
Meal frequency and timing in health and disease - Mikho
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4250148/
======
IceDane
I've kind of personally adopted a IF regime automatically for the past couple
of years. Incidentally I kind of think it started during a bout of depression
where I didn't eat enough at all and lost a lot of weight and just looked
horrible.

Since then I've gotten better at eating, but for the most part I still don't
eat until the afternoon or even dinner, and for the most part don't eat
anything afterwards(sometimes a late night snack).

This has had my friends react and tell me I'm crazy and express their
disbelief at how it's possible to go to work or some such and not eat anything
all day.

I literally have no problems wrt being tired and experience 0 reductions in
cognitive ability. I haven't had to take a nap in the afternoon for several
years and maintained the same-ish weight while retaining a good deal of muscle
mass from my weight training days without having to do much for it.

For me, it just works out better. it's just really nice not having to be
constantly focused on getting something to eat every few hours and since I'm
not stuffing my face with calories all day I've been able to eat basically
whatever I want without gaining any weight.

I've no plan to stop doing it this way since it's just become the natural way
to do things for me. The only issue I experience is the occasional loud
stomach rumbles for which my coworkers give me odd looks sometimes.

~~~
memebox3v
I have the same thing. Preople look at me like i'm crazy and tell me that I
should be careful not to hurt myself. I make a half hearted effort yo poiny
them in the direction of some studies like the above, but mostly people arent
smart/knowledgable enough to understand.

~~~
phkahler
It's amazing how doing something different is automatically viewed as bad for
you. I'm guessing you don't look unhealthy? Are the people who say you're
crazy healthy?

~~~
maxerickson
In general people seem to think they'd die if they went without food for a
week.

(Of course such a period is much more precarious for some people, but a
generally healthy person would barely notice except for being hungry at first)

------
AndrewKemendo
My personal anecdote here. I recently started eating dinner only and shooting
for a 16 hour fast daily with only coffee, tea or water during the day.

I haven't noticed a real drop in energy, however I have noticed significant
brain fog, lightheadedness and irritability in the afternoon. I also have
significant feelings of hunger all day, to the point where it's distracting.

I realized I needed to be adding some kind of salt to my intake during the day
to prevent the lightheadedness. The only zero calorie solution is basically
adding basic electrolyte to my water, which means I end up drinking a weak
salt brine most of the day which is not very pleasant.

I'm not sure if this is sustainable because it takes up so much of my mental
energy. There doesn't seem to be much in the way of good resource for doing
this kind of diet, so I'm excited to see what comes out in the next few years.
Perhaps it's just a transition period and it will work out.

~~~
extr
You do a 16 hour fast, but only eat dinner? When are you eating your other
food/meal? I do a similar length fast most weekdays, I just don't like eating
soon after waking up so I only have water/black coffee until lunch. But I have
a BIG lunch (1200-1600+ cal) and then something else around 7-8 or
occasionally skip dinner. I think it's much easier to deal with not having
eaten for awhile during the evening, you're usually doing something low-energy
by then and if you start getting really hungry you can just go to sleep.

~~~
AndrewKemendo
16 hours is the minimum.

No other meal, but I may snack later in the evening depending on what was for
dinner.

Anywhere from 12-2AM until 5-7PM is my fast period.

Yesterday for example, I didn't eat after 1 am but dinner was around 7PM so
the fast was about 18 hours that day.

Today I didn't eat after 1230 last night but dinner was at 5, so 16 1/2 hours.

I'm the opposite actually, I geared my eating to be in the evening as I stay
up late. I know I can distract myself with work or kids etc... during the day,
but night is where I would naturally eat/graze anyway, so might as well just
move my whole eating period to then.

------
Jedi72
I find fasting very easy on weekends, very difficult during the week, because
the 9-5 routine implicitely stipulates when you should eat. Solving the
situation where people need to spend 70% of their waking hours in a job would
have huge flow-on effects allowing people to exercise regularly, cook at home
more, and eat/live on their own body's schedule.

~~~
ObsoleteNerd
I just skip breafast. Lunch around midday, dinner as soon as I got (I not
longer work full-time) home around 7pm. Fits inside the 8hr window and I
honestly found skipping breakfast quite easy. I'd have a couple black coffees
throughout the morning, and that's it.

~~~
mrhappyunhappy
Article recommends a 16 hour window and skipping lunch as well a few times a
week.

