I prefer stacking most of my food early in the day. I prefer a small and early dinner. Even though I'm up late, I don't like to eat late or eat my biggest meal at night. Energy, mood, workout performance, body comp, and everything else is better when the day starts with plenty of food. I'm talking like two-thirds of my daily food intake before noon. In the past when I've restricted all day, that was a setup for feeling generally crappy and overeating at night.
About fasting, I was reading something from Dr Jason Fung. He was describing people who should never fast because it's dangerous and stupid for them, and he described me. That really reaffirmed the importance of tuning out these conversations about "optimal" eating/timing for weight loss, for obese diabetics, to reverse heart disease, to starve cancer cells. They're not talking to me. You know who is talking to me? My own body, all the time. It knows. It tells me what it needs and what feels awful, but it's the one expert I wasn't consulting. Everything is better now that we communicate again, and it sure as heck doesn't want to limit carbs, or fast all day, or eat mountains of raw vegetables, or go to sleep stuffed.
Sounds like a smart plan Skwigg!
I get cranky even if I have to do fasted blood tests in the morning! I’m waiting at the door when they open at 7am!
It‘a so trendy at the moment and there’s so much in the ether about IF but the title of this thread nails the point - the timing of meals is a totally individual thing.
I'm someone who completely wrecked my hormones from intermittent fasting.
[@Jess] I’m sure HA would be a clear no-go with fasting. A few years ago, there were a bunch of prominent fitness women who completely wrecked their hormones with intermittent fasting. Krista Scott Dixon was one of them. Her experience was harrowing, and yet her telling of it was extremely funny. It was a perfect cautionary tale. About listening to your body, fasting and all that, this week I have a biometric screening at 3:15pm, of all the dumb times. It’s a workplace wellness thing, obviously booked by someone who didn’t consider that people would have to fast all day! In the past, I would have used this as an excellent excuse to go 20+ hours without food, eating dinner the night before and then nothing until the blood test. Now that my body is the expert and not all these external rules and circumstances, I will get up early that day and have a big, satisfying breakfast, something with lots of eggs, starchy carbs, fat, fiber, and fruit and veggie volume. Then I’ll be comfortable all day, not thinking about food, and will still have fasted the minimum 8-9 hours necessary for the bloodwork. Winning!
Low body fat percentage, low BMI, and eating disorder history rule me out. Also, anyone who is pregnant, breastfeeding, under 18, and probably five other things I can’t remember.
So true! Interestingly, who should never fast? I‘m pretty sure I would be in that category too.