Alternate day fasting is another intermittent fasting method that may be beneficial if you want to lose weight. When you do alternate-day fasting, you are to fast every other day.
The process is simple: on fasting days, you are to consume a maximum of 25% (or 0 if you can) of your daily calorie intake. On non-fasting days, you eat whatever you like.
Alternate-day fasting shows promising results not only in losing weight but in body composition, inflammation, and has shown to reduce the risk of chronic heart disease.
What is Alternate-day fasting
Alternate-day fasting is a type of intermittent fasting approach. With this type of IF, you fast for one day and eat what you want the next day. Under this fasting method, you are only to restrict what you eat half of the time.
On fasting days, you are on a 0 to 25% maximum calorie diet. You can eat calorie-free beverages such as tea, coffee, or water, but it shouldn’t have sugar, creamers, or anything that may contain calories.
If you can’t stick to the minimum calorie diet, you can modify this method by consuming about 500 calories on fasting days or 20 to 25% of your daily energy requirements.
The good news is that on your feeding days, you eat whatever your hearts desire.
The total length of the fasting period is 36 hours. It may seem a lot, but remember, around 16hours of your fasting time is spent while you sleep.
Benefits of Alternate-day fasting
Studies have shown that alternate-day fasting is beneficial for weight loss. In a study among adults with overweight and obesity, it has been demonstrated that they can reduce 3 to 8% of their body weight in 12 weeks with their second week showing notable results.
Studies have shown that through alternate-day fasting and calorie restriction, harmful body fat, and the inflammatory markers linked to obesity are reduced.
If you combine endurance exercise with this intermittent fasting method, it can cause twice as much weight loss than with fasting and exercise alone.
It’s easier to stick to and produce better fat loss results, preserving more muscle mass.
What to eat for alternate day fasting
You don’t control the type of food to eat, only calories. But if you want to optimize your health, avoid foods that can affect your daily country intake. Healthy foods that don’t have sugar, trans fats, or artificial ingredients and eat only whole foods such as meats, vegetables, and fruits.
Who shouldn’t try alternate-day fasting
This type of fasting is not for everyone. If you’re stressed, lacking sleep, or doing intense exercises, you might not be able to handle alternate-day fasting. Also, consider your fat-adaptation. If you cannot utilize stored body fat, then this or any form of intermittent fasting will be excruciating.
Intermittent fasting is not recommended for nursing or pregnant women as the baby needs; it can get to be healthy.
Underweight people shouldn’t try it; the aim is to gain not lose weight.
Not everyone can try alternate-day fasting, but if you’ve tried some of the intermittent fasting methods and feel that it doesn’t work, you can try.