Episode 90: Long Term ADF, Body Dysmorphia, Ignoring Naysayers, 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, and I'm Sherry Bullock, longtime intermittent faster and
<v Speaker 1>health and wellness advocate. Please keep in mind that this
<v Speaker 1>podcast is for educational and motivational purposes only, and is
<v Speaker 1>not intended to provide medical or diagnostic advice. Jen and
<v Speaker 1>I are not doctors, so make sure to check with
<v Speaker 1>your trusted healthcare professionals before making changes, especially when it
<v Speaker 1>comes to any medical treatments or medications. Whether you're new
<v Speaker 1>to intermittent fasting or an experienced intermittent faster, tune in
<v Speaker 1>each week to get inspired, to learn, and to have
<v Speaker 1>some fun along the way. Hi, everybody, we are so
<v Speaker 1>glad you're here today.
<v Speaker 2>Welcome to this week's episode of the Fast Feast Repeat
<v Speaker 2>Intermittent Fasting for Life Podcast.
<v Speaker 1>How are you doing today, Sherry? I'm doing great, Me too?
<v Speaker 1>Episode ninety Oh my gosh, it is closing it on
<v Speaker 1>one hundred. Wow. Yeah, that's so fun. Where does time go?
<v Speaker 2>I know, Tom Flaws, it feels like this is our
<v Speaker 2>new podcast right, like we just started it. But ninety
<v Speaker 2>is it's ninety weeks.
<v Speaker 1>Doing a podcast over a year and a half now, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>so well that's fun. Yeah. I always enjoy chatting with
<v Speaker 1>you each week and me too, it's fun. I have
<v Speaker 1>a highlight of my week to sit here and chat
<v Speaker 1>with you. Well, we have a weekly celebration from Wendy
<v Speaker 1>in Ohio. Wendy wrote, dear Jin and Sherry, I want
<v Speaker 1>to start by thanking you for the time you invest
<v Speaker 1>into this podcast and helping fellow fasters around the world
<v Speaker 1>is our pleasure. We love it. I have been fasting
<v Speaker 1>for six and a half years after being introduced to
<v Speaker 1>Jenn's book Delayed, Don't Deny. My body responds great to
<v Speaker 1>a four to three pattern, which I practiced for many years.
<v Speaker 1>After hearing that a family member questioned whether or not
<v Speaker 1>I had an eating disorder because of having down days,
<v Speaker 1>I mentally was not able to do down for quite
<v Speaker 1>a while. After a stressful year in twenty twenty four,
<v Speaker 1>I put on some of the weight that I'd lost,
<v Speaker 1>and I was struggling to get back to my four
<v Speaker 1>to three pattern, which keeps my blood sugars and fasting
<v Speaker 1>insulent in a healthy range. I also could not get
<v Speaker 1>the extra pounds to come off.
<v Speaker 2>Can I pop in with something real quick, Sherry? Yes,
<v Speaker 2>And that is you know, I don't just make stuff up.
<v Speaker 2>I take it from you know, research and from experts
<v Speaker 2>who are actual, you know, like medical doctors or researchers.
<v Speaker 2>Christa Verdi, who developed you know, she calls it the
<v Speaker 2>every other day diet, but she's the one who's done
<v Speaker 2>the ADF research. She states in her book as the
<v Speaker 2>researcher who has researched this. She's the world's greatest expert
<v Speaker 2>on four to three and the person who invented it.
<v Speaker 2>She says that it is safe to do long term.
<v Speaker 2>So I wanted to put that out there. I know,
<v Speaker 2>it is so hard when someone you know plants something
<v Speaker 2>in your head, like and when they say eating disorder,
<v Speaker 2>that just feels icky, right.
<v Speaker 1>You know.
<v Speaker 2>My stepmother once told me, oh, you know this fasting thing,
<v Speaker 2>We've got an eating disorder. Well, now she does internet
<v Speaker 2>in fasting. Okay, So it's just one of those things
<v Speaker 2>that feels awful when someone says it to you. But
<v Speaker 2>I want to reassure everyone that this is a very
<v Speaker 2>well researched fasting protocol. I did not create it. I'm
<v Speaker 2>basing my recommendations on the work of doctor Christa Verdey,
<v Speaker 2>who has followed people doing it long term, and it
<v Speaker 2>is very safe and it's definitely not an eating disorder. Now,
<v Speaker 2>could someone with an eating disorder misuse all types of fasting, Yes,
<v Speaker 2>but that's a whole different conversation, right, all right, I
<v Speaker 2>just wanted to pop that in there.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, well, and yeah, it is a key when people
<v Speaker 1>make comments about our way and we hear this a lot.
<v Speaker 1>We hear lots of commons about people talking about how
<v Speaker 1>we fast or you know, choosing to eat healthy. And
<v Speaker 1>I'm just going to say, when people make comments like that,
<v Speaker 1>it's usually more about them than it is about what
<v Speaker 1>you're doing. Like, you're usually fun.
<v Speaker 2>I'm like, actually have lots of fun, And it has
<v Speaker 2>nothing to do with what I'm putting into my mouth
<v Speaker 2>at this moment.
<v Speaker 1>He usually has to with the fact that they're insecure
<v Speaker 1>about their weight or their way of eating in some way,
<v Speaker 1>and exactly for some reason, it makes them feel better
<v Speaker 1>to make negative comments about other people. Anyway, She says,
<v Speaker 1>I'm so glad that I had my history of ADF.
<v Speaker 1>When I ended up in the er in November I
<v Speaker 1>was in the er starting at nine am and didn't
<v Speaker 1>have to worry about not being allowed to eat just
<v Speaker 1>in case they were going to send me to surgery.
<v Speaker 1>Once they decided to keep me that Saturday evening, I
<v Speaker 1>was given a meal, but not on Sunday as I
<v Speaker 1>was put on a clear liquid diet for surgery scheduled
<v Speaker 1>Monday afternoon. Here's where my history of ADF helped me
<v Speaker 1>so much. I knew that sipping on broth and eating
<v Speaker 1>jello would do nothing to help me and would make
<v Speaker 1>me feel so hungry. I was able to just sip
<v Speaker 1>on black coffee and water all day on Sunday with
<v Speaker 1>no hunger. I ended up with a much longer fast
<v Speaker 1>than I normally would do for ADF since I could
<v Speaker 1>not have anything on Monday due to the surgery. But
<v Speaker 1>I was able to keep sailing with no hunger as
<v Speaker 1>I waited for surgery that ended up not happening until
<v Speaker 1>six pm. Once I woke up on Tuesday morning, I
<v Speaker 1>was able to listen to my body and start refeeding.
<v Speaker 1>After my very long fast, I ate what sounded appetizing
<v Speaker 1>anytime I was hungry as I went home and I
<v Speaker 1>began the healing process. I healed quickly and without any complications,
<v Speaker 1>which I know was helped by fasting and listening to
<v Speaker 1>my body. My celebration is that I was able to
<v Speaker 1>remember how good my body felt when I did follow
<v Speaker 1>a four to three pattern of ADF, and I have
<v Speaker 1>since been able to embrace the down day meal that
<v Speaker 1>I always used to think was going to make ADF
<v Speaker 1>less successful. I have a meal full of vegetables, fruit,
<v Speaker 1>and protein that helped me feel like I'm giving my
<v Speaker 1>body lots of nutrients on my down day. I lost
<v Speaker 1>many of the extra pounds after my surgery in hospital stay,
<v Speaker 1>and my face instantly looked thinner due to less inflammation.
<v Speaker 1>I think that my gallbladder had been a problem for
<v Speaker 1>a long while and it was causing lots of inflammation
<v Speaker 1>throughout my body. I am thankful for the clean fast
<v Speaker 1>and the way it helped me in my time of illness.
<v Speaker 1>Even though fasting did prevent my need for surgery, it
<v Speaker 1>helped me get through all parts of surgery and recovery.
<v Speaker 1>Thank you again for all you do to support my journey.
<v Speaker 2>Wendy, thank you so much for writing in and I'm
<v Speaker 2>so glad that ADEA for your experience with ADF helped
<v Speaker 2>you through that needing to fast longer for your surgery,
<v Speaker 2>because oh, you're right, if I had to have broth
<v Speaker 2>and jello that it would be so miserable, whereas black
<v Speaker 2>coffee and water, I could go and go.
<v Speaker 1>I'm sure. I mean, I eat every day, but I
<v Speaker 1>know I could do it if I needed to.
<v Speaker 2>But give me some gello and I'm like, all right,
<v Speaker 2>I'm starving now. I also want to pop one word
<v Speaker 2>thing in there, since I was talking about Krista Verity's
<v Speaker 2>research and what Wendy said about how she used to
<v Speaker 2>think that having the down day meal would make her
<v Speaker 2>down day less successful. ADF was researched with the five
<v Speaker 2>hundred calorie down day, so that is how the research
<v Speaker 2>was conducted. So that is actually the true way it
<v Speaker 2>was designed. And Christa Verity explained in her book The
<v Speaker 2>Every Other Day Diet that they tested all sorts of
<v Speaker 2>different amount for the down day, and the five hundred
<v Speaker 2>calory was what they found gave the best results.