~~~
trumpeta
I think they meant that a lunch at 12:00 and a dinner before 19:00 fit
together in an 8h window, which gives you 16h fasting window.

~~~
mrhappyunhappy
“Examples of such prescriptions include fasting or caloric restriction (e.g.,
500 calories) on alternate days or 2 d each week, or forgoing breakfast and
lunch several days each week”

They do however state that there is no single prescription yet and that
various timings should be studied further to find an optimum method.

------
pard68
I did a one meal a day plan. Lasted maybe 6 months. Reason I stopped was I
started working nights and the combo of 4 hours of sleep and no food just made
me a person you didn't want to be around. Had to drop something so I dropped
the diet.

While I was on it, however, it was great. Really made me evaluate why I eat
food and helped me stop eating to satisfy non hunger related needs.

Interview for a day job this week, if I get it I think I will switch back to
this diet.

~~~
coldtea
> _I did a one meal a day plan. Lasted maybe 6 months. Reason I stopped was I
> started working nights and the combo of 4 hours of sleep and no food just
> made me a person you didn 't want to be around._

So why didn't you just shift the meal time?

------
Fatpizza7
After one month of keto diet (less than 20g of carbs and less than 15g of
sugar, 75-80% fat), I started IF very easily for 18-20h. I break mostly for
social reasons as I'm never very hungry.

With the keto diet you loose the cravings, and you are not very hungry, I
think it should be achieved before starting IF.

I'm also in a deficit and I keep lifting and rowing. Never felt better in my
life, I am motivated to the journey for a 10% bodyfat body.

I recommend eatthismuch.com to help with meal planning.

Just give it a try, the first week is hard and after it's a new life. I feel
always good with a very clear mind (I dropped alcohol as well)

~~~
yhoneycomb
Any recommendation for filling, low-carb foods?

I like fried eggs personally. Anything similar?

~~~
bagacrap
Avocado, cheese, salad, nuts

------
rixed
" Our agrarian ancestors adopted a three meals per day eating pattern,
presumably because it provided both social and practical benefits for the
daily work and school schedules."

Isn't it surprising that school is considered an important factor weighting on
the evolution of early farmers?

~~~
downrightmike
Farming allowed for specialization. So school, or learning a trade, or how to
make something.

------
pella
"10 hour window" or "16 hour window"?

\----

related ( 1 day ago )

"Eating in 10-hour window can override disease-causing genetic defects,
nurture health" [https://www.salk.edu/news-release/eating-in-10-hour-
window-c...](https://www.salk.edu/news-release/eating-in-10-hour-window-can-
override-disease-causing-genetic-defects-nurture-health/)

HN:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17889591](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17889591)

~~~
dave84
8 hour window, 16 hour fast.

~~~
deltron3030
Late dinner & breakfast!

------
Mikho
Very useful data as to food consumption patterns. Nowadays we ruin our body
with unnatural eating cycles.

Basically fasting for around 16 hours a day is good for health. From the
evolutionary perspective--that invested in a human body 200K years--the way we
eat today is broken. And our body can't adapt to a new pattern--evolution is a
slow process that requires many thousands of years. Not to mention like
adapting to changes in a food consumption we see in the last 50 years. A human
body during 200K years of evolution was not prepared to eating a lot.
Viceversa--it was build to eat less. It needs to store energy and to use
stored energy and only after that to store again. That's a natural cycle and
functions that our body needs to execute. Nowadays we just store energy 24/7:

"Emerging findings from studies of animal models and human subjects suggest
that intermittent energy restriction periods of as little as 16 h can improve
health indicators and counteract disease processes. The mechanisms involve a
metabolic shift to fat metabolism and ketone production, and stimulation of
adaptive cellular stress responses that prevent and repair molecular damage."

Here is also an interesting patterns of daily and weekly food consumption from
this research including the common eating pattern of food consumption upon
which the epidemic of obesity, diabetes, and associated chronic diseases has
emerged.
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4250148/figure/...](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4250148/figure/fig03/)

~~~
jly
> our body can't adapt to a new pattern--evolution is a slow process that
> requires many thousands of years.

Humans have many adaptations to the 'modern' diet, consisting of large
quantities of farmed animals products and cereal grains. Lactose tolerance is
one of several well-known examples. In some cases these have only come about
in the last 200-300 generations. The point is that evolution of large, complex
polygenic adaptations may be slow but adaptive phenotypic change can occur
very rapidly and it has likely accelerated in humans over the last 10k or so
years.

> A human body during 200K years of evolution was not prepared to eating a
> lot.

We can't go back and ask detailed dieting questions of hunter-gatherer humans
200k years ago, but I'd guess the basic mechanisms of eating were similar to
us: they ate when they were hungry and when food was available. For some
groups, it seems likely that could often be several times per day.

What we do know about pre-agricultural humans is that there is no such thing
as a 'typical' diet, and what was eaten and when could vary significantly by
geography. Humans have thrived in every region and ecosystem on earth, and our
body is highly adaptable and not designed to subsist on a single, perfect diet
or eating cycle.

