I do low carb plus IF. I do 18/6 with a couple of 24 hour days. Some days I eat two times, some just once a day. I dont count calories. I eat if I’m hungry and stop when full. Being low carb makes IF easy because it takes away my appetite. I started 7/24 and I’ve lost 25 lbs.

Bfenton, in the NS videos, they say many people can get away with 2 meals per day. So, no, if you skip a meal, you would not make it up. On Thursday I went to breakfast from the City which was eggs and bacon, then I didn't eat lunch because I wasn't hungry and just had dinner. Today, had late breakfast around 11 a.m. because we were up a little later watching the UFC PPV, and I have not eaten lunch. I did not do spin today but will walk on the treadmill.

WTG, Kitch4me!! I would be thrilled to get there.

ETA: Here's an article on IF from one of the publications of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics https://foodandnutrition.org/Current-Issue/#A016_SO2018

Gs, you’re on your way!

As an aside, I first learned about I/F while perusing Youtube re a totally unrelated subject when it showed up on my sidebar. I started to SOB thinking, "Oh, geez...another crazy fad diet" but had to take a look. All I could think after watching was that it was the answer I'd been looking for to solve the b/fast issue I had, not for weight loss as that wasn't an issue for me.

The very next day I had a guy scheduled to come to the house to do some work. He arrived at 10 a.m. and left at 3. As we were settling up I commented that he must be famished since he hadn't taken time off to eat. He explained that yes he was a little hungry and hadn't eaten since 9 pm the night before. Turned out he began IF a few years ago. He's young and fit but said that in spite of his physically active job and working out regularly, he found he would put on weight in the winter. His trainer recommended I/F and his weight has remained stable since.

I agree that it is a fascinating subject!

Kitch4me, that's exceptional! Good for you.

Thank you writersblock and gsciencechick!

Forgot to say earlier that it's true that intermittent fasting is easier if you're also doing low-carb. I've been on an extreme keto regimen for about three weeks now as an experiment to see if it will help my nerve damage, and I find it almost impossible to eat as much as I'm supposed to, even with only two meals a day.

I've pretty much always lived my life doing IF. Not on purpose, but it fits with my "eat to live" habits compared to persons with "live to eat" habits. I've always been on the lower end of the BMI charts weight ranges.

My DS, a young adult, loves all food and had struggled with controlling portions. A few months ago he started IF on his own and has lost 20 lbs and says that he now has an understanding of when he has eaten enough to satisfy hunger and energy needs.

Edit to add that I have always eaten very little carbs and mostly eat high protein and full fat foods. I could never be a vegetarian! I also don't drink alcohol, which I think makes a huge difference for women as they get past the age of 45. I was never a big drinker and after having kids the effects seemed even worse, so I gradually just stopped wanting to drink any.

I had bariatric surgery and lost 172 lbs. I yo-yo'd my whole life and lost - but regained - 100 lbs twice. That's why I opted for surgery so I'm different than most people but I do have some tips. First, I totally agree with Chispa in that protein and full fat is very important in satiety. Full fat because most low-fat foods high higher junk carbs.

I snack on protein - eggs (usually keep deviled eggs in fridge); cheese (full fat); pork rinds - not everybody likes these but I do and they give me my crunch I used to get with potato chips without hooking me back on bad carbs; beef jerky; nuts but have to beware of amount of these. Greek yogurt (beware of higher sugar in some brands) that I've added flavor to; and my favorite is a quality protein drink that I've put in popsicle molds. Sometimes I'll add in some blueberries or strawberries after I've eaten the protein if I'm not full.

I'm forced to eat slowly or it will make me sick. My surgeon told me this is the hardest habit for people to break - eating fast - and I agree. I grew up in a house where we had plenty of food but you had to eat everything on your plate before you could have seconds. So sometimes - usually - it was a rush and competition with one of my brothers to finish the first serving so we could have seconds of our favorites. It was very ingrained!

