Ep. 186 - Modified Alternate Day Fasting vs. Calorie Restriction for Lowering Weight & Blood Sugar | Preventing & Reversing Metabolic Syndrome & Pre-Diabetes with Fasting | What is the best fasting schedule for insulin resistance? | Fasting Challenge
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In today’s episode, Dr. Scott and Tommy discuss alternate-day fasting and modified alternate-day fasting, calorie restriction vs modified alternate-day fasting, metabolic syndrome and why it matters, eating habit suggestions and so much more.
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Article Reference Links
https://pure.coventry.ac.uk/ws/files/30967868/Binder1.pdf
https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/metabolic-syndrome/symptoms-causes/syc-20351916
https://www.cdc.gov/heartdisease/facts.htm
https://www.cdc.gov/diabetes/data/statistics-report/index.html
Fasting For Life Ep. 186 Transcript
Hello. I'm Dr. Scott Watier.
And I'm Tommy Welling.
And you're
listening to the Fasting for Life podcast.
This podcast is about using fasting
as a tool to regain
your health, achieve ultimate wellness,
and live the life you truly deserve.
Each episode is a short conversation
on a single topic
with immediate, actionable steps.
We cover everything from fat loss
and health and wellness
to the science of lifestyle design.
We started fasting for life because of how
fasting has transformed our lives
and we hope to share the tools
that we have learned along the way.
Hey everyone,
welcome to the Fasting for Life podcast.
My name is Dr.
Scott Water and I'm here as always, and my
good friend and colleague, Tommy Whelan.
Good afternoon to you, sir.
Hey, Scott, how are you?
Fantastic, my friend.
Excited for today's conversation.
I want to welcome all you all listening
in today.
Appreciate you for tuning in to today's
episode.
We're going to be talking about modified
alternate day fasting
when compared to calorie
restriction in the treatment of patients
with metabolic syndrome.
And this is a randomized clinical trial
and excited to dive into it.
If you're new to the podcast,
thanks for giving us a shot.
If you want to learn more about Tommy
and I
and how fasting has transformed our lives,
please head back to episode one.
Give it a listen and get to know
a little bit more about why we do this.
Each and every week
we are on a mission to empower
folks to know that they have a choice
when it comes to weight loss,
when it comes to diabetes reversal,
when it comes to health overall,
and if you're a long term listener,
we are extremely grateful for you
to continually be on this fasting
lifestyle journey with us.
So, Tom, you know,
we want to give a shout out to a recent
five star review that came in because it
directly relates to the conversation
we're going to have today.
Yeah, absolutely. So thank you.
Halton or Horton Best podcast ever,
she says.
So grateful I found these guys.
I fasted for three years,
but these guys explain everything
clearly and simply only on episode 20.
Can't wait to hear all the rest.
I hope they touch base on modified
alternate day fasting
and what they actually eat. Love
all of it.
Big heart.
Heart. Back at you.
Thank you for listening.
Appreciate the kind words too.
And we are absolutely going to get in
to modified alternate day fasting.
We also do sprinkle in some of what we eat
over the episode, so keep listening.
You'll definitely get a taste for that
to see what you did there.
Yeah, based on that was nice.
So we really do appreciate
and are grateful for all the reviews,
if you feel so inclined
and you've had this podcast or
the resources
we have or the Facebook groups,
whatever it is, if we've made an impact
or a difference in your life,
we'd love to hear about it. Yes.
And then that goes on and tells
the podcast world and the podcast gods
and goddesses that we are
making an impact in providing value week
in and week out on this podcast.
So shout out you're only on episode 20,
you've got a lot more to go.
Hopefully you don't get sick of our voices
at some point,
but we try to keep it fun
and try to keep it light
and more importantly,
we want to keep it actionable
So each and every day,
much like you here in our pre-roll,
we want to give you something
that you can focus on today
and take something away
and do something today that furthers
your habit, building your lifestyle,
fasting, lifestyle adaptation, etc.
So when we first start off with
the article that we're going to go over,
I just want to pre frame it.
This is a modified alternate day fast
will define that in just a second versus
calorie restriction and the treatment
of patients with metabolic syndrome.
So a couple of definitions
that I want to go into.
First and foremost, alternate day fasting.
Tommy is a really powerful
fasting schedule.
There's lots of research out there on it.
