Episode 84: When is Extended Fasting Appropriate, Eating Enough in One Meal a Day, and More

<v Speaker 1>Welcome to Fast Feast Repeat Intermittent Fasting for Life. I'm
<v Speaker 1>Jen Stevens, author of the New York Times bestseller Fast
<v Speaker 1>Feast Repeat.
<v Speaker 2>And I'm Sherry Bullock, longtime intermittent faster and health and
<v Speaker 2>wellness advocate.
<v Speaker 1>Please keep in mind.
<v Speaker 2>That this podcast is for educational and motivational purposes only
<v Speaker 2>and is not intended to provide medical or diagnostic advice.
<v Speaker 2>Jen and I are not doctors, so make sure to
<v Speaker 2>check with your trusted healthcare professionals before making changes, especially
<v Speaker 2>when it comes to any medical treatments or medications.
<v Speaker 1>Whether you're new to intermittent fasting or an experienced intermittent faster,
<v Speaker 1>tune in each week to get inspired, to learn, and
<v Speaker 1>to have some fun along the way. Hi, everybody, we
<v Speaker 1>are so glad you're here today. Welcome to this week's
<v Speaker 1>episode of the Fast Feast Repeat Intermittent Fasting for Life Podcast.
<v Speaker 1>How are you doing today's Jerry? I am hanging in there.
<v Speaker 2>Do you know? I haven't even told you this? Let
<v Speaker 2>me share this so everybody by now should know. We
<v Speaker 2>love by Optimizers, Magnusium Breakthrough. Yeah, well, we ran out
<v Speaker 2>somewhere in between Christmas and New year's and I have
<v Speaker 2>a shipment on order. It's headed this way. I've been
<v Speaker 2>tracking it. It's in Las Vegas right now. But my
<v Speaker 2>normal average sleep is around seven hours and thirty five minutes.
<v Speaker 2>I can look at my or ring and see like
<v Speaker 2>my weekly average, and that's been pretty consistent for the
<v Speaker 2>last couple months.
<v Speaker 1>I went back and looked.
<v Speaker 2>The first week I ran out, my sleep average went down.
<v Speaker 2>The next week, my sleep average went down. Last week
<v Speaker 2>I was sleeping on average six hours and three minutes.
<v Speaker 1>Oh wow, you got the data. Wow, yes, so interesting. Yes.
<v Speaker 2>And even Eric, who is not a believer in anything
<v Speaker 2>related to nutrition or supplements or any of that, he
<v Speaker 2>even has noticed a difference and sleep.
<v Speaker 1>Does he take it then? Yes? And he said, all right,
<v Speaker 1>you might think I'm crazy.
<v Speaker 2>And so I had some other magnesium at home that
<v Speaker 2>we started using that you know, I don't even know
<v Speaker 2>why I had it. It was like another company's magnesium.
<v Speaker 2>And it was supposedly a blend you know or whatever. Well,
<v Speaker 2>number one, you have to take three instead of two
<v Speaker 2>to get the same not even quite the same amount
<v Speaker 2>of magnesium.
<v Speaker 1>But he said, you might think I'm crazy.
<v Speaker 2>But ever since we switched and started using an other magnesium,
<v Speaker 2>I don't sleep as well and I'm so tired. Yeah,
<v Speaker 2>see said and they thought, if you're crazy at all,
<v Speaker 2>And we started comparing our sleep data on our or ring.
<v Speaker 1>So I mean, I'm a believer. I'm a believer for sure. Yeah. Well,
<v Speaker 1>this section is not sponsored by a bioptomist. No it's not.
<v Speaker 1>It's not story right, And so I mean, I'm going
<v Speaker 1>to say it just because we're You know, if you
<v Speaker 1>go to bioptimizers dot com slash Fast Feast Repeat, use
<v Speaker 1>the Primo code f FR ten, you will save ten
<v Speaker 1>percent off your order. I never forget to take it
<v Speaker 1>because it's part of my routine. But I forgot to
<v Speaker 1>take it with me when I was out of town
<v Speaker 1>and I didn't have it, and I felt like I
<v Speaker 1>didn't sleep as well, And so I was like, is
<v Speaker 1>it because I'm out of town? Is it because I
<v Speaker 1>forgot my magnesium? Who knows? But I mean, you've got
<v Speaker 1>data right there with you and with Eric, so yeah.
<v Speaker 2>Well, and Eric is prone to muscle cramps, and he
<v Speaker 2>that's the first thing he noticed it is almost immediately
<v Speaker 2>he started getting muscle cramps again.
<v Speaker 1>After he didn't have the bioptomizers yeah. I mean, people
<v Speaker 1>probably notice I do not endorse both on this podcast
<v Speaker 1>and on my other podcast. I am not somebody who
<v Speaker 1>endorses supplements, right, And the fact that I endorsed this
<v Speaker 1>one and you too, but it says something. I don't
<v Speaker 1>take a lot of supplements. I am very skeptical. And
<v Speaker 1>I also, I mean, people want me to endorse things,
<v Speaker 1>like I get emails like literally every day wanting me
<v Speaker 1>to endorse stuff, right, and the fact that I don't,
<v Speaker 1>but I do endorse this, say.
<v Speaker 2>With you, yeah, yeah, Well, and you know the other
<v Speaker 2>one I have, I double checked and verified. You know,
<v Speaker 2>it's lab tested for purity and YadA, YadA, YadA. You
<v Speaker 2>know it's a good quality supplement. But it's just not
<v Speaker 2>doing the same thing in my body that the Bioptimizer's
<v Speaker 2>magnesium breakthrough.
<v Speaker 1>They've got a blend of so many different types of magnesium.
<v Speaker 1>I think that makes a difference. Anyway, good story and share.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, if you're struggling with sleep, or maybe you're struggling
<v Speaker 2>with fatigue and you don't even know that you're not
<v Speaker 2>sleeping soundly, give it a try. I mean, like literally,
<v Speaker 2>I think in thirty days you'll feel a difference. I know,
<v Speaker 2>I do well, so I know.
<v Speaker 1>But anyways, we'll be glad to know that we really
<v Speaker 1>do love their product that much. Maybe by next week
<v Speaker 1>I'll be.
<v Speaker 2>The celebration of the week because I'll be returned to
<v Speaker 2>sleeping soundly and I won't be sleepy. Sheary awesome, But
<v Speaker 2>for now, let's celebrate Catherine in Canada.
<v Speaker 1>Catherine wrote high Gen and Sherry.
<v Speaker 2>I started IF in April twenty twenty four after hearing
<v Speaker 2>Gin on the podcast and then reading Fast Feast Repeat.
<v Speaker 2>I was going to wait for my first fast aniversary
<v Speaker 2>to submit a long list of celebrations, but just wanted
<v Speaker 2>to pop on early to thank you both for your
<v Speaker 2>support in cruising through the holidays. For context, i am
<v Speaker 2>forty two years old, five foot five, and I'm maintaining
<v Speaker 2>somewhere around one hundred and thirty pounds, but I am
<v Speaker 2>in the no scale club just like Jin. I've always
<v Speaker 2>been fairly health conscious and have maintained within a healthy
<v Speaker 2>weight range of around one hundred and twenty five to
<v Speaker 2>one hundred and thirty five pounds for as long as
<v Speaker 2>I can remember. However, before intermittent fasting maintenance meant either
<v Speaker 2>actively trying to lose five to ten pounds through calorie
<v Speaker 2>restriction or over indulging, and then putting on an easy
<v Speaker 2>five to ten pounds, usually during Christmas holidays, and then
<v Speaker 2>again through summer vacation, and I get that that happens.
<v Speaker 2>The older I got, is seemed that the weight came
<v Speaker 2>on more easily and came off more slowly. I know
<v Speaker 2>many people have had more health challenges than me, but
<v Speaker 2>it was always a frustration and always in the back
<v Speaker 2>of my mind. The scale was gradually creeping up year
<v Speaker 2>after year, and I didn't feel good in my skin.
<v Speaker 2>Looking back now, I realized that I was overrestricting, which
<v Speaker 2>led to a desire to overeat. Last Christmas twenty twenty three,
<v Speaker 2>I was so full of food by the end of
<v Speaker 2>the day I felt sick and I actually had to
<v Speaker 2>excuse myself to go lay down just gross.
