Benefits of fasting..

[Ajay0]

Presenting a highly informative thread on the benefits of fasting...
 

https://www.allaboutfasting.com/benefits-of-fasting.html

In eastern medical and physical fitness systems, fasting is said to result in increase of prana/chi which results in better health and deeper states of meditation.

I have myself observed that my meditation is subsequently of a higher quality when I have fasted and missed a lunch.

My interest in fasting came up after I read a book on it highlighting its advantages, especially in healing. I have noticed that fasting enabled me to recover from diseases like cold, fever, constipation much faster, and I usually get over it in a day or two.

In the past I used to suffer from colds and fevers for a week or more. Fasting worked well for me in this regard, though I would ask people to consult their physician before undertaking such exercises so as to be on the safer side. Fasting will not work for people with type 1 diabetes .

Fasting has been proved by research to be effective in reducing risk of cancer or cancer growth rates.

https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/324169#:~:text=Fasting may help with cancer,resistance and levels of inflammation.

Edited January 31 by Ajay0

[Schizophonia]

It's a bit overrated, I think.
Probably it is mainly a question of limiting the time of exposure to allergenic foods that you consume, or even endotoxins.

[undeather]

The fasting protocols that are most likely to work are longer fasts with very little or no food intake. (at least 4-5 days.)
One of the potential downsides is that you might lose a lot of muscle-mass in the process.

Time restricted eating/intermittent fasting is, from a scientific perspective, pretty much overrated.
There is very little evidence that it really does shit. Most of those "hype studies" were done in rats and not humans. The problem is that rats have a completely different metabolic turnover rate, which makes comparisans pretty much impossible. 

But seriously - I always tell my patients to just. test. it. for. themselves.
The family of my girlfriend does a 4 week fast every year - where they eat very little and only very light foods. They do it because for them, it feels great. If you are going for longer fasts, check in with your healthcare provider first.

 

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Fasting will not work for people with type 1 diabetes .

Also Type 2 diabetes. You can fucking kill someone with a longer fast if their blood sugar is not regulated properly.
In general, if you have a chronic medical condition - inform yourself before doing self-experiments. Defintiely check in with your doctor beforehand.

 

Edited January 31 by undeather

[Basman]

I used to fast regularly. Anecdotally, I can't say if I experienced any direct health benefits.

It does have the benefit of saving money and time since you are not eating. So it is like nofap in that way. No observable benefits besides the completely obvious, the time you are saving from abstinence, be it food or masturbation.

It might have been beneficial to helping me reflect more on my life since I was basically committing a day to being more mindful.

[Osaid]

Intermittent fasting is basically non-negotiable when it comes to optimal health unless you are some kind of outlier. I find it unwise to wait for conclusive scientific evidence on certain things, so anyone reading this should probably go and test it for themselves, although initially getting into it can be an annoying and overly logical labyrinth with a lot of misinformation. Although, to be fair, there is a lot of scientific evidence showing the benefits of fasting too.

First and foremost, listen to your body, ask yourself why you crave the things you do and why you feel hungry at the times you do, and eat simple and whole foods that you enjoy. You will naturally learn about your body and how food affects it from there, work your way up from there.

Edited January 31 by Osaid

[undeather]

Quote

Intermittent fasting is basically non-negotiable when it comes to optimal health unless you are some kind of outlier. I find it unwise to wait for conclusive scientific evidence on certain things, so anyone reading this should probably go and test it for themselves, although initially getting into it can be an annoying and overly logical labyrinth with a lot of misinformation. Although, to be fair, there is a lot of scientific evidence showing the benefits of fasting too.

The unwise part is telling someone intermitting fasting is "non-negotiable" for optimal health. How do you know that is correct? You don't - it's an opinion. My guess would be that you fell for the hype that broke out  some years ago, but did not follow through with the adequate sensemaking process to find out if this is actually true and why. So did I by the way. The truth is that the process called "cellular autophagy" which is supposed to be triggered by this fasting process, does not occur in humans in such a short window of time. It takes 4-5 days of eating almost nothing to do that. Furthermore, we know now that intermitting fasting tends to reduce lean muscle mass because most people doing it can't get even near the adquate protein intake (which is at least 1mg/kg on the low end). Then, and this has been found quite recently, we know that eating windwos like the 16/8-protocol focused on the later parts of the day (eating from 12-20 for example) are actually terrible for your blood sugar/insulin control in the long run. There is something about eating a lot of food in at the evening which goes against the circadian tendencies of our body.

