protein Fat Carb

a patient asked me about high protein in the face of Volter Longo’s information about low animal protein and this was the conversation:

QUESTION:

Hi Doc,

_________ here. I have been thinking alot about protein since we spoke. So I took a look at my numbers. I track this which is easy since my daily diet does not change from day to day.

Skip breakfast

Lunch garden salad with 35g of chicken or salmon

Dinner a plate full of veggies plus 50g of  bison or turkey or lamb.

So I looked at my numbers. When I add everything up including meals and snals and wine. My daily intake of protein is 46g. My weight is 165 lbs.

That means .28g/lbs is my daily.

US RDA says .36g/lbs which would mean ~ 60g required.

I think you said 1g/lbs.

This means I likely have a protein deficiency and should probably consider upping my meats ( or whey protein drink). Interesting that when I l research the symptoms of protein deficiency I get: brittle nails, cold hands and feet, sluggish thyroid, fatigue. Most of which I think I have. Hmmm. Maybe need to up my protein intake. Interesting that I was intentionally seeking to lower my animal protein in keeping with Longo book and studies. So either more meat ( and eggs ) or Whey protein powder mix or both.

 I have all my nutrition number is a spread sheet if you want to see them. Also what should my fat/protein/ carb ratio be?

 Working on organizing my pills. Talk soon.

Best _______

ANSWER:

Ah good measures...ultimately the longo data can be helpful for middle age folks entering into cancer risk. the shortcut end statement of longevity (lifespan) attainment with fasting mimicking diet is very strong. Our focus right now is to get the "machinery" developed (muscle) to have metabolism controlled (healthspan) and optimized for avoiding standard american disease. 

the fat pro carb ratio is the moving target that changes with what we are doing for the week (higher protein during zone 5 days and yet more healthy carb fat during zone 2 days. ) then all that will change once we optimize for muscle tone, fat store lowering and strength/power for the season. I like what Naiman uses in his P:E diet essentially keeping carbs and fats 1:1 and maximizing on protein. 

to keep the confusion down,

1-know what your daily calorie count is ...maintain that as your most important limit for the day

2-commit to up to 5 days a week of zone 2 training at 30-60min per exercise session (heart rate 120-130) and up to 2 days a week of zone 5 training (150-160 heart rate or full perceived exhaustion) 15-30min per exercise session

3-crank up protein to 1gm/pound of target body weight without driving total daily calories higher (+/- 200cal)

4-maintaining healthy bowel habit and consistency

5-maintaining sleep stages as is or better (REM and DEEP sleep)

6-enjoying the change 

Caloric Restriction

Caloric Restriction

Along time ago in a gym far far away……

Someone came up with “Calories in / Calories out”.

Then science came of age and macronutrients were popular to manipulate.

Then the internet accelerated availability of data correlating real world outcomes to trigger NofOne experiments.

Now mass influencers are bringing to light, old concepts applied with a modern twist to “bio-hack” the journey to big, cut and sculpted into the shortest time needed to hit a summit…thus its back to Calories in / Calories out!

I feel regarding nutrition there are a few steps to consider in finding your Goldilocks window of how many

-calories

-macros

-meal timing

-celebration indulgence

Calories:

There is a resting metabolic rate -sometimes referred to as BMR, that can be measured and is different with everyone based on the amount of energy (which we will refer to as food) necessary to basically sustain our body/mind in a vegetative state.  There are ways to calculate this in a lab like liveleanrx where they have you come in, sit in a chair, wear a mask without moving and in roughly less than 30minutes can determine what you should be having in calories daily to survive death. The problem comes during the day we get active, get stressed, get rested and contemplate with brain power that demands will increase or decrease over your designated RMR.  

-If you go over the vegetative allotment, in theory you will be in “positive” balance (meaning you took in more energy than was necessary for the day…thus end of day you will be STORING excess energy in fat) 

-If you stay under the RMR….you will be in/around a neutral to “negative” balance (allowing you to burn the energy in muscle taken for the day and NOT STORE energy in fat)

The problem (and conspiracy) is in the way the modern food industry has modified/morphed food as energy to look the same as stuff mom made in the 70’s but internally cause a cascade of hormone reactions that subtly brainwash you into desiring more of the same in a few hours to days:

-piece of chocolate at night

-one extra serving of carb heavy/sugar laden something on the plate

-the increase to 16oz from 7oz for a beverage

-sugar coating food without seeing white powder…cafe mocha latte frappe chino…coffee isn’t coffee anymore!