<v Speaker 1>This year, I was.
<v Speaker 2>Determined to find the balance between enjoying all of the
<v Speaker 2>festive treats without overdoing it. My normal eating window is
<v Speaker 2>around six hours, and I figured I could keep to
<v Speaker 2>a seven to eight hour window for Christmas Day. I
<v Speaker 2>set my mind to only eating truly window worthy food,
<v Speaker 2>which in my mind, does anything homemade, store bought chocolates
<v Speaker 2>could be delayed for another day. Honestly, I can take
<v Speaker 2>them or leave them, but in the past I would
<v Speaker 2>have popped several in my mouth mindlessly over the day
<v Speaker 2>because quote, it's Christmas. Our kids are both teenagers who
<v Speaker 2>sleep in, so delaying our special brunch until noon was
<v Speaker 2>no problem. I opened with a delicious homemade cinnamon bun,
<v Speaker 2>eggs and tomato slices, and I enjoyed every morsel. I
<v Speaker 2>snacked deliberately on a few special treats like homemade dip
<v Speaker 2>and a couple of Christmas cookies, but I didn't feel
<v Speaker 2>the urge to overeat. By the time the turkey dinner
<v Speaker 2>was ready, I was hungry and ready to feast. In
<v Speaker 2>previous years, I can remember being full before dinner was
<v Speaker 2>even served, and I had a hard time enjoying it.
<v Speaker 2>The meal was absolutely delicious. I was very full but
<v Speaker 2>not sick, and we finished dessert by seven pm. While
<v Speaker 2>the visiting continued into the night, my window had closed
<v Speaker 2>and I was not the least bit tempted to munch
<v Speaker 2>on the numerous treats that were set out. This has
<v Speaker 2>been the story of countless other indulgences over the past
<v Speaker 2>eight months.
<v Speaker 1>Of fasting.
<v Speaker 2>But Christmas Day is a big one in my home.
<v Speaker 2>I am so empowered by how much more enjoyable that
<v Speaker 2>was compared to previous years, and how great I felt
<v Speaker 2>the next day and beyond. Though I don't weigh, my
<v Speaker 2>body feels the same as ever, and I don't need
<v Speaker 2>to come up with a restrictive eating plan for the
<v Speaker 2>new year. I'll just keep doing what I always do, fast, feast, repeat.
<v Speaker 2>You ladies are the absolute best. Your message is consistent,
<v Speaker 2>health focused, supportive and practical. Thank you from the bottom
<v Speaker 2>of them of my heart for helping me find peace
<v Speaker 2>with food and my body.
<v Speaker 1>Happy New Year. Well, I love that so much, Catherine.
<v Speaker 1>That is fantastic freedom. That is freedom. Yep. So now
<v Speaker 1>we have a question from a listener. This is from
<v Speaker 1>Karen in South Africa. I'm supposed to start taking an
<v Speaker 1>iron supplement that contains ascorbic acid. I think ascorbic acid
<v Speaker 1>will break a fast. My doctor wants me to take
<v Speaker 1>my iron either two hours before I have food or
<v Speaker 1>two hours after. I think a possible solution would be
<v Speaker 1>if I open my window and have my meal plus
<v Speaker 1>nack within three or four hours, and then have my
<v Speaker 1>iron supplements at five or six hours. Do you think
<v Speaker 1>that would work? Okay, So I have a few thoughts.
<v Speaker 1>If the iron pill.
<v Speaker 2>Has a scorbic acid in it and you're not tasting it,
<v Speaker 2>is it going.
<v Speaker 1>To break your fast? I can't for that.
<v Speaker 2>I have really no way of knowing that. I don't
<v Speaker 2>want to advise you different from what your doctor is
<v Speaker 2>advising you. However, iron supplements themselves can cause nausea and
<v Speaker 2>a lot of.
<v Speaker 1>What I was thinking, like, it makes me so sick
<v Speaker 1>to take iron on an empty systomach, like throw up sick.
<v Speaker 2>I'm the same way. I could not take prenatal vitamins
<v Speaker 2>for that reason. I had to take low iron prenatal vitamins.
<v Speaker 2>It makes me really sick. So I'm not sure why
<v Speaker 2>he's suggesting that you take them on an empty stomach,
<v Speaker 2>because if you actually google this, it's going to tell
<v Speaker 2>you that iron supplements should be taken with food.
<v Speaker 1>Because he is right.
<v Speaker 2>A sorbic acid is vitamin C, and vitamin C helps
<v Speaker 2>your body. It's a cofactor for iron. It helps your
<v Speaker 2>body uptake and use the iron. So usually that's why
<v Speaker 2>they say, like if you're going to use like spinach
<v Speaker 2>as a way to boost your iron to squeeze lemon
<v Speaker 2>over it or whatever. You need the vitamin C for
<v Speaker 2>the iron, But I would question why you have to
<v Speaker 2>take it. I mean, is it a special kind of iron?
<v Speaker 1>I don't know. You mean not that he wants her
<v Speaker 1>to take it before yeah?
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, empty empty yeah right, an empty stomach.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah.
<v Speaker 2>I don't know why he wants you to take it
<v Speaker 2>on empty stomach. I really don't, because most if you
<v Speaker 2>google it, it's gonna say, you know, may cause nausea, take.
<v Speaker 1>With food, YadA YadA. Yeah, talk to your doctor about it,
<v Speaker 1>your doctor and just double check it and do some
<v Speaker 1>research on it yourself. And again, same thing as Shary,
<v Speaker 1>that I absolutely cannot take iron on an empty stomach.
<v Speaker 1>Or zinc yeah, oh zero, zink so bad. It's just
<v Speaker 1>as bad as I hire. Yes, yeah, And because you
<v Speaker 1>know it's supposed to be good. If you feel like
<v Speaker 1>you're getting sick, zin fight it off. So back in
<v Speaker 1>the day I would try to take a zinc supplement,
<v Speaker 1>I'd be like, oh my god, I'm gonna die well.
<v Speaker 2>And I had read that zinc was good to take
<v Speaker 2>before bed, and I can't remember what the reason was.
<v Speaker 1>This was a couple of years ago.
<v Speaker 2>And so, so I was trying to like throw it
<v Speaker 2>in like with my magnesium before bed, you know, like
<v Speaker 2>an hour before bed is when I take that in
<v Speaker 2>my progesterone, and I would get so sick. And I
<v Speaker 2>couldn't figure out what it was until I read somewhere
<v Speaker 2>that zinc can really cause stomach upset.
<v Speaker 1>Chat with your doctor. Do what feels right to you.
<v Speaker 2>If you feel like you need to take it prior
<v Speaker 2>to eating, then I think take it and then wait
<v Speaker 2>two hours to open your window.
<v Speaker 1>If you're able to do that, Yeah, I wouldn't worry
<v Speaker 1>about that. Breaking your fast. Yeah again, like it's the
<v Speaker 1>taste you don't want to I think I would get
<v Speaker 1>super nauseous. I would. I know I was taking it fasted.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, so, And I don't want you to think that
<v Speaker 2>if you're getting nauseous, it's from breaking the fast, breaking
<v Speaker 2>your fast, right, it might be making you nauseous, just
<v Speaker 2>because iron is known to make people nauseous on an
<v Speaker 2>empty stomach. So that's why I was a little perplexed.
<v Speaker 2>And you know envitamin see you know sorba acid is
<v Speaker 2>a civic so that combined with it, I just think
<v Speaker 2>would be really hard on your stomach fasted. But anyway,
<v Speaker 2>all right, good luck Karen. Now we have a question
<v Speaker 2>from Katie, who is curious in the Isle of Man?
<v Speaker 1>Where is that? The Isle of Man? Is that in
<v Speaker 1>the UK? I think it is? I think it is,
<v Speaker 1>she says.
<v Speaker 2>I love when you guys right and from all over
<v Speaker 2>the world, because it really makes my geography challenge.
<v Speaker 1>Brain. Can I where you're at and I here it is?
<v Speaker 2>Yes?