Wow, pattyxlynn, were the lifestyle changes after surgery really hard?

Pattyxlynn, thank you for your perspective. Super interesting.

We made home-made pizza last night. Fortunately I am able to control to one slice. I use regular flour but I've seen recipes lately with cauliflower flour.

I am hungry this morning, so I will need to eat soon before I head out to the office.

Pattyxlynn, are you familiar with fathead crust? You really can't overeat pizza made that way, and I can't even eat it with regular pizza toppings. I need lots of veggies to cut the richness, although I was never one for those kinds of pizzas with regular dough:

https://headbangerskitchen.com

Very low carb. There are other variations on the dough but this is the easiest and lowest carb one I've found.

By the way, congratulations on sticking with it after the surgery. I know so many people who wind up gaining back weight because they get careless.

Congratulations, Patty, on your weight loss and lifestyle changes!

Speaking of pancakes, have you tried the recipe which calls for one mashed ripe banana beaten with two eggs (https://www.geniuskitchen.com/recipe/2-ingredients-eggs-banana-pancakes-501408#activity-feed)? These are actually pretty good!

I started eating KETO a little over 6 months ago. I have successfully done the low carb South Beach diet in the past. After about 2 months on KETO, I started IF. I only eat between 1pm and 8pm. I eat 'breakfast' at 1pm, some snacks at 4pm and dinner at 7pm. I am not hungry outside of those hours. I only wanted to lose about 25 pounds and I hit my goal in July. I feel great eating this way and I intend to mostly keep it up. KETO is very restrictive. I do follow the guidelines at home, but relax it a bit when we are out.

Thank you all, I'm so happy with this lifestyle change!

Whatsayyou, I very rarely eat bananas as they are high in sugar. I did eat them when we recently visited Rio de Janeiro as their bananas are a third of the size of ours and delicious! I used to make pancakes in my 20's with the banana and egg so I know they are good.

Writersblock, Thanks for the link. I haven't tried it but will check it out. The website looks like a great resource! I have had chicken crust pizza and while good, I wouldn't quite equate it with a regular crusted pizza. Same for the cauliflower crust.

Two questions for the IF folks (who don’t eat early in the day):

Do you have coffee in the morning?

Do you exercise in the morning?

I feel like I could skip breakfast but I don’t think I could skip coffee! And, I’ve convinced myself that I have to eat something (usually just a banana) before I exercise but maybe I actually wouldn’t die if I didn’t eat?

I'm not a coffee drinker but it is my understanding that black coffee is fine. I do drink herbal tea if I wake up hungry.

I don't exercise in the a.m. (walk every evening for an hour) with the exception of an a.m. Pilates class once or twice a week.

Sueb, not IF but the program I am using said if you exercise you probably do need to eat something. I could not get through Spin class fasted. In the mornings, your glycogen is low.

Now doing my treadmill desk at < 2 mph I probably don't need to worry if it was fasted.

Oh yeah, definitely need coffee!! We can use creamer if < 1 g sugar. Some people use real cream or half and half too.

Sue, coffee is allowed, as well as tea, water and bone broth. I drink one cup in the morning with a small amount of heavy whipping cream and stevia, technically a no no. Dr. Fung, from dietdoctor.com allows Hwc on his program. I don’t exercise, other than walking the dog in the evening.

The website looks like a great resource!

Yeah, he has a lot of good recipes, although his soups are pretty terrible. I put that down to the difference in ingredients between here and India. Another useful site is dietdoctor.com. Lots of low-carb and keto recipes, there, too.

BTW, I have given up artificial sweeteners like Stevia, Splenda etc. so I do not like that this program kind of encourages them. I don't even know the last time I had a diet coke.

Sue,

I don't drink coffee, but do drink green tea in the morning. Coffee is fine, just without caloric additions.

