Improving Health and Fitting on Rides

[tielo]

Let me start by saying I am not a doctor, nor a dietitian or a scientist, the best I can offer is that I am a man of science and that I have studied Intermittent Fasting now for more than 18 months by reading research papers and watching YouTube videos of scientists who are the best in their field regarding the subject. If you have an eating disorder, pregnant, breastfeed or are under the age of 21 you should not do Intermittent Fasting!

Last time I visited Universal Studios Orlando I sat in a EV due to multiple illnesses. These are arthritis, asthma, osteoporosis, sleep apnea, high blood-pressure and more. I can do about 3 hours in the park and had to take 2 days of rest and that was pushing it for me. I had problems fitting in a ride vehicle due to being too fat.
About 2 more years passed and my weight gained and medication grew. I felt terrible all the time, was constantly in a lot of pain and was exhausted.
Then I heard someone talk about intermittent fasting and it got me interested. There are a few things that caught my attention;
1. It is NOT a diet
2. It doesn't cost money
3. You'll loose weight
4. It has huge health benefits
5. You don't need to exercise

For a fat guy sitting in a chair, all day, in pain, it was worth a try.
It's also very simple. You eat a certain amount of time and after that you don't eat. You can drink water, tea, koffie or diet soda but nothing with sugar in it. A popular version in 16/8 where you don't eat for 16 hours and you eat for 8 hours. That doesn't mean you can snack away in these 8 hours, just eat a regular meal. But there are many more variations like OMAD (One Meal A Day) and it is just that, you eat 1 meal and that is it, simple.
I found out that autophagy (this is when the body breaks down bad cells and replace it with good cells) goes in high gear after about 18-20 hours of fasting. In overdrive is more than 200%! As I explained I was obese and my body was broken so it could use a long fast and I was going to try to do the OMAD thing but started with 20/4 so after the start of my meal I had a bit less than 4 hours to eat something more. I did that for 3 days and decided that the one meal was more than enough. The funny thing is that after those 3 days I started to feel good, much better, even tough I was still fat.
I continued this OMAD thing and in the beginning I graved food. I tried to feel if it was hunger or addiction and it was the last. Not strange as in research it's proven that there are connections made in your brain by eating high carbs food that as similar to the patterns in addictions for drugs of alcohol. When I ignored them these feelings went away within 5 minutes, sometimes they came back but like a wave the went away.
The strangest thing was that I didn't feel hunger but then I remembered my body was still eating when I was not. After about 8-10 hours the food you eat is gone and your body needs a different fuel and I had a ton of it in the form of body fat.

I lost in 1 year 30 kilo/66,14 lb. I could stop my blood-pressure medication, I use half of my arthritis and asthma medication and these illnesses are less severe and attacks are shorter and less impactful. My bone density is only 0.1 below normal and I expect that this will become normal. My parents did the same and had similar results. My dad (78) cured from his diabetes and his arthritis saw the same result and my mom's (76) fibromyalgia is less severe and her asthma had the same result as mine. We all are more active and feel much better and we all lost weight.
I never thought I would visit a theme park ever again but now I have a future and it's one that has a theme park visit in it.
The shocking thing to me is that no doctor or anyone told me that this existed. I lost 2 nieces from cancer, a friend who had ALS and met a lot op people who where as ill as I was and they all could have been so much better off. It works for everything and although it doesn't cure everything the improvements and quality of life has been huge.
If you want to know more, please let me know.

 

[JoeCamel]

Let me start by saying I am not a doctor, nor a dietitian or a scientist, the best I can offer is that I am a man of science and that I have studied Intermittent Fasting now for more than 18 months by reading research papers and watching YouTube videos of scientists who are the best in their field regarding the subject. If you have an eating disorder, pregnant, breastfeed or are under the age of 21 you should not do Intermittent Fasting!

