Super-Fasting

I came up with an interesting idea on fasting.  It has to do with combining the benefits of alternate day calorie restriction with intermittent fasting.

First, we know intermittent fasting is a good thing in terms of health.  A number of studies have been done, and more studies are in the works.  The essence of a fast is of course skipping food, and further research is needed to find out the benefits of different length fasts.

We also know that alternate day calorie restriction provies health benefits.  This is different than lifelong calorie restriction, which has been shown to increase lifespan.  Alternate day calorie restriction simply has days of uneven calorie intake.  For example, instead of a person eating 2,500 calories day after day, they would eat in a pattern of maybe 1,000 calories one day and 4,000 calories the next.  The benefits of this approach do not appear to be connected to fasting periods.  In other words, it doesn't matter if the either the high or low calorie days are spread out over several meals or condensed into fewer meals or one meal.

My idea is, why not combine the two for maximum benefits?  Here's an example.  Let's keep things simple and say a person eats one meal per day in the evening.  This gives them a long intermittent fasting period during sleep and the daylight hours.  Now you can graft alternate day calorie restriction on top of this.  On day 1, the nighttime meal would be smaller, say 1,000 calories.  On day 2, the nighttime meal would be larger, in the form of 4,000 calories.  A person would simply alternate between "little feasts" and "big feasts" each night, with intermittent fasting during the day.

Would this type of approach work in practice?  Would fasting during the day and then only being able to eat a smaller amount at night on some days be too much to handle?  I have no idea.

This is pretty far on the other end of the spectrum in comparison to the normal six-meals-a-day advice.  But that doesn't mean that this is wrong or wouldn't work.  It is probably a very natural eating pattern in many respects.  Even animals that eat in feast-or-famine cycles aren't always guaranteed a big feast.  Some days their luck would be better than others.  Adding this randomness of feast sizes could be beneficial in terms of health. 

Comments

[will]

This may not work-- considering Dr. James Johnson’s comments about once-a- day eating. A study by a prominent IF researcher seems to show that oxidative stress is not reduced when eating one meal per day--at least if the meal is a large one. Alternating the 1000 and 4000 calorie meals might produce a somewhat different effect, but I suggest visiting http://www.johnsonupdaydowndaydiet.com/ to help evaluate your IF proposal.
(As an aside, some of the male leaders at Weston A. Price eat about 4500 calories of food every day. But they do look a little hefty.)

[David]

Interesting theory.....and since it's along the same lines as what I've been doing for the past three weeks....I'll humbly offer my perspective in hopes of advancing the discussion.

I've been doing about 5 low cal days and then one "way high" cal day. The low cal days have averaged about 900 calories per day....the high cal days about 5,000 calories. The low cal days alternate with one day of less than 30g carbs then one day of about 120g carbs....and as for the high cal days, well....sorry, but two of them have been massive carb fests (think loss of control) while today's was a low carb (less than 100g) but still a ton of fat calories (almost 2k just from tahini).

Conclusions....I like the general idea, as I really feel as though my body is getting a break from the stresses of digestion on the low cal days, but....I really don't like the two days following a 5k calorie day....just feel sorta' yucky all day.

Ahhhhh....and I should add....I eat one meal a day (regardless of caloric intake)...over a 3 hour period...starting at about 7:30pm each day. So 5k calories in 3 hours might be too burdensome on the digestive system.....and there might be difficulty for the body to absorb all of the protein from such a meal, too. Not sure...and would love to hear more from others.

CHEERS!

David

[will]

Actually, according to Dr. Eades, IF isn’t looking so good for humans. First, a trial with women eating once a day showed elevated glucose and BP, and no reduction in oxidative stress. Also, a lot of forum individuals report similar results. The exception may be a trial by Dr. James Johnson described on Dr. Johnson’s website which I referenced above: really dramatic(!) reductions in oxidative stress. But average blood glucose levels increased.
Dr. Eades was initially interested in IF, but now thinks that low-carb (<50 carbs/day) induced ketosis provides the most benefits.

[Jordan]

Will makes a good point. 4000 calories all at once may be a bit much. But Matt just used that as an example, so we shouldn't focus on that too much. The underlying idea is really interesting. I've thought about combining ADCR and IF as well. 3 square meals on one day and one small-to -medium meal on the next day would seem like a sensible approach.

[Mike]

I feel that 4000 kcal in one meal or in a short feeding window is just too much for the body to handle. I personally like to adopt a "only eat when you are really hungry" approach, and stop eating before I feel full.