IF / ADF / 4:3 / 5:2 / 6:1 / 16:8 ~ Maintaining at a healthy weight ~ Chapter 5

[TalkinPeace]

This thread is for those of us who have been practicing IF (Intermittent Fasting) for quite a while ( it being nearly 2 years since the Michael Mosely TV programme aired ) and are now at, or nearing, their target healthy weight.
It's also for anyone who is doing it for the health benefits alone.

How do we mix fasts and a stable food intake while having little or no weight to lose?
How do we ensure that this WOL keeps us at the healthy weight long term rather than revert to yoyo games?
How do we ensure that we keep ourselves looking great rather than just thin?

More and more of us have been maintaining at our original goal weight for many months, and others are joining all the time.
Obviously, the more the merrier!
It is also worth considering whether a second, leaner target might be achievable.

You'll find the first four maintenance threads and all the main 5:2 threads for posters practising IF to lose weight here Fasting / 5:2 on the diet forum. We're currently on thread no. 46, but there is a new main thread every 2-3 weeks.

There are three other associated threads:
This one, which is an absolute goldmine of Tips and Links on how to practice IF, and the research behind it.

And here is a treasure trove of 5:2 recipes, mostly low calorie for fasting days, but there are also recipes for when you want to treat yourself. And, now we're maintaining, we'll need more of these!

Since I started the last Maintainers thread the importance of exercise has come even more to the fore, as part of our general health and to help weight loss. BigChocFrenzys thread is here

Eat your meals with chopsticks ! Study
There is growing evidence that eating more slowly will help lower blood glucose response to carbs.

I was brought up to only eat with a fork : it drives English people up the wall when I cut up meat with the side of a normal fork and pick up peas without a knife
but it does allow one to eat slowly

if I remember right its about the grehlin response

I lost my place on all the threads! I'm still here, naturally falling into 16:8 habits here and there, semi fasting when I've eaten more than I need the day before. I grew up only eating with a fork TIP so it wouldn't bother me! Nice to see such ways validated, although I don't remember it slowing me down tbh...

Nice to hear how you are maintaining so easily, Betsy TK must help too.

Tip Good news for you about red wine protecting memory in later years
Hmm, I wonder if peanuts would work as well, easier on the liver

More studies examining possible benefits of IF for Chemo and (Mattson again) to avoid ParkinsonsDisease

That's really interesting about IF benefits for Parkinsons bigchoc, my Grandmother suffered with it for about twenty years before she died; its such an awful disease. More motivation to keep fasting!

Tip, B&W I arrived back very late to see someone quoting the outdated doom and gloom about how IF will make you store fat Here on the 5:2 topics.
I posted a very sleepy rebuttal. Maybe you can add some more awake views in the morning !

jumped in with both feet

< admires the big Vulcan boot >
Great response, both of you

Love the quote "the plural of anecdote is not data". It's one of my favourites too (yes, I'm another scientist! )
Haven't popped in much recently, mostly because... well, 5:2 is working for me and I'm just quietly getting on with it

Nice to see you, Sarah
For a "fad diet" we have a hell of a lot of scientists doing it !

Has anyone got access to this exciting new paper ? (I don't)

Mark P. Mattson, David B. Allison, Luigi Fontana, Michelle Harvie, Valter D. Longo, Willy J. Malaisse, Michael Mosley, Lucia Notterpek, Eric Ravussin, Frank A. J. L. Scheer, Thomas N. Seyfried, Krista A. Varady, and Satchidananda Panda
Meal frequency and timing in health and disease
PNAS 2014 111 (47) 16647-16653; published ahead of print November 17, 2014

I gather it is accessible without subscription from some countries, but not others.

Really surprised that Mosely has joined (is at that level) with Mattson, Varady, Harvie,and Longo. Must be combining some work from them all.
I'm very interested to see, e.g. if they compare 1 / 2 / 3 meals per day and the effects of say eating after 8pm.
The title suggests the study concentrated on health effects, even more interesting than weight loss tbh.