<v Speaker 1>So I can't remember did they have a protocol where
<v Speaker 1>the people tried a bunch of yeah's, I thought, I did.
<v Speaker 2>I know, I've seen it somewhere else too, where she
<v Speaker 2>actually said that people who had the five hundred calories
<v Speaker 2>lost more fat.
<v Speaker 1>That's not in the book. I can't find that in
<v Speaker 1>The every Other Day Diet. It must have been her
<v Speaker 1>on some kind of a blog post or something or
<v Speaker 1>whatever somewhere I saw that, or else my brain made
<v Speaker 1>it up, but I don't think so. I think I
<v Speaker 1>read it because it like really stuck in my mind.
<v Speaker 1>But in the book The Every Other Day Diet, she
<v Speaker 1>does say that the protocol that gave the best results
<v Speaker 1>was five hundred, not zero. She specifically says that.
<v Speaker 2>So now for some people, that being said, the zero
<v Speaker 2>calorie down day, the full fast version is what they
<v Speaker 2>can stick to the easiest, So that's the one that
<v Speaker 2>they should do. If you find that every time you
<v Speaker 2>try to have a five hundred calorie meal you end
<v Speaker 2>up eating two thousand calories by accident because you can't
<v Speaker 2>stop at five hundred, then maybe you do better with
<v Speaker 2>the thirty six hour full fast.
<v Speaker 1>So that's why we want you to figure out what
<v Speaker 1>feels the best to you. But I love that Wendy
<v Speaker 1>is having a down day meal full of vegetables, fruit
<v Speaker 1>and protein that fills her up for the five hundred calories,
<v Speaker 1>and I don't want anyone to ever feel like that's like,
<v Speaker 1>you know, cheating, because that is what ADF was originally
<v Speaker 1>based on, and Christa Verde says, that's what gave the
<v Speaker 1>best results. Yeah, And I want to say too, like
<v Speaker 1>sometimes people will start ADF and they you know, mentally
<v Speaker 1>they want that down day meal and then they're like, oh,
<v Speaker 1>I tried it, and I was hungrier after I had
<v Speaker 1>the meal, and so the five hundred calorie meal doesn't
<v Speaker 1>work for me. It's not maybe that it doesn't work
<v Speaker 1>for you. Sometimes there's a little bit of trial and
<v Speaker 1>error with trying to figure out what food composition, you know,
<v Speaker 1>what your composition of your meal it makes you satisfied, right,
<v Speaker 1>And I can tell you what makes me satisfied for
<v Speaker 1>a five hundred calorie meal, and it might be different
<v Speaker 1>for gen right, And so you know, it does take
<v Speaker 1>some trial and error. You do have to practice a
<v Speaker 1>little bit, and maybe you decide you just don't even
<v Speaker 1>want to do that right now. You just want to
<v Speaker 1>get the ADF going, and you know, and you just
<v Speaker 1>want to just skip that down day meal and full fast.
<v Speaker 1>That's great too, But don't think that you can't ever
<v Speaker 1>do that five hundred calories because sometimes once you really
<v Speaker 1>get in the rhythm and your body gets you get
<v Speaker 1>more in tune with your body and eating and society.
<v Speaker 1>As time goes on, you might really be able to
<v Speaker 1>transition to the five hundred calory eating window. So just
<v Speaker 1>think that you have to what works this month is
<v Speaker 1>what you have to do forever, because you know, we
<v Speaker 1>change and adapt and learn throughout this whole journey. Absolutely.
<v Speaker 1>So now we have a question from a listener. This
<v Speaker 1>question is from Erica in Wisconsin. Hijen and Sherry. First
<v Speaker 1>of all, thank you for all that you do. I
<v Speaker 1>love listening to the podcasts every week. I was wondering
<v Speaker 1>if you had any thoughts to share about the mental
<v Speaker 1>aspect of losing weight and adjusting to your new body.
<v Speaker 1>I am thirty five and five foot four inches. I
<v Speaker 1>have always been overweight. In high school, I was two
<v Speaker 1>hundred and forty pounds on a five foot four frame
<v Speaker 1>and settled into two hundred and seventy to two hundred
<v Speaker 1>and eighty for my entire adult life. My one year
<v Speaker 1>fastiversary will be on December twenty seventh, as this is
<v Speaker 1>in the past, so she's already passed it. Congratulations to
<v Speaker 1>your fastiversary, Erica. She said, I am the smallest I
<v Speaker 1>have been as an adult at two hundred and ten pounds.
<v Speaker 1>As you can imagine, I'm reaching a point where I
<v Speaker 1>need to update my wardrobe. I'm really finding this to
<v Speaker 1>be a big mental hurdle. I still see myself in
<v Speaker 1>my two hundred and seventy pound body and have to
<v Speaker 1>retrain my brain that the weird fit is more often
<v Speaker 1>because I need to size down. Thank you for your time.
<v Speaker 1>I would love to hear your thoughts. Well, I have
<v Speaker 1>a lot of thoughts on this because I went through this.
<v Speaker 1>I struggled with this for a very long time. And
<v Speaker 1>there is actually a term for this. They call it
<v Speaker 1>the ghost fat syndrome or the phantom fat syndrome. I've
<v Speaker 1>ever heard of that. Sharing Well, you know, I remember
<v Speaker 1>back from like a weight Watchers training thing that I
<v Speaker 1>went to like that this was briefly brought up and
<v Speaker 1>like I kind of well, I was prepping this was
<v Speaker 1>like there's a word for this, and it's a form
<v Speaker 1>of body dysmorphia, and it's kind of like a transient
<v Speaker 1>body dysmorphia and that's the term it's in. Like there's
<v Speaker 1>so much out there. Google it. There's Psychology Today articles
<v Speaker 1>on it. But anyways, Yeah, so it is a form
<v Speaker 1>of body dysmorphia, and some of the suggestions they really
<v Speaker 1>make to overcome it or take progress photos, and you know,
<v Speaker 1>I'm a fan of progress photos, and this is how
<v Speaker 1>I overcame this for me personally. I took progress photos
<v Speaker 1>and chopped my head off. It was helpful for me
<v Speaker 1>for the longest time to see the body without my
<v Speaker 1>face attached to it, because I could look at that
<v Speaker 1>body and see it more objectively, because if it was
<v Speaker 1>my body, then I'm like picking it apart still, but
<v Speaker 1>if it's just a body, and especially when I was
<v Speaker 1>comparing it to a bigger body, it was really easy
<v Speaker 1>to see the progress. It was easier to see like, oh,
<v Speaker 1>you know, the arms are thinner, the hips are thinner,
<v Speaker 1>the thighs are thinner, the bellies thinner. And it really
<v Speaker 1>helped me. And then from there I was able to
<v Speaker 1>see it with my head attached to it, and then
<v Speaker 1>I was like, Okay, this really is me. But you know,
<v Speaker 1>it would take me by surprise when I would catch
<v Speaker 1>my reflection in a mirror or a glass window and
<v Speaker 1>I'm like, who's that thin woman, and then I'm like,
<v Speaker 1>oh wait, that's me, that's my body, and it's it
<v Speaker 1>is a weird feeling. But for the longest time, I
<v Speaker 1>would buy everything a size or two too big, and
<v Speaker 1>I would get it home and be like, huh, this
<v Speaker 1>is too big, that's so weird. Why doesn't this fit.
<v Speaker 1>I knew that I was forty five pounds later, but
<v Speaker 1>I felt like I still was a size large, you know,
<v Speaker 1>I felt like I was still a size fourteen pant.
<v Speaker 1>So it took a lot of practice and actually going
<v Speaker 1>into dressing rooms and trying on different sizes and asking
<v Speaker 1>people in the dressing rooms or take a front with
<v Speaker 1>you and ask them, you know, is this flattering? Does
<v Speaker 1>this fit me well? Because too, you know, when we
<v Speaker 1>aren't comfortable in our bodies and we were heavier, we
<v Speaker 1>tend to dress in ways to try to camouflage our body,
<v Speaker 1>so we're not even really sure what our body looks
<v Speaker 1>like really in well fitting clothes. So some of the
<v Speaker 1>suggestions that they gave are progress photos a body gratitude practice.
<v Speaker 1>So you know, I've suggested this people in community before
<v Speaker 1>every day wake up, and all you have to do
<v Speaker 1>is say, you know, I am grateful for and for me.
<v Speaker 1>My grateful would be like, I am grateful that I
<v Speaker 1>have fixed strong legs because they help me move my patience.
<v Speaker 1>You know, just things like that, I'm grateful that I
<v Speaker 1>used to hate being tall, but now I can say
<v Speaker 1>I'm grateful that I'm five ten. I can reach things
<v Speaker 1>on the top shelf in the kitchen that my husband
<v Speaker 1>can't reach. So it's little things. It's just finding things
<v Speaker 1>that you're grateful for your body and thanking your body.