<v Speaker 1>Now are we wrong? It is a self governing British
<v Speaker 1>crown dependency in the Irish Sea between Great Britain and Ireland,
<v Speaker 1>one of the Celtic nations. Okay, all right, you're gonna
<v Speaker 1>learn all sorts of stuff here everybody. This is just
<v Speaker 1>how Jin's and my brain work. Right.
<v Speaker 2>We hear something we don't know and our the little
<v Speaker 2>light bulb turns on and our head like.
<v Speaker 1>Well, you know, Will is like that too. We were
<v Speaker 1>out looking out at the ocean. He was here at
<v Speaker 1>the beach house with me one day. We're looking out there.
<v Speaker 1>We're like, how do dolphins sleep if they have to
<v Speaker 1>keep coming up for air all the time. That is
<v Speaker 1>a fascinating question. Well, I now know the answer because
<v Speaker 1>we've looked it up. Do you want to know. Yes,
<v Speaker 1>now we need to know. I mean, because I'm thinking,
<v Speaker 1>you know, if you're sleeping, how are you gonna remember
<v Speaker 1>to come up and get your oxygen?
<v Speaker 2>Right?
<v Speaker 1>But clearly, because they're mammals, they have to breathe the air,
<v Speaker 1>they have to come up right. Will looked it up.
<v Speaker 1>Their brain has two hemispheres, where our brains have two
<v Speaker 1>hemispheres as well, but only one hemispher of their brain
<v Speaker 1>sleeps at a time.
<v Speaker 2>I think I knew that actually when you said that,
<v Speaker 2>I yep.
<v Speaker 1>That rang a little bell in my head. I have
<v Speaker 1>heard that. Can you imagine if only if you were
<v Speaker 1>like half your brain was sleeping the other half was awake,
<v Speaker 1>Like if that's how we.
<v Speaker 2>Operated, I don't know my husband's brain might operate that.
<v Speaker 2>You know, he's a sleep sleep talker. Oh maybe he's
<v Speaker 2>like a dolphin. Anyway, that's funny. I did sleep, you know,
<v Speaker 2>and dolphin.
<v Speaker 1>Is a sleep type. Oh I got that to see him.
<v Speaker 1>My husband's a dolphin. Well maybe now that that's where
<v Speaker 1>that came from.
<v Speaker 2>Hi, thanks Katie for triggering our curious brains. I think
<v Speaker 2>you'll appreciate it since you listed yourself as curious in
<v Speaker 2>that I a man she says, I've been enjoying the
<v Speaker 2>IF life for six months now, I clean fast and
<v Speaker 2>I'm currently around thirty five pounds down.
<v Speaker 1>Woohoo.
<v Speaker 2>I cannot tell you how great I feel. I was
<v Speaker 2>amazed that I managed to get used to black coffee
<v Speaker 2>after about a month, and now I love it. My
<v Speaker 2>question is to do with my husband. I've realized he
<v Speaker 2>is naturally gravitated to joining me in the fasting lifestyle.
<v Speaker 2>He does not need to lose any weight. But as
<v Speaker 2>he is also enjoying black coffee and has reported that
<v Speaker 2>he is skipping breakfast as he is at hungry, I
<v Speaker 2>would say he is averaging a six to seven hour
<v Speaker 2>eating window. Now do you think this is a suitable
<v Speaker 2>eating window for maintenance? And would he still enjoy the
<v Speaker 2>non weight related benefits of fasting. I do not want
<v Speaker 2>him to lose any more weight, but I hear so
<v Speaker 2>much about fasting for health. I just want to make
<v Speaker 2>sure he appro is this correctly. Thank you for any
<v Speaker 2>advice that you can give me.
<v Speaker 1>All right, Well, we can't predict whether this will be
<v Speaker 1>a suitable eating window for him to maintain or if
<v Speaker 1>you will indeed lose a little weight. That's just something
<v Speaker 1>you're going to have to see over time, you'll see
<v Speaker 1>what happens, and then you'll know. This makes me think
<v Speaker 1>of my husband Chad, who never needed to lose weight,
<v Speaker 1>always was very lean. That's how he's built. He's lanking
<v Speaker 1>and lean. And after he watched me living the intermittent
<v Speaker 1>fasting lifestyle for a while, he started drinking black coffee,
<v Speaker 1>started skipping breakfast, and now he just eats two meals
<v Speaker 1>a day in about probably seven to eight hours. And
<v Speaker 1>so did he lose a little weight? Yes, did he
<v Speaker 1>need to know? Is he too thin? No, he didn't
<v Speaker 1>realize he needed to lose a little bit around his waist,
<v Speaker 1>but he did. You know this pants got a little looser,
<v Speaker 1>That was it. But yes, you asked if it was
<v Speaker 1>great for health benefits. Yes, that's why he does it.
<v Speaker 1>He does it because he feels so good. So over time,
<v Speaker 1>if he loses more weight than he feels comfortable with,
<v Speaker 1>he'll just need to open his window up a little
<v Speaker 1>bit wider, eat a little bit more, add a snack
<v Speaker 1>in there. But this is the trial and error part
<v Speaker 1>that is just really difficult to predict. But that's why
<v Speaker 1>we're each our very own study of one. But congratulations
<v Speaker 1>on your success as well. Did you want to add
<v Speaker 1>anything sharing? Well, I always look this back up.
<v Speaker 2>I really should save this data because I've shared this before,
<v Speaker 2>but like from a website here that I just found,
<v Speaker 2>it says, unlike your glycogen stores, which are limited, body
<v Speaker 2>fat is a virtually unlimited source of energy, even for athletes,
<v Speaker 2>even those who are lean and mean, have enough fat
<v Speaker 2>stored in muscle fibers and fat cells to supply up
<v Speaker 2>to one hundred thousand calories, enough for over one hundred
<v Speaker 2>hours of marathon running.
<v Speaker 1>Wow.
<v Speaker 2>So I think before I looked up and I found
<v Speaker 2>something this at like around seventy or eighty thousand, that was.
<v Speaker 1>A different source.
<v Speaker 2>But all that to say that even lean people have
<v Speaker 2>fat on their body that can be used for energy.
<v Speaker 2>And you know, as we age our body, what's the
<v Speaker 2>word composition changes And so you say you don't want
<v Speaker 2>him to get leaner, but like he may be carrying
<v Speaker 2>fat in places that you don't really notice on him
<v Speaker 2>because just as we age, it's natural for people. I
<v Speaker 2>always think of the host Jonathan on Zoe podcast who
<v Speaker 2>talked about how he did not think he needed to
<v Speaker 2>lose any weight and he was really surprised when he
<v Speaker 2>started fasting that like his waist circumference went down a
<v Speaker 2>little bit, and he'd had some sort of tests. I
<v Speaker 2>don't know if it was like a DEXA scan, I
<v Speaker 2>don't know what he had where it measured like visceral
<v Speaker 2>fat and he was really surprised at how much visceral
<v Speaker 2>fat he had and how that reduced through I believe
<v Speaker 2>he was fasting at the time.
<v Speaker 1>And I also have said before, your body's.
<v Speaker 2>Not going to become emaciated through fasting. A healthy body
<v Speaker 2>knows when it gets to a point that is healthy
<v Speaker 2>for it to maintain health and where you're gonna still
<v Speaker 2>have energy and vitality. And so that's really I don't
<v Speaker 2>think I would be concerned about that at all.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, you'll your body will ramp up the hunger signals,
<v Speaker 1>you'll have the drop to eat a little bit more,
<v Speaker 1>you'll settle in yep. So now it's time for our
<v Speaker 1>segment called What's your Why. Most of us start with
<v Speaker 1>weight loss in mind, which is a great reason to
<v Speaker 1>begin intermittent fasting, But there's so much more that intermittent
<v Speaker 1>fasting can do for us beyond weight loss. If your
<v Speaker 1>why is deeper, than weight loss alone. I really think
<v Speaker 1>you're more likely to find long term success and view
<v Speaker 1>intermittent fasting as a lifestyle.
<v Speaker 2>This week we have a why from Breaking the Cycle
<v Speaker 2>in Pennsylvania. My mother is my why. I'm a forty
<v Speaker 2>three year old, fairly healthy and fit woman who has
<v Speaker 2>opened Pandora's box of autoimmune issues over the past few years.