Oh, a kind person on Fast Diet site downloaded it to Google Drive Link
I'll read it tomorrow over lunch

Ooh... looks interesting. I will try and read it over my miso soup!!

Still jumping on that thread - its quite fun.

Still sad I killed the "leafy comp" thread yesterday though - that was MN at its utter best

I'm glad you guys are bringing sanity to that thread. Due to dealing with burst exploded kitchen pipes, I'm avoiding bunfights to keep stress down.

That paper is a surprise: they are equivocal about skipping breakfast - it may be that supper is the meal to avoid, rather than breakfast. However, in rl, families may prefer to have supper together anyway.

In their ref 25, the study took 93 overweight women and split them into two groups, same total cals:

1. 700 cal breakfast, 500 cal lunch, 200 cal dinner
2. 200 cal breakfast, 500 cal lunch, 700 cal dinner

After 12 weeks, group 1 lost 8.7 kg vs 3.6 kg for group 2. Crikey !
That successful Diabetes UK Trial with IF also had their (pre-diabetic) eating breakfast + linch, skipping supper.

Big Choc do you have another link to that paper as I can't get it to open?
I have to say I'd always thought that when you eat wasn't important and the old adage of nothing after 6pm/going to bed on a full stomach was rubbish as your body adjusts for when you eat... but not according to the resutlts of this survey!

anglaise Try Mattson-Varady-Mosely Paper and Breakfast Paper

Thanks Bigchoc, will have a good read of those this weekend.
My bedtime reading at the moment is Matt Fitzgerald's "Diet Cults:The Surprising Fallacy at the Core of Nutrition Fads and a Guide to Healthy Eating for the Rest of Us" which is very interesting. With a bias towards the importance of exercise, of course!

A pressie for the geeks on this thread ....
www.shiftn.com/obesity/Full-Map.html

Very detailled paper explaining why the obesity epidemic started around 1980 in the USA. Holds worldwide though. They mention greater meal frequency, higher calorie intake, availability of ready meals / snacks.

Hi everyone. I'm still here but not posted for a while as I haven't been feeling good since I left my old job. I was out of work for over a month but now temping on a two month assignment. The money is OK and the role will look decent on my CV but the work is awful and some of the people very unfriendly. I've had it with the grind and expense of the capital and looking to move elsewhere within the country for a better quality of life.

I'm still maintaining, give or take a few pounds, by doing a weekly fast and I rarely eat breakfast as there's nowhere cheap to eat where I work and I'm not hungry when I get up. I was going to fast today but had a bad nights sleep so can't be bothered...however I may fast on Monday or Tuesday as have done almost no exercise this week and Sunday is always my indulgence day.

Hi sed Sorry to hear you haven't found somewhere permanent. It's so stressful if you don't get on with colleagues.
Well done for maintaining despite all that. now get back to lifting !
Yes, plenty to do and enjoy outside the Smoke. Best wishes for your job search and relocation.

(((( southeast ))))
Come down teh M3 and let the pace of life slow down a bit and you can still nip back up the trainline when you need a fix of 'busy'
pleased to hear that you are still finding fasting useful to keep you at happy weight.

Sorry to hear that your temping job isn't much fun SE but well done on keeping positive, and not letting yourself go health/fitness wise! I'm sure 2015 will be better for you. Do you have any specific idea of where in the provinces you would ideally like to relocate to?

Blimey - this is the longest the thread has been quiet!

Celebrated 3 years of IFing at the end of Feb. Currently, I'm working on posting an update on my blog - but I've been mega busy these last few days.

Just to show how flexible this WOL is, and how the good habits I've acquired come in useful, I went all day on Tuesday until 8.30 before I ate.

This came about because I ran 4 bread making sessions in the day, from 10.30am until 8 in the evening. I normally have two classes on a Tuesday, but I was asked to do an extra one in the morning - then I did a session at the local YMCA youth club in the evening.

Prior to IF, I would have had breakfast, taken sandwiches for lunch - and probably for dinner as well. As it was, I skipped brekkie (giving me extra time in bed) and didn't give the other meals a thought.

It's a much more convenient way of life, yes?