Intermittent Fasting Part 3 39/84

Part 3 has arrived. Sorry to drag this out so long but I really do have a lot that I want to say about this. We've already covered the different types of intermittent fasting, the potential benefits it can proved, and the potential side effects it can have. Today I'm going to get into which people can really benefit from IF and which people should probably stay away from it.

So just to start here, I can never really hurt to experiment with something for a short time just to see how it's going to effect you. Even if you find yourself on the list of contraindications, feel free to experiment with yourself a bit to see how it goes (this really applies to a lot of things in the fitness world). With that said, if you start to notice anything bad happening then pay attention and don't be dumb.

So we'll start with the good list, these are the people what can really benefit from some kind of fasting protocol. There's really a lot of lifestyle factors that need to be in play like; when you workout, when you work, if you have to work with clients, when you sleep, what your fitness goals are, and how stressful your life is already. The people that are going to benefit the most are going to be people who have low-ish stress jobs, work normal hours, and usually work out around lunch time or later. Although it's generally thought to be best for cutting, IF can be beneficial for a bulk too. Personally, I do it to try and stay as lean as I can while I gain weight and I just make my fast slightly shorter. Overall, from what we've seen, IF is much more beneficial for men than it is for women. As I mentioned quickly yesterday, IF can have some pretty big negative side effects for some women including missing periods and symptoms or pre-menopause.  Obviously, this won't apply to all women but it's something to keep an eye out for if you want top try. Let's run down that list again...

-Fat loss
-Normal work hours
-Not high stress job
-Later workouts
-Usually men

Now let's take a look at the flip side and see who might want to think for a while before trying. First, if you workout early in the morning, IF is probably not the best (the 16/8 version at least) because you're going to want to eat before, during, or after your workout at some point. Early people could try the 24 hour version though, When you work can be a factor and is associated with when you sleep because you're going to have to plan your meals around that. Usually, the morning is the best time to fast because that fits the best with social norms like going out for lunch or dinner, but it's not 100% necessary. Also, If you're someone who's going to get irritable from not eating, working a job where you work 1-on-1 with people may not be in your best interest. Obviously, this is how my job is but I've  been doing it long enough that I don't get cranky. Also, black coffee helps keep you nice and peppy. If your job or life is already very stressful, the IF just becomes another stressor. This might be the one to put you over the edge so it's better to take some help from anti-stress protocols before you worry about this. Next, if you are an athlete or have very athletic based goals you may benefit form breakfast depending on when you workout or when you have practices etc. Finally, again, women need to pay close attention. It can still work for you but you're going to want to pay pretty close attention to how your body is feeling.  So this list is basically the opposite of the first

- Athletic or massive weight gain goals
-Odd or unpredictable work hours
-High stress job
-Morning workouts
-Often women

The final thing I want to talk about is some strategies that I use to make it through my fast every day so you guys can have them in your arsenal as well. I think the biggest one is to make sure you stay busy. IF works out really well for me because I just fast while I train my morning clients. Once I'm done in the afternoon, I go home and eat. Pretty simple. I'm busy enough during the day to not even think about food most of the time. The next biggest thing is about understanding hunger. There are two main things here; knowing that the feeling of hunger doesn't last that long, and realizing that you need to accept hunger as part of losing fat. Hunger usually only lasts for about 30 minutes or so on average and, after that, it doesn't come back for a very long time. Having this knowledge in the back of you head makes it easier to push through that feeling because you know there is a light at the end of the tunnel. Related, at some point during a Cut, you're going to get hungry, it's just going to happen. You're eating less food than your body is used to and it doesn't like that. If you can get more comfortable with the feeling on hunger than it's going to make the whole process easier for you. The times you'll feel it the most are when you normally eat a meal, so like when you normally eat breakfast. When I do get hungry, water and black coffee help me curb my apatite enough to get over it. If you doing a 24 hour fast then you can add some BCAAs or a greens supplement to help you make the it whole time. Aside from those, it's just about getting it done. You'll feel the most hungry when you first start but you're body will absolutely get used to it. It also help you from getting hungrier during the day if you do happen to miss a meal. That's one of my favorite things because we don;t live in a perfect world and you're not always going to be able to get you 6 meals a day in every 3 hours.

I think that's just about it for these posts. Hopefully you guys are getting some good information from these posts and we're getting close to the halfway point on my daily posts! If you want to stay up to date on everything, get some free stuff including my Top Fat Loss and Top Muscle Building Tips,  nutrition plan, and access to my private Facebook group, fill out the pop up window on here to become a subscriber. Subscribers will also be the first people I go to for workout testing and free programs so don't wait! As always, if you have any questions at all, or feel like you need some help with this whole fitness thing, reach out to me and I'll do whatever I can to help!

See you tomorrow!

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