I take long, brisk walks in the morning before eating (18-19 hours into my fast) without any problems. If you mean high intensity workouts, check YouTube...there are a lot of athletes doing IF.

Bone broth has calories and will end a fast.

I never had any issues doing a hard workout without eating anything in the morning. Even a morning of hard skiing. Depending on timing, I might have some black tea, with nothing added, first thing in the morning.

For me, it seems strange seeing people call this a "diet". I just never felt hungry first thing in the morning and never felt I had to eat because someone else had labeled that time as "breakfast".

I mostly follow an IF type eating schedule usually not eating before noon. I have found that eating breakfast, regardless of what I eat, makes me hungrier throughout the rest of the day. Unless cross-country skiing or hours longer vigorous hiking, most of my regular exercise regimen is in the morning before I eat anything. This is just what works for me.

I have also been a vegetarian for more than 30 years. I don't worry about carbs at all; I just look at my choices and try to vary what I eat constantly. Again, this is what works for me, and isn't a plan for everyone.

I respect and admire anyone who is working to be healthy with their food choices. It is a very tough thing to make changes like this.

BTW, I have given up artificial sweeteners like Stevia, Splenda etc. so I do not like that this program kind of encourages them.

I wouldn't like that, either, gsciencechick. I can never get over the number of people who fall for the "this one is different" narrative about artificial sweeteners, even though it's been shown over and over that faking your body out about sweets leads to trouble. It bothers me about the young kids all over youtube who do keto for no special reason--they all have a slew of dessert recipes loaded with all that stuff, thinking you can have it all.

While there's a lot I don't like about the extreme keto they're having me do right now, one agreeable surprise was how quickly I got over craving sweet things. I'm allowed a few berries (four or five raspberries or blackberries a day) but after a week or so I didn't feel any need even for those.

I totally agree about the 'artificial' sweeteners. I had a very bad sweet tooth and my triglycerides were moving up into not so good territory. After a few weeks on keto, I don't crave sweets anymore. And my triglycerides have gone down by 60%.

I do, however, still entertain. This weekend, I was asked to bring dessert to a gathering. I made a cheesecake with an almond flour crust and used a monk fruit sweetener. It was delicious and no one was the wiser.

To answer someones question above, I do drink coffee in the morning. For me, coffee is non-negotiable on any 'diet' I do. I never drank sweet coffee, just milk. On keto, I use heavy cream. I walk about 3 miles almost every morning.

Down another 1 lb. on my WI this morning. And I was not hungry so I have not had breakfast yet.

My DH worked with someone years ago who used to order a couple of appetizers, a big dinner, dessert, wine, everything, but was thin as a rail. He would order everything he wanted and only have a bite or two of each thing. Usually he would pass the extra apps and dessert to other people at the table. He was a company owner so he could afford to pay for a lot of food he wasn’t going to eat.

I do not eat breakfast either. I am never hungry in the morning, though black coffee is de rigueur. If I do have a morning meal, then I want lunch sooner, not later. In my ideal world I have a nice and substantial lunch as my main meal and a salad or vegetable soup for dinner.

I would rather sate a sweet craving with a small square of dark chocolate than anything with an artificial sweetener in it.

Gscience,

In re intermittent fasting, it is an interesting concept. Thx for the article, which was a bit more sober about this fad. I've never been someone who binged but this point below was interesting in re brain chemistry and it does make some sense. I guess that is why the current philosophy is not to make anything entirely verboten as it gives food greater power.

I think it is shocking how little medicine really knows about the body's weight management mechanism. I suppose it makes sense that the system is complex, since the way your body uses energy and the drive to get energy is at the very root of survival. But you can find so many contradictory studies!

I consider Yale and UPenn to have some of the best research on the topic, and if you look at the programs they offer, they use everything under the sun to help patients. Behavioral counselling, Nutritional counselling, Drugs (several kinds), Shakes, Surgeries (several kinds). I find it interesting that they offer such a variety, which seems to suggest there is no one best answer. And IIRC correctly, most studies show that nearly any approach at all will make you lose weight, and no approach is better than any other for maintaining weight loss (which is to say, not very good!).