-a hamburger or hot dog that is impossibly just a plant with chemicals but tastes bleeds and feels like meat!

-family sized chip bags that are purchased to save money but actually just cause guilt when you bottom out the package while binge watching Netflix. 

The food industry is out to make money by creating addiction.  It can be argued that the food industry is in bed with the pharmaceutical industry that is out to make money by temporarily fixing your symptoms with medicines that cause weight gain!

Regardless of what you believe, “IF” you can cook fast and tasty, you can control your exposure to these hyper palatable foods and beat aging.  Yes accelerating the aging process is usually what happens in an energy positive state/fat accumulating lifestyle.  Cellular DNA in a constant fed state will not be concerned about preservation of the species, internal surveillance for cancer, building muscle vs building fat stores, or keeping arteries open vs clogged.  Can you hold your fork if exposed to other humans indulging while your stomach is growling and your brain is saying “indulge-you deserve it”?! 

The answer is NO…the typical reason most resolutions are broken by the 2nd week of January. 

Most people have a distant memory of losing a lot of weight by deploying a decrease in energy for a short amount of time…may have been for 

-a wedding

-a reunion

-the threat of medical illness

-getting married

-looking for a new job

-not having money to indulge 

-a bet

…and most people will default to that old routine from 20 yrs ago not knowing that aging will decrease your RMR even further so your old go to won’t work now that your post menopausal or low testosterone….

OR worse

-your muscle mass has decreased and there is not as much “engine” to burn the excess daily energy as younger years!

With all this doom and gloom-is there a go to diet concept that will allow return of muscle tone and loss of fat depot areas?

Yes and it varies person to person! Takes a lot of work to figure who the real client/patient is in the room but once a good base is established of:

-prior attempts/successes/roadblocks

-hormonal balance/age

-nutritional deficiencies

-restorative sleep quality

-weekly exercise volume

-gut dysfunction/balance 

-family/friend/community support

-genetic/environmental risk

Macronutrients:

The Randall Cycle from the 60’s used an answer of if there is enough fat around, glucose utilization will be halted.  Some scientist/doctor/nutritionist still believe this dividing the country in half. One half saying good to be on healthy carbs/plants and low fat….the other half believing if you push high fat you will preferentially bring insulin sensitivity back.
BUT

The anecdote I have found is most of my patients CANNOT sustain either extreme of the macro ideology. (This is the one reason I have developed a 3month deadline to count down to when we reassess your goal attainment).

I still say the ultimate fat/weight loss will come with caloric restriction so if you want to do keto vs ornish vs carnivore vs mediterranean….GO for it but maintain weekly calorie restriction. 

Fasting/timed restricted eating;

Works by same concept of caloric restriction…decreased total calories per week still “should” allow weight loss. THE PROBLEM is when we have the idea of Fat Burning AT THE SAME TIME as Muscle Building!

I am opposed to this line of thinking (unless you are a newbie to exercise -newbie gains anecdotally will see both but only for a finite time). One cannot be catabolic at the same time as being anabolic.  Honestly most older patients are just looking to cut weight as they are focused on the scale as their only metric. I look at

-insulin levels

-power to strength

-resting heart rate

-perceived exertion

-zone training

-RMR

-jump height

-cardiovascular fitness

-explosive power

-muscle mass/fat %

-oxidation of LDL

-fasting glucose

-BHB (if practicing fasting)

OMAD, Prolon, FMD, Intermittent Fasting…all honorable if done occasionally (monthly) but have a plan on what to maintain with. 

Carb cycling:

Not sure I believe this but most of my patients are not elite athletes so honestly don’t think this works and is more of an excuse for some to just munch out on carbs due to an altered food relationship. (I’m Asian, raised on rice daily as a carb staple with every meal…but at 60+yrs old I cannot maintain this too long unless I drop daily protein signal of 1gm/1lb goal body weight.)

