@KarlT : If this was directed at me, I (often) don’t eat during the day and only eat over a four-hour window at night. Somme people call this “fasting”, and some people call this a “feeding window”; since it’s every day and not even 24 hours I personally don’t call it “fasting” but to each her/his own. I don’t do this every day, and I feel good doing it so continue. There’s supposedly some benefits aside from calorie control but there’s not sure the research is great here and I personally can’t confirm any specific benefits (I would have guessed this is too short for autophagy, which is a benefit of longer fasting, but what do I know). I also typically work out before I’ve eaten (so ate the night before and that makes 18 hours since I last ate.
Separately, I have done “fasts” which are typically four days.
I might try a two-day (full 48-hour) fast every week for a time: this should provide autophagy benefits, but at s’more-regular basis. And skip the four-day fasts for a while. I assume there is benefit from mixing it up a bit so your body doesn’t get used to anything.
No, wasn’t directed at you. Tough to differentiate these terms as there are no great definitions.
For the purpose of autophagy, I would think “fasting” is at least 48 hrs without calories. Anything less than 24 hrs I would call “time restricted eating.”
I think there is growing evidence that there is significant cost in the form of muscle loss, to fasting.
Like you, I did time restricted eating out of convenience, but now I break that up with protein bars.
I do one long fast (72hrs+) in early January as I’m fairly certain I would have eaten far too much over processed rubbish foods over the Christmas holiday period.
I take activated charcoal over those three fasting days to mop up any toxins being released.
I practiced OMAD everyday for one year but my experience of that was that I got too skinny of that. So 1.5-2 meals per day seems to be the sweet spot for me. So today I do around 18-20 hours fasting every day. I have taken a break from my extended fasting for around 36-72 hours because I want to see how my different biomarkers develop when I’m on rapamycin. In the autumn my plan is to ramp up the extended fasting again.
I work in a restaurant where (ironically) it’s difficult to find time to have a break and eat a meal, so many days, I get off at 4 or 5, eat dinner, and that’s it. When I take my rapamycin once monthly (I’m young and so am dosing conservatively), I always take it fasted.
I don’t have any objective measurements from DEXA or any other instrument but I would say both body fat and lean mass went down. It was hard to build muscle on that but when I went back to 1,5-2 meals per day and increased also protein intake then my body started to respond better to resistance training. But if I increase the meals to 3 per day my guess is that muscle building will increase even more but now I’m satisfied with the progress. I don’t need to get so much bigger than I am today.
I know also Peter Attia has quite recently started to switch his view on fasting because of the risk of decreasing lean mass. Especially if people are not resistance training. But my view is that if you resistance train than fasting around 16-20 hours can work. The biohacker Siim Land has practiced 1.5 meal per day for many years and built a good amount of muscle. But it’s important to keep in mind that Siim is still a young guy. I don’t know how well his protocol would work for an elderly person. I’m 45 years old and not near his amount of muscle but for me I think it works ok.
He calls it OMAD but it’s more 1.5 meals I would say
“I got too skinny”
My hunger pattern is such that I could easily do OMAD and I tried it for about one week.
The problem was that it was just too uncomfortable to try to pack a full day’s calorie allotment into just one meal. I eat my first meal when I am hungry, which usually occurs between 12:30 and 3 PM. So I am with you in eating 1.5 -2 meals a day.
I do time-restricted feeding because that is my natural response to eating. I didn’t realize this until after I retired and could eat anytime I wanted to.
When do you usually eat you meals? I eat my first around 2PM and the second 6PM with the family. Research studies seem to point that it’s better to eat breakfast and lunch instead of lunch and dinner but if I do that I miss the family social interaction with the family at the dinner which I see as an important part.
Dr Brad Stanfield usually express this “Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince, dinner like a pauper” which is quite good align with the above.
Here is also an interesting post from Rhonda Patrick
My first meal is around 12:30 to 3 PM. Normally it will consist of a whey-based protein drink, egg omelet, or occasionally, oatmeal with walnuts and blueberries. I eat dinner at 5 PM.
Because I always eat dinner with someone else it could be anything from spaghetti to steak.
I don’t claim my diet or eating window is optimal, it is just what I do.
This experiment and theoretical biology points in the direction that, when fasting, it is not only the restriction of total calories that is important for longevity. But also the experience of feeling hungry. Feeling hungry is in itself a biological signal that change our biology in a healthful direction, towards longevity. This is not directly translatable to humans, but it brings forward a new topic the do research on.“The hunger signal”.
“While it has been long understood that limiting the amount of food eaten can promote healthy aging in a wide range of animals, including humans, a new study has revealed that the feeling of hunger itself may be enough to slow aging.”
I start about 3:00-3:45pm and end at 16:30 OMAD every single day. I never feel hungry at all, don’t have naps and have good amounts of energy all daylong! My sleep score is good and feel nice and easy all time! My blood bio markers are ok, never have teeth issues. So for me N=1, it fits correctly!
Might also explain the benefit of red light therapy.
To look at hunger apart from dietary composition, they used a unique technique, activating neurons associated with the hunger drive in flies using exposure to red light, using a technique called ptogenetics. These flies consumed twice as much food than did flies who were not exposed to the light stimulus. The red-light activated flies also lived significantly longer than flies used as a control.
