I used to skip lunch for years and it always felt great. I like to see studies on fasting but I have to ask: how do you deal with the hunger when fasting with 24h? How does that affect your mood?
I fast for 36 hours every week, from Sunday evening until Tuesday morning.
To admit it, sometimes I'm overly tempted and I don't make it.
It has kept my A1C levels very low. My normal blood sugar is in the 120-140 range, but always below 100 on Tuesdays.
I have read elsewhere that fasting can pull A1C down by .5 easily, and that it also triggers a cellular process called "autophagy" that is very helpful.
It makes me great if I don't feel eat anything until the evening. I am much more energized, less sleepy, and productive. If I eat through the day, especially if I do breakfast, I feel tired, sleepy, and hard to focus on anything good. Thus, I've never understood the classic "breakfast is important" argument that old ones day, as it has always been the opposite for me.
I sometimes fast 24h and it feels awesome, I literally feel that I'm much more healthier both physically and mentally.
The sleepiness you feel is probably your body's response to large intake of carbohydrates and the subsequent spike in insulin. Increasing the amount of protein and fiber in your meals will decrease this feeling, as will exercising after your meal.
Breakfast is important if you are going to be physically active during the day since it provides the fuel to sustain it. The reason it's become less important is because many of us are extremely sedentary.
Yeah the sleepiness usually comes from carbs; if I take fibers/protein it feels better.
Maybe anectodal but still, even if I'm physically active the whole day (unless I'm snowboarding with a tshirt 9-17) I really feel better off eating nothing. I feel the urge to eat after physical activity, but not before. If I eat (and I'm not planning to burn 2000+ active calories) I'm still better off on not having any breakfast but just water and perform MUCH better on physical/mental activities.
I was worried about this too, but I’ve been alternate day fasting ADF (eat dinner at the normal time, go to bed and don’t eat the entire day, eat normally the following day) for two weeks now (and down nearly 6 lbs so far to 215lbs), and it hasn’t actually been a problem. I get a bit hungry by the end of the day, and sometimes I’ll have a protein shake to tide me over.
But mostly I’m just looking forward to my meals the next day. And by the next morning I’ve started to become indifferent to food. I’ll have breakfast, but I don’t feel deprived, food seeking or anything.
Also studies on ADF actually allow participants to eat 25% of their daily calories (or up to 500 Cal) and still be on diet. I’ve taken advantage of this once and had a single McD cheeseburger for dinner. So it was nice having the option as backup if I got really hungry.
Everyone’s different, but I can go a while without food and not have it bother me. It’s not uncommon to go a day without it and not really notice. I hear people talking about getting “hangry” but I don’t personally relate to the that feeling at all. I don’t even know what that’s like, or how common it is to feel that way. If anything, I just get tired.
I've noticed that I get worse hunger if I eat more often, especially if I just eat bread to postpone the hunger. For some reason, the hunger I feel when on a lower-carb diet is much less pressing, and can be easily ignored for quite a while.
Carbs are also addictive to me: I sometimes notice that I want to eat even when I know I'm not hungry, so I have to make sure I don't make snacks too available.
Most days, I just eat once because it's an easy rule to stick to. I might have a snack if I've taxed my brain and feel like I need the extra fuel, but usually one meal is plenty.
IME - hunger and mood start to separate. Hunger fades away into a shadow of its former self. There is less energy to be joyous in a fasted state, but there is also less energy to be upset. I find a certain bliss in that.