My conclusion is that it is very much individual, and there no harm (for healthy people) to just try things and see what works. It is probably different for each of us and also different over our lives as lifestyles and circumstances change.

I've lost weight and people ask how. My answer is terribly dull. I eat healthier foods, but I have always* done that... whole foods, more veggies, less meat, less fat, little added sugar. I am eating smaller portions and making fewer exceptions (holidays and special events are nearly constant, so they cannot be a reason to change eating habits). I've done a few different exercise regimes but for me that has not been key. I'm about 90% of the way to my goal but I have been kind of stuck there.

For me, I think back to something I learned in undergrad business school. The gist of it is that you can make almost any change to improve worker productivity and it will be successful, simply because of the increased attention. In the same vein, I should probably choose a new regime or program to increase my focus and get these last pounds off. I was actually just looking at a "bootcamp" program and contemplating that. Just hope it isn't too gimmicky!

*ETA ... not always I suppose, but ever since starting a family and cooking for them, I have been very food aware

"In my ideal world I have a nice and substantial lunch as my main meal and a salad or vegetable soup for dinner.

I would rather sate a sweet craving with a small square of dark chocolate than anything with an artificial sweetener in it."

YES to all of this! This is pretty much how we attempt to eat though we are not 100% consistent about it (heavier lunch, light dinner). We actually find this easier to do when we're traveling but manage to do it about 75-80% of the time when home..

Personally, I do not find that the binge issue mentioned applies to me in the least bit. Perhaps for those who have not adopted a "mindful eating" approach it would be more relevant?

Whatsay, It probably goes back to the individuality of eating styles. If it comes naturally to someone to skip meals (I'm not usually hungry until lunch, and I think that is common), then IF is fine. But if people are really fighting to fast, it might set them up for rebound if eating then creates a rush of dopamine. If you weren't hungry to begin with, no biggie.

I think looking at foods that have a slightly higher fat or protein content can help with satiety. Oftentimes when people diet they eat "diet" food or poor nutritional quality food or foods that are too high carb, and that tends to make people more hungry.

Just wanted to update I am down 7 lbs in 7 weeks, so pretty happy about it. I WI on Tuesday mornings. Not that I haven't had challenges, but overall it has been pretty smooth. I am finding that my body wants/needs less food. I do not feel deprived since I can really eat anything.

Yay!

That is great news!

And I *feel* thinner in my midsection and my clothes are fitting better. I can see it and I have a pretty positive outlook, which is great to give me momentum. Trying a new approach has been good for me vs. just going back to WW.

It really is all about finding what works for you. ALL diets work, if....you actually DO them!

A pound of week is the way to go. The slower you lose, the better chance you have to keep it off. I think it takes your body/mind time to regulate itself to less food.

One of the members at WW said she is so tired of thinking about food and what to do about it all the time. But, you have to make this a life commitment and eventually it is incorporated in how you do things. We just this past week celebrated her reaching goal.

Gscience, not all WW meeting are equal. You have to like your leader (I do) and like the other members who attend that particular meeting. (I do) . I found some leaders annoying. Same to with the people. For me, I learn the most from the other members.

Longtime lurker here but I wanted to give my experience with intermittent fasting. I started about 18 mo ago and it has been a life changer. I've always been a pretty healthy eater and regular exerciser but a few years ago gained 10lbs that wouldn't budge. Certain foods were making me bloat, my energy was low, and my midsection was spreading. I don't remember how I came across IF but in my research also learned that Mark Mattson, a professor at Johns Hopkins and also a chief at the National Institute on Aging has studied its benefits. (video here.) I'm 49 and going through menopause and IF may have flipped that trigger, not sure. But along with regular exercise and generally taking care of myself, and probably good genes, IF seems to have balanced my hormones and I have NO symptoms of menopause. (Other than no periods!) My weight has stabilized and I wear the same size as I did in my 20s. I feel really really good.

