re on a CR diet to match your new food intake level over time. I can find some studies. However that is not true of fasting approaches. The reality is weight loss via caloric restriction is incredibly hard. WeightWatchers for instance published a study that showed people on their program were less likely to lose weight than the general public. Caloric restriction diets generally simply do not work. You can always blame compliance or the participants but at the end of the day the goal of a weight loss program is to have compliance. The reality is your body is in a very different mode when you eat nothing as compared to when you’re eating a little less.
- p1necone 6y ago
  This describes me most days and I'm certainly not intentionally fasting. I just don't really like to eat breakfast, so my first meal is usually lunch sometime around 12, and dinner is usually before 8. I might have a coffee in the morning though (although I suspect coffee on an empty stomach in the morning is making my anxiety worse, so perhaps making myself eat breakfast would be a good idea)

As someone who's had Extensive experience with fasting, both intermittent and extended, I would hardly even consider this study 'Time Restricted Eating' much less fasting.

arcticbull 6y ago

Indeed. This is just eating lunch at noon and dinner any time before 8pm with unlimited snacks allowed in between. That's not much of an intermittent fasting regimen unless you're eating all the time.

RandallBrown 6y ago

Why isn't eating only between noon and 8pm time restricted eating? I thought that was one style of intermittent fasting.

arcticbull 6y ago
I don't want to move the goalposts here because I think this is worth studying and I'm happy to see any studies being done at all. From my research, and I'm happy to dig up my sources: The longer you go between meals the more pronounced the effect. 16:8 with ad libitum eating is what a lot of people kinda do naturally if they skip breakfast. The longer you abstain the more pronounced metabolic changes you see. Human growth hormone levels triple over fasted period of, for instance, 5 days. Glucose levels fall off a cliff, and so do free fatty acids. [1] It's unclear that fasting for less than a day would yield similar effects. I think the idea that if you don't eat, you lose weight, is pretty well documented so it feels like all we can really take away from this study is 16:8 with all the food you can eat doesn't qualify. [1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC329619/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC329619/
- vcxy 6y ago
  For a different point of view: I can't imagine being able to sustain restriction to 8 hours for more than a day. I've struggled with gaining weight my entire life, which is certainly not the norm, so I'm not really a central example of anything. The point about growth hormone is interesting. Im not sure if I'd be able to eat enough Calories in that time to survive, but if I were able to fit them all in to 8 hours, do you think someone who is under weight but doing consistent weight training would actually gain weight?
  - arcticbull 6y ago
    No idea, to be honest! I've been digging around from the all-to-easy-to-gain-weight perspective. It might be interesting for you to check out some of the 'leangains' guy's write-ups. He's a bodybuilder who incorporates fasting into his regimen.
    - vcxy 6y ago
      Thanks for the reference, I'll check it out! I definitely plan to do something like a 16:8 ad libitum (or actually, if I have a minimum to hit, I guess it isn't ad libitum?) eventually, but I'm still working on just getting used to eating at a small surplus in general. Not the typical problem, haha.
- p1necone 6y ago
  "don't eat, lose weight" is obvious of course. "eat the same amount of calories but with different timing, lose weight" is more interesting. Does having higher growth hormone levels result in burning more calories with the same amount of physical activity?
  - arcticbull 6y ago
    Based on what I've read so far, and again, I'm not an expert, just sort of an arm-chair enthusiast. 1. One major component to weight gain is insulin. Insulin triggers the uptake of blood glucose by your adipocytes, and prevents its release. This means when your insulin is high, your body stores free sugar as fat and prevents your body from releasing it for consumption. 2. Insulin follows a positive feedback cycle and can exhibit a runaway condition, broadly speaking, called insulin resistance. You eat more sugar, your body produces more insulin, your cells get used to the insulin, and your body has to produce more insulin to lower your blood sugar. 3. Eventually your body can't make more insulin. It's tapped out. So your doctor prescribes you, usually, a front-line treatment like Metformin -- itself fascinating in its own right as a life extension drug. Once that's not sufficient to control your blood sugar, you have to start start injecting insulin. This is broadly speaking Type II diabetes and, eventually, metabolic syndrome. 4. The idea with intermittent fasting, or adjusting the timing of your meals, is that your body does in fact lower its insulin level once you stop eating. That much we know. Over time, longer periods in this low-insulin state this will reduce your body's concept of what a "low" insulin level is, walking back that runaway condition. 5. In time, this might reverse Type II diabetes [1]. The linked writeup is a small study, n=3, however: "All three men were able to stop injecting themselves with insulin within a month of starting their fasting schedule. In one case this took only five days." 6. Once insulin levels are normal, you're back to normal, too. HGH reduces body fat and increases lean muscle mass. [2] Further, when fasting, your metabolism is actually elevated, in part due to high levels of noradrenalin. Makes sense, if you're an ape in the jungle and you haven't eaten in a day or so, your body is primed to go out and get more food -- not to waste away. So, lots of moving pieces, and we're not 100% sure yet. There appears to be smoke here, IMO, which is why I mentioned I'm just excited to see any studies at all. [1] https://www.bmj.com/company/newsroom/planned-intermittent-fasting-may-help-reverse-type-2-diabetes-suggest-doctors/ https://www.bmj.com/company/newsroom/planned-intermittent-fa... [2] https://www.acpjournals.org/doi/10.7326/0003-4819-152-9-201005040-00007 https://www.acpjournals.org/doi/10.7326/0003-4819-152-9-2010...
- LegitShady 6y ago
  What are the effects of hgh on a fasted nutrient state though? You aren't packing on muscle fasted for any length of time.
  - mikevm 6y ago
    You are correct - there aren't (see my post above)
  - arcticbull 6y ago
    Correct, it doesn't add to your muscle mass when fasting, of course, that wouldn't make sense. What it does is increase fat oxidation and prevent the breakdown of your existing muscle. The net of it is a better final body composition; specifically a better fat:muscle ratio.
    - LegitShady 6y ago
      But you can get that ratio with any caloric deficit - no fasting hgh required.
      - arcticbull 6y ago
        There are physiological differences between caloric restriction and fasting approaches. Fasting naturally ends up in ketosis where you body has switched to using lipids as your primary fuel and hgh supports that process. This isn’t the case with normal caloric restriction diets generally speaking. Continually eating keeps insulin levels up, suppresses hgh production and unless you’re very intentional about it, keeps you out of ketosis making your primary fuel glucose instead of fat. Your body also produces substantial amounts of noradrenalin while fasting. Further compliance is another area where you may see differences. A lot of people find it much easier to eat nothing at all than to count and document each calorie. Certainly if ketosis if your goal where getting to that point takes few days and accidentally eating a few grams of sugar physically switches your brains primary fuel source from ketones to glucose. Lastly the other big difference between continuous caloric restriction and fasting is that your metabolism will slow down when you’re on a CR diet to match your new food intake level over time. I can find some studies. However that is not true of fasting approaches. The reality is weight loss via caloric restriction is incredibly hard. WeightWatchers for instance published a study that showed people on their program were less likely to lose weight than the general public. Caloric restriction diets generally simply do not work. You can always blame compliance or the participants but at the end of the day the goal of a weight loss program is to have compliance. The reality is your body is in a very different mode when you eat nothing as compared to when you’re eating a little less.
p1necone 6y ago
This describes me most days and I'm certainly not intentionally fasting. I just don't really like to eat breakfast, so my first meal is usually lunch sometime around 12, and dinner is usually before 8. I might have a coffee in the morning though (although I suspect coffee on an empty stomach in the morning is making my anxiety worse, so perhaps making myself eat breakfast would be a good idea)