<v Speaker 1>Visualization exercises. There's mirror mantras. Stand in front of the
<v Speaker 1>mirror practice mantras. You know, I am strong, I am beautiful,
<v Speaker 1>I am thin, I am healthy, you know whatever that
<v Speaker 1>whatever speaks to you. And then one of them that's
<v Speaker 1>really powerful as well, is to take your old like
<v Speaker 1>your old sized pants and your new size pants and
<v Speaker 1>lay the new ones on top of the old ones.
<v Speaker 1>It's really powerful to see like how much extra fabric
<v Speaker 1>there is, and it really helps you see that yes,
<v Speaker 1>you can and wear those smaller sized pants and you
<v Speaker 1>you know, and they do fit you and you don't
<v Speaker 1>need all that extra material anymore. So look up ghost
<v Speaker 1>fat or phantom fant syndrome. You know, find a resource
<v Speaker 1>that's helpful for you, and then you know, if you
<v Speaker 1>really are still struggling, they do suggest some CBT therapy.
<v Speaker 1>There are therapists to help specifically with body dysmorphia. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>I think that's that's really is our great suggestion, Sherry,
<v Speaker 1>because it really is true. Same with me.
<v Speaker 2>When I got down to my goal, I was picking
<v Speaker 2>up clothes and thinking there's no way I could sit
<v Speaker 2>into that right, because I was still visualizing myself bicker right,
<v Speaker 2>and then I would put it on like I'm like god,
<v Speaker 2>it's all like went crazy and bought way too many
<v Speaker 2>clothes because it felt so good, you know, to see,
<v Speaker 2>but you really it takes time to adapt to moving
<v Speaker 2>through the world a smaller body. And I also want
<v Speaker 2>to point out that it can also be hard for
<v Speaker 2>people who've known you a long time to see the
<v Speaker 2>new you. They might say you've lost too much weight,
<v Speaker 2>don't lose anymore, even though that's not actually accurate. They
<v Speaker 2>might have like body dysmorphia about you, right, because they're
<v Speaker 2>used to seeing a certain you and now you look different.
<v Speaker 1>So like Chad told me, I'd lost too much.
<v Speaker 2>Might don't lose any more weight, and that was when
<v Speaker 2>I'm heavier than I am right now, and he wasn't right,
<v Speaker 2>but he was used to seeing, you know, two hundred
<v Speaker 2>and ten pound me and then one hundred and thirty
<v Speaker 2>five pound me.
<v Speaker 1>You know, when I got to my first goal was
<v Speaker 1>very different than two hundred and ten right then, I
<v Speaker 1>wanted to lose some more and he absolutely doesn't think
<v Speaker 1>I lost too much, and I don't. Haven't. It just
<v Speaker 1>took his brain time to catch to catch up as well. Yeah, yeah, exactly.
<v Speaker 1>So a lot of us we go through it, and
<v Speaker 1>also the people who love us go through it. So
<v Speaker 1>something to keep in mind. And congratulations, it looks like
<v Speaker 1>you've probably lost about sixty to seventy pounds this last
<v Speaker 1>year and that is amazing. So I just want to
<v Speaker 1>congratulate you, Erica. All right, So we have a question
<v Speaker 1>from Debbie in Hampshire, London. She says, Hyjien and Sherry.
<v Speaker 1>I am a fifty year old mom of three boys
<v Speaker 1>and married. I've always loved my food with a healthy
<v Speaker 1>appetite and was brought up thankfully with wholesome food that
<v Speaker 1>my mom would make from scratch. I've always been well
<v Speaker 1>covered and as my mom would always say, my legs
<v Speaker 1>would fill my shorts well covered. Does that mean well padded?
<v Speaker 1>I'm not familiar with that term. Yeah, that's an Anglo
<v Speaker 1>surprise we haven't heard of all right, So she says,
<v Speaker 1>I currently weigh one hundred and seventy seven pounds and
<v Speaker 1>I have historically been members of weight loss clubs and
<v Speaker 1>while they worked, when I followed them, there would always
<v Speaker 1>be something that would cause me to quote slip up
<v Speaker 1>and then eventually quit. My husband introduced me to intermint pasting.
<v Speaker 1>I thought he was crazy and I thought he was
<v Speaker 1>doing it all wrong. Is I had the mantra from
<v Speaker 1>my weight loss clubs embedded in me like probably eat
<v Speaker 1>multiple small day meals throughout the day. I however, took interest,
<v Speaker 1>especially when I heard of the inflammatory spoonss that I gave,
<v Speaker 1>so I thought I'd give it a go. And I
<v Speaker 1>think she means anti inflammatory. I started off with following
<v Speaker 1>the eight hundred fast approach with the late Michael Mosley.
<v Speaker 1>He was my number one guru. We felt and looked
<v Speaker 1>amazing while doing it. We then went on an all
<v Speaker 1>inclusive holiday and since then I have struggled to truly
<v Speaker 1>get back on it. I continue to eat wholesome foods
<v Speaker 1>every day, and my intake of ultra processed foods has
<v Speaker 1>vastly decreased. I love this podcast and I listen to
<v Speaker 1>you every day, even re listening to the same podcasts
<v Speaker 1>to recap, and I love finding out new information. The
<v Speaker 1>information is just mind blowing. I also listened to the
<v Speaker 1>Zoe podcasts. The science behind health and nutrition is fascinating.
<v Speaker 1>When I fast clean, I can easily fast until two
<v Speaker 1>or four and then open my window with some poached
<v Speaker 1>eggs and rye toes, sauerkraut and seeds, trying to boost
<v Speaker 1>my gut microbiome, and I try to stop eating before
<v Speaker 1>nine PM, a bad habit that I'm trying to break. Recently,
<v Speaker 1>I listened to a Zoe podcast with Tim Spector and
<v Speaker 1>another professor, and they said that long fasts of sixteen
<v Speaker 1>to twenty hours are helpful for short term health. However,
<v Speaker 1>long fasts can be damaging for long term health. And
<v Speaker 1>then he went on to say that they recommend ten
<v Speaker 1>to twelve hour eating windows, and they don't advocate shorter
<v Speaker 1>eating windows. And now I'm so confused. Here's my question.
<v Speaker 1>Please tell me what I should do. I know what
<v Speaker 1>works for some may not work. For me, but I
<v Speaker 1>want to do it right for long term health goals.
<v Speaker 1>I feel now with all of the podcasts I've listened
<v Speaker 1>to from both FFR and Zoe that there's conflicting advice.
<v Speaker 1>Thank you for all your support. You both are truly
<v Speaker 1>inspiring and I'm so happy that I found Fast Feast Repeat.
<v Speaker 1>All Right, we know exactly what episode you're talking about,
<v Speaker 1>because you know I'm a fan of the Zoe podcast.
<v Speaker 1>Tim Spector's awesome. He does internitt and fasting himself, and
<v Speaker 1>they had a guest st on. I'm not going to
<v Speaker 1>say by name. If you heard it, you know who
<v Speaker 1>I'm talking about. And this guest is very interesting. We
<v Speaker 1>actually talked about his protocol a few weeks ago on
<v Speaker 1>this podcast. Let's just say he likes something called fasting
<v Speaker 1>mimicking rather than actual fasting. And by the way, he
<v Speaker 1>will also sell you his fasting mimicking approach if you
<v Speaker 1>would like to buy it, So it is in his
<v Speaker 1>best interest to promote that his approach is better than
<v Speaker 1>other approaches out there. So set that aside for a moment.
<v Speaker 1>I want to go back to what I've already talked
<v Speaker 1>about on this episode, and that is Christa Verity's work.
<v Speaker 1>She is a research scientist who has studied alternate day fasting.
<v Speaker 1>Think about it like a thirty six twelve right where
<v Speaker 1>they're doing the longer fast down day up day. She
<v Speaker 1>has found through her research that it is absolutely safe
<v Speaker 1>long term. So what do you do when one person
<v Speaker 1>is researching alternate day fasting and say, and that's even
<v Speaker 1>longer than my average fast is probably nineteen hours, So
<v Speaker 1>alternate day fasting is longer than that. So if she
<v Speaker 1>says it's safe, and then you know, Jen's over here
<v Speaker 1>doing a daily five hour eating window and has been
<v Speaker 1>doing it for ten years. And then we've got this
<v Speaker 1>other person who's saying, oh, no, no, no, you should
<v Speaker 1>have a ten to twelve hour eating window every single day.
<v Speaker 1>Anything more than that is not good for you. That
<v Speaker 1>is so confusing. So think about who says what and
<v Speaker 1>why they might say it. Why might someone who would
<v Speaker 1>like to sell you a fasting mimicking approach try to
<v Speaker 1>convince you that longer fasting is not what you want
<v Speaker 1>to do. Instead, you want to do what he wants
<v Speaker 1>you to do, right, I have no desire to tell
<v Speaker 1>you what you should do. I'm also not selling you
<v Speaker 1>a fasting program.
<v Speaker 2>I want you to figure out what works the best
<v Speaker 2>for you, and I know that you can do that.
