Intermittent fasting has become very popular because we live in a world surrounded by diet culture where severe restriction is sadly so normalized and a lot of people are afraid of eating calories. Most people who practice Intermittent fasting want to lose weight, and you can achieve that goal when you eat less. If you want any diet to work for you, it’s important that you do it right because when you make the wrong kinds of choices your results are not going to be as good and make cause you to gain weight. A few years ago, I tried Intermittent fasting for a short period of time, but eventually I gave up on it because I was getting more negative health outcomes than positive ones and the risks far outweighed the benefits. Recently I decided to try it again because I get a lot of bloating from endometriosis and wanted to see if it would help improve my pain. I knew going into it that Intermittent fasting hadn’t worked for me in the past and wasn’t sure if it was going to work for me this time around. I started to think about what mistakes I could have made the first time that set me up for failure so didn’t make those same mistakes. What Intermittent fasting mistakes have I made? In this post, I am sharing some of the most common Intermittent fasting mistakes you need to stop making for better results.
Fasting for too long- When you start Intermittent fasting, sometimes people think that you have to fast as long as possible to see results but longer is not always better. Longer fasts have a lot of benefits, but if you aren’t used to fasting, I wouldn’t jump into a twenty-four hour fast on day one because your body isn’t used to skipping and you will have a hard time fasting that long. I am used to eating breakfast around six or seven a.m. and one of the biggest mistakes I made the first time around was I tried to fast for too long. If you are used to eating breakfast, ease yourself into it because if you fast for too long, it will cause you to become too hungry and you will likely binge the moment you break your fast. At the moment, I am only fasting until eleven a.m. because my body is not used to skipping breakfast, but as my body adjusts, I may try to do longer fasts. Fasting for longer is not always better if it causes you to overeat, which inevitably will happen if you let yourself get so hungry that you can’t handle it. Ease into longer fasting because doing it for too long often backfires and does the complete opposite of what you want it to do. Long fasts only work if you don’t become ravenous otherwise it is just going to make you gain weight.
Ignoring healthy eating- When it comes to fasting, sometimes people think that because they skipped a meal, it means you can eat whatever you want but it doesn’t work that way. Intermittent fasting can most definitely help with weight loss, but what you eat to break your fast matters because skipping a meal doesn’t undo poor eating choices. If you want to see positive results from Intermittent fasting, you still have to eat vegetables and maintain good nutrition because skipping a meal or two doesn’t mean you get to ignore healthy eating. I gained weight the first time I tried Intermittent fasting because I was in the mindset that if you skip meals, you can eat whatever you want but if anything you should be prioritizing healthy eating even more. I can remember eating scoops of peanut butter when I broke my fast and wondering why I wasn’t seeing positive changes in my body that everyone talks about. Ignoring healthy eating is one of the biggest Intermittent fasting mistakes you can make because you can’t undo hours of unhealthy eating by skipping one meal.
Not eating enough calories during your eating window- When you practice Intermittent fasting often, you will eat less calories, and it is easy to under-eat calories because you are training your body to eat less often. It is so important that you are eating enough when you are not fasting because you are going to have a hard time reaching your goals when you aren’t fueling your body properly. It is so important that you eat enough calories because your body still needs fuel to function, and not eating enough often leads to binges. One of the biggest struggles I had when I practiced Intermittent fasting a few years ago was that I either ate too much or not enough. I didn’t know how much to eat, and there were days I was more tired and felt hungrier than normal because I didn’t eat enough. Now I have a better idea of how many calories my body needs to function and am extra mindful of how many calories I am eating to make sure I am not under-eating. It is easy to under-eat when you are Intermittent fasting but it is so important that you eat enough if you want it to work for you.
Eating too much when you are not fasting– If you are fasting for too long and aren’t used to it, you will often become so hungry that you may eat more calories than you would have if you were eating consistently. Intermittent fasting can help a lot of people lose weight, but it can also cause you to gain weight because skipping one meal isn’t going to put you in a calorie deficit if you are bingeing at dinner time. In my previous experience with Intermittent fasting, I had days where I felt like I couldn’t stop eating and probably ate double the amount of calories than I normally would. It is easy to over-eat calories during your eating which is why it’s so important that you make sure you eat enough to avoid severe hunger.
Intermittent fasting can help some people improve their health, but it doesn’t work for everyone and often affects women differently than men. Women go through things such as periods that men wouldn’t have to consider, and sometimes we don’t get results as quickly. Fasting can work for some people, but it is so important that you still eat healthy because, despite what people believe, skipping one meal doesn’t undo unhealthy eating, and you still have to eat vegetables. You don’t have to fast to lose weight, and you can achieve that by making healthier choices, and the only reason I tried it again was to improve my bloating. Fasting has not completely gotten rid of my bloating because nothing can completely get rid of it, and the only thing it did was make me not experience it as often. Some people will get great results from fasting, but I wouldn’t recommend it for anyone who has medical conditions that require consistent meals or has an eating disorder. Intermittent fasting is something that you can try to see if it works for you but don’t be discouraged if it doesn’t work because not everyone will respond well to the same types of diets. What mistakes have you made with Intermittent fasting? If you liked this post, please leave a comment below and share it with your friends.
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