And the results
in terms of some of the metrics
we're going to be speaking about today
and we'll outline those.
There's a really powerful potential
for weight
loss for lab metrics
to move in some of the upstream drivers
of diabetes and obesity epidemic
that we currently have in the country.
So alternate day fasting
just by plain definition, meaning
one day you're going to eat ad libitum
meaning as much or as anything you want,
as much satiation
to satiation to three meals a day
to whatever at the bottom,
just like intake what you'd like,
and then the next day you're going
too fast.
Meaning no food intake.
So if you stop eating dinner at,
let's say,
or close your window in the last time
you ingest anything is 8 p.m.
on Monday night, then you would not
readjust anything until 8 p.m..
The following morning because you would be
fasting that entire day, right?
Two days. So okay, we're talking.
Yeah.
So we're talking 40 plus hour fasts
for alternate day fasting.
Now, a lot of people,
especially when they start fasting,
start with like a 16, eight or an 18 six.
So there's a big gap in the feasibility
of making that happen
and or doing that consistently.
So that's where modified alternate day
fasting comes into play.
Yeah.
So when we modify it
instead of being in that like 36 to 40
plus hour with nothing like no calories
coming in, then this is compartmental
ized to get, you know,
sometimes you'll see
it cited as 25% of your caloric needs.
But oftentimes it's simplified
as a 500 calorie mini meal.
And for the purpose of this study,
that was typically a lunch
like a very early meal,
somewhere between like 12 p.m.
and 2 p.m., I believe.
And that's commonly cited
or even recommended
because it reduces
insulin spikes later in the day.
It kind of controls certain variables
and it it makes for like a midday break
without feeling like a need to go
the full day without anything, because not
everyone's prepared to do that
or can see themselves doing that just yet.
So this is there's a really cool method.
That's
where the modified title comes in. Yeah.
And it's it's more common to do
the modified based on what you just said
because that bridges that gap of being
able to consistently do 40 hour fast.
Right so I don't like 48 hour fast
typically 40 to 72 hour fast
a lot of the stuff
if you want to go to the show notes,
you can click and grab the blueprint
of fasting for fat loss.
It's a free resource.
It's 20 page PDF to give you some
fasting schedules and things in there.
It gives you some similar schedules
to modified alternate day fasting
or to alternate day fasting in terms
of how to ramp up your fasting times
and whatnot.
But the modified portion
allows you to have just that little bit of
that comfort in knowing that
you get a small little something right.
And if you're eating at home,
a small little something
can be a considerable amount of food
with five or 600 calories.
So typically for women at 500,
like you mentioned,
for men, it can be upwards of six or 700
depending on your
if you're tracking and looking at calories
and all those types of things.
Yeah, I mean,
it does require that level of specificity.
So we use ads or modified
ads inside of our VIP coaching group
when we are doing like a drill down week,
like we really want to hone in,
look at making sure we're consuming good
quality foods, making nutritional swaps,
focusing on a nutrition window versus
just an eating or feasting window,
which can lead some people in the way
we speak to ourselves to allow us
to just kind of go off the rails.
So, sure, yeah.
The big picture here is
it has a lot of potential for for results,
but it also has a lot
of potential pitfalls.
Specifically if you're just looking
about talking about ads Now
in terms of fat burning,
we did an episode back in the day
where we compared,
oh, mad to ads to 6 to 8.
And there's a couple others
that we talked about briefly as well.
Yeah, five,
five to the five two diet, right.
Which is where you have
five days of normal eating
and then only two days of fasting,
which we have not found that
that really drives the needle.
If you've got considerable weight to lose
or metabolic issues to, to reverse.
Yeah. Not my favorite. Yeah.
So this study is interesting
because it's comparing the standard
operating procedure,
which is caloric restriction,
which is figure out
if you can go grab a count.
One of those calculators we just did
a recent episode on those BMR equations.
Yeah, Accuracy and my Fitness pal apps
and all that stuff,
all that dieting culture stuff
which works short term for lots of folks,
but it's hard to stick to
for the majority of people, which is why
we love fasting, because it creates that
freedom where you don't have to do that.
Now, periodically
you might have to hit a plateau
kind of off track, need to see what it is
you're consuming, etc.
When it comes to food, fasting
is the easy part, right?
As we like to say,
simple, at least in not always.
Yeah, simple. Not easy, right?