<v Speaker 2>So when you hear somebody and it doesn't job with
<v Speaker 2>your own lived experiences with fasting, then you can say, huh,
<v Speaker 2>that's a sound right, wonder why I might say that,
<v Speaker 2>and then dig in a little bit see if you
<v Speaker 2>can figure it out.
<v Speaker 1>And so I just, you know, talking from my own
<v Speaker 1>point of view, two hundred and ten pound Gin from
<v Speaker 1>twenty fourteen was not doing well physically. I was heading
<v Speaker 1>down a path that wasn't wasn't going to lead to
<v Speaker 1>good things for my body.
<v Speaker 2>So instead I have adopted an intermittent fasting lifestyle. I've
<v Speaker 2>been doing it for now over ten years. I feel amazing.
<v Speaker 2>When I go to the doctor. My doctor's like, wow,
<v Speaker 2>you're doing great.
<v Speaker 1>You know. I'm at a healthy weight and all of
<v Speaker 1>my blood work looks really good. So two hundred and
<v Speaker 1>ten pound Gin caught everything that came down the pike.
<v Speaker 1>I was always sick. I needed antibiotics all the time.
<v Speaker 1>I don't. I haven't needed to go to the doctor
<v Speaker 1>for a sick visit since I started fast and clean.
<v Speaker 1>So my personal study of one has shown that what
<v Speaker 1>I'm doing is way better for me than what I
<v Speaker 1>used to do. And I want you to ask yourself
<v Speaker 1>the same thing. If what you're doing leads to improvement
<v Speaker 1>in health markers for you, that's a good thing. If
<v Speaker 1>what you're doing leads to all of your health markers
<v Speaker 1>are getting worse and worse and worse, that would not
<v Speaker 1>be a good thing. Let your results speak for themselves
<v Speaker 1>and trust that if you are losing fat and getting
<v Speaker 1>healthier and feeling good, that is a good thing. And
<v Speaker 1>an expert who says something that's contradictory to that, that
<v Speaker 1>doesn't hold true to your experiences, I would question that. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>And I want to say too, you know, like, yes,
<v Speaker 1>we love Zoe, we love the work they do. But
<v Speaker 1>they put out a weekly podcast with a guest every week, okay,
<v Speaker 1>and so they interview guests who are in the longevity, wellness,
<v Speaker 1>wellness nutrition Ye okay. So the thing that you can do, though,
<v Speaker 1>is if you look back through all the Zoe episodes,
<v Speaker 1>you're going to find that their guests often have differing
<v Speaker 1>opinions on the other guests. Right, You're gonna have whole food,
<v Speaker 1>plant based guests. You're gonna have guests that say, you know,
<v Speaker 1>all seed oils are bad, You're gonna have guests that
<v Speaker 1>says bad as I don't think zoecause Zoe doesn't oils
<v Speaker 1>are bad like they do. Well, I'm just bad. So
<v Speaker 1>I don't think they would actually like I just I
<v Speaker 1>just threw that out. There's a you know scenario, you know,
<v Speaker 1>but that is another exact They don't think seed oils
<v Speaker 1>are bad exactly. The other people would be like, this
<v Speaker 1>is the reason that everybody is sick is the seed oils.
<v Speaker 1>So that's they don't agree with what everybody's saying about
<v Speaker 1>seed oil. Said that you got to balance that. So
<v Speaker 1>you mean it's that whole. You can find different perspectives,
<v Speaker 1>you can find research that shows different things, and then
<v Speaker 1>you know some research is not I mean why was
<v Speaker 1>the research being conducted? You know who is funding the research.
<v Speaker 1>So you know, there's just so many variables to it.
<v Speaker 1>And so Zoe is doing a good job of putting
<v Speaker 1>this information out there. They're getting people thinking about their health,
<v Speaker 1>they're showing them different options to address do they Does
<v Speaker 1>that mean they one hundred percent? Does that mean the
<v Speaker 1>producers of Zoe one hundred percent agree with everything that
<v Speaker 1>comes out of their guests mouth probably not arguing exactly
<v Speaker 1>the arguing with guests right, right. So that's where it
<v Speaker 1>comes down to do your own research and do what
<v Speaker 1>feels right for you. And you know there is information overload.
<v Speaker 1>There was a period of time where I was listening
<v Speaker 1>to everything under the sun, and you can make yourself
<v Speaker 1>crazy because everything is everything conflicts itself. Like you can
<v Speaker 1>find pros and cons for every single thing. For me,
<v Speaker 1>my list of pros for fasting far exceeds any list
<v Speaker 1>of cons for me. And so yeah, you just have
<v Speaker 1>to come down to you knew you felt great, your
<v Speaker 1>husband felt great. Do you want to return to what
<v Speaker 1>you were doing before and you felt great doing that,
<v Speaker 1>then do that. If down the road you don't feel great,
<v Speaker 1>tweak what you're doing. Use your body as you do
<v Speaker 1>your own personal research. Be your own research study. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>you know. I look at doctor Mark Natsen, who worked
<v Speaker 1>for Johns Hopkins neurological researcher. He's been living the intermittent
<v Speaker 1>fasting lifestyle since the nineteen eighties. He is a research scientist.
<v Speaker 1>He's been living the intermittent fasting lifestyle since the nineteen
<v Speaker 1>eighties as a man, and he has like he would.
<v Speaker 1>He was.
<v Speaker 2>He came on intermittent fasting stories. He would fast till
<v Speaker 2>the afternoon every day. That's what he does.
<v Speaker 1>So I really think that people, instead of listening to
<v Speaker 1>people who don't like it, listen to the people who
<v Speaker 1>do like it and see why they like it.
<v Speaker 2>Why do people promote intermittent fasting. The people who think
<v Speaker 2>it's bad for you are going to say certain things
<v Speaker 2>that may not prove to be true for your experience.
<v Speaker 2>Like the person who was on this Zoy podcast that
<v Speaker 2>you're referencing, he has something he says about heart attacks
<v Speaker 2>that he pulls out. He'll say that like fasting too
<v Speaker 2>long a gets your heart attacks. He's been saying that
<v Speaker 2>for a long long time or something like that. But
<v Speaker 2>I remember hearing him years and years and years ago.
<v Speaker 2>We were still on Facebook, that's how long ago it was.
<v Speaker 2>And it was something it was It was actually a
<v Speaker 2>written article. It was a written article instead of I
<v Speaker 2>think a pot So I was able to see his
<v Speaker 2>sources that he had cited, and I looked at the
<v Speaker 2>source he had cited, and that is not what that
<v Speaker 2>source said. He was claiming that this source that he
<v Speaker 2>cited said something that it didn't like, he said this
<v Speaker 2>proves this.
<v Speaker 1>He misrepresented it. He misrepresented exactly. He misrepresented what this
<v Speaker 1>study proved. And a heart scientist knows better than that.
<v Speaker 1>Either they know better and they are doing it to
<v Speaker 1>try to sway you, or they don't know better, which
<v Speaker 1>in which case I would be even more concerned. I mean,
<v Speaker 1>I'm an elementary teacher, right, and I can look at
<v Speaker 1>that and say that wasn't what he said it was.
<v Speaker 1>So he I think he knows that, but it's just
<v Speaker 1>really easy to throw it out there because.
<v Speaker 2>People aren't going to argue with you because you're the
<v Speaker 2>research signed is that everybody's heard of, right, and you're like,
<v Speaker 2>that's not what that study said. And I've actually done
<v Speaker 2>that a lot as a reader of books. Somebody in
<v Speaker 2>a book will cite something and I'll go to the
<v Speaker 2>reference section find that study and I'm like, that's not
<v Speaker 2>what it said.
<v Speaker 1>That's not what it says at all. And so I've
<v Speaker 1>seen that happen so many times that I'm a little
<v Speaker 1>little jaded about it, and so question if something sounds,
<v Speaker 1>you know, opposite of your experiences, you know, don't just say, oh,
<v Speaker 1>well he said that. If we just listen to everything
<v Speaker 1>we'll be so confused we can't do anything right. It
<v Speaker 1>reminds me this the whole conversation that made me think
<v Speaker 1>of a conversation that came up years ago in the
<v Speaker 1>Facebook groups and all of a sudden, somebody comes in
<v Speaker 1>and says, oh wait this, you know, fasting expert says
<v Speaker 1>we should not be drinking black coffee while we're fasting. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>oh yeah, that was a big one. I know why, No,
<v Speaker 1>it's not the same. God's okay, it's not. Well. So
<v Speaker 1>when we started to dig into why, he flat out
<v Speaker 1>says it's in a podcast interviews because most people don't
<v Speaker 1>drink black coffee. They always add butter cream or sweeteners,
<v Speaker 1>sweeteners to their coffee, and you can't have that while fasting.
<v Speaker 1>So it's easier just to tell people not to drink coffee.