<v Speaker 2>To make a long story short, burning in my throat,
<v Speaker 2>mouth and on my tongue has been investigated by several
<v Speaker 2>different specialties, including GI E and T and oral medicine specialists,
<v Speaker 2>and three rheumatologists. Along the way, I have had rainode
<v Speaker 2>symptoms intensify, mixed connective tissue issues emerge, a lip biopsy,
<v Speaker 2>and very specialized blood tests, leading to a vague and
<v Speaker 2>possible diagnosis of early chogrin syndrome. Mainly my tongue burns,
<v Speaker 2>my lips tingle, and I'm generally uncomfortable. It could be
<v Speaker 2>so much worse, but it is something I have tried
<v Speaker 2>multiple medications and remedies to alleviate. My mother had autoimmune
<v Speaker 2>issues since she was eighteen years old, beginning with a
<v Speaker 2>diagnosis of Crohn's disease and most recently wait for it chogrins.
<v Speaker 2>In addition to all of her physical ailments. My mother
<v Speaker 2>is depressed and does not have a positive outlook on
<v Speaker 2>life whatsoever. She is in constant pain and makes it
<v Speaker 2>very known. When a friend began talking about IF in
<v Speaker 2>your books, I listened. She looked great and told a
<v Speaker 2>group of us how great she felt. I reserved fast
<v Speaker 2>Fee's Repeat from my library and begin reading. I was
<v Speaker 2>so interested in the science behind IF, and was also
<v Speaker 2>hoping to get rid of some weight I'd gained through
<v Speaker 2>social drinking and eating and excess over the summer months.
<v Speaker 2>I have been cleaned fasting since the end of September
<v Speaker 2>twenty twenty four, and I have lost over ten pounds
<v Speaker 2>so far. I have been keeping a journal of my
<v Speaker 2>oral discomfort, and I believe that I've had more days
<v Speaker 2>quote burn free than prior to the beginning IF. I
<v Speaker 2>am coming off of what I believe was my first
<v Speaker 2>flare when my legs were hurting, I couldn't get comfortable,
<v Speaker 2>and I was physically exhausted. I am basically petrified that
<v Speaker 2>I will turn into my mother as I age, and
<v Speaker 2>will continue on my IF journey to try to prevent
<v Speaker 2>this from happening. I am also loving the side effect
<v Speaker 2>of weight loss too. Thank you for your inspiration, well,
<v Speaker 2>thank you for sharing that and your poor mom being
<v Speaker 2>in the pain that she said, I can't even imagine.
<v Speaker 1>I feel like I wouldn't be very positive. I've if
<v Speaker 1>I was in pain all the time, right.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, anybody living with autoimmune or chronic health issues, it
<v Speaker 2>really just takes a toll on your mental health and.
<v Speaker 1>It's so so hard I can only imagine. But again,
<v Speaker 1>you're seeing that, and you don't want to be in
<v Speaker 1>pain as you age. So I'm sorry that you're dealing
<v Speaker 1>with that, but I'm so glad that you have the
<v Speaker 1>optimism of intermittent fasting and that you feel like your
<v Speaker 1>pain has gotten better already.
<v Speaker 2>All Right, So we have a question from a listener
<v Speaker 2>in Belgium. She says, Hello, I'm Alice, forty one years old.
<v Speaker 2>She says she's one meter sixty nine and I don't
<v Speaker 2>know what that conversion is. I'll do some looking while
<v Speaker 2>you do it, okay, and sixty seven kilograms, so she's
<v Speaker 2>about one maybe forty five. She says she's a triathlete
<v Speaker 2>and fit. She has no health issues, but a history
<v Speaker 2>of cancer in Parkinson's in her family. She says, I
<v Speaker 2>started the adventure in twenty nineteen with a five day
<v Speaker 2>hydrick fast and a supported center. The objective was mainly
<v Speaker 2>to accompany my husband who wanted to get rid of
<v Speaker 2>his hay fever. Unexpectedly, I loved the experience. Then I
<v Speaker 2>did the intermittent fasting schedule sixteen eight on and off
<v Speaker 2>for several years, but always with an annual water fast.
<v Speaker 2>The aim of the annual fast for me is anti
<v Speaker 2>aging and anti inflammatory. Who knows, maybe anti cancer and
<v Speaker 2>anti degenerative diseases. So the objective is really taking care
<v Speaker 2>of my health another way than most people do. The
<v Speaker 2>objective of the daily intermittent fasting for me is more
<v Speaker 2>to maintain my weight and indulge in social life without guilt.
<v Speaker 2>I only discovered clean fasting this summer, and I'm grateful
<v Speaker 2>to you because my fasting routine is so much easier now.
<v Speaker 2>Since October, I've reduced my eating window to a nineteen
<v Speaker 2>five with quite often a weekly down day followed by
<v Speaker 2>an upday in hope of losing two to three kilos,
<v Speaker 2>but without success, I am maintaining my weight perfectly. I
<v Speaker 2>have two questions. The first is, why don't you to
<v Speaker 2>encourage or why even discourage a multi day extended fasting.
<v Speaker 2>Is it for fear that people will do it too often?
<v Speaker 2>Or is there some other reason.
<v Speaker 1>My second question, let's answer that, Kay and I know
<v Speaker 1>who Alice is. Hello, Alice. She's in our community. I've
<v Speaker 1>seen her there and we've chatted there. And this is
<v Speaker 1>a great question, especially since there are other fasting communities
<v Speaker 1>that are like fast as long as you want. There's
<v Speaker 1>no such thing as too much fasting. And we vehemently disagree.
<v Speaker 1>And there's a lot of reasons why I have these
<v Speaker 1>cautions about fasting. I first want to talk about a
<v Speaker 1>documentary that I saw years ago. I believe it was
<v Speaker 1>on Amazon Prime. You're talking about fasting. It was filmed
<v Speaker 1>in I believe European countries, and I think there's some
<v Speaker 1>Russia fasting centers in there. I can't remember. They might
<v Speaker 1>have even had True North in there, a little bit
<v Speaker 1>which is an American fasting center. And it was an
<v Speaker 1>amazing documentary about benefits of extended fasting. Here's a little
<v Speaker 1>vocabulary for everybody. Extended fasting is when you're fasting beyond
<v Speaker 1>the fasts of ADF. ADF is not extended fasting alternate
<v Speaker 1>daily fasting, so we have daily eating window, we have
<v Speaker 1>ADF which is like thirty six hours, maybe up to
<v Speaker 1>forty two, and then beyond that, beyond ADF, we have
<v Speaker 1>extended fasting. So they were using extended fasting at these
<v Speaker 1>centers for healing purposes, like, for example, if someone has
<v Speaker 1>a medical condition, and the people who work at these
<v Speaker 1>fasting centers understand how fasting could help with these medical
<v Speaker 1>conditions or the health benefits of these longer fasts, And
<v Speaker 1>all throughout this very pro fasting documentary, all throughout it,
<v Speaker 1>they kept saying, remember, you need to be under medical
<v Speaker 1>supervision while you're doing this. They said it over and
<v Speaker 1>over again. So these are people who genuinely believe in
<v Speaker 1>the healing power of fasting. And not once did they
<v Speaker 1>say go for it, you can do it on your own,
<v Speaker 1>try it, see if it helps. They were vehement that
<v Speaker 1>to use this healing tool you needed to be under
<v Speaker 1>medical supervision under people who understood it. I listened, and
<v Speaker 1>this was years ago, early in my fasting life, and
<v Speaker 1>I remembered that. I also remember reading a book written
<v Speaker 1>by doctor Joel Furman, and doctor Joel Furman is someone
<v Speaker 1>who advocates for longer fasts for healing purposes, and he
<v Speaker 1>had a book about fasting for Help. I can't remember
<v Speaker 1>the name of it, but it might have been called
<v Speaker 1>Fasting for Help. I don't have it here in front
<v Speaker 1>of me, but a Joel Furman book. He talks about
<v Speaker 1>the longer fasting and he says in his book, your
<v Speaker 1>metabolism will be slowed dramatically. And I'm paraphrasing here after
<v Speaker 1>this longer fast, So the way that you come out
<v Speaker 1>of it and the way that you refeed and all,
<v Speaker 1>that's all going to make a big difference because your
<v Speaker 1>metabolism has been lowered. So hm, that also was something
<v Speaker 1>I'll remember. We know that fasting is different than localorie dieting,
<v Speaker 1>Like there was a study and I talk about this
<v Speaker 1>in Fast Feast Repeat in the Fasting Red Flags chapter. So, Alice,
<v Speaker 1>I would encourage you to go read the Fasting Red
<v Speaker 1>Flags chapter of Fast Feast Repeat or anybody else who's listening,
<v Speaker 1>because I go into this here. There's a study that
<v Speaker 1>they did where they were measuring people over seventy two
<v Speaker 1>hours one seventy two hour fast. Now, these were not
<v Speaker 1>people who lived in an intermittent fasting lifestyle. These were
<v Speaker 1>just people who did one seventy two hour fast, and
<v Speaker 1>the researchers look to see what would happen, and I
<v Speaker 1>thought it was super interesting. They measured their metabolic rate
<v Speaker 1>at baseline, which is before they started fasting, and then
<v Speaker 1>they measured it as time went on throughout the seventy
<v Speaker 1>two hours, and what they found was from when they
<v Speaker 1>started fasting, their metabolic rate increased. So they're fasting, they're fasting,
<v Speaker 1>they're fasting, their metabolic rate increased over time. Time. The
<v Speaker 1>number of key tones in their blood obviously increased over
<v Speaker 1>time as they're switching into fat burning. But then an
<v Speaker 1>interesting thing happened. At some point throughout this one seventy
<v Speaker 1>two hour fast that they did in isolation, because these
<v Speaker 1>were not people who did intermitten fasting, their metabolic rate
<v Speaker 1>started on a downward trajectory. So by the time they
<v Speaker 1>got to the end of the seventy two hours, their
<v Speaker 1>metabolic rate was still higher than it had been at baseline,
<v Speaker 1>but it was on a decline. It was heading down.