It's my own phrase
and I, I backed into it there.
So when we're looking at calorie
restriction versus modify the fasting,
I love the comparison here
because yes, fasting does
put you into a calorie deficit.
But it's interesting to see the changes
when we look at a lot of the time
restricted eating or time restricted
feeding studies
versus calorie restriction.
This was an eight week study.
So short duration
and it was a small number of participants.
Now it is a randomized clinical trial,
so it is a pretty solid study
in that regards.
But there were two groups.
So calorie restriction and modified
ads, right?
So the diets are prescribed by dietitians
and specialized for each participant
blood pressure, anthropometric parameters,
fasting plasma glucose, fasting
insulin, homa air and lipid profile
were measured at baseline
and after the trial conclusion.
So the results showed that compared
with calorie restriction
following the modified ADF diet
fasting diet significantly
either called a fasting schedule
significantly reduced body weight.
Now these are statistical significance,
right?
Body weight because we're going
to come back to that statistical
significant part here
and extrapolate it to real life, Right.
Reduce body weight,
waist circumference, systolic blood
pressure and fasting plasma glucose.
Right.
However, no
major statistical significant difference
between the two groups
and triglycerides, total cholesterol,
LDL, HDL, diastolic blood
pressure, Homa IRR, which is the gold
standard for insulin resistance
and fasting insulin concentrations.
The cool part about this study,
they did not report any compliance issues
or difficulty adhering to the diets,
which a lot of the times
you'll find a big fall off
point in a lot of these studies.
So I found that interesting.
And the calorie restriction
group decreased their energy intake
by 15 to 40% of daily needs.
So there's a big variability there based
on the application of the individual.
So it depends on how much weight
you have to lose.
Are you in the overweight,
obese, morbidly obese?
Right.
If we're talking big picture here,
what type of restriction to look at
as well as the modified versus
alternate day
or modified alternate day versus
alternate day fasting,
where that 25% or 500 or 600
calorie mini
meal, as we call it, would be ingested.
So we're not going to those longer fasts.
So I like the setup of the study.
I like the fact that it was 18
year olds anywhere from 25 to 60.
So a good population variability
and the exclusions were anyone that had
already been losing or gaining weight
within the three months prior, any history
of liver or cardiovascular issues, etc..
So to wrap up kind of the overview,
the big picture here is we want to
look at what metabolic syndrome is
and why it's important
to prevent it
and or if you have it, reverse it
in like
even just coming into the study
and then using caloric restriction.
Just to take us a step back just for a
second here, caloric restriction versus
the actual time restriction of the set up.
I feel like it's important to note
that the caloric restriction was just
taking 75% of their caloric needs,
and they're just doing that each day.
So just a 25% reduction rate,
which I think most people
can identify with using a method like that
at some point or another.
But they didn't have any time restrictions
on that versus the hey, here's
the 500 calorie mini meal,
approximately 25% of your caloric needs.
And then on the other days, it's
basically this is what, 100% looks like,
so have 100% the other day.
So you're only restricting on the time
and then with the mini meals
and then it's just it's good to see
you can almost compartmentalize it like,
hey, just this is the low and slow method
to do the same thing every day.
Here's your,
you know, prescribed reduction.
And then on the other side of that, it's
going to be a little bit more variable,
but very, very intentional
with the time of things.
And and that means we get to actually
control the glucose spikes, control
the insulin effects and control
the sleep quality as well,
because the food timing
is very compartmentalized.
Thank you for clearing that up, too.
And in going back for a second,
when I said that 15 to 40%,
that was not the study.
That was the big picture of what a caloric
restriction approach could look like
when compared to an alternate day
or a modified alternate day fast.
So I'm glad you cleared that up
because in this study it was indeed
a 25% reduction.
So instead of 2000 calories
a day, let's say it would be 1500.
Yeah, right.
So thank you for calling.
Do that for years. Yeah. Yeah.
Because I've been there too.
But I definitely did not put that dividing
line in there when I was laying out
the different groups here.
So I also like that the modified meal
and we've done
podcast episodes on this
in the past of, of that timing component.
I like that small meal
was earlier in the day,
less insulin response earlier in the day.
So you had just mentioned
with calorie restriction, right,
you minus the percentage.
So in this case it was 25%.
