What is the Intermittent Fasting (IF) Diet? How to Do Intermittent Fasting?

Fasting is one of the concepts that our people are accustomed to. The act of fasting, which has been practiced in various forms for centuries, is generally carried out on religious grounds. In recent years, fasting has become very popular among people who want to lose weight by dieting. Intermittent fasting, one of the modern types of fasting, is a type of diet that is applied for 1-4 days a week without consuming very little or no calories. You can follow the rest of the article for other topics you are curious about about the intermittent fasting diet.

What is Intermittent Fasting?

Intermittent fasting, as the name suggests, is a type of nutrition program in which food can be consumed during certain periods of time, but no calorie intake and fasting at other times of the day. There are many different methods by which this diet program can be implemented. The main difference of the intermittent fasting plan compared to other nutrition programs is that the person focuses on when to eat rather than what to eat.

How to Do Intermittent Fasting Diet?

There are various programs available for intermittent fasting. Among these programs, the most suitable one for the person should be chosen and implemented in consultation with specialist physicians. Some popular intermittent fasting diet programs are:

• 16/8 Diet:In the 16/8 diet, people restrict food consumption for 16 hours of the day and eat in the remaining 8 hours. People can fit 2 or 3 meals into this nutrition process with good planning. The easy way to follow the 16/8 diet is to skip breakfast and not consume anything after dinner. However, it should not be forgotten that people who wake up hungry in the morning and feel the need to have breakfast may have difficulty applying this method.
• 5:2 Diet: In the 5:2 diet, individuals must follow a normal eating plan for 5 days and limit their daily calorie consumption to around 500-600 calories on 2 days of the week.
• Eat Stop Eat Diet: In this diet method, people can fast for 24 hours after having dinner at 7 o’clock, for example, and then eat again at dinner the next day. This full-day, meal-to-meal fasting program is carried out 1-2 days a week. Not consuming food for 24 hours can be quite challenging for some people. For this reason, it is recommended for people who want to do an eat stop eat diet to start with 14-16 hour fasting periods.
• Warrior Diet:Warrior diet is a nutrition plan in which only raw vegetables and fruits are consumed during the day and protein-based, high amounts of food are consumed at dinner. Therefore, while people are constantly fasting during the day, they end the day with a single meal in the evening. The foods consumed in the warrior diet, which is similar to the paleo diet in terms of the foods included in the nutrition plan, are basically selected from unprocessed foods.

What is the Intermittent Fasting Diet List?

The way to get high efficiency from any diet is to make the right choices in the foods included in the diet planning. Nutrition plans created by choosing foods with high nutritional content support people in losing weight in a healthy way. Therefore, when performing an interval fast, it should be noted that sufficient intake of all food types is taken and that the products consumed are selected from unprocessed foods. Some foods that can be consumed within the scope of this diet program are as follows:

• Fruits: Fruits such as apples, bananas, mulberries, oranges, peaches, pears, apricots and tomatoes.
• Vegetables: Broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower, zucchini and leafy greens.
• Whole Grain Foods: Foods such as barley, buckwheat, quinoa, oats.
• Healthy Fats: Other oils considered healthy, especially olive oil.
• Protein Sources: Eggs, fish, red meat, poultry, legumes, seeds and nuts.

One of the biggest mistakes made during intermittent fasting is that people turn to behaviors such as consuming processed snacks or sugary drinks during feeding times. It should not be forgotten that intermittent fasting performed in this way will cause more harm than good to the person.

Can You Drink Water During Intermittent Fasting?

During intermittent fasting, consuming beverages such as water or unsweetened coffee and tea, even during the fasting period, is very important in terms of both controlling the person’s hunger level and preventing dehydration.

What are Intermittent Fasting Diet Hours?

People who will practice intermittent fasting can choose a nutrition plan that is most suitable for them, with 8 hours of daily nutrition and food restriction the rest of the time. The most preferred 16/8 feeding times are: 7 am – 3 pm, 9 am – 5 pm, 12 noon – 8 pm and 2 pm – 10 pm.

How Many Days to Do Intermittent Fasting?

People can apply the intermittent fasting nutrition program at varying levels, from a few days to every day of the week, depending on their metabolic characteristics.

What are the Benefits of Intermittent Fasting?

Some changes occur in the body when food consumption is stopped. Some of these changes are as follows:

• Insulin Level: During fasting, there is a significant decrease in people’s blood insulin levels, and this decrease has a stimulating effect on fat burning in the body.
• Growth Hormone Level:During times of hunger, a dramatic increase in growth hormone levels may occur in people. The increase in the level of this hormone may cause changes in the body, such as accelerating fat burning and increasing muscle mass.
• Cellular Repair: During the fasting process, renewal occurs at the cellular level. When the removal of waste materials within the cell is added to this renewal, the general health condition can be positively affected in various aspects.

The mechanism underlying these benefits of intermittent fasting is due to changes in various hormone levels in the body when food is not consumed. Apart from hormonal changes, some differences may occur in the level of inflammation in the body with the intermittent fasting diet. Acute (sudden onset) inflammations are caused by the body’s natural immune response in case of injury or various diseases. However, if this state of inflammation becomes chronic (continues for a long time), health may be negatively affected in some respect. Various studies indicate that fasting can reduce the level of inflammation in the body.

How Much Weight Can You Lose With Intermittent Fasting Diet?

The main factor that causes this situation in intermittent fasting, which is among the frequently used nutrition plans for weight loss, is that people restrict the calories they consume daily and accelerate fat burning during periods when meals are skipped. Some studies on this subject have shown that people can achieve a 3-8% reduction in body weight during a 3-24 week diet process. When we examine how much weight loss these values ​​​​correspond to weekly, it is thought that the amount of weight that can be lost with intermittent fasting is around 0.25-0.75 kg per week.

Intermittent fasting is an effective nutrition program that, in addition to reducing body weight, also reduces waist circumference and abdominal fat. It is estimated that the reduction in waist circumference will be approximately 4-7%. When implementing intermittent fasting, unlike other diet programs, people do not need to strictly monitor the calorie levels they consume. As a result of various studies, it has been shown that strict calorie restriction while implementing an intermittent fasting program does not result in a significant difference in the level of weight loss achieved.

Intermittent fasting is a weight loss diet program that is suitable for many people. However, as with any diet program, not everyone may be suitable for this nutrition program. Intermittent fasting is not recommended, especially for people with various underlying health problems and nutrition-related health problems. It is recommended that you contact health institutions and get support from experts on how to implement this program in the most appropriate way for you and the foods you should or should not include in the program.