<v Speaker 1>So when is the point that their metabolic rate would
<v Speaker 1>actually start to be lower than it was when they started.
<v Speaker 1>I don't know. They didn't continue past seventy two hours,
<v Speaker 1>so I can't answer that. And also, what would be
<v Speaker 1>the effect of doing seventy two hour pasts over and
<v Speaker 1>over again, repeatedly once a month frequently. I don't know.
<v Speaker 1>Is there a point where your body's like, this is
<v Speaker 1>a lot of fasting. Something bad's going on. There must
<v Speaker 1>be a famine. I'm going to just slow down the
<v Speaker 1>metabolic rate tremendously. So I am not an expert on
<v Speaker 1>extended fasting, but I listen to people who are okay,
<v Speaker 1>and the people that I listened to your Joel Furman,
<v Speaker 1>who said, I love fasting. Fasting is an amazing for
<v Speaker 1>health benefits. I encourage people to do it at my
<v Speaker 1>center and know that your metabolic rate's going to go
<v Speaker 1>down and you have to work with that after you stop.
<v Speaker 1>And then the same thing with the fasting documentary, the
<v Speaker 1>people are like, we love fasting. It is so good
<v Speaker 1>for you if you have certain health issues, but you
<v Speaker 1>must do it under medical supervision. So based on that,
<v Speaker 1>I would never ever encourage anyone to do a fast
<v Speaker 1>beyond seventy two hours unless you're under medical supervision, And
<v Speaker 1>I would not encourage you to do any fasts longer
<v Speaker 1>than ADF for the purpose of losing fat, because when
<v Speaker 1>is it too much? Overfasting is not good for you.
<v Speaker 1>I cannot define what overfasting is for you because it's
<v Speaker 1>going to depend on so many factors, how much you eat,
<v Speaker 1>how long you fast, your metabolic health, so many things.
<v Speaker 1>So I don't want people to overfast or do anything
<v Speaker 1>that's not going to be good for them. And that
<v Speaker 1>is why I'm never going to encourage anybody to fast
<v Speaker 1>longer than seventy two hours unless you're under medical supervision,
<v Speaker 1>and I would not encourage you to do anything beyond
<v Speaker 1>ADF for the purpose of losing weight more quickly. We
<v Speaker 1>also very early in the day when we were you know,
<v Speaker 1>when I had my Facebook support groups, and there was
<v Speaker 1>nothing out about fasting. This is before the OBCD code.
<v Speaker 1>This is before I mean Joel Furman's book was out,
<v Speaker 1>but there really weren't books about fasting. And there were
<v Speaker 1>people who were like, I'm just going to fast for
<v Speaker 1>thirty days until I lose all the weight I want
<v Speaker 1>to lose, and then I'll just maintain it with a
<v Speaker 1>daily eating window. I mean, you remember people like that,
<v Speaker 1>Sherry or early on, we didn't know I hadn't written
<v Speaker 1>any books yet, We're just hearing these fasting groups, and
<v Speaker 1>the people who were doing long fasts, they would lose
<v Speaker 1>weight really fast, and then they would get an increased
<v Speaker 1>urge to bend. Then they would regain the weight that
<v Speaker 1>they lost on the long fasts, they would regain it
<v Speaker 1>faster than they lost it, and then the urge to
<v Speaker 1>binge stuck around, and then their weight was higher than
<v Speaker 1>it had been before they started, and they were continuing
<v Speaker 1>to feel the urge to binge. So it's like it
<v Speaker 1>really backfired. And I saw that multiple times. The people
<v Speaker 1>who were doing really long fast the people who were
<v Speaker 1>fasting longer than ads and not having the proper refeed
<v Speaker 1>or the up day, the people who were really disciplined
<v Speaker 1>enough to do long long fasts seemed to have a
<v Speaker 1>lot of yo yo ing and binge behaviors come up.
<v Speaker 1>And then when I was researching to write Fast Feast Repeat,
<v Speaker 1>I was writing it in twenty nineteen when I really
<v Speaker 1>dug into the Minnesota Starvation experiment and the work. What
<v Speaker 1>the an covered with these people who were going through
<v Speaker 1>this low calorie eating, this long period of the starvation,
<v Speaker 1>as they called it, the binge behavior picked up. That
<v Speaker 1>is what our bodies do if they feel like we're
<v Speaker 1>overly restricting. And so all of that to say, I
<v Speaker 1>will never encourage anybody to do anything that could give
<v Speaker 1>you more long term problems down the road. And just
<v Speaker 1>based on my personal experience with people who were very
<v Speaker 1>enthusiastic about losing weight quickly doing really long fast, and
<v Speaker 1>I saw that that didn't tend to go well, like Sherry,
<v Speaker 1>Do you remember anybody who did really long fast like
<v Speaker 1>that and then it ended up great? No? I don't either,
<v Speaker 1>and I don't say that lightly. My goal, I have
<v Speaker 1>one goal. It is for you to succeed in a
<v Speaker 1>healthy way. That's it. That's my goal. I want you
<v Speaker 1>to succeed in a healthy way. And based on what
<v Speaker 1>I know from the experts and also from experience of
<v Speaker 1>seeing other people, I just I can't endorse anything beyond
<v Speaker 1>EIGHTF EIGHTYF is well researched, right, and it's well resard
<v Speaker 1>for how it affects your metabolism, how it affects you
<v Speaker 1>is how safe it is. The key is the upday,
<v Speaker 1>of course, So I can only encourage you to do
<v Speaker 1>things that are well researched and that we have experience
<v Speaker 1>with so for everybody listening, you know, make sure you're
<v Speaker 1>having medical supervision if you do anything like that.
<v Speaker 2>Do you want to add anything, Well, there's a graph
<v Speaker 2>I have in my head and I cannot recall I
<v Speaker 2>know what you're maybe.
<v Speaker 1>From it's from that study, but I think it's from
<v Speaker 1>that study. I think it was in the Obesity Code,
<v Speaker 1>but I think it's from that study. With a seventy
<v Speaker 1>to our fast.
<v Speaker 2>At thirty six hours, there was a slight dip in
<v Speaker 2>metabolic rate.
<v Speaker 1>It started to decline, and then.
<v Speaker 2>Like it's sixty hours, it kind of dipped again, and
<v Speaker 2>then I think it was like seventy two hours where
<v Speaker 2>that was where they were like, you know, you really
<v Speaker 2>wouldn't want to fast past that because the metabolic rate
<v Speaker 2>seemed to kind of fall off at that point. But
<v Speaker 2>then there was also concern about muscle mass conservation past
<v Speaker 2>a certain.
