There are more and more people who are looking for effective weight loss strategies every day. An intermittent fasting meal plan is probably one of the best strategies for effective long-term weight loss.
With little hard work and a wide array of health benefits, you can employ our intermittent fasting meal plan in your lifestyle starting today! Read on to learn more about intermittent fasting and how to get our 7-day intermittent fasting plan pdf.
What is Intermittent Fasting?
Intermittent fasting is basically an eating timing scheme. In an intermittent fasting meal plan, you alternate between periods of eating and periods of fasting.
Following an intermittent fasting meal plan does not involve eating some particular foods and shunning the rest. Instead, it simply tells you when you should eat and when you should not. This makes it an easy-to-employ fat burning method.
***Keep reading to see how to get our free 7-day Intermittent Fasting Meal Plan pdf.
The Science Behind Intermittent Fasting
Our bodies are designed to perform in their optimal capacity during all sorts of conditions. It can adapt to any type of changes in the environment by modifying its internal processes.
When we are fasting, the processes going inside our body change to adapt to the food shortage. This is especially true for genes, cell repair processes, and hormones.
Since there is fewer calories intake, the blood sugar and insulin levels drop significantly. The growth hormone in the body increases.
With the drop in the insulin level and the blood sugar, the body goes into a fat burning mode. This is why intermittent fasting becomes an effective weight loss strategy.
Types of Intermittent Fasting
An intermittent fasting meal plan isn’t restricted to a particular type of eating habit. You can induce intermittent fasting in your diet in a variety of ways. These include:
Intermittent Fasting: 16/8 Method
This is one of the best and simplest intermittent fasting meal plan method. In 16/8 fasting, you skip your breakfast early in the morning. You have your first meal at noon and your last meal strictly before 8 pm.
This means that you are eating within those eight hours. The rest of the 16 hours of the day become your fasting period (yes, you are fasting while you sleep).
Intermittent Fasting: Eat Stop Eat Method
Eat stop eat intermittent fasting meal plan is easy to employ as well. in this method, you simply fast for an entire day once or twice in a week.
For example, suppose that you want to fast on Tuesday. You can have dinner on Monday. The next meal you should then consume is dinner on Tuesday. This gives a 24-hour gap between meals. Hence, you fasted for an entire day.
Intermittent Fasting: 5:2 Method
The 5:2 intermittent fasting meal plan is similar to the Eat Stop Eat method. In the 5:2 method, you basically eat normally for five days a week. However, for the remaining two days, you have to gradually limit the calories you consume.
The calorie intake on these 2 fasting days should be 25% of your normal calorie intake. For example, if your normal calorie intake is 2000 calories, you should have only 500 calories on the two days that you fast.
***Want a free 7-day Intermittent Fasting Meal Plan pdf? Keep reading!
Crescendo Fasting: Best Intermittent Fasting for Women
Men and women have different body compositions. Due to this, their bodies react differently to fasting. For women, general fasting methods can lead to different problems like insulin resistance, hormonal issues, and a few others.
This is why a specialized fasting method called Crescendo fasting is recommended as a starting point for women. Crescendo fasting is an intermittent fasting meal strategy that is best suited for women due to their complex bodies. It is a hybrid of the fasting methods we discussed.
You do not need to fast every day if you are using Crescendo Intermittent Fasting Meal Plan. You only need to choose two or three days (non-consecutive) as per your choice for fasting. If you are a beginner, start with any two days.
Now, on the fasting days you choose, you should follow the 16:8 method. You can eat for any eight hours of your choice but you have to fast for the rest. During the fasting period, it is advisable to consume a lot of water. You can also have coffee, tea, and some other non-sugar drinks.
Further, your exercise patterns should be adjusted as well. Strength training or other heavy exercises should be avoided on fasting days. If you want to do any exercise, you can do yoga or easy cardio workouts. You can do heavy exercises on the non-fasting days.
Once you are acclimated to this intermittent fasting meal plan, you can increase your fasting days from two to three non-consecutive days. For example, you could fast on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. You would continue to add fasting days until you are able to easily fast every day of the week.
Check out our article on cresendo fasting. Learn how to do it the right way.
What to Drink During Intermittent Fasting?
While following an intermittent fasting meal plan, you should from eating during the fasting period. However, you are encouraged to drink plenty of fluids.
You should especially consume a lot of water. In addition to that, you can have tea and coffee as well. Herbal tea is an excellent option. However, alcoholic beverages are strictly prohibited.
Other acceptable options include sparkling water and apple cider vinegar. You don’t want to raise your insulin levels during the period you are fasting. Therefore, you should avoid any beverage that does has sugar. There are different schools of thought concerning whether or not adding non-calorie sugar substitutes to drinks are acceptable during fasting. Here at Libifit, we believe that using Stevia as well as aspartame (in limited amounts) are acceptable to add to drinks during your fasting period.
