TIME-RESTRICTED EATING - HOW TO REAP THE BENEFITS
No doubt you’ve heard somebody say, “you are what you eat”?
Now, there’s some truth in this maxim, but it’s not only what you eat that influences your health, appearance, and performance – but when you eat is critical to these outcomes too.
When you think about this, it’s actually great news. Without consciously restricting your diet choices or calorie intake, you can likely improve your health simply by changing when you eat and drink.
A simple, practical way to gain these benefits is by implementing time-restricted eating.
What Is Time-Restricted Eating?
The definition of time-restricted eating does vary, but let’s define it as -
Restricting the consumption of all calorie-containing foods and drinks to a period of 12 hours or less each day.
I’ll refer to this period of daily calorie consumption as the caloric period.
If, for example, you had a black coffee (no sugar added) at 7AM, started your breakfast at 9AM, finished your dinner at 7PM, and finished a post-dinner glass of wine at 8PM, your caloric period that day would be 11 hours (9AM to 8PM).
This is because coffee scarcely contains any calories – only dietary events that contain more than 5 calories count towards your caloric (eating) period.
So, you can consume drinks such as green tea, black coffee, and herbal teas outside of the caloric period, although you’ll benefit from avoiding caffeinated drinks late in the day.
What are the Benefits of Time-Restricted Eating?
Most of the initial studies of dietary time restriction looked at its effects on animals such as mice and fruit flies.
The research basically compared animals that had round-the-clock access to an unhealthy diet to animals that only had access to the diet for an 8 to 10-hour period during their waking hours.
This latter detail is important because organisms’ bodies are best at digesting and metabolising food during the hours at which they’re naturally awake.
Anyway, the results showed that time-restricted feeding improved the function of the animals’ body clocks, thereby protecting them against weight gain and the development of fatty liver disease, improving heart muscle and skeletal muscle function, enhancing gut health, and slowing the ageing process.
Not bad, right?
But what about us humans?
Skipping Breakfast as a Form of Time-Restricted Eating
One way to apply time-restricted eating is to skip breakfast.
Carefully controlled studies of breakfast-skipping generally show while that when people skip breakfast they do unconsciously consume fewer calories. When they skip breakfast they’re also less physically active.
As a result, skipping breakfast seems to have negligible effects on body weight and health - if anything, skipping breakfast may slightly worsen blood sugar regulation in lean people and reduce sensitivity to the actions of insulin (an important energy storage hormone) in obese people.
Wait… don’t those studies imply that time-restricted eating isn’t beneficial?
There’s an important detail to consider here. That detail is the timing of the caloric period. Basically, all sorts of biological determinants of how your body responds to eating and drinking function best relatively early in your waking day (around your breakfast time and your lunchtime). So, if you’re going to use time-restricted eating, you’ll likely benefit if you implement relatively early time-restricted eating.
Early Time-Restricted Eating May be Best for You?
Recent research shows that when people used early time-restricted eating (only consuming calories between about 8AM and about 2PM) they had increased insulin sensitivity and improved blood sugar regulation,reduced blood pressure and oxidative stress (which contributes to ageing), improved appetite regulation, and increased use of fat for energy.
Something to note with these studies of time-restricted eating is that what the people ate (the number of calories and so on) was controlled.
In practice though, many people who use time-restricted eating tend to inadvertently eat less.
Furthermore, when people use “early time-restricted eating,” they tend to make better diet choices too - most people drink alcohol late in the day, not at breakfast! So, if you try early time-restricted eating, you’ll probably improve the composition of your diet too, amplifying the positive effects of the time restriction. Bonus!
Guidelines for Implementing Time-Restricted Eating
If you want to try time-restricted eating, I suggest you start by trying the following:
Choose a regular, 6- to 12-hour caloric period each day, starting at least 30 minutes after you’d wake up naturally (that is, not to an alarm) and ending at least 2 hours before bedtime (earlier may be better).
Wait 3 to 6 hours between meals, and don’t snack.
Consume most of your calories and carbohydrates earlyin the caloric period. Simply consuming a greater proportion of calories and carbohydrates early in the day can lead to improved weight loss and metabolic health.
If you can only exercise late in the day, it’s fine to use a slightly later caloric period and consume a substantial proportion of your daily energy intake around exercise.
If you don’t want to try early time-restricted eating for some other reason (for example, if you want to have dinner with your family), simply reduce the size of your final meal and increase the size of your first meal.
When making the transition to time-restricted eating, make the transition easier by consuming non-caffeinated teas such as mint, ginger, chamomile, rooibos, and fennel.
With all of this said, time-restricted eating is not for everyone. For example, if you want to gain weight but are struggling to pack on mass, using time restriction won’t help you eat more calories!
Are There Any Side Effects to Implementing Time Restricted Eating?
We always recommend to extend your fasting window gradually to minimise side effects, which can include the following:
Initial tiredness and low on energy. Essentialelectrolytes can support energy during this time.
Struggle to sleep. Some people struggle to sleep due to the drop in glucose levels and also potential rise in cortisol levels.
Headaches and dizziness. Some people also experience headaches due to sugar and caffeine withdrawals. This is totally normal and will pass. Our Fasting Support Pack can help breeze through your fast. - Quintonic or Electrolyte Synergy- Carnitine
Synergy- Phenylpiracetam- Natura Tranquility pm +/-Sleep remedy.
Contact info@wellgevity.co.uk to order your fasting support pack today.
Closing
I hope you benefit from implementing some of the strategies in this article. If after giving them a go you’re still struggling with a particular health complaint or are looking to further optimise your health and performance, you may benefit from additional guidance.
This is where Wellgevity can help you. The Wellgevity team uses a comprehensive approach to get to and address the root causes of people’s health problems, and the team has helped hundreds of people improve their wellbeing and performance.