<v Speaker 1>He literally said that, rather than telling people to consume
<v Speaker 1>black coffee, He's like, they're not gonna drink black coffee,
<v Speaker 1>so I'll just tell them not to have any coffee
<v Speaker 1>at all. Right, Right, So that actually got out there
<v Speaker 1>that you couldn't have coffee. I mean, if you don't
<v Speaker 1>want to have coffee, don't have coffee. There's no requirement
<v Speaker 1>to have black coffee. But there's black coffee. It's petra
<v Speaker 1>inticated right exactly. It would be like Gen coming out
<v Speaker 1>and saying nobody can have tea while fasting because ten
<v Speaker 1>like fifty million tea questions a day, and Jen's like,
<v Speaker 1>you know what, I'm tired of ask answering tea questions.
<v Speaker 1>So I'm just gonna tell people they can't drink tea
<v Speaker 1>or no tea at all, they've got to tea. I
<v Speaker 1>don't like tea, so yeah, same exact thing. Anyway, I
<v Speaker 1>appreciate that you asked this question. I could go on
<v Speaker 1>and on and I'll stop. Yeah. My bline is we're
<v Speaker 1>not here to convince you to fast now. We're here
<v Speaker 1>to support you when you make the decision that that's
<v Speaker 1>what's right for you. But don't let someone else talk
<v Speaker 1>you out of it. That's the main thing. Don't let
<v Speaker 1>a naysayer talk you out of it with like scary things.
<v Speaker 1>If your health is getting worse and worse and worse
<v Speaker 1>every time you go to the doctor, your health is worse,
<v Speaker 1>then that's a sign that what you're doing is not
<v Speaker 1>working for you. But if you're healthy and things are good,
<v Speaker 1>then don't let someone scare you all Right, Now it's
<v Speaker 1>time for our segment called What's Your Why. Most of
<v Speaker 1>us start with weight loss in mind, which is a
<v Speaker 1>great reason to begin, but there's so much more to
<v Speaker 1>what intermittent fasting can do for us beyond weight loss,
<v Speaker 1>and I genuinely believe when your why is deeper than
<v Speaker 1>weight loss alone, you're more likely to find long term
<v Speaker 1>success and view intermittent fasting as a lifestyle. Well. This
<v Speaker 1>week we have a wife from Claudia. My why is that,
<v Speaker 1>for the first time in years, I'm not afraid of
<v Speaker 1>chronic disease from aging. I have been feeling in my
<v Speaker 1>thirties the way I wouldn't want to feel in my
<v Speaker 1>fifties and sixties. I knew I was running headlong into
<v Speaker 1>my family history of cancer, heart disease, diabetes, and dementia,
<v Speaker 1>and it just felt inevitable. I felt like I had
<v Speaker 1>tried everything and nothing was going to change my direction.
<v Speaker 1>I was broken until now now I feel great in
<v Speaker 1>my body in a way I haven't felt since my
<v Speaker 1>mid twenties. Every fast feels like a gift that will
<v Speaker 1>protect and care for my body in all the ways
<v Speaker 1>I hope. And I also don't even know I need,
<v Speaker 1>and my future health just feels like this present to
<v Speaker 1>unwrap as I heal more and more over time. It's
<v Speaker 1>not that I think it's all going to be sunshine
<v Speaker 1>and roses, but I feel hopeful that my health span
<v Speaker 1>will much more closely match my life span, and I
<v Speaker 1>am so grateful. I love that. I do think we
<v Speaker 1>need to focus on our health span. I think so too.
<v Speaker 1>We're more than just the number on the scale. We're
<v Speaker 1>We're so much more and we want to be strong,
<v Speaker 1>we want to be healthy, we want to be able
<v Speaker 1>to move through the world. Well, I actually use the
<v Speaker 1>word health span when talking to a physician's assistant this
<v Speaker 1>weekend at work. Huh, And he had never heard the
<v Speaker 1>term light. Oh wow, it's a powerful term. And I
<v Speaker 1>said to him, I said, well, I think we really
<v Speaker 1>need to be focused on that. It doesn't matter how
<v Speaker 1>long you live. If you're if there's not health in
<v Speaker 1>that life. You know, if the last ten years of
<v Speaker 1>your life is riddled with poor health and being immobile
<v Speaker 1>and having dependent on others, then you know what value
<v Speaker 1>ares those last ten years. So I you know, I
<v Speaker 1>kind of I hope that when I walked away, he
<v Speaker 1>was kind of left thinking, Yeah, I think of my
<v Speaker 1>granddaddy trying him. And you know he he lived. He
<v Speaker 1>was strong, and he was he always worked and he
<v Speaker 1>retired from his job. He supervised construction sites. He was
<v Speaker 1>an architectural engineer, and he leaned over one day to
<v Speaker 1>put on his shoes and just died of a heart
<v Speaker 1>attack right that minute. That's how I want to go.
<v Speaker 1>I want to go like my granddaddy train him. He
<v Speaker 1>had a business that he had worked out of it.
<v Speaker 2>He took wood and cut it down and made stakes
<v Speaker 2>for construction sites, right and he just would go out
<v Speaker 2>there and saw the wood.
<v Speaker 1>After he retired. That was what he did for his business,
<v Speaker 1>and he enjoyed it, and he was physically active. He
<v Speaker 1>did was he Oh gosh, I can't tell you. I can't.
<v Speaker 1>I don't know. I'm not sure. Okay, I hadn't done
<v Speaker 1>that math. I'd have to go back and think. I
<v Speaker 1>couldn't tell you. But he was probably eighty huh right,
<v Speaker 1>probably around eighty, and like I said, he was getting
<v Speaker 1>ready to go do his active job, leaned over to
<v Speaker 1>put in his shoes, just died of a heart attack.
<v Speaker 1>But he was active, And I contrast that with my
<v Speaker 1>dad who just passed away in twenty twenty four. He
<v Speaker 1>was eighty and he was in such poor physical condition
<v Speaker 1>at the end of his life. And I want to
<v Speaker 1>go like my granddaddy, train them, and so being active
<v Speaker 1>is just really important. Yeah, wow, were that story of
<v Speaker 1>my granddaddy. While we were having that conversation. At work,
<v Speaker 1>There's a guy I work with and he's my age,
<v Speaker 1>so fifty one, and he in the last few years
<v Speaker 1>has really become more aware of his health and has
<v Speaker 1>recently lost about fifty pounds and he tries to be
<v Speaker 1>active every day and he's, you know, really tweaking his diet.
<v Speaker 1>He's actually doing that seventy five hard right now. But
<v Speaker 1>he he said, you know, he had this like awareness
<v Speaker 1>one day and it was just from watching, you know,
<v Speaker 1>our patients come in through the ear and he said,
<v Speaker 1>you know, I started thinking to myself, does it really
<v Speaker 1>matter how long I live? If once I get to
<v Speaker 1>retirement age, I just spend it in a recliner exactly.
<v Speaker 1>And he said, you know, did I do all of
<v Speaker 1>this and work all this hard, you know, throughout my
<v Speaker 1>life so that I can retire and be so exhausted
<v Speaker 1>and so overweight and unfit and unhealthy, that I can't
<v Speaker 1>enjoy time after retirement. And he said, and that was
<v Speaker 1>like a really like a big wake up to me.
<v Speaker 1>And he said, and I realized I have to live
<v Speaker 1>better now so I can live better later. And I
<v Speaker 1>thought that was so profound. I think so too. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>all right, so we have a questions and then from
<v Speaker 1>Melissa in the Midwest, she said, Hello, I'm a thirty
<v Speaker 1>six year old woman mom took three kids. I'm five
<v Speaker 1>four and currently one hundred and seventy two pounds. I
<v Speaker 1>have been intermittent fasting since twenty twenty three. After having
<v Speaker 1>my last baby in twenty twenty, I found IF after
<v Speaker 1>wondering why six months of calorie counting and exercising was
<v Speaker 1>not helping me lose weight. I couldn't understand why eat
<v Speaker 1>less mood more wasn't working for me, and I stumbled
<v Speaker 1>across articles on insulin resistance. I do have hypothyroidism, and
<v Speaker 1>I exhibit several traits that are common with pcos, such
<v Speaker 1>as irregular periods, acne, skin tags, weight around the belly.
<v Speaker 1>I read the code and fast piece repeat, and then
<v Speaker 1>I started IF doing sixteen eight and then eighteen six.
<v Speaker 1>For a few months. I thought I would try ADF,
<v Speaker 1>and I loved how I felt doing it Monday, Wednesday
<v Speaker 1>and Fridays. My starting weight was one seventy eight and
<v Speaker 1>I lost twenty six pounds in six months with total
<v Speaker 1>body recomposition. I loved to run and work out, so
<v Speaker 1>I was alternating fasting days with my workout days, and
<v Speaker 1>the rhythm worked to keep me fueled and also see
<v Speaker 1>the scale move. I got to my lowest weight since
<v Speaker 1>having kids, at one hundred and fifty two pounds at
<v Speaker 1>the end of twenty twenty three. I was totally okay
<v Speaker 1>with that number on the scale, but my issue was
<v Speaker 1>how to maintain it? What I have to do ADF forever?
<v Speaker 1>Is it okay to do ADF for the long term?
