Intermittent fasting is a fancy term for a very simple activity: grouping all your meals in a narrow time interval. Instead of spreading your eating across the entire day, you decide to eat only between certain hours and you stick to that routine. There are quite a few benefits for doing this, but I'll get back to that later on.
Since December 2017 I'm on a 20/4 intermittent fasting routine. It means that I'm consuming calories only during a 4 hours time window, and for the rest of the day, 20 hours, I'm fasting. I usually have the first meal between 1PM and 2PM and the last one between 5PM and 6PM. In that time window I have no restriction to what and how much I'm eating (other than keep being a vegetarian, that is).
So, there are basically 150 days since I'm doing this, or 5 months.
In this post I will try to sketch a little bit of a report about this habit, how I locked it in, what worked and what didn't.
Disclaimer And Precautions
Although there are benefits to this routine, please consult with an accredited physician before trying intermittent fasting. We're different human beings, we have different metabolisms and different states of health, and what's working for me may not work for somebody else.
Getting To The Optimal Time Window
It's important to know that I didn't get to the 20/4 routine just like that, from the day one. I came to it after a few months of trials. All these trials were basically 30 days challenges. I'm a big fan of 30 days challenges and, if you follow me on Steemit for more than a few months, then you remember that I did quite a few 30 days writing challenges here.
The first 30 days challenge had an 8 hours time window. I had my first meal of the day at 10 AM, and the last one at 6 PM. Nothing before and nothing after. It went very well and I had no difficulties sticking to it. As a matter of fact, it didn't felt like a challenge, but rather like a small adjustment to my eating habits.
After this first challenge I got back to "normal" eating, for 30 days. Meaning I didn't have fixed hours, I was eating whenever I was hungry. Then I started the second attempt, this time on a 6 hours time window. I had the first meal at 10AM and the last one at 4PM. This 30 days challenge was a bit more difficult, but also more relevant. I did noticed some patterns and, at the end of it, I decided to go for a 4 hours time window (of course, after another month of pause).
So, in December 2017 I started the 20/4 routine and I found it the most beneficial. It's basically my normal eating routine now. And even though I went through Christmas and Easter on this 20/4 window (and these holidays are heavily related to ingesting large amounts of food in Romania), the benefits are way too consistent to give it up now.
Cheat Days
It will be wrong to assume that I've been robotically on a 20/4 window. I do have what I call "cheat days", or days in which I eat outside the window (most of the time the "outside" is on the evening end of it, I find sticking to the first par - meaning not eating until 1 PM - relatively easy). But I don't have more than 2-3 cheating days per month and there are strings of 2-3 weeks going on without any cheat day at all.
Also, during travel I had to adjust this and I had a couple of consecutive cheat days, but I tried to make it up for that by lowering the amount of calories (and intensifying exercise) after I adjusted to the local cuisine.
Main Benefits
The first, and most important benefit, is, as you may imagine, weight loss. I wasn't overweighted when I started it, but I was on a 3 months pause from running and that kinda showed up on my body. So, the first thing that I saw on this routine was that the internal fat was trimming down. It's not the fat that is on the outer side of the body, but the one which is "invisible", hidden inside and covering your internal organs. I was able to observe this because, although I didn't have a six pack yet, my teeshirts became kinda loose and my pants were suddenly a bit large.
It may seem a bit counterintuitive to lose weight on a regime where I don't limit calorie intake (like I said, during the eating window I don't have any restriction and I often indulge in whatever I want to eat) but it does work. And the reason it works is because, during the fasting window, the body is forced to tap into fat reserves in order to survive (since it doesn't have access to a constant influx of calories). Overall, this kinda balances the metabolism and the body starts to function better, which has a boomerang effect on the whole thing: it burns whatever it burns more efficiently, it doesn't send signals of hunger so often, and so on and so forth.
But the most important benefits, at least for me, are not related to losing weight (although I do enjoy being slim and all). The most important benefits are related to sleep, concentration and emotional balance.
From the first days of this experiments, even when I was on a 8 hours window, I noticed that my sleep improved dramatically. Going to sleep at least 3 hours after the last meal made a big difference. I fell asleep more easily, the sleep quality was better and I needed less sleep than before. Now, I can go to sleep at 10:30PM and wake up at 6:00 AM without any alarm clock, refreshed and recharged.
And then there is concentration. I work a lot with my brain (my day job is being a programmer) so focus is very important. And I noticed that, during the first part of the day, I am way more productive than before. Probably because there aren't any activities related to food in my body, since I don't have breakfast, the whole thing is steadier and I have a much clearer mind. This also extends to the entire day, which goes on without any significant somnolence or lack of energy. It feels like I have less to manage unconsciously, so I have more energy to direct to the task at hand.
Closely related to focus is the emotional balance. Since I'm on this routine, I have a much better grip on my emotional reactions (being them constructive or destructive). It comes easier to control my auto pilot responses to various stimuli and it's also easier to chill and just be relaxed. The fact that I'm doing at least one and a half hour of yoga each day (under the close supervision of my teacher, @raluca) may also have something to do with this, I admit it.
Caveats
There are few caveats to this.
First of all, it took a while for the body to find its balance. During this time, I was more sensitive and my immune system wasn't at its best.
Also, from a socializing point of view, it can be a bit challenging to go to a dinner with somebody else after your time window and not eat anything. I try to offset this with just a beer, but, I don't know why, it seems to make things even more awkward...
Current Status
As I wrote above, this is my natural way of eating now and I see no reason to stop it.
Again, if you plan to start something similar, do consult with a qualified physician. What worked for me may not work for you.
I'm a serial entrepreneur, blogger and ultrarunner. You can find me mainly on my blog at Dragos Roua where I write about productivity, business, relationships and running. Here on Steemit you may stay updated by following me @dragosroua.
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