<v Speaker 1>Part of the fast.
<v Speaker 2>I actually recently read something that said anything beyond thirty
<v Speaker 2>six hours could potentially impact muscle mass, not because your
<v Speaker 2>body is using your muscle for energy, but because you're
<v Speaker 2>not fueling your muscles for muscle stabilization, let's say. So
<v Speaker 2>that's why you know, even when people are doing alternate
<v Speaker 2>day fasting, and they think, oh, I want to push
<v Speaker 2>myself and I want to always fast to forty two
<v Speaker 2>hours and try to keep my refeet as short as possible.
<v Speaker 2>I can't get behind that because I am just such
<v Speaker 2>a believer in our muscle health and maintaining muscle mass
<v Speaker 2>and doing anything we can to support that, because in
<v Speaker 2>the end, that is going to be the most influential
<v Speaker 2>thing on a healthy aging without a sarcopenia, last lack
<v Speaker 2>of muscle mass. It increases your chance of illness. I mean,
<v Speaker 2>it affects your immune it affects your metabolism, It affects
<v Speaker 2>how you process carbohydrates and metabolic health. And so you know,
<v Speaker 2>if I had to say there was like one thing
<v Speaker 2>that was super super important, it's going to be keeping
<v Speaker 2>You know, I'm not selling you pound protein. I'm telling
<v Speaker 2>you think about fueling your muscles, and if you were
<v Speaker 2>to continually do these long seventy two hour fasts, you're
<v Speaker 2>not doing that. So much so that a year and
<v Speaker 2>a half ago, a longevity expert came out and gave
<v Speaker 2>his personal experience. I was just gonna say that extended
<v Speaker 2>fasting he was doing like monthlyter a tea.
<v Speaker 1>Let's just say it. It was aciped atia.
<v Speaker 2>Four or five day fasts a month, and he started
<v Speaker 2>paying attention to his muscle mass. And what he realized was, now,
<v Speaker 2>let's I want to just be clear, he wasn't doing
<v Speaker 2>daily intermint fasting. He was doing alternate day fasting. He
<v Speaker 2>was doing these four and five day extended fasts like
<v Speaker 2>once a month if I'm remembering the data correctly, something
<v Speaker 2>like that, and he noticed that he was having a
<v Speaker 2>substantial decrease of muscle mass, so much so that he
<v Speaker 2>came out and kind of spoke out against doing this
<v Speaker 2>kind of fasting. So that's just another thing I think
<v Speaker 2>to keep in mind. I do think for somebody who
<v Speaker 2>is very sick, who is trying to heal some sort
<v Speaker 2>of health condition and doing it in a medical setting
<v Speaker 2>like these fasting centers, you know that there is a
<v Speaker 2>benefit to that. And I do believe that they are
<v Speaker 2>pretty controlled as far as they're refeeding after.
<v Speaker 1>That as well, which is a danger because if you're
<v Speaker 1>not refeeding properly, you can actually hurt your body. Right. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>So this was a great question.
<v Speaker 2>I think it's you know, important to kind of dive
<v Speaker 2>into a little bit, so people understand it's.
<v Speaker 1>That whole.
<v Speaker 2>Moderate We want to do things in moderation. It's a
<v Speaker 2>whole balance. It's a balance of fasting and feasting. It's,
<v Speaker 2>you know, not one extreme or the other. We don't
<v Speaker 2>want to be eating for sixteen hours a day, but
<v Speaker 2>we also don't want to be fasting for you know,
<v Speaker 2>whatever it might time or whatever that might be.
<v Speaker 1>So and you know, we don't want to put words
<v Speaker 1>in Peter A Tea's mouth just because we could be
<v Speaker 1>getting it wrong. Is what we remember from what we've
<v Speaker 1>read and what we've heard. But I think he's a
<v Speaker 1>fan of time restricted eating, but not about the you know,
<v Speaker 1>the law.
<v Speaker 2>Because when this all came out, people were like, whoa,
<v Speaker 2>my god, he doesn't like fasting.
<v Speaker 1>He's against fasting. Oh my gosh, should I stop fasting?
<v Speaker 2>But when you really read about what he was doing,
<v Speaker 2>what his experience was, how what kind of fasting he
<v Speaker 2>was doing, he was not doing. He was not clean fasting,
<v Speaker 2>and he was not doing a daily, intermittent fasting time
<v Speaker 2>restricted lifestyle like we are doing.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah. Yeah, so you know there are times that extended
<v Speaker 1>fasting would be appropriate. We've got a couple of people
<v Speaker 1>in the community that are going through cancer treatment and
<v Speaker 1>they're cancer treatment team, their medical team is working with
<v Speaker 1>them as they are using longer fasts around their chemo
<v Speaker 1>because there's some research that longer fast surrounding chemotherapy can
<v Speaker 1>be beneficial for targeting the cancer cells through the chemo.
<v Speaker 1>That is an appropriate use of extended fasting. Again, do
<v Speaker 1>it with your medical teams blessing and their knowledge and
<v Speaker 1>their guidance. That's super important. And if I were diagnosed
<v Speaker 1>with certain medical conditions, I would one hundred percent reach
<v Speaker 1>out to a fasting center such as True North or
<v Speaker 1>you know, something like that, where they know what they're doing.
<v Speaker 1>They understand fasting therapeutic when it's appropriate when it isn't.
<v Speaker 1>So it's a very powerful therapeutic tool, but not something
<v Speaker 1>to do on your own. Do you want to read
<v Speaker 1>her second question?
<v Speaker 2>She says, my second question is what fast would you
<v Speaker 2>recommend after my yearly extended seven day fast.
<v Speaker 1>I bought the book twenty.
<v Speaker 2>Eight day Fast Start day by day to follow my
<v Speaker 2>annual fast, which I'm going to do in January twenty
<v Speaker 2>twenty five, from January twelfth to the twentieth. And while
<v Speaker 2>I know that I need to do my food recovery
<v Speaker 2>well and that it's important to eat properly after having
<v Speaker 2>worked my body like that. I'd like to keep a
<v Speaker 2>negative delta in terms of weight loss those stubborn two
<v Speaker 2>to three stubborn kilos.
<v Speaker 1>Thank you so much, Alice. All right, now, I have
<v Speaker 1>to be very very transparent that I can't tell you
<v Speaker 1>what to do after the seven day fast, because that's
<v Speaker 1>what the people who are guiding you, the medical team
<v Speaker 1>guiding you, needs to do. They need to tell you
<v Speaker 1>how to refeed properly, because there's something called refeeding syndrome
<v Speaker 1>after long fast, because your digestive system is slowed down.
<v Speaker 1>It's almost gone into hibernation. That's probably not the right
<v Speaker 1>medical way of describing it, but you can understand that analogy,
<v Speaker 1>like imagine your digestive system is hibernating and if you
<v Speaker 1>like eat certain things, it could really cause major physical
<v Speaker 1>problems going through your digestive system. So you have them
<v Speaker 1>guide you and how to refeed. I know it true, North.
<v Speaker 1>They have a very prescriptive like they start with light
<v Speaker 1>broths or something. I don't know, Yes, I'm not sure
<v Speaker 1>what they see, but they don't start with any solid
<v Speaker 1>food at all, But I can't guide you about that
<v Speaker 1>as far as you know what intermint fasting approach to
<v Speaker 1>use is your lifestyle. I'm a big fan of time
<v Speaker 1>restricted eating, the daily eating window and finding the approach
<v Speaker 1>that works well for you. You know, you'll have to
<v Speaker 1>see how that goes well.
<v Speaker 2>And she's been doing nineteen five, so sounds in my
<v Speaker 2>mind on you. Once you come through your therapeutic fasting
<v Speaker 2>that you're wanting to do, and you've done the reefeed
<v Speaker 2>that they prescribe for that, and then you're ready to
<v Speaker 2>resume life after that, then I would just slide right
<v Speaker 2>back into that nineteen to five window. That's a protocol
<v Speaker 2>that's been working for you, all right.