Last time I visited Universal Studios Orlando I sat in a EV due to multiple illnesses. These are arthritis, asthma, osteoporosis, sleep apnea, high blood-pressure and more. I can do about 3 hours in the park and had to take 2 days of rest and that was pushing it for me. I had problems fitting in a ride vehicle due to being too fat.
About 2 more years passed and my weight gained and medication grew. I felt terrible all the time, was constantly in a lot of pain and was exhausted.
Then I heard someone talk about intermittent fasting and it got me interested. There are a few things that caught my attention;
1. It is NOT a diet
2. It doesn't cost money
3. You'll loose weight
4. It has huge health benefits
5. You don't need to exercise

For a fat guy sitting in a chair, all day, in pain, it was worth a try.
It's also very simple. You eat a certain amount of time and after that you don't eat. You can drink water, tea, koffie or diet soda but nothing with sugar in it. A popular version in 16/8 where you don't eat for 16 hours and you eat for 8 hours. That doesn't mean you can snack away in these 8 hours, just eat a regular meal. But there are many more variations like OMAD (One Meal A Day) and it is just that, you eat 1 meal and that is it, simple.
I found out that autophagy (this is when the body breaks down bad cells and replace it with good cells) goes in high gear after about 18-20 hours of fasting. In overdrive is more than 200%! As I explained I was obese and my body was broken so it could use a long fast and I was going to try to do the OMAD thing but started with 20/4 so after the start of my meal I had a bit less than 4 hours to eat something more. I did that for 3 days and decided that the one meal was more than enough. The funny thing is that after those 3 days I started to feel good, much better, even tough I was still fat.
I continued this OMAD thing and in the beginning I graved food. I tried to feel if it was hunger or addiction and it was the last. Not strange as in research it's proven that there are connections made in your brain by eating high carbs food that as similar to the patterns in addictions for drugs of alcohol. When I ignored them these feelings went away within 5 minutes, sometimes they came back but like a wave the went away.
The strangest thing was that I didn't feel hunger but then I remembered my body was still eating when I was not. After about 8-10 hours the food you eat is gone and your body needs a different fuel and I had a ton of it in the form of body fat.

I lost in 1 year 30 kilo/66,14 lb. I could stop my blood-pressure medication, I use half of my arthritis and asthma medication and these illnesses are less severe and attacks are shorter and less impactful. My bone density is only 0.1 below normal and I expect that this will become normal. My parents did the same and had similar results. My dad (78) cured from his diabetes and his arthritis saw the same result and my mom's (76) fibromyalgia is less severe and her asthma had the same result as mine. We all are more active and feel much better and we all lost weight.
I never thought I would visit a theme park ever again but now I have a future and it's one that has a theme park visit in it.
The shocking thing to me is that no doctor or anyone told me that this existed. I lost 2 nieces from cancer, a friend who had ALS and met a lot op people who where as ill as I was and they all could have been so much better off. It works for everything and although it doesn't cure everything the improvements and quality of life has been huge.
If you want to know more, please let me know.

I'm glad you found what works for you and your parents

 

[Parkscope Joe]

Not a doctor, dietician, etc:

I also did intermittent fasting, calorie counting, and exercise in college to drop from 200 lbs to around 140 with muscle. Intermittent fasting worked great for me and it's something I always keep in mind even to this day.

 

[WAJAS]

Not a doctor, dietician, etc:

I also did intermittent fasting, calorie counting, and exercise in college to drop from 200 lbs to around 140 with muscle. Intermittent fasting worked great for me and it's something I always keep in mind even to this day.

Did you have any kind of rebound afterward? This is my biggest worry with all of these programs and strategies I see.

 

[Parkscope Joe]

Did you have any kind of rebound afterward? This is my biggest worry with all of these programs and strategies I see.

I held around 140-145 for awhile,

 

[tielo]

Did you have any kind of rebound afterward? This is my biggest worry with all of these programs and strategies I see.