<v Speaker 1>So in twenty twenty four, after gaining ten pounds back,
<v Speaker 1>I started fasting again, doing a mix of twenty four
<v Speaker 1>and ADF, and then other times I did not fast. Honestly,
<v Speaker 1>there were days and weeks I did not fast at
<v Speaker 1>all or workout consistently, and I was afraid to step
<v Speaker 1>on the scale in the new year. All that to say,
<v Speaker 1>I arrived at January first, twenty twenty five, back at
<v Speaker 1>one hundred and seventy two pounds. We eat fairly clean
<v Speaker 1>as a family and focus on less processed foods, no gluten,
<v Speaker 1>and limited dairy. But I know I can focus on
<v Speaker 1>my eating, moving my body, and fasting more consistently. Since
<v Speaker 1>January first, it is now January fifth as I write this,
<v Speaker 1>I have been doing twenty four and I started to
<v Speaker 1>work out and run again. The scale hasn't moved much,
<v Speaker 1>but I do feel I have less inflammation. I guess
<v Speaker 1>my question is should I go back to ADF again
<v Speaker 1>to lose twenty to thirty pounds and then work on
<v Speaker 1>a maintenance plan again. Ideally I would like to get
<v Speaker 1>under one hundred and fifty pounds. Will a daily eating
<v Speaker 1>window consistently help me reach my goal? Or do I
<v Speaker 1>need to do ADF longer or longer fasts? Is it
<v Speaker 1>normal to gain back the weight I lost so quickly,
<v Speaker 1>or do I have bad insulin resistance that requires longer fasting.
<v Speaker 1>I'm totally sold on the eye of fly style, but
<v Speaker 1>I'd like to find my group with a schedule that
<v Speaker 1>could help me reach my goals and still be consistent
<v Speaker 1>with my family at home. I'm reminding myself of my
<v Speaker 1>why beyond weight loss to be able to keep up
<v Speaker 1>with my kids without losing my breath, avoid the health
<v Speaker 1>struggles my parents have had from obesity, and keep inflammation
<v Speaker 1>down in my body for longevity. I'm so grateful for
<v Speaker 1>your podcast and listen to it weekly, and I have
<v Speaker 1>recommended it to several friends. So what do you have
<v Speaker 1>to say? Jan Boy?
<v Speaker 2>I wish I could give you a definitive answer to
<v Speaker 2>every one of those questions, but unfortunately I can't.
<v Speaker 1>So I'm looking back. You started at.
<v Speaker 2>One seventy eight and you lost twenty six pounds in
<v Speaker 2>six months, so it sounds like you kind of regained
<v Speaker 2>it at a very similar pace to how you lost it.
<v Speaker 2>So I know it seems like you gained it back
<v Speaker 2>really fast, but I think you've probably gained it like.
<v Speaker 1>I'm looking at the amount of time. Does am I
<v Speaker 1>right with that? Sherry? Does that seem about right?
<v Speaker 2>Like in twenty twenty four, it sounds like twenty twenty
<v Speaker 2>four was a year of not a lot of fasting
<v Speaker 2>and then you got back to where you had been.
<v Speaker 2>So should you go back to ADF again to lose
<v Speaker 2>twenty to thirty pounds? It sounds like you enjoyed IDF,
<v Speaker 2>so maybe maybe, So that might be a great plan
<v Speaker 2>for you.
<v Speaker 1>And then will a daily eating window help you reach
<v Speaker 1>your goal? Maybe? Maybe not.
<v Speaker 2>That's the thing we can't predict. The only way you
<v Speaker 2>will know is by doing it and seeing if it happens.
<v Speaker 2>That's where we're the study of one the experiment. You know,
<v Speaker 2>you say, okay, will a daily eating window get me
<v Speaker 2>where I want to be? You answer that by trying
<v Speaker 2>the daily eating window for a significant enough period of
<v Speaker 2>time to see what happens, and then you'll know. And if,
<v Speaker 2>for example, you.
<v Speaker 1>Have a five hour daily eating window, you weigh daily,
<v Speaker 1>and then once a week you calculate your weekly average,
<v Speaker 1>and then after four weeks of doing that, your weekly
<v Speaker 1>average is trending down from one half to one pounds
<v Speaker 1>per week, then you know that you're losing weight. If
<v Speaker 1>after four weeks your weekly average isn't changing at all,
<v Speaker 1>then you'll know that that is not working for you
<v Speaker 1>right now for weight loss. And that's how you adjust.
<v Speaker 1>You try something, you see what happens. If it's giving
<v Speaker 1>you the results you want, you keep doing it. If
<v Speaker 1>you're enjoying it. If it's not giving you the results
<v Speaker 1>that you want, you change something, and then you stick
<v Speaker 1>with it. Long enough to see what happens. So you
<v Speaker 1>know you're you're wondering about whether you have insulin resistance,
<v Speaker 1>and that would be maybe the time to go get
<v Speaker 1>a fasting insulin test. And I also want to encourage people.
<v Speaker 1>I haven't really said this, and I wish i'd gone.
<v Speaker 1>I wish I could go back in time and always
<v Speaker 1>say this from the beginning, but I would really get
<v Speaker 1>fasting insulin and fasting glucose at the exact same time,
<v Speaker 1>because because you need both of those numbers, right, you
<v Speaker 1>need your fasting insulin and your fasting blood glucose that
<v Speaker 1>were taking exactly the same moment, and then you can
<v Speaker 1>do what's it homa hr or ir homa ir ho
<v Speaker 1>dash ir. It gives you your insulin resistance score. Like
<v Speaker 1>somebody in the community had a really low fasting insulin
<v Speaker 1>level and she's like, this is a dangerous it's low,
<v Speaker 1>but she doesn't know what or fasting blood sugar was
<v Speaker 1>at the same time. So like if you had a
<v Speaker 1>really this is I'm going to talk some theory here.
<v Speaker 1>We know that insulin keeps our blood sugar steady, right,
<v Speaker 1>and if if our blood sugar is in a healthy range,
<v Speaker 1>that's all, that's a good sign, right, So if you
<v Speaker 1>have really really low insulin levels but your blood sugar
<v Speaker 1>is also in a good, low, healthy range, that's a
<v Speaker 1>good sign. On the flip side, if your fasting insulin
<v Speaker 1>was very very low but your blood sugar is sky
<v Speaker 1>high at the same exact moment, that indicates, uh oh,
<v Speaker 1>your body might not be able to produce enough insulin
<v Speaker 1>to keep your blood sugar where it needs to be.
<v Speaker 1>You might have something wrong with your pancreas. Of course,
<v Speaker 1>you would need to talk to your doctor and have
<v Speaker 1>your doctor dig into that more. But if all you
<v Speaker 1>have is your fasting insulinline and you don't know what
<v Speaker 1>your blood sugar is doing at that moment, you might
<v Speaker 1>not know or you're not going to know. So she
<v Speaker 1>she had a like, we say the range two point
<v Speaker 1>five to five is optimal for fasting insulin. Hers was
<v Speaker 1>below the two point five She's like, is that bad?
<v Speaker 1>And again, we don't know. If you're below two point
<v Speaker 1>five and you're fasting blood sugar is really high at
<v Speaker 1>the same time, that would be a red flag. You
<v Speaker 1>would definitely want to talk to your doctor about that.
<v Speaker 1>But if your blood sugar was seventy then and your
<v Speaker 1>fasting insulin's low, then obviously your body doesn't need a
<v Speaker 1>lot of insulin right that minute, because your blood sugar
<v Speaker 1>is seventy right. Yeah, say to you both. If your
<v Speaker 1>hemoglobe and ANC is high and you know you're struggling
<v Speaker 1>to get it down, but your fasting insulin is low,
<v Speaker 1>then that is really then there's a concern that your
<v Speaker 1>body's not producing enough insulin. And so you know, it's
<v Speaker 1>not just as easy as oh, I have this one
<v Speaker 1>number and it's right and range. It's another one of
<v Speaker 1>those nuanced, kind of big picture things. And then I guess,
<v Speaker 1>you know, it looks like that she got to her
<v Speaker 1>goal at the end of twenty twenty three, and then
<v Speaker 1>she started to see some weight regain. She said she
<v Speaker 1>gained ten pounds back, so she started fasting again. So
<v Speaker 1>it sounds like she took like she just stopped fasting. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>And so you know, I don't I want you to
<v Speaker 1>start really contemplating the idea that intermittent fasting is something
<v Speaker 1>you do, it's a lifestyle, it's something she did for life.
<v Speaker 1>There were days and weeks I did not fast at all.
<v Speaker 1>That's a right time, right, So you know, Intermittent fasting
<v Speaker 1>works when we remain metabloically flexible, when our bodies can
<v Speaker 1>switch back and forth between burning you know, glycogen and
<v Speaker 1>fat for energy, and if you take time off, then
<v Speaker 1>your body's not going to make that shift and you're
<v Speaker 1>going to start to refill your glycogen stores. So that's
<v Speaker 1>where the consistency comes into play. And so you know,
<v Speaker 1>I'm wondering, did you quit because ADF didn't feel like
<v Speaker 1>a long term lifestyle. And if that's the case, you
<v Speaker 1>don't have to do ADF as a lifestyle. You can
<v Speaker 1>do a daily you know, eating window approach is your lifestyle. Now.