Protein Signaling/Leucine Threshold

Highly follow this for myself and anyone older than 40yrs old. Very tough work to get this amount in daily for a target weight without increasing total calories daily!!! 

As most of my patients fit this age group, I find decades of not exercising has left patients in sarcopenia and dynapenia. (Muscle loss and Strength loss) So restarting the trajectory of exercise to build muscle is usually VERY S-L-O-W

So much that most give up when they see NO LOSS ON THE SCALE…in fact they may notice a heavier scale weight but interpret that as fat not muscle. I am so muscle centric that I am biased to lean into growing muscle initially to burn up more energy in the long run. (Be it fat or carbohydrate)

Ultimately its still a personal plan that must be designed in addition to the education process that ALL WILL STUMBLE coming out of the gate.  ALL WILL BURN OUT after a short time. MOST WILL DO BETTER with short tasks and frequent follow up. ALL WILL BENEFIT from a team of support (coaches) to reshape thoughts, expectations, fatigue, motivation. 

If this makes no sense or you disagree, fair ….. but has your team attained successful goals and does your data reflect health/longeivty?

DrRic

DETOX

Gut Detox Cleansing. 

Since the Human Microbiome Project run by NIH in 2007, the scientific community has accepted the value of the gut being more than just a tube to breakdown and absorb food for fuel. Before that if you were to ask a Gastroenterologist about SIBO or the microbiome sending antibody signals and hormone reabsorption …. Most would say please follow up with your primary care doctor. In fact the only docs addressing GUT and the ecosystem of the small and large intestine were “functional medicine doctors”.  This specialty can be given to MD’s and DO’s trained in standard allopathic medical schools OR to ND’s (naturopaths) trained at Bastyr University or chiropractors, acpuncturists, dieticians psychologists or even personal trainers. So with the wide sweep of different training methods, I feel it is imperative to know the education  redentials of your healer. Bottom line is to have a team of Profesionals guiding you on making proper lifestyle changes to keep you healthy and disease free WHILE using data interpretation and personalization.

Back to detoxing, when vitamin shops and the concept of nutraceuticals came into vogue every brand was touting their product as a single pill/liquid to take and fix all ailments!  Estimates have figured the nutraceutical industry will make 100-400 billion dollars this year.  With that, there are non medical protocols being sold as “this is what your gut needs to function properly”. Obviously if your gut has been slowly rendered dysfunctional over 3-4 decades…it will take a lot of fixing to return back to youthful function. (..the days you could eat anything and not be effected!) Now-a-days you have that same extra scoop or one last sip or the desert that you deserve and BOOM your up 10 lbs with bloat, brain fog and reflux. 

So I’m these times of over abundance it will take a lot of education and experimenting to find what is healthy for you and what you should stay away from both in type of food, volume or food and timing of food. You must be your own advocate and a guardian for your family to steer clear of the food hormone traps that make us all prisoners of the fast food industry. (The algorithms are calculated to draw your attention when you are weakest…so you MUST prepare to respond and live your strongest in these times of abundance) To learn how civilization has dealt with times of plenty (seems to come in cycles) let’s look at tradition.

It’s fairly easy to say where the practice started, ancient cultural traditions have involved decreasing food intake during times of religious abstinence. Most old religions will have the concept of cutting down food and beverage during a short time to become more attuned to developing inner wisdom. (This means if you are distracted and cannot focus on a mindful routine try to remove the biggest signals-hormone triggers. When the digestive system is empty, it causes less hormonal waves and adds to better focus and concentration on a goal/target/emotion. Many of the major religions throughout the world will practice some form of fasting. In Catholicism  (what I practice) we do not eat meat on Fridays during Lenten season.  With my fraternity called Exodus 90, we start with no meat on Wednesday and Friday in January and go until Easter Sunday…(along with exercise daily, holy hour dedication, no unnecessary social media and cold showers!)  This introduced me to cold immersion therapy!  I cannot speak for other religions but many friends have honored me by teaching how they celebrate “detoxing”.