The fun about Intermittent Fasting is that you need to mess it up (controlled). The thing is that your body gets stress like "oh no we don't get food" panic. But if you do that everyday it gets a routine and your body adepts. What I do once every 3 months I stop eating for 48 hours (so I skip 1 meal). And during holidays and birthdays I eat pie and stuff within 4 hours of my meal. It makes it easy to continue but I always get back to OMAD.

 

[UNIrd]

Just curious. What are you eating for your OMAD? Like what would one consist of.

 

[tielo]

Just curious. What are you eating for your OMAD? Like what would one consist of.

I started with my regular meal, I'm Dutch so my meals will be wildly different than yours but I do BBQ and all the stuff you see in the pictures. What I did is I did my regular meals and added more vegetables. Most of these meals are on a big pizza plate (I also eat pizza) and we always end with a small ice cream. A small hack I do is cooking my pasta the day before and cool it off. The next day I heat it up and that save you 70% of the cabs. So in shot this isn't a diet, stat with you regular meal and see if you can improve on it (less carbs and sugars, more vegetables) and that is it.

 

[tielo]

I would recommend the video's from professor Dr. David Sinclair who explains a lot about what happens in your body. It's about aging and health but all aspects of intermittent fasting come by.

 

[Freak]

For the 16/8 policy, I take it that doesn't mean you eat constantly for eight hours. I take it that means you eat what meals you can for eight hours?

I'm giving it a try myself. Hoping to lose about five to eight pounds. Had a big meal at 9:30 last night and don't plan on eating until 3:30 (Which would make it about 18 hours since the last meal). Hoping to try it again for the next day but use that next meal as breakfast and then so on.

 

[shiekra38]

I found adjusting behavior over a period of 21 days usually helped to eliminate said behavior.

I was able to drop a lot of pandemic weight after developing some bad habits like eating a ton of cereal and ice cream lol

Over a few months I would remove an indulgent item from my daily activity and the weight vanished pretty quickly

For instance, I would focus on removing ice cream for 21 days, after that period I would re-introduce it, but only recreationally

The most interesting one was bread, I cut bread for 21 days and after that period of time had a pub sub and felt terrible.

Where as before I could murder two of those bad boys easy

Of course riding my bike and walking helps

I find a lot of people try to do everything at once, and your body goes into defense mode (as it should).

I wanted something that affected my weight, and didn't affect my mood

Also, as far as parks go, it is insane how many calories you burn by walking around theme parks

If you don't already have it, get the MapMyWalk App, it tracks your walking distance and burnt calories

 

[tielo]

For the 16/8 policy, I take it that doesn't mean you eat constantly for eight hours. I take it that means you eat what meals you can for eight hours?

I'm giving it a try myself. Hoping to lose about five to eight pounds. Had a big meal at 9:30 last night and don't plan on eating until 3:30 (Which would make it about 18 hours since the last meal). Hoping to try it again for the next day but use that next meal as breakfast and then so on.

You are correct, in a 8 hour window you could have about 2.5 meals and no snacks.
I eat until I'm satisfied. So not that I hardly can breath as you do after a Christmas dinner, but that I'm full.

The hours you eat can be different but it's the time you are fasting that does the wonder. Also eating early helps. I start my meal at 11:30 in the morning, and I'm done 45 minutes later, that gives me the rest of the day to burn it. Eating at night will sit in your stomach (partially) when you sleep and although you use energy while you are asleep it's less than when you are active. But I also know that it sometimes isn't possible.
That said, it's great you are going to try it. Remember that the first weeks your addicting will kick in as patterns in your brain are formed like an addict, just ignore that hunger feeling or feeling you want to eat something, you don't need it and very quick the feeling will pass. Tel me after 3 days if you feel better.

 

[Bort]

Also not a dietician/anything professional, but have spent the last decade heavily into sports performance/bodybuilding/fitness.

The general tips I would add to any sort of diet:
1. Don't drink your calories. If you can switch from Coke to Diet Coke, for example, that about a 140 calorie swing. If you drank a can of soda every day, that's nearly 1,000 calories you can save by switching to a low-calorie soda. Saves you roughly 1lb every 3.5 weeks.