But then you have the entire day
to be snacking and grazing and sure,
maybe stoking that metabolism
if you're bringing that old diet culture
kind of metabolism stuff
in from previous attempts at weight loss
or balancing my blood sugar.
Right. Right.
Like like the ADA, the American
Diabetic Association says to do so.
All right.
So if you eat a certain amount
of carbohydrates and etc., proteins
and fats each meal, then you would
you would have a more stable line,
especially if you're well, just
in the case
if you were trying to manage that
with medication
because you're trying to keep things
between the field goal goalpost,
so to speak. Right.
When we're looking at the results here,
they're pretty interesting.
I want to make sure we go back to that
point that I alluded to in the beginning
when I said, you know,
the statistical significance you just
mentioned when we were talking about that
the calorie restriction,
the kind of able to just kind of stimulate
insulin all throughout the day.
One of the main reasons
why big picture here this matters is
because I like the fact that the study
was looking at metabolic syndrome.
Now, metabolic
syndrome is when you have a clustering
of at least three of the following
five medical conditions.
And this was me.
This was, you know, abdominal obesity.
So that visceral adiposity, right.
Your high blood pressure,
high blood sugar, high
serum triglycerides and low serum HDL.
The reason this matters is metabolic
syndrome is associated with the risk
of developing cardiovascular disease
and type two diabetes.
So right now, cardiovascular disease,
a year die from cardiovascular disease.
Wow. That's one in every five deaths.
So it's about $240 billion a year is spent
on a lifestyle preventable disease.
Wow. Right.
And about one in five are silent,
meaning the damage is done,
but they're not aware of it.
And it's the leading cause of death for
most racial and ethnic groups in the US.
Well, you have to talk about a reason
to be having this conversation
to absolutely glean some things
that we can take some action on them
and not fall into that,
not become one of the next statistics.
And right to six are only getting worse.
You're right.
You're not better yet.
Yeah, we're spending more
and doing more and more tests, etc.
But the reality is it's up to us to make
those changes and that's what we love
seeing hearing from you guys as you start
adopting the fasting lifestyle.
When we share the results here
in a second, you get to see these changes
too. So that's just the heart disease
component, right?
Or the metabolic syndrome leading
to the cardiovascular disease component,
the diabetes components even more scary
because then you've got the comorbidities
that overlap and we're talking about
decreased lifespan, quality of life
later in life, money
spent on health care, etc..
So diabetes facts as of late is 37.3
million people or just over
or undiagnosed diabetes.
and about 8 million
or 23% of that group is not diagnosed.
So they don't even realize they have it.
The real scariness comes
when we look at the prediabetes numbers
and we know this is a progressive thing.
Unless you can make the necessary
lifestyle changes to reverse it.
Which this was me,
I was one of these 96 million people,
over the age of 18
or older have prediabetes
that's 38% of the adult US population
and 48% 26.4 million
people, 48.8% or 49% of 65 years or older.
Age group has prediabetes.
We've got to do something
right? Right? Yeah.
All right. So that's all the bad stuff.
Here's all the good stuff, right,
Tommy?
Some of these statistics,
some of these results from the study,
the results demonstrated
that in comparison
to a calorie restriction diet
is difference to an ADF diet lifestyle.
I don't like that
word has a more beneficial effect
on reducing body
weight and waist circumference.
Nice and improving in systolic blood
pressure
and fasting plasma glucose or fasting
blood sugar.
Now, it did say, however,
findings of the present study
do not suggest any difference
between the following and BMI.
Lipid profile diastolic blood
pressure, homa-ir and fasting insulin.
So some Are you going,
wait a minute, slow down, say that again.
So weight loss minus
four kilograms versus -1.7.
So double double,
we use double and a half in eight.
We way circumference minus
four centimeters versus minus one.
Systolic blood pressure down 13 points
versus one point. Wow.
That's all you might need in
eight weeks, right?
Yeah.
A lot of times
it's like, oh, man, it was it was 125.
It was 125 over 90. It was 135.
You know, like it's oftentimes
not this giant movement
that you actually need, but starting
to get in control of the insulin
that helps the aldosterone, helps the
kidneys, then leads to the blood pressure.
Right.
And it's beautiful fasting,
blood sugar down five points versus zero.
And the calorie restriction group doesn't
sound like a lot, but man, over time,
throughout the day, five points means
lower insulin because I'm not sensing
as much blood sugar.