Yes I equated Fasting Diet practice with Detoxing. In my view, it results in the same gain…focused attention, better insight, less need for sleep and less hormonal waves from the HIGHLY PROCESSED FOODS OF TODAY!!! Fasting is ancient but now more than ever I see value in the regular implementation of a fast/detox.  The hyper-palatable, highly processed foods with a shelf life of years vs days is convenient to store and pull out at arms reach while in the seated position (…and sometimes even while lying down) at any time of the day or night…totally breaking moms tradition of “don’t eat before dinner or you’ll lose your appetite”.  Before the internet was invented, people had to commute to work (30-60minutes one way) and store a mid day meal (lunch bag or lunch truck) and then travel home to eat at the table together. Now the lines at home are obscure like the hours of work and recreation (even sleep). The data on regular meals vs smaller more frequent meals vs cutting down on total calories vs low carb vs intermittent fasting vs OMAD…all confusing on purpose. The food industry is spending millions of dollars to keep you addicted, keep you hungry and keep you as a frequent flyer.  I would go one step further and suggest the food industry is linked to the prescription drug industry with a strategy to keep you as subscribers for the remainder of your diseased life. 

SO where does detoxing come in? If you look at the current problems with health…number one is obesity  The trickle down effect of that is metabolic syndrome, diabetes, heart disease, cancer and dementia. These are not in order and people that dont care about their health can enter the timeline of disease at any point but it always centers around eating TOO MUCH. 

The easiest way to break your addiction to the hormonal cascade caused by processed food ingestion is to stop it. AH BUT THE FOOD INDUSTRY PAYS THE MOST BRILLIANT PSYCHOLOGISTS IN THE WORLD TO KEEP YOU HOOKED!

The hyper palatable state many of the food companies create is just SOOOOO YUMMY!! The foods they produce give you a big wave of hormone (usually insulin and dopamine) that drown your tastebuds into thinking = orgasm!  How does one not get hooked. Case in point, take your youngest toddler-relative and ask the parent how the childs face looked when first given a slurpy or chocolate or lollipop or icecream? Usually its a facial reaction of bewilderment, happiness, elation and “GIVE ME MORE”. A single exposure is what starts the “food-fix” ravenous search and destroy hunting for snacks all the time. Like a food alcoholic…eye opener first thing in the am, a pick me up before lunch, another crunchy thing to wake you up post lunch…then the after dinner (and you didn’t eat much cause you were full) indulgence.  No boundaries between work space / kitchen / tv room 2 cupboard / bedroom tv and tablet-phone middle of the night. Likewise if you’re hungry at any point during the day…listen to your stomach as there is inherent wisdom in signaling the hunt for food reflex.  And that is the problem…the most devastating drug creation by the food industry is high fructose corn syrup. 10x sweeter than sugar 5x faster to absorb than a bowl of Frosted Flakes. Guaranteed to make your pancreas flood the brain with insulin (hellos diabetes and Alzheimers) and here’s the kicker…it dysregulates ghrelin and leptin the 2 major signaling molecules that send feedback from fat cells or the stomach that you are full (so stop eating). If your brain cannot tell when to stop eating you become that fat mouse in the experiment of continuous feeding. 

So ultimately cold turkey isn’t easy cause your brain will fight like hell to make you hunt for that sweet goodness if you are late by 30 minutes. No one looks forward to the withdrawal from sweets/simple carbs/alcohol…and consequently we rationalize by saying “I can’t detox because the last time I did, got chest pain, headaches, moodiness….essentially HANGRY!  How do you break this cycle? One way is to have the designated time of detoxing to a certain month or season or time of life and you can build up to it. Doing a detox can be exciting if you plan a ramp up to the event; join for a cause; do it as competition or just link it to a goal of reversing disease and feeling young again. These declarations make it more appealing and yes if you just use data, it can be motivating.

My favorite data comes from Volter Longo and the Fasting Mimicking Diet. This is a 5 day fast essentially decreasing total daily calories and the type of food eaten. His data showed benefit to chemotherapy patients, reversal of diabetes, ridding the gut of bad pre-cancer cells in fact he even found stems cells can be triggere to create youthful organs and immune systems again.