On most days, I do the 18/6 plan. I don't eat breakfast and only drink black coffee in the morning (and agree with the poster above that consuming anything with calories, even broth or chewing gum, breaks the fast, at least for me). My first meal is usually somewhere between 12-2 pm, and my next one is early evening. Then that's it until the next day. There are exceptions like evenings out, special occasions. But I follow the 18/6 90% of the time and it works for me. I tried the other versions of IF and I thought they worked, too, but the 18/6 plan is easiest for me to follow.

My food choices during those 6 hours of eating are mostly good and healthy. I aim for 5 different vegetables, eggs, nuts and seafood for protein, and no processed food. I do have occasional treats. My diet is mostly boring to many, but it's a tradeoff for me. The alternative is low energy, those extra pounds that make me feel like a slug, and maybe worse menopausal symptoms. I exercise daily and alternate between weight-bearing, functional exercise, and walking. I can work out on a fasted stomach. It doesn't bother me at all. I think by now my body is used to it and knows how to find alternative stores of energy (aka, fat).

I'm a firm believer that whatever works, works, as long as you do it. My friend has a saying, it's hard to be healthy but harder to be unhealthy, and it's true. Gsciencechick so glad to read about your loss! Congrats! Thanks for letting me drop in.

Argh, we were fixing the washing machine and wound up with a late lunch around 3. Of course, I am not hungry now and DH asks what I want for dinner. Nothing really since I am not hungry. This is the only challenge I see is that sometimes on weekends we are not on the same page. I was hungrier yesterday because I did spin in the morning.

Spam.

Um, alrighty then. You resurrected an old thread to say that people are "lazy"? And ... you're a Houzz "pro"? Hmmm.

Ida, maybe she'll come back later and "edit" her post to add something.

Like a link to her carpet cleaning site?

I am on the Naturally Slim program through my insurance company and yes, I have lost weight. I opted not to weigh myself until I go back to my doctor in April. For me, it's working. They never mentioned IF, but that's what I end up doing. I usually skip breakfast and eat normally for lunch and dinner. Add 1/2 gallon of water to drink and get some exercise in. Eat slowly. That's pretty much it, but you should lose about 1 pound a week.

@gsciencechick you should update us! Are you still following this program? Do you do two meals a day?

I know we had some type diet thread and I mentioned that I was kind of doing IF but unknown to me. I do not like to eat early in the morning. I most often eat around 11:00 ish and will either do breakfast or lunch foods, whatever I am in the mood for. I rarely have caffeine, but I do like a hot drink in the mornings if I'm having breakfast type food. I usually don't eat again until dinner, although many days I will have something mid-afternoon, usually an apple or nuts, or sugar-free cocoa (during cold weather), etc. Once I started hearing so much about IF, I became more intentional. I try to eat between 11:00 am - 7:00 pm. Right now I'm really working on getting in more water. I have not lost any weight recently, but I have not gained, even during the pandemic.

No, I'm quite the diet disaster lately, and every time this thread pops up, it just reminds me of that. I really need to see if I can get it deleted. There were just some things with this program I can't agree with, and it really messed me up. And I've got to go back for a follow up doctor's appointment, and, gee surprise, my weight is no better.

Oh no! I hate to hear you had problems with the program. But, there are plenty of other good eating plans out there. You just have to find what works for you.

It's nice that you are interested in such things as diet. I have tried it with slim results. When I work on my daily routine, I feel more energic and easier. All this story started after I visited the doctor. I had pain in the stomach. So, the doctor told me that a daily routine could help me. After that, I searched for a website or a forum that can help me. I'm glad that I found and use https://medicalweightlosslehighvalley.com/ Because of sites like this, I started working on myself and improving day by day using their simple guides.