So we have quite significant potential downsides and overblown benefits. Listening to your body has an important place in optimal health, but we should not be naive about it. 
If people really want to do it, then track protein intake, follow a protocol which focuses on food intake in the earlier parts of the day (skipping dinner), and definitely do some resistance training to fight potential muscle loss. 

If you look at wisdom traditions from around the world, what they usually mean with fasting are longer protocols of food restriction over days/even weeks. This is the kind of fast that most likely comes with said benefits like autophagy. 

 

Edited February 1 by undeather

[Ajay0]

9 hours ago, undeather said:

Also Type 2 diabetes. You can fucking kill someone with a longer fast if their blood sugar is not regulated properly.
In general, if you have a chronic medical condition - inform yourself before doing self-experiments. Defintiely check in with your doctor beforehand.

Thanks for the input. I think you mean to say long fasts are not compatible with Type 2 diabetics.

 

There are  medical articles that states that intermittent fasting may reverse type 2 diabetes. 

https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/type-2-diabetes-intermittent-fasting-could-reverse-the-condition

https://www.endocrine.org/news-and-advocacy/news-room/2022/intermittent-fasting-may-reverse-type-2-diabetes

Quote

After an intermittent fasting diet intervention, patients achieved complete diabetes remission, defined as an HbA1c (average blood sugar) level of less than 6.5% at least one year after stopping diabetes medication, according to a new study published in the Endocrine Society’s Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism.

Intermittent fasting diets have become popular in recent years as an effective weight loss method. With intermittent fasting, you only eat during a specific window of time. Fasting for a certain number of hours each day or eating just one meal a couple of days a week can help your body burn fat. Research shows intermittent fasting can lower your risk of diabetes and heart disease.

 

[undeather]

5 hours ago, Ajay0 said:

Thanks for the input. I think you mean to say long fasts are not compatible with Type 2 diabetics.

 

There are  medical articles that states that intermittent fasting may reverse type 2 diabetes. 

https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/type-2-diabetes-intermittent-fasting-could-reverse-the-condition

https://www.endocrine.org/news-and-advocacy/news-room/2022/intermittent-fasting-may-reverse-type-2-diabetes

 

The mechanism of why some diabetes-patients get better under a fasting protocol is weight loss due to caloric restriction.
Weight loss is the best predictor of why people reverse their diabetes - and that's really good news! 

In general, short time fasting like intermitting types are safe for MOST diabetics.
Potential problems come into play when there is medication that lowers blood sugar levels.
Some might lead to an increased tendency to go hypoglycaemic, which is potentially life threatening.
There are also other metabolic diseases which, especially in context of a diabetes diagnosis, could do that as well.
So before any diabetic starts fasting, they should contact their healthcare provider to get the green flag.

Edited February 1 by undeather

[Applegarden8]

I am aiming to try honey/water fasting for at least 7 days this year with some daily intake of neem, turmeric and haritaki. I would really love to do longer if possible. I wanna see what happens.

Edited February 5 by Applegarden8

[Ajay0]

Intermittent fasting has been linked to reduced disease activity in arthritis patients.

https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/11/8/e047758

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PII0140-6736(91)91770-U/fulltext

https://www.arthritis.org/health-wellness/healthy-living/nutrition/healthy-eating/eat-right-for-your-type-of-arthritis

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Several studies have looked at the effects of vegetarian and vegan diets on RA going back to the 1990s, before biologic medications were widely used. And while it’s long been known that limiting food consumption inhibits inflammation, researchers also have found that a period of fasting followed by a vegetarian diet may also benefit inflammatory arthritis patients, although it’s important to note that the patients continued their medication during the trials. According to the 2020 meta-analysis in Nutrition Reviews, studies show that restricting calories for seven to 10 days followed by a vegetarian diet for a year or more resulted in less pain, morning stiffness and inflammatory biomarkers. A study published in 2019 in Nutrients linked intermittent fasting with reduced disease activity in psoriatic arthritis.