<v Speaker 1>So we have a question from Monica from Zagreb, Croatia,
<v Speaker 1>And if I said that wrong, I'm sorry. High likelihood
<v Speaker 1>that I did, She says Hijin and Sherry, I've been
<v Speaker 1>into this lifestyle for only three months so far, but
<v Speaker 1>I love it. I am forty eight years old and
<v Speaker 1>steadily losing weight approximately one pound per week. As far
<v Speaker 1>as my win and it goes, I started with sixteen eight,
<v Speaker 1>then switched to eighteen six. My goal window is nineteen five,
<v Speaker 1>but sometimes it's only two to three hours because I'm
<v Speaker 1>not hungry enough to eat more after I finish my dinner,
<v Speaker 1>which usually consists of a small snack cheese, olives, and fruit,
<v Speaker 1>followed by the main course, a salad and a dessert.
<v Speaker 1>What's bothering me is this, I have a really hard
<v Speaker 1>time mentally accepting that one meal a day is enough
<v Speaker 1>for my body. I am not restricting in any way,
<v Speaker 1>and I feel great, both physically and emotionally. It might
<v Speaker 1>be my upbringing and all the voices in my head
<v Speaker 1>telling me I have to finish my plate, and the
<v Speaker 1>cultural conditioning of obligatory five small meals a day. I
<v Speaker 1>know that if my body needed more energy, it would
<v Speaker 1>ramp up my hunger hormones, but I still struggle because
<v Speaker 1>of that mental pressure. I sometimes find myself eating a
<v Speaker 1>large snack before dinner, even if I'm not really hungry,
<v Speaker 1>which eventually ruins my dinner. Thank you for your help
<v Speaker 1>and any advice you may provide, and for all your
<v Speaker 1>hard work on the books and the podcasts. You are
<v Speaker 1>both so interesting and kind and funny. Okay, So I.
<v Speaker 2>Have a couple thoughts and my answer kind of so
<v Speaker 2>that anytime we give an answer like this, it's not
<v Speaker 2>a generic general answer for everybody. Right, So, right now
<v Speaker 2>you are in a weight loss phase and you went
<v Speaker 2>from sixteen eight to eighteen six. You say your goal
<v Speaker 2>window is nineteen five, but that's sometimes it's only two
<v Speaker 2>to three hours. If it's sometimes it's two to three hours,
<v Speaker 2>I don't think that's a problem. If it's becoming an
<v Speaker 2>everyday thing that's two to three hours, you may consider
<v Speaker 2>purposely throwing in some longer windows. And one of the
<v Speaker 2>ways I would do that is when you're having this
<v Speaker 2>snack of cheese and olives. Those are fatty foods, and
<v Speaker 2>you know they can make you feel full. Some people
<v Speaker 2>are really satiated by fat. I'm not one of them,
<v Speaker 2>but I have noticed that when people say they don't
<v Speaker 2>feel like they can eat enough in their window and
<v Speaker 2>they're having higher fat snacks to open their window, that
<v Speaker 2>that's often why you may consider swapping that small snack
<v Speaker 2>for something different that's not as high fat, and then
<v Speaker 2>that might allow you to feel hungry enough to have dinner.
<v Speaker 1>That's so interesting that you said that, Sherry, Because if
<v Speaker 1>I just ate olives and cheese, I'm starving like it
<v Speaker 1>would not fill me up. Like I could eat an
<v Speaker 1>entire block of cheese and a jar of olives. I'm
<v Speaker 1>the same way. I don't think I'd be satisfied at all.
<v Speaker 1>Fat is not satiating for me. I think that's why
<v Speaker 1>keto is not satiating. I mean, I've got to have
<v Speaker 1>a little dart with my fat, with my carbs and
<v Speaker 1>my vegetables and whatever it else it is, but just
<v Speaker 1>straight fat.
<v Speaker 2>No, I have noticed though, like it mainly like in
<v Speaker 2>our community, people will say, I don't know how I'm
<v Speaker 2>supposed to extend my window. I open and I have
<v Speaker 2>nuts and some olives and some cheese, and then I
<v Speaker 2>struggle to eat my dinner. And then after three hours
<v Speaker 2>or two hours, I'm full. I couldn't possibly eat more.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah. So interesting.
<v Speaker 2>And then when I'm like, well, try swapping out your
<v Speaker 2>snack or opening with your dinner and saving your snack
<v Speaker 2>for after dinner, then suddenly they're able to open their
<v Speaker 2>window up a little bit whider.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah.
<v Speaker 2>So, like I said, so we're all just wired differently.
<v Speaker 2>As long as you're losing weight and you have fat
<v Speaker 2>to burn, your body's not in deprivation. So you say,
<v Speaker 2>you know, you're worried that that's enough for your body.
<v Speaker 2>Rather than thinking about is it enough for your body?
<v Speaker 2>Think about are you meeting your nutritional needs? Think of
<v Speaker 2>your micro nutrients, think of your vitamins, think of your minerals.
<v Speaker 2>Really address your window that way. Did you eat the
<v Speaker 2>colors of the rainbow? Did you get everything your body needs?
<v Speaker 2>And are you satisfied? And if you're satisfied, then you're
<v Speaker 2>eating enough. And like you said, you know that if
<v Speaker 2>your body needs needs more, it's gonna ramp up your
<v Speaker 2>hunger and you're gonna you're gonna feel hungry. So, like
<v Speaker 2>you said, you sometimes find yourself eating a large snack
<v Speaker 2>before dinner, even if you're not really hungry, and that
<v Speaker 2>ruins your dinner. That snack is not providing the nutrition
<v Speaker 2>that your body needs.
<v Speaker 1>Your dinner is.
<v Speaker 2>So if your snack is ruining your dinner, get it
<v Speaker 2>to that snack and open with dinner.
<v Speaker 1>That's my best advice. Do you have anything else? Jin? Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>And I want to say that as you're losing weight,
<v Speaker 1>when you're losing fat and that is your goal, and
<v Speaker 1>you're losing fat because you're flipping that metabol ex which
<v Speaker 1>every day and you're having some good time in fat burning,
<v Speaker 1>your body is having to tap into your stored fuel
<v Speaker 1>which is on your body, which you want it to.
<v Speaker 1>You want it to tap into your stored fuel. That
<v Speaker 1>fuel counts towards your needs for the day. So that's
<v Speaker 1>what you know that fasting study that I talked about earlier.
<v Speaker 1>You know how the metabolic rate ramped up through the
<v Speaker 1>early hours of the fast in that study. That's because
<v Speaker 1>you're bodies like, all right, we got nothing coming in,
<v Speaker 1>let's see what's already here, and then it like busily
<v Speaker 1>goes and uses some of that stored fuel, right, and said,
<v Speaker 1>then you eat your dinner after that, because you're not
<v Speaker 1>doing a seventy two hour faster eating every day, and
<v Speaker 1>you fuel. But you've got that other fuel that your
<v Speaker 1>body already used and that counted to meet your needs
<v Speaker 1>for the day. So your fuel needs for the day
<v Speaker 1>are met by what you're putting in and what your
<v Speaker 1>body is using that was already there. So keep that
<v Speaker 1>in mind as well. That's just we can't tell you
<v Speaker 1>how much your body actually used from what was already stored,
<v Speaker 1>but it's something and it used it, right.
<v Speaker 2>I think doctor doctor Fuhn used an analogy once, like
<v Speaker 2>it's not just what you ate today.
<v Speaker 1>It's also that pizza you ate last month, right that
<v Speaker 1>your body finally had a chance to use to store
<v Speaker 1>it up there? Yeah, exactly. Say, Before we get to
<v Speaker 1>our tweek of the week, I want to take a
<v Speaker 1>minute to tell you about my books. I will always
<v Speaker 1>be a teacher at heart, and it makes me very
<v Speaker 1>happy to have a wide variety of resources for you
<v Speaker 1>no matter where you are in your intermittent fasting journey.
<v Speaker 1>I recommend that you start with Delayed on Deny, which
<v Speaker 1>I think is the best quick introduction to intermittent fasting
<v Speaker 1>that's out there. The updated second edition is available in
<v Speaker 1>paperback and hardback only on Amazon, and it's an ebook
<v Speaker 1>and audiobook format wherever you find your ebooks and audiobooks.