Pre-modern humans did one thing very differently to what we do today: when
they wanted to eat, they had to move and work to get their food. It could very
well be that the 'what' and 'when' of our modern eating is less of an issue
compared to the high caloric intake and sedentary lifestyle.

~~~
coldtea
> _our body can 't adapt to a new pattern--evolution is a slow process that
> requires many thousands of years. Humans have many adaptations to the
> 'modern' diet, consisting of large quantities of farmed animals products and
> cereal grains. Lactose tolerance is one of several well-known examples. In
> some cases these have only come about in the last 200-300 generations._

200-300 is 6000 years (assuming 30 years per generation), so that's already
consistent with the parent's "many thousands of years".

Besides that, we've changed our nutrition and its ingredients more in the last
50 years that we had in the last 20000 years. Adaptation takes much more than
that (if it's not even harder to adapt to an ever changing list of factory-
produced BS substances that weren't ever co-evolved along with humans, but on
some food chemist's and big food corporation's whim).

> _Pre-modern humans did one thing very differently to what we do today: when
> they wanted to eat, they had to move and work to get their food._

Not really. Hunter gatherers are said to have been able to gather food for
several days in a few hours in a single day.

------
donovanh
I started eating one meal a day a few weeks ago. At first I had huge dinners
but they’ve tapered off a bit and are now substantial but not crazy, and
usually a small snack an hour or so later depending on how I feel. Combined
with morning body weight training / running (which feels awesome when fasted)
I’m really enjoying it. The few days when I’ve eaten during the day have left
me feeling heavy and bloated and the hunger during the day has gone. It’s very
doable.

~~~
bagacrap
Almost any lifestyle or diet change can be held for a few weeks. Most studies
that show participants losing weight after a diet change don't hold up over
longer periods (subjects are back to their old weight after a year).

~~~
donovanh
I’ve been paying attention to my diet and exercise routine for a few years now
and am quite happy with where I am, so I’m really not sure how relevant your
comment is. I have no intention of losing weight. I’m more interested in how
enjoyable this routine is, how it helps me keep an eye on my macros and how
they impact training, and how much I enjoy food too.

So far I’m quite happy with it. I’m more interested in creating varied and
interesting dinners, I’m still performing well with the workouts and I feel I
have more time during the day as I’m not preparing and eating food so often.

Just my 2c.

------
modells
I find fasting for a week easier than for 12-16 hours.. eating makes me
hungrier; whereas fasting for a few days, the extreme hunger goes away after
3-4 days.

Ironically, a friend of mine whom runs a restaurant and works long hours eats
like the suggested diet unintentionally: one normal-sized meal a day in the
evening because of working nonstop since 5 am.

The downside of fasting is that it stimulates the SNS and increases stress and
cortisol... which may well cancel out any "good" effects.

~~~
makemoniesonlin
who, not whom.

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justboxing
Having a hard time reading and understanding these type of academic study
papers.

Sincere request: Can someone who understands do a TL;DR please?

( Usually when I make this request I get downvoted, but happy to take the risk
for this one as I am really curious)

~~~
epmaybe
It's not exactly a study, more of a review of other papers. The authors state
that the timing of the food we eat isn't really that great for us. The provide
some evidence based meal timings, and discuss ways that they could implement
these changes and the pressures against those implementations.

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siruncledrew
Does the 16hr window between eating include sleeping time as well?

~~~
justboxing
Almost always, yes. If you are referring to intermittent fasting, then the 8
hour eating window starts at your 1st meal of the day. So if you wake up and
eat breakfast, then 8 hours from that is when you stop, and then sleep. If, on
the other hand, you have your 1st meal as dinner in the evening, then also,
you have slept for 8 hours and spent another 8 hours - morning through
afternoon fasting.

So either way, 8 hours of sleep covers half the fasting. Which is why it's
somewhat intimidating cos there's a chance you wake up feeling hungry and
can't fall asleep...

I do intermittent fasting on week days, but like someone else has mentioned
it's kind of difficult to keep up with considering the 9 to 5 work schedule
dictates our eating routines (for most people). I did notice an improvement in
my digestion and in sleep quality. On days that I do work out, I sometimes
wake up and have trouble falling asleep as I feel hungry... that's always
annoying.

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qrbLPHiKpiux
I can't eat in the morning, I'm not hungry. When I get home from work, I can't
eat, same reason.

When I'm hungry, I eat.

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lifeisstillgood
tldr; A fast window of just 16h seems to be enough to gain benefits seen in
IF, so perhaps we need to rethink the modern lifestyle

~~~
mrhappyunhappy
That’s exactly what the article talks about.

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js290
probabilistic structure for fasting… @nntaleb
[http://bit.ly/2ivHC5d](http://bit.ly/2ivHC5d)

