Intermittent Fasting for Healing and Weight Loss : Why it’s so effective. [Updated]
We naturopathic doctors often hear patients say...
“I just don’t feel my best.”
“I can’t lose weight.”
Is that you?
When we can’t lose weight or feel awful, it can be difficult to know where to start to feel better. Major changes in our patterns of eating, sleeping, pooping, thinking, and moving are difficult. What if we could start altering all of our rhythms by simply adjusting the timing of when we eat? This is achievable through intermittent fasting.
Intermittent fasting is as close as we can get to a “one size fits all” approach to weight loss or feeling better. Studies show this lifestyle change can lead to incredible improvements in cardiovascular, metabolic, and hormonal health. Intermittent fasting dials in a fantastic range of hormonal and digestive factors. Even if you’re not trying to lose weight, but want to heal any kind of inflammation or ailment - try intermittent fasting. I’m sure this article will have you convinced of the benefits, and you’ll likely be surprised by how do-able this is.
What is intermittent fasting?
Intermittent fasting expands the amount of time you spend NOT eating a.k.a. “fasting”. The timing of eating and not eating is designed to allow for proper rest of the digestive system as well as proper reset of your hormonal patterns. This hot and effective dieting trend can be useful no matter what you eat! Although....to get your dose of daily vitamins, I still recommend eating organic, local vegetables at every meal ;).
The 14 Hour Fast
There are many ways to do intermittent fasting, but I typically recommend the 14 Hour Fast. This technique limits food intake to a 10-hour window of the day. (Other types include fasting for 2 non-consecutive days a week, meal skipping, and other variations. The benefits of long, multi-day fasting is incredible). I prefer the 14 hour fast because it is practical and effective when combined with naturopathic healing programs such as 14 Day Smoothie Cleanses. Limiting eating to the hours between 9am-6pm is practical for many of our schedules. This leaves you 14 hours of time where you’re only drinking water and resting your digestive system.
Why do I need to rest my digestive system?
Resting your digestion decreases the demand on the hormone system that is responsible for absorbing nutrients into the body. During the 14 hour fast, your body puts energy towards the recovery processes that are deep inside the inner workings of the liver, brain, and elsewhere. If you’re digesting, that energy is taken by digestion.
Why is fasting so effective?
The science of fasting can be discussed for ages. A key player in the fasting state are the ketone bodies. In the fasting state, the body experiences a metabolic shift. The body turns from the glucose stored in the liver for energy to the ketones stored in fat. The action of ketones is to “enhance the body’s defense against oxidative and metabolic stress.” So, our body cleans up shop while we’re in the fasting state. We improve our ability to adapt to stress and balance inflammation. (reported in Jan 2020 by The National Institute on Aging).
The 14-hour fast is vastly studied due to its promise. While study sizes are all too small for us to come to population-wide conclusions, the 14-hour fasting state is looking pretty beneficial. 14-hour fasts have been studied to have a wide range of medical benefits in prevention of disease and enhanced treatment of disease.
Studies suggest that if you were to start these longer periods of fasting your brain would likely enjoy memory enhancement and your liver would likely have enhanced regeneration. One study showed that mice practicing intermittent fasting have their white blood cells return to “young animal” levels. And bone building is another plus!
What are the health benefits of intermittent fasting?
Weight loss
Improved stress resistance
Improved immune function
Enhanced digestive function
Lower cholesterol
Reduced Inflammation
Improved mental performance
Improved blood sugar regulation
Enhanced physical performance
Better sex (ok, this one is presumptive based on all of the above...)
The benefits seem to be obvious from fasts that last at least 14 hours.
Note: Most people keep their exercise program the same or start fasting earlier in the night if they need to eat earlier in the day.
What health conditions can be improved by intermittent fasting?
Intermittent fasting often works for weight loss, but the up to 7% body fat loss is not the most award winning feature.
Limiting eating to only 10 hours a day can improve conditions such as obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular, cancers and neurological disorders.
Studies show that these benefits are shared even if you don’t change your diet. The benefits are measured after a few months of getting into this rhythm.
Recent data here was collected in a study at University of California, San Diego. The study population was obese… and lost 3% body fat in 12 weeks. The benefits of blood sugar control, decreased blood pressure and lower cholesterol- all were benefits that were independent of the weight loss (not attributable to weight loss, but to the timing of eating).
Schedule with me if you need support with trying intermittent fasting or if you have symptoms that make fasting difficult.
An old naturopathic trick.
Old time naturopaths taught me to “fast a patient” to support the body through a healing crisis. I learned that a fever will never get too high if the patient is fasting and hydrated (so long as the fever isn’t suppressed with medications). According to Dr. Pizorrno, a 3 day fast resets digestive inflammation caused by food allergies.
Questions to consider before trying intermittent fasting…
What if I want to shift my eating hours to later in the day?
I don’t recommend this. Part of the key benefit is stopping eating so that you’re sleeping after digestion. You need at least 2-3 hours between eating and sleeping. We know from research that people who eat their evening meal around 3pm are thinner than people who eat later in the day. In general, I recommend NOT eating after 8PM. For folks looking for the full benefits of intermittent fasting, I recommend 6 or 7PM as the latest time to eat.
Why shouldn’t I eat late at night?
Generally, eating during the night hours messes with our circadian rhythms. Eating late at night is luxurious and should be saved for special events only. This makes sense when we understand that our body functions are coordinated by hundreds of clocks syncing in with one another to create our rhythms. Eating is a major player in changing the timing on the clocks. The hormones and neurotransmitters are tuned by a system of clocks. Hormones and neurotransmitters are the communicators between all of our vital functions. So eating drastically impacts all of our body’s communications. The night hours are the hours we want all the energy directed at recovery, not digestion.
What am I allowed to drink during fasting?
Drinking water is encouraged during fasting. Fasting requires zero calories coming in. You may be asking yourself... “what about coffee?!” Coffee consumption mimics a stress response. It also stimulates digestion and contractions in the gallbladder (Boekema, 1999). We’re trying to rest digestion and stress response during the 14 hour fast. So, water only everyone. You got this.
Who should not try intermittent fasting?
I do not recommend fasting while pregnant or menstruating. People with Type 1 Diabetes need strict glucose monitoring and added support to practice intermittent fasting.
Folks in a time of prolonged or excessive stress often need to eat more, not less, to get the body settled. If stress is high, work with your naturopathic doctor for support with hormone and stress balance.
What if intermittent fasting doesn’t work?
Unchecked inflammatory processes might need to be addressed in order for you to have an optimal response to this approach. Those who are not having success with mood, energy, and metabolism benefits of intermittent fasting likely need support with hormone balancing.
Get the support you need
Intermittent fasting is worth the experiment! Let me help you get the rest of those patterns of eating, sleeping, thinking and moving back in line, too. Schedule with me and let’s figure it out.
Written by Dr. Kelsi Ervin. Originally posted on NCNM.
Resources:
Boekema PJ, Samsom M, van Berge Henegouwen GP, Smout AJ. Coffee and gastrointestinal function: facts and fiction. A review. Scand J Gastroenterol Suppl. 1999;230:35‐39. doi:10.1080/003655299750025525
De Cabo R, Mattson MP. Effects of Intermittent Fasting on Health, Aging, and Disease [published correction appears in N Engl J Med. 2020 Jan 16;382(3):298] [published correction appears in N Engl J Med. 2020 Mar 5;382(10):978]. N Engl J Med. 2019;381(26):2541‐2551. doi:10.1056/NEJMra1905136
https://www.cell.com/cell-metabolism/pdfExtended/S1550-4131(19)30611-4