Now before I go into the ones that weren't
statistically significant,
but still incredibly significant due
to the small sample size
and the small length of this trial.
I want to mention the macro
breakdown done for these groups.
So calorie restriction
group, 75% of their energy needs, right?
So a 25% reduction.
All the groups were required to prepare
meals at home control and intervention
group subjects were informed to maintain
their regular physical activity.
Subject were also instructed to pair
healthy food choices
by selecting low fat meat.
Those are all going to talk about
some of the foods that we eat
and dairy options
and increasing fruit and vegetable intake.
Okay, here's the breakdown.
Daily dietary, carbohydrate, fat
and protein accounted for
carb fat, protein, carb, fat, protein.
Okay.
We're talking about blood sugar metrics
or insulin,
not statistically significant changes
in fasting, insulin or homa are.
Yeah, carb fat and protein macro
breakdown, 52% carbohydrate,
like the switch,
those protein and carbs right there.
Okay, 50 to 54% carbohydrate.
And if it's still saw substantial weight
loss still, right?
Yep. And blood pressure.
And blood pressure
and waist circumference. Yeah.
Waist to height ratio and waist
circumference is a direct indicator
of insulin resistance.
So this blood sugar change, this small
five point change, which they did
say was statistically significant
in this trial
with a 52% carbohydrate intake.
Yeah.
Now, I'm not going to say
don't ever eat a carb again.
They limited the refined processed stuff.
Right.
Is that eat at home?
What does that mean to you?
Well, I mean,
what are you buying to make it home true.
Are you off the Twinkies and put some ice
cream on it or what are we doing here?
Right. So I hope not. Great. Not the best.
But my point is just even if it was all
unrefined, natural, like, right.
Like it was just balanced.
Yeah. Balanced. Whole Foods. Right. Yeah.
So with that macro breakdown,
these results are incredible,
But we're talking about fasting,
blood sugar.
That is a downstream metric.
Upstream is insulin.
So the ones that still changed were BMI.
So -1.6 versus -0.8.
That's a good doubling there. Yeah.
In terms of results,
triglycerides were down 52. Wow.
And 40 in the calorie restriction.
So both gold Star. Heck yeah, sure.
Yeah.
But not 32% 30% better but not not
yeah not coming up with statistically
significant total cholesterol down
in both -11 versus minus eight, LDL down
only in the ADF group,
the modified ADF minus five LDL came down.
And by the way,
LDL is not a great indicator anymore
for good or bad
conversation of the risk of cholesterol.
Two broad
right, HDL, minus one and stayed the same.
So not really any change there long term.
You will see HDL come up when you adopt
the fasting lifestyle and give away to us.
Diastolic blood pressure dropped in
both minus eight, minus five and fasting
insulin dropped -2.4
versus -1.5 in both the modified
ADF versus
the control group Homa Air drop point
seven versus 0.39.
So almost double.
So everything was trending towards
modified ADF, though
mortality have been substantially better,
even though only three of the categories
came up because of the statistical power
of the study.
I mean, it's really important to note
because you take those 70 participants
across eight weeks and go
maybe 700 or 7000 participants over
and then you start to get much,
much bigger statistical power
and then you start to be able
to see even really small differences
between these groups.
But this is this incredibly promising,
and I would absolutely jump
into this schedule based on those results,
extrapolating that out,
because I mean, the promise there from
from the study,
I love the way this study was designed,
even though there weren't a ton of people
doing this for a right time.
Right.
I love the adherence
rate, studying it. Right.
I love the adherence to the ADF.
My strategy has more beneficial effect
on those metrics,
but in all it had more beneficial effect
on all metrics.
Yeah, right.
And those are without without people
complaining about it being hard
to stick to and yeah, right, right.
Because you're not
just setting a timer for 72 hours and then
falling off the wagon on the weekend
and then restarting your Monday
with another 48 hour fast again
and then letting stress in life
and all those things get in the way again.
Weekend warrior, gratuitous graze
or a fasting freelancer right?
Yeah.
So this study suggests that ADF is more
effective strategy in managing body
weight and waist circumference
and reveals superior improvements,
systolic blood pressure, fasting
plasma glucose.
It may be a more beneficial
therapeutic option, in our opinion
is the option
for managing metabolic syndrome,
preventing prediabetes, diabetes
and all of the heart
disease and cardiovascular risk
that we just mentioned.