<v Speaker 1>You also said that you started fasting again January first,
<v Speaker 1>and you wrote this on January fifth, and you said
<v Speaker 1>you didn't see the scale move much. But you know,
<v Speaker 1>if you're just returning to fasting, you know, we again
<v Speaker 1>we don't really see weight loss during the first month
<v Speaker 1>for a lot of people. We see some inflammation shift,
<v Speaker 1>but that's really just the time where your body's getting
<v Speaker 1>metabologically flexible again. So if you want to stick with
<v Speaker 1>a daily eating window, give it a couple more months
<v Speaker 1>of a you know, four to five hour eating window.
<v Speaker 1>Feeling well and you know, if you're not seeing the
<v Speaker 1>scale shift, then you may need to jump back into
<v Speaker 1>ADF again for a little bit, and then you know,
<v Speaker 1>once you've lost the weight, you could transition back to
<v Speaker 1>a daily eating window. But I'm with Jin, I really
<v Speaker 1>think that having your fasting ends and a fasting glucose
<v Speaker 1>would be really helpful. Then you'll know whether or not
<v Speaker 1>you're yeah, yes, all right. Sorry. Our next question is
<v Speaker 1>from Colorful in Auckland, New Zealand, Hijen and Sherry. I've
<v Speaker 1>had a curious thing happened to me which I can
<v Speaker 1>only attribute to intermint fasting, and I wonder what you think.
<v Speaker 1>The other day I was at the hairdresser and I
<v Speaker 1>had just sat down in the chair and the hairdresser
<v Speaker 1>was looking at me in the mirror. As we discussed
<v Speaker 1>what I was going to have done. She paused to
<v Speaker 1>ask me if I had noticed the dark brown hair
<v Speaker 1>growing around my hairline, pointing out that I had about
<v Speaker 1>a quarter of an inch of brown colored regrowth next
<v Speaker 1>to my scalp where my hair had previously been growing
<v Speaker 1>out gray. It had been ten weeks since I had
<v Speaker 1>last done my hair, so I had over an inch
<v Speaker 1>of gray regrowth with a quarter of an inch of
<v Speaker 1>brown hair below that next to my scalp as background.
<v Speaker 1>I'm a sixty year old woman and I've been going
<v Speaker 1>gray for nearly thirty years, and I've regularly colored my
<v Speaker 1>hair for about the same amount of time. I used
<v Speaker 1>to have dark brown hair, but now I'm quite gray
<v Speaker 1>white around the face, and still have a little natural
<v Speaker 1>color at the back with salt pepper gray in between
<v Speaker 1>if it's not colored. I've been intermittent fasting for over
<v Speaker 1>five years and lost about one hundred pounds in the
<v Speaker 1>first two years, and then maintained that weight for one year.
<v Speaker 1>These last two years, however, have been challenging for many reasons,
<v Speaker 1>and I've regained about thirty pounds, mainly by not being
<v Speaker 1>consistent and keeping to my regular IF schedule, as well
<v Speaker 1>as poor few food choices. Stress and lack of sleep
<v Speaker 1>have also contributed. However, about ten weeks ago, I traveled
<v Speaker 1>away from home to have Christmas with my family. For me,
<v Speaker 1>this time of year comes with family stresses, and that,
<v Speaker 1>combined with tempting food, led to very slack fasting, sometimes
<v Speaker 1>no real fasting at all. At New Year, I caught COVID.
<v Speaker 1>Then a family member had surgery, and after a couple
<v Speaker 1>of weeks supporting her recovery, I returned home. I've been
<v Speaker 1>consistently clean fasting with a twenty four protocol for about
<v Speaker 1>three weeks at the time of visiting the hairdresser, I
<v Speaker 1>cannot think of any reason for my hair to suddenly
<v Speaker 1>start growing brown again instead of gray, other than if
<v Speaker 1>my hairdresser said she's never seen anything like it before.
<v Speaker 1>I'm curious to know if you've come across anything like this,
<v Speaker 1>what do you think. I'd also like to say thank
<v Speaker 1>you to both for all that you do. I'm grateful
<v Speaker 1>to have found IF and for all the knowlogy share
<v Speaker 1>and support you give. Thank you so much. You know,
<v Speaker 1>this is a really cool question because we actually have
<v Speaker 1>heard before from people that their hair went from it
<v Speaker 1>was gray and then it went back to their natural
<v Speaker 1>hair color as intermittent fasters. Now, the part that's tricky
<v Speaker 1>in here is that it didn't do it before when
<v Speaker 1>you were doing a remitten fasting, and then you took
<v Speaker 1>the time off and came back to it, and now
<v Speaker 1>it's changed color. So that's just one more variable that's
<v Speaker 1>difficult to reconcile in there. But we have heard before
<v Speaker 1>that people's hair went back to their natural color. Mine
<v Speaker 1>did not. I not said lots of gray. Mine did not.
<v Speaker 1>Did you have anything you wanted to add to that, Sherry,
<v Speaker 1>I didn't. Yeah, I just other than I just wanted
<v Speaker 1>to to share this because we actually have heard this before.
<v Speaker 1>And you know, some gray hair can be caused from
<v Speaker 1>nutritional deficiencies. And so if through fasting, you know you've
<v Speaker 1>cleaned up your eating and you know you've allowed your
<v Speaker 1>body to heal, and like, I think copper might be
<v Speaker 1>one of the minerals that's important for hair color, and like,
<v Speaker 1>an impaired liver can impact the way you process copper.
<v Speaker 1>So if fasting, you know, clears out your liver and
<v Speaker 1>your liver's working better, then I think it makes sense
<v Speaker 1>that your hair could return back to its natural color. Yeah.
<v Speaker 1>The body is so fascinating. It really is. Yeah, it
<v Speaker 1>really is. Before we get to our tweak of the week,
<v Speaker 1>instead of talking about my books, I'm going to talk
<v Speaker 1>about something else. I'm sure shocking to Sherry, But I
<v Speaker 1>want to tell you about my new favorite meal kit.
<v Speaker 1>And y'all know that I love meal kits, right, I
<v Speaker 1>have been using meal kits since twenty sixteen, I guess
<v Speaker 1>a long time. As soon as I started using them,
<v Speaker 1>I never quit, except for brief periods where I'd tried
<v Speaker 1>to do my own thing and it didn't work out.
<v Speaker 1>I love the meal kits, but I am now loving
<v Speaker 1>sun Basket, and so I wanted to talk about it.
<v Speaker 1>You know, I used sun Basket a little bit here
<v Speaker 1>and there over the years, and I stopped using them
<v Speaker 1>at some point.
<v Speaker 2>I can't remember why, but I was using it was
<v Speaker 2>probably because you know, it was sponsored by Plated for
<v Speaker 2>a while, and you know, then Green Chef I was
<v Speaker 2>sponsored by them, and they hadn't played of course went
<v Speaker 2>out of business, but they have great options. So I
<v Speaker 2>had just drifted away from sun Basket.
<v Speaker 1>But as I've gotten farther along, I am more concerned
<v Speaker 1>about meat quality, like meat quality and what's going on
<v Speaker 1>with that meat, and so i'd kind of gotten to
<v Speaker 1>the point where I was mostly getting vegetarian meals from
<v Speaker 1>some of the meal kits because I don't want to
<v Speaker 1>have non organic meat.
<v Speaker 2>That's just something that you know, I don't know what
<v Speaker 2>they're doing to those animals. I want my meat to
<v Speaker 2>be organic.
<v Speaker 1>So I am loving sun Basket because you can upgrade
<v Speaker 1>your meat to organic for the meals, and like, I
<v Speaker 1>haven't ordered chicken from a mealkit in so long because
<v Speaker 1>I am not going to eat non organic chicken. I
<v Speaker 1>have like repulsion to that for reasons like woody chicken breast.
<v Speaker 1>If you don't know what that is, google it. It's gross.
<v Speaker 1>It's gross. It is so gross.
<v Speaker 2>So I am back to sun Basket and I am
<v Speaker 2>so excited. Sun Basket is also kind of quick and easy,
<v Speaker 2>like they have like a lot of things are pre prepped,
<v Speaker 2>but the quality is so good, so every night we
<v Speaker 2>are enjoying a restaurant quality meal at home, but at
<v Speaker 2>a lower cost than going to a restaurant. Now, Sunbasket
<v Speaker 2>is more pricey than some of the other meal kits,
<v Speaker 2>which I think might have been one of the reasons
<v Speaker 2>I went away from it as well.
<v Speaker 1>But I am now at the point where you get
<v Speaker 1>what you pay for, and I am now the point
<v Speaker 1>where I am willing to pay more to ensure that
<v Speaker 1>I am having organic meats. They have organic produce. Almost
<v Speaker 1>all of their produce is organic, not all of it,
<v Speaker 1>but most of it is. And so you know, I'm
<v Speaker 1>loving it. And if you're interested in trying sun Basket.