<v Speaker 1>The new edition has been updated in twenty twenty four
<v Speaker 1>with a comprehensive ADF chapter. The wording clean fast was added.
<v Speaker 1>You'll find updates throughout the whole book, and my favorite
<v Speaker 1>part are the success stories all from members of the
<v Speaker 1>Delayed on Tonight community. Now, if you want to dig
<v Speaker 1>into the concepts from Delayed on Tonight, either on your
<v Speaker 1>own or in a book study group with a friend
<v Speaker 1>or a group of friends, I created a book study
<v Speaker 1>companion workbook called Delay Don't Deny Digging Deeper, and it's
<v Speaker 1>been updated to match the twenty twenty four Delayed on
<v Speaker 1>Tony updates. You'll definitely hear Schoolteacher Jen coming through on
<v Speaker 1>every page, and you will reflect on how to apply
<v Speaker 1>the concepts from Delayed on Tonight into your own life.
<v Speaker 1>Reading a book is one thing, Applying it is another.
<v Speaker 1>There's my schoolteacher again and Delayed on Tony Digging Deeper
<v Speaker 1>was designed to help you apply the concepts from Delayed
<v Speaker 1>on Tony in a meaningful way. Now, if you're looking
<v Speaker 1>for a way to keep track of all sorts of
<v Speaker 1>things such as your daily fasts, you're eating, windows, your
<v Speaker 1>daily weights, your weekly averaging, goal setting, non scale victories,
<v Speaker 1>food and exercise journals, a daily reflection and more, then
<v Speaker 1>you need the Delayed on Deny Life Journal. It's designed
<v Speaker 1>to last you six months and it's a great place
<v Speaker 1>to keep track of what you're doing, what's working, and
<v Speaker 1>your overall progress. Both Delayed on Tonight Digging Deeper and
<v Speaker 1>Delayed on Tonight Life Journal are available in paperback form
<v Speaker 1>only on Amazon, and Digging Deeper is also available as
<v Speaker 1>an ebook wherever you get your ebooks. So now it's
<v Speaker 1>time for our tweak of the week. You know, I
<v Speaker 1>always say tweak it till it's easy. But the tweak
<v Speaker 1>that works for me might not be the one that
<v Speaker 1>works for you. That's why it's super hopeful to hear
<v Speaker 1>how other intermittent fasters are making intermittent fasting work for them.
<v Speaker 1>You know, Sherry, before I share the one shared by Ramona,
<v Speaker 1>you know my latest tweak. Yeah, I still tweak. Sherry
<v Speaker 1>still tweaks this many years, and I've been opening with
<v Speaker 1>my dinner instead of a hearty snack, and it's making
<v Speaker 1>such a difference, yep, Like I need to eat a
<v Speaker 1>satisfying amount of food, and so I've just switched up
<v Speaker 1>my window. I had gotten into the habit of eating
<v Speaker 1>what could have been considered a meal, a pretty substantial meal,
<v Speaker 1>and then a few hours later cooking a full dinner
<v Speaker 1>and having that too because I've made it and it
<v Speaker 1>was delicious, And I realized I was feeling overly full.
<v Speaker 1>I was ignoring my satiety signals, and I was like,
<v Speaker 1>this isn't working for me right now. So I switched
<v Speaker 1>to making the dinner earlier, starting with that and then
<v Speaker 1>later having where I'm still having about a five hour window.
<v Speaker 1>I've just and I'm not feeling overly full anymore. That's great.
<v Speaker 1>So I just needed I needed to tweak it up,
<v Speaker 1>switch it up a little bit, and so you would
<v Speaker 1>could say I'm starting with a meal and ending with
<v Speaker 1>a snack. More so, so just something to keep in mind.
<v Speaker 1>You know, you've got to figure out what works for you.
<v Speaker 1>And here is what Ramona is sharing. She said, I
<v Speaker 1>wanted to share something that has helped me with making
<v Speaker 1>better decisions for myself and the goals I want to achieve.
<v Speaker 1>I made a small card. It could also be on
<v Speaker 1>a piece of paper, and note that all the advantages
<v Speaker 1>that fasting and healthy decisions will get me. It can
<v Speaker 1>include things like I will feel better in my own body,
<v Speaker 1>or I will have more energy, et cetera. The deeper
<v Speaker 1>you can get, the better because these need to be
<v Speaker 1>things that need to be very important to you. Twice
<v Speaker 1>a day, you can put a reminder on your phone
<v Speaker 1>read that card. Additionally, read it every time you're tempted
<v Speaker 1>to make a bad decision that doesn't match your goals.
<v Speaker 1>It has and is still helping me tremendously because it
<v Speaker 1>really implements the reasons why you're on this journey. Make
<v Speaker 1>sure to focus on all all the positive changes. I
<v Speaker 1>think that's great.
<v Speaker 2>I actually kind of recommended something similar to somebody who
<v Speaker 2>was having trouble with like snacking after her window closed. Yeah,
<v Speaker 2>and I said, you know it's time to you know,
<v Speaker 2>really remember why you don't reopen your window. And she
<v Speaker 2>was able to verbalize to me she doesn't sleep as well,
<v Speaker 2>she has crazy dreams, she has restless legs, she has
<v Speaker 2>to get up and use the bathroom more in the
<v Speaker 2>moment night. And I told her that same thing. I said,
<v Speaker 2>put it on a note in your phone, make it
<v Speaker 2>your screensaver on your phone, so you have to look
<v Speaker 2>at those reasons, you know, like make it front and
<v Speaker 2>center because we're I mean, most people are pretty visual people.
<v Speaker 2>You can say something, you can think something, but once
<v Speaker 2>you read it, yeah, it's in your head. So you know,
<v Speaker 2>even every time you go to eat something, think how
<v Speaker 2>does this support my goals? How will this make me feel?
<v Speaker 2>How will I feel about this decision tomorrow? There's a
<v Speaker 2>lot to learn from ourselves and our own experience and
<v Speaker 2>our own feelings, So like interview yourself. We'd love to
<v Speaker 2>leave our listeners with inspiration or motivational quotes, and this
<v Speaker 2>week we have a quote from Jessica from Huntsville, Ontario, Canada.
<v Speaker 2>Jessica shared, I've lost twenty two pounds in six months
<v Speaker 2>and I absolutely love if my daughter bought me the
<v Speaker 2>Fast Piece Repeat book and I've read it and shared it.
<v Speaker 2>I feel amazing and I will be an intermittent.
<v Speaker 1>Faster for life.
<v Speaker 2>Thank you for your very entertaining podcast. I listen to
<v Speaker 2>you it every week while I drive up and deliver mail.
<v Speaker 2>The quote I would like to share is we are
<v Speaker 2>better able to appreciate blessings if we endure hardships, and
<v Speaker 2>Jen and I believe that so much.
<v Speaker 1>Absolutely right. I don't think I would appreciate the way
<v Speaker 1>I feel in my body now if I didn't have
<v Speaker 1>the experience of being obese. And now it just feels
<v Speaker 1>so amazing to be able to paint my toenails, bend
<v Speaker 1>over all things, yeah, yes, be able to comfortably zip
<v Speaker 1>your jeans up, uh huh. Yeah. Thanks so much for
<v Speaker 1>listening today. We would love to have you join us
<v Speaker 1>in the Delayed On Tonight community where you can interact
<v Speaker 1>with both me and Sherry, plus the most supportive bunch
<v Speaker 1>of intermittent fasters you'll find anywhere. Go to Jenstevens dot
<v Speaker 1>com slash community to join us.
<v Speaker 3>Don't forget to subscribe to this podcast to your favorite
<v Speaker 3>podcast app, and if you haven't already, please leave us
<v Speaker 3>a five star review that helps new listeners find the show,
<v Speaker 3>and we really appreciate it.
<v Speaker 1>We are a community driven podcast, so to submit your
<v Speaker 1>success stories, your questions, your favorite tweak it till It's Easy, moments,
<v Speaker 1>or anything else you want us to share on the podcast,
<v Speaker 1>go to fast Feast Repeat dot com slash Submit and
<v Speaker 1>then listen each week to see if we share your
<v Speaker 1>submission or answer your question.
<v Speaker 2>Until next week. Thanks for listening, Si,