Will Intermittent Fasting Slow Down My Metabolism?
Intermittent Fasting refers to going for an extended period of time without food. It may include skipping a meal each day, fasting a single day each week, or fasting on a daily basis. Another variant of Intermittent Fasting is the 5:2 Diet, where women are required to consume only 500 calories for two days each week, while they eat normally the rest of the days. On the days that one is fasting, it is recommended to drink tea, water or any other low to no-cal beverages.
When done the right way, Intermittent Fasting can be safe, effective and comes with a number of health benefits including weight loss. It also appears to have similar health benefits to those of caloric restriction. Caloric restriction involves eating meals normally but regulating or limiting the amount of calories intake by 15 to 40 percent each day. It has the benefits of increased lifespan and reduces the risk factors for chronic diseases such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes and cancer.
Will Intermittent Fasting Slow Down My Metabolism?
There are false claims out there saying that, fasting or even skipping a meal can slow down your metabolism, and will even advice you to eat several small meals a day. If you eat normally when you are not fasting, your body will not need any adjustments during the fasting periods, thus your metabolism will remain at its fat burning peak.
There is a difference between dieting and intermittent fasting. Dieting involves going for long periods of time without food, or depriving our bodies enough nutrients. Unfortunately, going for long periods without food can significantly reduce your metabolism. This is called the starvation response or the starvation mode; because our bodies adapt to the amount of energy we burn and the calories that we eat.
Thus, in as little of three days of a calorie controlled diet, your metabolism will adjust and even stop burning fat, significantly slowing down the fat burning process. This does not happen with intermittent fasting. This is because the less frequent eating in intermittent fasting does not decrease ones metabolism unless you have continually fasted for many days. In fact, fasting for less than two to three days can have the opposite effect of increasing your metabolism.
Weight Loss
Regardless of what or how you eat, weight loss trickles down to a calorie deficit. Intermittent Fasting makes it easier to be in negative caloric state without obsessing or feeling deprived about food, because eating less often makes it harder to overeat. On the other hand, if intermittent fasting is not done right one are likely to get fatigued after a while and eventually regain the weight.
Research indicates that weight loss improves your glucose metabolism and calorie restriction which allows you to lose more weight. It makes it easier for you to lose body fat because your body is in a fat-burning metabolic state for a long period of time each day. Moreover, short term fasting increases your metabolism. Finally, intermediate fasting increases ones energy levels or gives you an active feeling, rather than feeling exhausted throughout the day from your body having to use energy to digest food.