2. Some training is better than none. A lot of people get discouraged by thinking they need 2 hours in the gym 5 times per week. That's not true, especially at the beginning. If you can do something (walking, yoga, basketball, weights, etc.) 3x/week for 30 minutes a day, that's still going to go a long way in reaching your desired goals.

3. Weight lifting does not make you add weight. If you take in more calories than you burn, you'll add weight. If you burn more calories than you take in, you'll lose weight. Simple as that.

4. Find what works for you. There's a million different variations of any type of diet. Aim for whatever one seems like it can fit into your lifestyle long-term. If it's a diet you can't do long-term you'll have to work harder to avoid rebounding.

 

[tielo]

Also not a dietician/anything professional, but have spent the last decade heavily into sports performance/bodybuilding/fitness.

The general tips I would add to any sort of diet:
1. Don't drink your calories. If you can switch from Coke to Diet Coke, for example, that about a 140 calorie swing. If you drank a can of soda every day, that's nearly 1,000 calories you can save by switching to a low-calorie soda. Saves you roughly 1lb every 3.5 weeks.

2. Some training is better than none. A lot of people get discouraged by thinking they need 2 hours in the gym 5 times per week. That's not true, especially at the beginning. If you can do something (walking, yoga, basketball, weights, etc.) 3x/week for 30 minutes a day, that's still going to go a long way in reaching your desired goals.

3. Weight lifting does not make you add weight. If you take in more calories than you burn, you'll add weight. If you burn more calories than you take in, you'll lose weight. Simple as that.

4. Find what works for you. There's a million different variations of any type of diet. Aim for whatever one seems like it can fit into your lifestyle long-term. If it's a diet you can't do long-term you'll have to work harder to avoid rebounding.

You make some excellent points. I drink diet Pepsi or tea without sugar.
Due to all my limitations I didn't train or do sports (I don't even like it) but I started to be a able to do more in a day so I walked more and was more active in general.
And definitely do what works for you. My gardener who, is doing heavy physical work, cut his breakfast and he lost quite some weight and feels more energetic. I would never tell him he should do 1 meal a day. But if I still was doing an office job I would be fine with 1 meal.

 

[Freak]

You are correct, in a 8 hour window you could have about 2.5 meals and no snacks.
I eat until I'm satisfied. So not that I hardly can breath as you do after a Christmas dinner, but that I'm full.

The hours you eat can be different but it's the time you are fasting that does the wonder. Also eating early helps. I start my meal at 11:30 in the morning, and I'm done 45 minutes later, that gives me the rest of the day to burn it. Eating at night will sit in your stomach (partially) when you sleep and although you use energy while you are asleep it's less than when you are active. But I also know that it sometimes isn't possible.
That said, it's great you are going to try it. Remember that the first weeks your addicting will kick in as patterns in your brain are formed like an addict, just ignore that hunger feeling or feeling you want to eat something, you don't need it and very quick the feeling will pass. Tel me after 3 days if you feel better.

Back with an update! The first day was the worst. But after about a couple of days, it's not quite as bad. Here's how my routine went:

Friday: Ate the night before at 9:30. Decided to skip breakfast and wait until my meal around 3:30 and until then it was brutal. Was planning on going cold turkey and doing the OMAD approach this day, but work got crazy later in the evening and I needed some food. Ate around 7:00.

Saturday: Went to bed late, but ate a decent breakfast around 11:30. Didn't eat for the rest of the day. Already the addiction part didn't feel as bad.

Sunday: Eat a fairly small breakfast around 7:30 then ate a decent lunch at 2:00. Wasn't super nutritious since it mostly Taco Bell for lunch Didn't eat for the rest of the day afterwards and again, while I was still definitely hungry, it wasn't quite as brutal as Friday.

Monday: Breakfast around 8, lunch around 3.