***Download our 7-day Intermittent Fasting Meal Plan pdf below.
Supplements for Intermittent Fasting
While fasting, you are allowed to consume supplements that are without any calories. These supplements have a variety of health benefits on your body. They include:
Electrolyte Supplements: Electrolytes are important chemical compounds that power important bodily functions. They are important for sending messages throughout your body as well.
Generally, the body’s need for electrolytes is fulfilled by fruits and vegetables. However, during the fasting period, you are not consuming any of them.
Therefore, it is a good idea to consume electrolyte supplements in the intermittent fasting meal plan. These supplements help in avoiding muscle weakness or any fatigue you might feel during the fasting period.
Cinnamon Supplements: Cinnamon, among its other health benefits, is found to lower your blood sugar levels. It also lowers the insulin resistance of the body.
Therefore, it can act as an added booster during your fasting session. You should have these supplements as recommended.
Apple Cider Vinegar: Apple Cider Vinegar is like a magic drink with its tons of benefits. It has no calories in itself and the benefits of the beverage are numerous.
It lowers the blood sugar level of the body. Therefore, it can be an extra aid during the fasting period. Not only that, it aids in digestion as well.
Whey Protein: Amino acids are essential life blocks which carry out all the repair and cellular process in the body. They are created from protein, which in turn comes from food.
When you are on a fasting period, your body is not consuming any proteins. Therefore, during the physical exercising, it can start breaking down muscle to create Amino acids.
To avoid this, it is a good idea to supplement eating periods with whey proteins. That way, you have enough protein build up in the body to avoid muscle breakdown.
Fiber Supplements: Fiber supplements are a good way to curb your appetite without spiking your insulin levels. They are especially helpful when you have just started intermittent fasting meal plan.
You can mix a teaspoon of fiber supplement with a beverage and you will see you no longer feel hungry. Fibres have numerous health benefits on the body as well.
***Download our 7-day Intermittent Fasting Meal Plan pdf below.
How to Avoid Binge Eating on An Intermittent Fasting Diet
When you first start following an intermittent fasting meal plan, you might experience extreme hunger pangs. When this happens, you can be tempted to binge eat during the eating period.
The first thing to know is that even though you have fasted, there is still a need for a caloric deficit. This means that if you binge during your eating period, and consume more calories than you burn during the day, you WILL NOT LOSE WEIGHT. You must still follow a healthy diet during your feeding window.
To avoid binge eating, you should be prepared. Have your first meal ready to go at the start of your feeding period. And this first meal should be filled with green veggies and fiber. We recommend that your first meal after fasting be a huge bowl of veggies or a large salad. This will help to fill you up and give you more self-control. If you are full, you will make better food choices during you eating period. You should also have a teaspoon of MCT oil before you eat anything. Here is the MCT oil we recommend.
In addition to eating healthy and breaking your fast the right way, you should take the supplements recommended above.
It is also important to note that it takes some time to include intermittent fasting in your lifestyle. Most people tend to feel immense hunger during the first week, but they soon become acclimated to it.
Therefore, if you have just started intermittent fasting, you simply need to be patient. If you still feel it is a hard thing to do, you can make a few tiny changes here and there to ease yourself into it. You will find it to be one of the best decisions in your life.
Benefits of Intermittent Fasting
- Burning up of your fat stores: Intermittent fasting creates a calorie deficit in your body. Therefore, your body will start burning up the fat in order to create energy. This can lead to the desired weight loss.
- Immunity: Intermittent fasting is shown to improve the immunity of the body. This helps you to be protected against all types of diseases.
- Longer life expectancy: Studies have found that people who practice intermittent fasting tend to live longer. Therefore, you can follow this simple life and enjoy the extra years of your life happily!
- Improved Bodily Function: Intermittent fasting helps in improving the overall bodily functions. People who practice this method testify that they get better sleep, feel higher energy levels in the body, and feel a general sense of wellness.
- Hearth and Brain Health: Intermittent fasting improves brain function and heart health drastically. You are at a lower risk of a heart attack. Further, it helps in controlling type 2 diabetes as well.
- No restrictions on the food: Intermittent fasting does not force you to eat any particular type of food or avoid the other. During the eating period, you can eat whatever you like as long as it is healthy and there is a caloric deficit. This makes it a less restrictive method and gives you a sense of comfort.
Conclusion
As you can see, following an intermittent fasting meal plan is easy to employ and has tons of health benefits and is excellent for weight loss. Download our 7-day Intermittent Fasting Meal Plan PDF file to get started today!
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