Which only leads to the remaining question
from the shout out for that listener
who was on episode 20, what do we eat?
Right? Well, yeah, briefly.
We don't subscribe to one hard fast
set of rules
when it comes to your long term
sustainability, when it comes to the foods
you eat, when it comes to your lifestyle,
there's pros and cons to everything.
There's extremes to everything, right?
I typically feel better.
I feel better, my clothes fit better.
My visceral fat is coming down more
when I am sticking to more of a carnivore
type diet.
That's never to say that
I don't eat some fruit, that I don't eat
some dairy, raw dairy
that I never have a tortilla chip, right.
But it is few and far between
because I'm at a point
where I just feel better
adopting more of a protein paste.
Because we did an episode,
I think it was episode 178,
if I recall correctly,
I think are about prioritizing protein.
Yeah.
Which is if you just think about a time
you have a cool analogy versus
just carb eating versus protein eating.
Yeah,
I was listening to a podcast recently,
or it might have been a snippet from one
and I can't remember
exactly where it's from, but they said,
You want to reduce your cravings,
eat more.
Me Fill yourself up on meat
until you don't have the room for sure.
The simple carbohydrate
that you can always
kind of take another bite
of or another cookie or another
salty snacky type indulgence
that might be getting you off track.
Yeah, It's like, you know, like you talk
about like a blood sugar rollercoaster.
It really can feel like a rollercoaster
when you're you're taking in carbs,
especially the more processed ones
throughout the day.
And it's like you're feeling
that rollercoaster effect.
You're feeling the ups and downs
in your insulin and your blood sugar
and thus your cravings
and your hunger as well.
Whereas you're bringing in protein.
I mean, it's literally like
throwing in, you know, fuel on the fire
and it doesn't have to be meat.
Not everybody eats meat or a lot of it.
You know, That's a good point.
That's where I was going with this.
Like we don't subscribe to just,
oh, you can be a vegan and fast.
You can be a pescatarian moving fast,
you can be a carnivore and fast.
You want to do. KITO Great.
We did an entire episode on using sic
like kito or carb cycling
or The point is, it's
whatever is sustainable for you,
where you feel good and you get results
because then that keeps you going.
Yeah, I would say over the years
in my house we've kind of developed
kind of a mix and we're probably
a third of the time eating either Kito
or carnivore another third of the time
more along like the, like a Whole30,
and then another third of the time
being more like Paleo, you know.
So somewhere, somewhere in there
with most meals cooked at home.
So we can control the ingredients
and the quality in that
and kind of the macro breakdown.
And we're also able to make food swaps
that way too, because I used to work in
Italian restaurants and fettuccine Alfredo
still has like, you know, this place
in my memory, but I'm from a place
in your soul, something like that.
But, but I'm not going to go order it.
But at the same time, if we make something
that's like a pasta dish at home,
we're going to do it with a banza
or a red lentil, something else
that's going to be way lower
on the glycemic index for that pasta.
Like, I want to be in control
of those important food swaps.
So I don't feel like, Oh no, I can never
even like sniff a piece of pasta again.
But at the same time
I'm going to control it,
you know, or and pizza,
like bringing pizza inside of our house
and making that whatever way
we want to do it to control it.
It's a lot more work.
It's going to be a little more expensive,
but it's a heck of a lot less craveable
And it doesn't have like,
you know,
a control over me and my my thoughts,
you know, for the next time that I'm
when am I going to have that pizza,
you know?
Right.
It breaks that habit pattern
of the convenience of just ordering.
Right.
Because we see this on Friday night,
my wife and I, before we had kids,
we were just married,
living in an 800 square foot apartment.
You know,
I look like a strong man in the off
season, like a bench press, a Buick.
But I still had,
you know, £20 around my midsection.
And 15 of that was visceral fat.
Yeah, felt like crap. Doing macros, 225
carbs, 180 grams protein,
you know, trying to feel better, right?
Yeah, just trying to feel better.
Working out, following programs higher.
The nutritionist did the six the ten
K program here in Houston for six months,
but it wasn't sustainable
and the results didn't continue
because of my insulin resistance.
My insulin number was in the low twenties.
So when we're talking about this study,
making that change of a couple of points
and insulin
in your fasting insulin number,
you know, once
you get down into the from 20 to 18,
just like going down in the BMI
categories, right.
