axle2152 Wrote:Interesting, some of the stuff I came across suggested that fasting helps with insulin sensitivity.... I know it is a topic for debate, seems to be good and bad things concerning fasting. Logically speaking it would make sense for our bodies to be more efficient at absorbing nutrients when after fasting... I need to sit down and do some reading on it.
I'm not sure about post-fasting absorption efficiency, so I won't discuss that. Although, one could weight the food intake and the poop output for a week and make a comparison of fasting vs non fasting, right?
The thing with fasting is that you are not keeping constant blood glucose levels which is essential if you hope to manage your weight, hunger, food habits, etc.
Much like you need to take in a pill every certain amount of hours for the plasma concentration of the drug to reach a steady state and be able to perform its action, you need to keep your plasma glucose levels as constant as possible to avoid starving state in which fat storage is actually promoted and also to avoid level spikes which mean overproduction of insulin, which, you guessed it, mobilize excess glucose to be turned into fat.
I suppose fasting would work if kept indefinitely, you would sure as hell get skinny then!
The key is what is being used as "fuel" when you lack food intake. Blood glucose comes first, muscle and liver glycogen come next and both fat and muscle tissue as last resources.
Therein lies the problem. If you keep a regular exercise schedule you are constantly depleting your glycogen reserves and what you don't want to happen is add fasting to the mix and have your muscle tissue disappear.
This why I for one, deem more logical the bit about increasing the amount of times you eat per day but lesser portions each time, minding above all things a proper protein intake. This way, glucose levels reach a "steady state" of sorts and no insulin "spikes" occur.
Then exercise should add the important tasks of: 1) keeping the needed amount of calories out (cardio) 2)building muscle tissue (bodyweight, strenght training)
Both of those things should then increase your basal metabolic rate and keep you at a nice healthy weight and general homeostasis.
You said it yourself, quite a controversial topic. Most definitely because we are all phenotypically very different. I wouldn't be surprised if there are people that actually benefit from fasting, but it would be a more of a case by case thing.