Today, I can got off-track a little bit as I had three meals in my eight hour window, but I hope to go back to the routine tomorrow. With this routine I have done, I've already lost one pound, maybe a pound and a half! When I wore my leather jacket on Sunday, I could already tell it felt just a hair looser than when I last wore it the week before, so there is progress! Hoping to go back to the routine tomorrow. While I haven't cut sugar treats entirely, I haven't eaten any treats the past couple of days but might have one tomorrow for my "snack".

So yeah, I'm hoping to lose at least five more pounds, and if I want to keep going I might shoot for eight. So far, this seems like the most practical and doable way to lose weight. I tried keto once, and while that was brutal for a week and a half, I lost weight fast, but rebounded a half of the weight I lost since I just couldn't take the insanity anymore and just ate away on carbs. This is a lot more doable, but I just gotta be patient with the process. It also helps as a big coffee drinker that I don't like to have anything in my hot beverage. Not even cream. I'm a coffee purist. lol

I remember Arnold Schwarzanegar's response when he was asked "How can you lose weight?" His response: "Don't eat after 6". That totally makes sense as people may typically get up around 6 or 7 and the 12 hour mark is when the fat burning occurs (According to Google). So once I ease off of this routine, my plan will simply be trying not to eat anything after six and just eat "normally" during the day.

So thank you much for this thread! I may have found a solid method to lose weight! I recommend y'all try it, of course, barring your doctor thinks its a good idea and don't have any health issues/blood sugar issues that may keep you from doing it.

 

[tielo]

Back with an update! The first day was the worst. But after about a couple of days, it's not quite as bad. Here's how my routine went:

Friday: Ate the night before at 9:30. Decided to skip breakfast and wait until my meal around 3:30 and until then it was brutal. Was planning on going cold turkey and doing the OMAD approach this day, but work got crazy later in the evening and I needed some food. Ate around 7:00.

Saturday: Went to bed late, but ate a decent breakfast around 11:30. Didn't eat for the rest of the day. Already the addiction part didn't feel as bad.

Sunday: Eat a fairly small breakfast around 7:30 then ate a decent lunch at 2:00. Wasn't super nutritious since it mostly Taco Bell for lunch Didn't eat for the rest of the day afterwards and again, while I was still definitely hungry, it wasn't quite as brutal as Friday.

Monday: Breakfast around 8, lunch around 3.

Today, I can got off-track a little bit as I had three meals in my eight hour window, but I hope to go back to the routine tomorrow. With this routine I have done, I've already lost one pound, maybe a pound and a half! When I wore my leather jacket on Sunday, I could already tell it felt just a hair looser than when I last wore it the week before, so there is progress! Hoping to go back to the routine tomorrow. While I haven't cut sugar treats entirely, I haven't eaten any treats the past couple of days but might have one tomorrow for my "snack".

So yeah, I'm hoping to lose at least five more pounds, and if I want to keep going I might shoot for eight. So far, this seems like the most practical and doable way to lose weight. I tried keto once, and while that was brutal for a week and a half, I lost weight fast, but rebounded a half of the weight I lost since I just couldn't take the insanity anymore and just ate away on carbs. This is a lot more doable, but I just gotta be patient with the process. It also helps as a big coffee drinker that I don't like to have anything in my hot beverage. Not even cream. I'm a coffee purist. lol

I remember Arnold Schwarzanegar's response when he was asked "How can you lose weight?" His response: "Don't eat after 6". That totally makes sense as people may typically get up around 6 or 7 and the 12 hour mark is when the fat burning occurs (According to Google). So once I ease off of this routine, my plan will simply be trying not to eat anything after six and just eat "normally" during the day.

So thank you much for this thread! I may have found a solid method to lose weight! I recommend y'all try it, of course, barring your doctor thinks its a good idea and don't have any health issues/blood sugar issues that may keep you from doing it.

Wow, you are doing great! I'm so happy for you. I was wondering, do you feel more energetic of just the opposite?
Keep it up, try slowly cut a bit more of the carbs and good on you for the coffee!