The dada from Jason Fungs book The Obesity Code cracked the breakfast industry by showing data to benefit pushing back the first meal of the day. The popularity of the Atkins diet brought low carb (this low insulin) eating to what is now the “keto” movement. Going into ancient times, fasting was suggested to prepare the digestive system and metabolism for the bounty of the new harvest. (Like going from the calorie dense foods and dishes of winter to the abundance of lighter veggies fruits legumes seeds of spring summer. So I usually suggest a detox end or winter beginning of spring then again end of summer/fall and beginning of winter. So at least a twice a year detox. Personally I do a 5 day detox about every 3 months. 

All in all with the science, ANY DETOX would be a good as it 

1-keeps high fructose corn syrup out of your practice for a while

2-it can get your gut ready for tasting good food and not the processed stuff

3-during the cutting back, you can inject a rekindling of your mindful practice/devotion

4-it forces you to declare food items as bad and good (clearly when under the influence of sugar/sweet/salty/drunk…it’s hard to discern. 

5-the practice helps break down large obstacles to longevity as small speed bumps throughout the year -much easier to handle than the January 1st wish of ‘losing 100lb’!

2 OMAD-ohMan

OMAD … OhMan

Most people have figured out if they eat less, weight gain stops and even may reverse….a little. Until the inevitable point of going back to indulgence. That could be in 

-volume of food in 24 hours

-amount of sugar ANYTIME

-frequent feeding (and old 1990’s suggestion by the ADA)

-late night eating

-alcohol

-sugary drinks

-highly processed meals / drive thru

Yes the food industry made what looks like the same meals as the 70’s-80’s but now end result is a HYPERPALATABLE dish. Grandmother’s can tell the difference with one taste but those who haven’t indulged in true home cooked meals won’t know ingredients are baked-in to make you dependent to the franchise. (Can anyone really stop at 5 chips, 2 cookies, a 7oz soda or a bucket of popcorn?) 

As an example, I take Pellegrino as my indulgence drink and in 1 liter there’s about 32 grams of sodium.  In one 12oz can of soda, there’s around 12 to 45grams of sodium….Coke disguises the salt with sugar and carbohydrate! What happens when you take too much salt? You get thirst!…and so starts the rabbit hole of processed food addiction. 

The general public does the best it can to detox and swear away any repeat offense…but…stress will always bring us back to the drive through. 

Now there’s a new monster in town…the crumble cookie, the frappachino or the mocha cookie crumble frappachino! All less than 15$ but with enough sugar/carbohydrate to account for your entire daily allotment. (And you finish each indulgence in 5-10minutes…causing an insulin spike then 3 hours later an insulin crash…sending you back to satisfy this weird desire for more carb!.

REGARDLESS, if you survive the typical 5 day detoxification / withdrawals…you may be able to think clearly and be motivated to eat healthy as the body now can taste and appreciate real flavors. Tasting sugar on the tongue amps up your sweet tastebuds and that neurological signal dominates the brain in identifying what food is. Salt, bitter, pungent, sour and umami nerve connections to the hunger center of the brain become turned off and mute. You become a sugar zombie. The detox can mimic a heroin withdrawal minus the seizures. 

Say you make it through all the hurdles and challenges. If you didn’t pay attention to grandma or mom with the family recipe and steps to chop veggies, throttle the burner to simmer over hours, allow dough to rise you will be a prisoner to the local food factory and back to square one!

OR

You will have salad with limited flavors, tunafish in a can or pricy steak. (Spoiler alert this won’t last past your first taste of the good stuff again)

So how do I suggest my patients that don’t have cooking talent/knowledge to survive the zombie apocalypse of the food industry? 

Read labels-slow

Learn to cook-slow

Move in with mom or grandma-not available most times

Take appetite suppressants-addictive with side effects

Don’t change food intake but shrink the daily volume-FASTING!

Jason Fung popularized skipping breakfast (another American Diabetes Association creation to eat a well balance meal before school or work fully carb heavy with sugar!!! Waffles syrup hash browns French toast kids cereal!