<v Speaker 1>There's a link in the show notes that you can
<v Speaker 1>click on, or you can also find it by going
<v Speaker 1>to my Favorite Things tab at Gen Stevens dot com
<v Speaker 1>or at the Gin's favorite thing tab at fast Feast
<v Speaker 1>repeat dot com. The current offer as of today is
<v Speaker 1>ninety dollars off spread over your first four orders, but
<v Speaker 1>that could change it anytime.
<v Speaker 2>So click on the link see what the offer is.
<v Speaker 2>And you know, the one thing about it that's different
<v Speaker 2>than most of the meal kits is that the price
<v Speaker 2>is very based on what you choose. Some meals are
<v Speaker 2>more expensive, some meals are cheaper, and so you really see,
<v Speaker 2>you know, if it's got more expensive ingredients, it's going
<v Speaker 2>to cost a little bit more. So what I found
<v Speaker 2>with the other meal kits was that they were kind
<v Speaker 2>of you know, what's that shrink flation shery.
<v Speaker 1>Is that we could call it where the quality goes
<v Speaker 1>down because you're still paying the same amount. That's kind
<v Speaker 1>of what I had noticed. A lot of the meal
<v Speaker 1>kits were just really gravitating in lots and lots of pasta.
<v Speaker 2>Let's vegetables, and so you know, I want more vegetables.
<v Speaker 2>I want a variety of vegetables. I don't want it
<v Speaker 2>to always be zucchini and kill and Kale. I don't
<v Speaker 2>want to always be zucchini and kill.
<v Speaker 1>So Chad and I are both so excited with some
<v Speaker 1>basket and we are loving it.
<v Speaker 2>So take a look and see what you think. And
<v Speaker 2>now it's time for our tweak of the week. You know,
<v Speaker 2>I always say tweak it till it's easy, But the
<v Speaker 2>tweak that works for me might not be the one
<v Speaker 2>that works for you. That's why it's super helpful to
<v Speaker 2>hear how other intermittent fasters are making intermittent fasting work
<v Speaker 2>for them. This is from Happy Faster in New York City.
<v Speaker 2>Hi to two of my favorite people. I have a
<v Speaker 2>tweak of the week that I would love to share
<v Speaker 2>with other listeners. I have been intermittent fasting for about
<v Speaker 2>five years, ever since I found Gen's books and podcasts.
<v Speaker 2>By the way, my favorite pairing of hosts by are
<v Speaker 2>is the Gin and Cherry fun combo platter. Your chemistry
<v Speaker 2>and your wisdom and how well you balance each other
<v Speaker 2>out is golden. I just want to say thank you.
<v Speaker 2>Sherry and I really are friends, like we're true friends.
<v Speaker 2>If I have a problem, Cherry and Rocks here are
<v Speaker 2>like some of the first people I go to, like literally,
<v Speaker 2>whatever my problem might be not fastening related. So true
<v Speaker 2>friends can do a podcast together, right Sheery?
<v Speaker 1>Yep, absolutely all right, So I'm off. Where was I? Okay?
<v Speaker 1>Here is my tweak of the week, and with it
<v Speaker 1>there's a little feedback to something I've heard Gen say
<v Speaker 1>on the show. I'll start with that. I've heard Gen
<v Speaker 1>say that maybe one reason so many of us crave
<v Speaker 1>Brussels sprouts after we start fasting is because of the
<v Speaker 1>black coffee and getting used to bitter flavors. I have
<v Speaker 1>never been a coffee drinker, and yet when I started IF,
<v Speaker 1>I started craving Brussels sprouts and still do. I don't
<v Speaker 1>know what is it. I don't know what it is
<v Speaker 1>about them, but let's find out. Anyway. Here is my
<v Speaker 1>tweak of the week. Because my cravings, since I start
<v Speaker 1>at if or for such healthy things that are so
<v Speaker 1>good for my body and fulfill clearly what nutrients my
<v Speaker 1>body really needs at that moment, I do the opposite
<v Speaker 1>of that advice that people give you not to shop
<v Speaker 1>when you're hungry. Toward the end of my window, when
<v Speaker 1>I am hungry, I go to the grocery store and
<v Speaker 1>stand in front of the produce section, and it is
<v Speaker 1>very clear to me which of the vegetables are calling
<v Speaker 1>my name and which I want to eat. Sometimes it's zucchini,
<v Speaker 1>sometimes eggplant, off in Brussels sprouts, and cauliflower, and cabbage
<v Speaker 1>calls out to me more than lettuce does. I find
<v Speaker 1>what I want when I do this. I also always
<v Speaker 1>end up eating a rainbow of different colors over the
<v Speaker 1>course of a few weeks. Sometimes I crave yellow squash,
<v Speaker 1>sometimes purple cabbage. I would love to hear if anyone
<v Speaker 1>else tries this and how well it works for them.
<v Speaker 1>It makes me eat absolutely what I think are the
<v Speaker 1>healthiest things for my body, and it works so well
<v Speaker 1>generally I try to eat some of them right away
<v Speaker 1>that night, and then the others over the course of
<v Speaker 1>a day or two. I hope you like my tweak
<v Speaker 1>and I will never ever stop listening to you and
<v Speaker 1>your wonderful, wonderful show. You two are the best. Thank
<v Speaker 1>you for everything you do. I absolutely love that happy Faster,
<v Speaker 1>party faster that we would like happy faster as a person.
<v Speaker 1>She sounds cool, and I think that's brilliant advice. I mean,
<v Speaker 1>you don't sit on the couch and think, oh my gosh,
<v Speaker 1>I'm just craving some delicious whatever Ruda bega. But when
<v Speaker 1>you're really hungry and you're like, I'm hungry, I want
<v Speaker 1>something delicious to eat, and you're standing in the produce aisle,
<v Speaker 1>suddenly all those colors and textures like sound so much
<v Speaker 1>more delicious than they are, like at nine o'clock in
<v Speaker 1>the morning making your grocery list. And it reminds me
<v Speaker 1>of the study that I talked about in Clean Ash.
<v Speaker 1>It was not a long, long, long long time ago,
<v Speaker 1>like one hundred years ago even by now, I don't know,
<v Speaker 1>but a pediatrician had these children who are like orphans.
<v Speaker 1>You could never do it now. But they let these.
<v Speaker 2>Infants and toddlers like designed what they wanted to eat,
<v Speaker 2>and they just offered them a bunch of stuff, and
<v Speaker 2>those kids picked out exactly what their bodies needed. Like
<v Speaker 2>somebody had something like rickets or something, and he was
<v Speaker 2>eating cod liver oil. This baby is toddler was like
<v Speaker 2>eating cod liver oil like NonStop every day, and then
<v Speaker 2>he cured himself of his rickets. Then he never had
<v Speaker 2>cod liver oil again.
<v Speaker 1>You know, that's just body new. It's body new, and
<v Speaker 1>so we could never repeat that experiment now. But that experiment,
<v Speaker 1>the pediatrician who did it said, these kids were like
<v Speaker 1>these babies and toddlers were like master nutritionists. Yeah, well
<v Speaker 1>it's like dark chocolate is high in magnesium. And so
<v Speaker 1>you know, somebody's theorized that when people are pmsing, well
<v Speaker 1>they know that women need more minerals during their mestor cycle.
<v Speaker 1>And so there's this theory that the reason you crave
<v Speaker 1>chocolate is because you're really craving a magnesium yep. So yeah,
<v Speaker 1>your body really does speak to you. We'd love to
<v Speaker 1>leave you with inspirational or motivational quotes, and this week
<v Speaker 1>we have a beautiful share from Virginia from Julong, Australia.
<v Speaker 1>As a former teacher, I had attend lots of professional
<v Speaker 1>development and one of my favorite things to take away
<v Speaker 1>from them was a great quote. One quote that always
<v Speaker 1>remained with me was be yourself everyone else has already taken.
<v Speaker 1>I felt this was a very powerful quote for my students,
<v Speaker 1>but also now in our fasting journeys, as Jen always says,
<v Speaker 1>we have to find our own unique path to success
<v Speaker 1>in our own fasting life. I love that. Thank you, Virginia.
<v Speaker 1>From one Virginia to another, Thank you, thanks so much
<v Speaker 1>for listening today. We would love to have you join
<v Speaker 1>us in the Delayed On Tonight community, where you can
<v Speaker 1>interact with both me and Sherry, plus the most supportive
<v Speaker 1>bunch of intermittent fasters you'll find anywhere. Go to Jenstevens
<v Speaker 1>dot com slash community to join us. Don't forget to
<v Speaker 1>subscribe to this podcast to your favorite podcast app, and
<v Speaker 1>if you haven't already, please leave us a five star
<v Speaker 1>review that helps new listeners find the show and we
<v Speaker 1>really appreciate it. We are a community driven podcast, so
<v Speaker 1>to submit your success stories, your questions, your favorite tweak
<v Speaker 1>it till It's Easy moments, or anything else you want
<v Speaker 1>us to share on the podcast, go to Fast Feast
<v Speaker 1>Repeat dot com slash submit and then listen each week
<v Speaker 1>to see if we share your submission or answer your
<v Speaker 1>question Until next week. Thanks for listening.