We know that it's not the best measurement
for health, but it's a way
to compartmentalize correlations
and different groups of folks
in terms of overweight or obese or obese
and risk factors that go along with it.
You know, getting that down to when I went
from a ten to a seven and then down
to a two, a five point whatever it was,
Now I'm now in the lowest version
of the normal range and that matters.
Nice. So sustainability.
If I were to given up on this fasting
or this lifestyle adaptation years ago,
I wouldn't be here, right?
I'd still be operating
in that old construct.
So whatever for what it is that we eat,
having that ability to control it
and know that you're making the decision
that's going to further
your long term sustainability
or your long term goal is a key piece.
So when my dad comes down,
you know, he's reverse diabetes, he's off
the fasting protocols and has been
in the coaching and has done all the work
and all 120 units insulin offer
multiple blood sugar, medications, right?
Yeah.
Nice work, Fred.
Multiple
cholesterol, multiple blood pressure meds.
I completely transformed his life in
his mid seventies as a full time retiree.
And grandpa now, like,
he's literally come back to life.
But when he comes here, cool. We still do.
We make turkey meatballs.
They're paleo, They're incredible.
Every time we have family coming down
to make the meatballs
and it's literally the simplest thing,
We throw
an air fryer, for God's sake,
and just it's like, whatever.
Awesome. Sorry.
And Italians out there
don't scorn me, okay?
And we have the system
and we use bonds of pasta, right?
So but when my dad comes, I still know
his appetite is big and I usually keep him
pretty busy when he's down here.
So we'll make a spaghetti squash
and the bonds are nice.
So we do a split.
So we do a split so you get a little bit
of the more volume of food.
So what he's accustomed to
or his old habits push him towards.
Yeah, and I'll sit down there with him,
I'll have the spaghetti squash,
I'll have the, you know, the whole setup.
And then I'll also be able
to indulge in the stuff
that actually fills
that pasta like desire.
It's much less now based on the results
of adopting the fasting.
Mostly, I don't crave it as much anymore,
but when I do, it's really nice to know
that you have something.
It's not going to completely derail you,
throw you off your diet
and have to have you get stuck
in that vicious cycle of start,
restart, start, restart, stop, start,
restart however you want to label it.
So we do not subscribe to one.
We will say if you want to,
if you have blood sugar issues
and you are trying to reverse
metabolic disease or reverse diabetes,
going low carb using keto
cycling for 90 days, trying
carnivore is going to be hugely impactful
in the results you get.
But again, keeping in mind
that it's not a long term
sustainability, anything drastic like that
tends not to be long term.
The beauty of fasting is you're
focusing on that time component,
so you can vary your windows,
you can open your windows
as you get closer to maintenance
and the disease processes
and the medications have fallen off.
You have that control piece
because you're compartmentalizing
when you consume that food.
So I love this study.
Modified alternate day
fasting versus calorie
restriction in the treatment of patients
with metabolic syndrome,
a randomized clinical trial.
If you're saying, well, what do I do now?
If you want to come join us
in our Facebook community group,
Tommy, they can click the link in the show
notes. Yes.
And you can also go grab the blueprint
of fasting for fat loss,
which is if you're looking
for other schedules like a PDF,
we have a bunch of sample weeks in there
on how to ramp up.
You kind of vary your windows.
We also give you a little bit
about the why
behind it, different types of fasting,
why insulin matters, not just calories
and how to kind of download this or adapt
this into your lifestyle.
Yeah, And I say, you know,
coming off of this conversation
like if you've tried modified
ADF in the past,
do it again with a little bit
different perspective this time.
You know,
knowing the things that we just talked
about and see how you feel,
see if it feels any different
from the last time
or how you can adapt it
a little bit better.
Think of yourself
as a little bit better version of yourself
than the last time you tried it.
And if you've never tried it before,
this is absolutely a great time
to do that. So.
So grab that blueprint
and then also start your timer
for for a modified ADF like, you know,
going into tomorrow because fairly simple,
not a whole lot of moving parts
but a whole lot of power
and that's what we're looking for here.
A little bit of planning goes a long way.
So yes,
good stuff. Hope you all enjoyed it.
Tommy, thanks for the conversation
as always. And we'll talk soon. Thank you.
Bye to
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