But people started skipping first meal and doing well! (Little detox notes here and there but folks were driven by motivation) thus started the 16/8 routine. Then the 18/6 routine with decent adherance! Eventually everyone raved about skipping meals and increasing their fasting window! And finally from sustaining an empty stomach for 18 hours, it was the next progression to call on One Meal A Day….OMAD!

Doesn’t take cooking skills, takes a little will power but if you keep yourself busy with what seems to be endless internet chores, 10 hour days you become comfortable with the growling stomach…(I actually enjoy waiting for it! Then when the first growl hits…I picture my metabolism starting to suck fat out of my storage depots) My wrestler friends in high school and college used to “shrink their stomachs” to make weight…I remember seeing them spit in a cup to even stop swallowing their own saliva-dangerous foolish and a building block to body dysmorphism! (A psychological disease label)

It can be argued that all forms of fasting may be boarderline reasons for food aversion and pathologic relationships with food. Unfortunately this is the industry we are up against and at this point the industry is too big to fail. Now the drug industry is taking advantage and making medicines deemed a cure for diabetes BUT actually making more money helping hollywood lose weight. 

Question: Will OMAD help you lose weight?

Answer: Yes but not indefinitely 

Caution: the biggest loser phenomenon found those contestants that won the prior season, were not invited back as they gained the weight PLUS MORE since the season finale. The data suggested those humans were put through so high a starvation signal PLUS INTENSE exercise never experienced before….right about the last episode was when their metabolisms adapted to the morsel of daily food and STILL digestive systems were able to manifest full calorie extraction from even a crumb.
So if you only rely on OMAD without adding exercise (intense) and a calming practice to develop faith…you are walking a temporary bridge that will eventually “crumble” when you enter back into public kitchens, food courts, watch commercials or attend a family event! 

So bottom line is its novel to try this practice…at least build up to it…I would only use is as an accessory technique perhaps once a month to PULSE a change to your metabolism that triggers a good adaptive response but then return to enjoyable eating but do it smartly by building your knowledge base around the kitchen, grill or pantry. And if grandma is still around or mom hasn’t fallen to the dark side of the industry….watch, learn, do and thrive. 

DrRic

1 Healthy Eating

The food industry has successfully infiltrated our minds and stomachs with hyperpalatable food and “you deserve a break today” memes. Tobacco companies did the same thing in the 70’s and 80’s till the medical information was UNREFUTABLE about the associating between smoking and early death. Now regarding food you will hear it, that eating processed food is unhealthy or obesity is sweeping our adults and kids. But the information an average patient going in for an annual wellness exam is getting - try to lose weight this year, take this medicine for your pre-hypertention, eat more veggies and try to exercise….then “see you next year!”. Really motivating right? And if the average patient does a google search…about 1 million plus articles will populate…some popular and from apex journals…others from trainers or lifecoaches or social influencers re-interpreting and already biased author. For important stuff like should you get a stent…you should read information on pubmed that has been accepted as peer reviewed. There are things called hazard ratios, confidence intervals, mendelian randomizations that give more weight to the impact statement at the end but these are dry and usually have to be interpreted by a physician or scientist. Good luck getting your doctor to read anything while your 15 minute visit is counting down. (no offense to cardiologists but my daughter went to a heart doc and as soon as he walked in the room, he talked AT HER, said your heart looks fine on EKG (heart tracing) then walked out leaving the medical assistant in the room to answer questions. 3 minutes for 200$! (I picked the wrong specialty!)

My patients at herbal411 are different. I empower mine to read and ingest articles. I define new released studies as I put the theory to the test with self experimentation. I can act as the sage that translates sciency mumbojumbo and apply it to the individual.
Regarding eating and being overweight. Bottom line is there is something wrong with a fuel going in, the absorption process, partitioning the building blocks of food and utilizing the fuel as energy/or storing it. The curve ball is the way its processed, the anticipation we are poisoned with with visual and olfactory stimulation, the sleep deprivation most of American accept as normal and the lack of knowledge on how to cook from scratch. I am not a registered dietician (but am enrolling in a masters program in nutrition 2024!) but I can use my 30,000ft view of the problem and advise big changes to consider in pulsing a change to a stagnant body. I don’t like calling it a commitment as no one can keep a restrictive diet up forever and even if you have the durability to get through emotional, physical challenging times of life and maintain restriction….the metabolism is smart and we return you back to your weight set point. (the biggest loser phenomenon) As Jeff Goldblum’s line in Jurrasic Park...”Nature always finds a way”. So if you through adversity, your metabolism will adapt to the stressor and adjust. This could be bad for folks just deploying intermittent fasting and skipping breakfast. Very helpful at first but most folks will experience a plateau. Then soon after noticing that weight isn’t coming off anymore….the same restrictive diet of waiting till noon for your first meal, carb, calorie….will still make you gain weight back to where you started or a few pounds more! This is why I feel its better to pulse your changes….add a stressor…let the body react….embrace the success and ease up on the technique to allow a refrain.

SO how do I start my first article on healthy eating? I’ll talk about INTERMITTENT FASTING. Jason Fung wrote the Obesity Code and it allowed people to skip breakfast. The general public has been brain washed into eating grains/carbs for breakfast with the allure you need the energy for the day…(but what about the stored energy in my love handles triceps beer belly ot thunder thighs?) So eat a healthy breakfast…eat a sandwich for lunch with veggies and maybe fruit then a bid dinner and lie down to watch TV. Fung set off a frenzy of controversial intermittent starvation..which is all you are doing. You are taking a day and partitioning the times of an average working day to when you can eat and when you cannot. Brilliant as most of Americans graze all day into the night. If a culture is given rules…and we follow said rules….even a high schooler can be successful. So the genius is the hormone data that supported what essentially is a compressed feeding window. When you increase your time stomach is empty, the pancreas will sense starvation/food scarcity and will stop making insulin. (lower insulin=less diabetes…this is a metabolic adaptation) At first you will go through withdrawal of not having your carb, calorie, sugar but after about 4 days…the growling stomach (ghrelin) stops and you dont get as hangry. Watch the exploits of Chris Helsmworth on Netflix with Peter Attia and you can see what water only fasting does to a human. (granted Helsmworth is an actor and when the camera is on, there will be a hawthorn effect of muscle through the hunger and look tough)

Bottom line is I agree with building up to an 18 hour fast….say stop any fuel/food/beverage early evening and do not put anything through the lips till 18 hours later. BY DEFAULT…you may eat anything you want for the 6 hours of eating typically noon to 6pm…but eventually it will be so nauseating to push alot of food in a small window of time. when you can only eat 2 big meals…you hit satiety, you cut down total calories daily and you curb/train your craving. Watching TV can get you mindless eating…like what happens in a 2 hour movie theater with a large popcorn and coke…your done both before 1st act is finished. Or alcohol at a bar watching sports…2 hours of celebration or sorrow but either way…compressed liquid calories/sugar PLUS those damn snacks that seem to go so well. (then when the alcohol dis-inhibits your restraint centers of the brain….you really let go!)

At the end of the day if we can first funnel our eating to a schedule…this to me is the easiest lever to pull in taking back control of weight/guilt. Ozempic is so hot now if you are lucky enough to have it covered…it induces nausea, constipation, persistent fullness to the stomach and helps stop absorption of some carbohydrate. BUT if not combined with healthy eating advice you will find a way around the weekly injection or you will be addicted to it for weight maintenance (since you never addressed root cause) The newer injection called tirzepetide admits once you start it…you will need to maintain it for life.

Regarding food choices while initiating the prolonged fasted state….as a reward for my patients I say exactly what I typed above…eat what ever you want for the first 1-2 weeks during the feeding window (feeding frenzy) but after 2 weeks pull back the reigns and be smart…dont overeat to pain, no sugar, keep carbs complex and mixed with healthy protein and fat and no sweets. Boring but after 4 weeks reasses…get a libre on the arm to have fun with food, fasting, work outs..and move onto the next novel thing. If you are on diabetes medicine you should get medical clearance first. If you are my patient I already cleared you and put together a lifestyle plan.

Eat healthy, Move healthy, have a healthy Spirit. Tune in next week!